We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

by Guest Fri Mar 30, 2018 7:13 am

[*]Maureen Harvey recounts life in Birmingham’s ‘squalid and cramped’ houses
[*]She says walls were so thin, they could hear neighbours going to toilet at night
[*]Mice, rats and beetles nicknamed ‘black bats’ populated the cellar in their house

It’s become fashionable to romanticise a Fifties, working-class childhood as a smudge-faced, urban idyll of homemade go-karts, conkers and knicker-flashing cartwheels in the streets. But Maureen Harvey’s account of life in Birmingham’s ‘squalid and cramped’ back-to-back housing provides a crisp, but lively, corrective for nostalgics. Born in 1946, Maureen was the third of nine children born to Joe and Ruby Rainbird. The family were lucky to have (cold) running water, but the toilet was outside, along with the ‘brewuses’ (communal wash houses). They washed in an old tin bath before the fire (when they could afford the coal).

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/books/article-5560159/What-life-fifties-REALLY-like.html#ixzz5BD5ETdoW
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by magica Fri Mar 30, 2018 11:18 am

I remember the tin bath, had that in front of the tele. Our scullery as it was named then, was where mum cooked. We didn't have a front room where we bathed, it was the parlour leading from the scullery, or kitchen as its called now.

We lived in the airie, of a big house, made into flats. I remember having to walk up the top of the house to take a sandwich to an old Scottish lady who scared me by saying she had wolves in the room beside her bedroom. Mum didn't send me up again lol. She did it.

We knew no different as kids, life was fun.

by Guest Fri Mar 30, 2018 11:42 am

magica wrote:I remember the tin bath, had that in front of the tele. Our scullery as it was named then, was where mum cooked. We didn't have a front room where we bathed, it was the parlour leading from the scullery, or kitchen as its called now.

We lived in the airie, of a big house, made into flats. I remember having to walk up the top of the house to take a sandwich to an old Scottish lady who scared me by saying she had wolves in the room beside her bedroom. Mum didn't send me up again lol. She did it.

We knew no different as kids, life was fun.

Thanks for sharing Magica +1

by magica Fri Mar 30, 2018 12:22 pm

My pleasure Didge, I can still remember that house, even though it was pulled down years ago. Happy days Laughing

by Syl Fri Mar 30, 2018 1:03 pm

The book looks good, I might buy it when I see it, she describes the childhood home I had....happy memories.
I don't recall rats or beetles, and the mice only came when the council started demolishing neighbouring streets before they had rehoused ours.

I think people remember their deprived childhoods as being happy because kids always see the best in life (I'm sure the grown ups saw the hardships we didn't) plus...everyone was in the same boat, so it was the norm.
Unlike today, in the inner cities everyone knew their neighbours, everyone watched out for other peoples kids, and there was actually a very strong moral code back in the 50's and early 60's
.
Todays kids have gained many things but lost out on others.

by nicko Fri Mar 30, 2018 1:11 pm

"In a tin bath watching the Tele", you must have been rich. We only had an old Radio that worked when Dad pedalled his bike to provide the Electric ! Laughing

by magica Fri Mar 30, 2018 1:23 pm

Lol Nicko, it was a small box one, and others had them in our street.

Everyone knew each other so if playing out, we were well protected.

Funny thing, my dad was born on the same road I was, how's that for coincidence lol.

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We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

Re: We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

Re: We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

Re: We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

Re: We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

Re: We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

Re: We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like

Re: We were so poor, even the tooth fairy gave us a miss! What life in the fifties was REALLY like