Parents?

[manzanita]

Sometimes I think about calculating how much time parents in the novels spend with their children what with them being at boarding school etc!

Obviously, it's a different time and place and a different way of raising your children. The Arnolds place emphasis on the children going off in order to toughen them up to be of use in the world for example, but not all parents can afford these experiences!

I was born in 1979 and I had a fair bit of freedom as a child. I grew up in West Berkshire, which isn't a million miles away from where Peterswood is suggested to be, so in many ways I had a fairly Blyton-ish style of childhood. My friends and I were allowed off for the day and as long as we were back by an appointed hour, there was no problem. We used to go for miles on our bikes - although not in the moonlight!

Manzy

[Moose]

I was born in 75 and had a lot more freedom than my nephew seems to have these days. He is nearly nine and he has only in the last year or so had the liberty to roam about with his friends, within definite parameters. From the age of 5 I was doing that

[dsr]

Miles Kington wrote a spoof short story, "The Famous Five on the Motorway". Quote:

"We're so lucky to be on holiday together again", said Julian."It's a real stroke of luck that none of our parents ever want to have us around at holiday time but would rather pack us off alltogether!"

"Mmm", said Ann [sic], trying to remember what her father looked like.

[Petermax]

I was born in the mid 1960s and had quite a lot of freedom from the age of six onwards. The half mile walk to my local school was done alone, no problems there but imagine todays parents allowing that. From the age of eight I was using the buses and from ten or eleven the trains.

There was a certain Blyton element to my childhood as I roamed the local fields and woods with my merry band of friends. A favourite of ours was a walk along the old Titchfield Canal path to the Solent, a popular walk with the added attraction of old World War 2 fortifications near the beach at Hill Head.

On our jaunts we would actually speak to each other in mock Enid Blyton language, usually at my instigation I'm now ashamed to say! Anyone listening would have heard dialogue very similar to "Five Go Mad in Dorset"! When we tired of this we would switch authors do a "Just William", this entailed the use of catapults and sheath knives. Yes, with the approval of our parents we carried knives although we did so discreetly and exercised due responsibility. Not so with the catapults which we fired in vain at overhead power lines hoping to cause a blackout in the Titchfield, Stubbington and Hill Head areas!

As a final touch we would once more change to another author and do a "Jennings". Mock boarding school language was the order of the day and surnames only to be used when addressing each other!

Somehow I cannot picture todays children doing the things that we once did back in those mid 1970s summers.

[Jen-Jen]

I was born in 1985 and never had the freedom to roam around as you 70's children. Any outdoor activities (playing in the front yard, or biking down at the nature park) was done under the supervision of our parents.

It was only when we went camping in the bush that we were allowed to spend all day wandering around on our own with no parents. That was great, we used to spend all day (or until we were hungry) exploring the bushlands and climbing trees.

[Rob Houghton]

During the 1970's me and my friends enjoyed quite a lot of freedom, though we were always supposed to let our parents know (roughly) where we were. We would go off on our bikes to the park,fish for sticklebacks in the stream or the canal. We played for hours in the woody area next to the canal which separated our gardens from the canal, building dens, playing hide and seek etc. we would go up to the local shops, and sometimes be away from home for hours before our stomachs called us home!

Those were probably some of the best days of the last few decades. We had the freedom of the 1950's and 1960's with the home comforts of later days. Children of my generation were very lucky to have been growing up when we did, with 'the best of both worlds', I think. It seems a terrible shame nowadays that children are confined to their gardens etc and that parents are afraid to let them out of their sight. Most of my childhood was spent outside doing whatever we wanted, and rarely causing other people trouble as so many youngsters seem to do these days.

I think that the reason we have so many teenage tearaways nowadays is the fact that children are so restricted until they're in their teens, then they go mad with the freedom they are suddenly presented with.

[manzanita]

The excerpt from "Famous Five On A Motorway" made me laugh - do you have the full copy online anywhere?

I think the amount of freedom naturally depends on where you live. I'm in Okehampton, which is a small town on the northern edge of Dartmoor, but never grew up here so no idea how things have changed here.

Quite often you see under 11s going around by themselves and walking themselves to school and a lot of the time, they're in the supermarket where I work with a shopping list picking up bits and bobs for their parents. You rarely see it in any of the other two supermarkets, but I'm thinking economics come into that. I work in Lidl and the other two are Somerfields and Waitrose. So maybe here children aren't quite so restricted.

Crime here isn't too bad and is usually of the level of windscreens getting smashed in which no doubt plays a role in freedom. Interestingly enough, the change to the drinking laws actually helped a lot of the chaos at the weekend on a tangential note.

Anecdotally, in the villages kids still play out and wander off, but that's a different set up again.

Due to the rural nature of the place, there's nowhere they can really go to out of town unless they want to catch a bus ride for an hour each way! A similar thing seems to occur in Tavistock the next town over when often young kids are out and about. In Exeter (small city situation) it's teenagers you see out and about, not young kids.

Manzy

[Rob Houghton]

I think that's true: location obviously plays a very big part. I was lucky enough to live on the southern outskirts of Birmingham (Kings Norton) and we are within half a mile of the country. Its quite a 'rural' area compared to most people's idea of Birmingham, and was even more so when I was young. I can't speak for those living in the more inner city areas, but we maybe had more freedom because we were in one of the 'safer' areas, and in a more 'country' setting.

It makes a big difference I should think. I dont reckon my mom would have given me quite so much freedom if we'd been nearer the 'spaghetti junction' for example!

[Comerscroft]

I was born in 1953, and brought up in a 'good' area of Edinburgh. For a girl, I had considerable freedom, as did all my friends.

Right from day one, I walked to and from school---there was no second car, and if there had been, my mother would not have dreamed of using it for the school run.

Aged 8, I was allowed to go down to the shops (about 1/2 a mile) at 7AM during the summer holidays, to help the milkman on his round. I would ride onthe electric float, carry glass bottles and help old Harry. Can you imagine any child, never mind an 8yr old girl, being allowed to do that nowadays???!!!!

I was also allowed to go off on bus runs to the other side of the city on my own from about age 10. No mobiles, hardly any money, my mother didn't know where I was but assumed that I would turn up for tea!

[manzanita]

Right from day one, I walked to and from school---there was no second car, and if there had been, my mother would not have dreamed of using it for the school run.

Aged 8, I was allowed to go down to the shops (about 1/2 a mile) at 7AM during the summer holidays, to help the milkman on his round. I would ride onthe electric float, carry glass bottles and help old Harry. Can you imagine any child, never mind an 8yr old girl, being allowed to do that nowadays???!!!!

Your milkman story reminds me of Tootie on Mr Neely's ice wagon in "Meet Me In St Louis!

Likewise, in my childhood, cars were for long journeys, not for school runs and going to the shops for the odd item! But I lived in suburbia, so I can see how in very rural areas, the car would have been used differently.

Manzy

[charmstar]

I'm sure this has already been raised but I couldn't find it anywhere...
I'm on an Enid reading spree at the moment,and it really amazes me that in FF and Barney Mysteries in particular,the parents are happy for their children to go off on their own all holidays after they've been away three months at school,sometimes even booking holidays at the same time as the school holidays.
Is there a particular reason for that or is it just a plot thing?
I'm sorry if there's already a topic on this.

Always amazed me in the Barney mysteries how Mr & Mrs Lynton were always off to America, you would think Mr Lynton's business trips would be arranged to take place during term time and not school holidays. He comes across as a terrible father, always complaining about everything the children do and he can't wait to get away from them.

[auscatherine]

Kids these days definitely have a lot less freedom than kids in the past. I remember as a kid spending whole summer days just roaming around on my bicycle, something I would never let my kids do in Sydney. My kids only get to experience that kind of freedom when we are visiting my husband's family who live on an isolated island where it is safe for kids to roam around on their own and have adventures etc etc.

There is actually an interesting blog devoted to this very topic called Free Range Kids.

http://freerangekids.wordpress.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I think the Famous Five and co could probably be described as the original "free range kids".

[auscatherine]

I have been thinking about this some more and the absent parents things seems to crop up a lot in other children books, even modern ones. One that struck me recently was Charlie and Lola. Occasionally the mum is quoted as saying something or other (eg, 'Mum said not to twist your loose tooth') but other than that, you never see any adults and Charlie seems to be the one taking care of Lola all the time. Same with Ruby and Max (I think this is American). The grandmother appears in one book but that is about it. Otherwise, Ruby is the one putting Max to bed at night etc etc.

I think most children's writers probably consider adults a nuisance who just get in the way.

[Yak]

Slightly off topic but the loose tooth quote reminded me of it ... one of my memories of school at age about six or so was of our teacher, Mrs Middleton - I use her real name because I was very fond of her and would love it if anyone recognised the name and could tell me if she was still alive* - getting any of us who had loose teeth to line up to have her pull them out if she could (this was voluntary, obviously, but we all wanted her to because we knew we'd get ten pence** from the tooth fairy if she managed it). My teeth were very stubborn and, though I remember her having a good yank at them, much to our mutual chargrin she never managed to budge one. Can you imagine the law suits if any teacher did that today though?

*she always seemed about 108 to me, after the manner of all adults, but for all I know she might have been only 22. Realistically I would guess she was in her mid to late forties at the time though

** nowadays they get two pounds and a lottery scratch card, I hear

[auscatherine]

My mum was the tooth puller in our neighbourhood. I can't do it with my kids. Their afterschool carer used to be the local expert where we used to live. Not sure what I will do once my son starts getting wobbly teeth. Might need to fly him down to Mum to work her magic.