Misconception of the Fifties in the Famous Five Books

[IceMaiden]

Not one thing is an improvement in modern life? Really? Disease that would have killed are now destroyed with a week of antibiotics. Streets that were empty - because (1) few could afford a car and (2) they were film sets (each car costs money)! Children that knew how to behave? A local paper used to print extracts from 10, 25, and 50 years ago. One item from 1955(?) Was an item encouraging the youth to plant trees in order to encourage pride in the area - and reduce vandalism. Not sure if it sounds too idyllic to me,!

Well I personally can't think of many in all honesty. Those diseases that would have killed in a week might now be curable but that wholly depends on if you can see a doctor in time. Or get an ambulance. Or seen at the A&E. What use is having an antibiotic to cure you in a week if you can't see the doctor to give it you for three or more? What good is it if they've got the supplies to treat you in a hospital if you can't get looked at? They may as well not have them, at least people in the 50s wouldn't have depended on stuff as it wouldn't have been there to depend on!

Streets aren't film sets, my dad assures me that the streets when he was young were nothing like today's. No chip papers, fast food, chewing gum all over the place, he said you could walk barefoot and used to. I won't even walk in my wellies by our bus stop, the floor is awful, full of old cigarette ends and gum. I don't think we have a street sweeper anymore unfortunately.

Yes children were better behaved. They aren't now as there are no deterrents or consequences. My aunt works in a school and was complaining that the kids were like wild things, they had climbed ladders to remove the light coverings to use as sledges, while the teachers were there and could do nothing. Do you really think kids in the 80s and earlier would have got away with that? Even in the 90s we wouldn't have been allowed to behave like that. Not sure why planting trees to encourage pride in a area is a negative thing, that sounds like a positive to me. A pity more people don't take pride in where they live.

The Internet is a good invention for the most part, but it's got it's downsides. Taking away pen and paper jobs, automating everything and putting things online only. Social media and smartphones are terrible inventions and a lot of modern technology seems to be a case of just because it can be done doesn't mean it should be. Frost on the inside of windows is nothing, I've had that myself this week. I can't think of anything that's an actual improvement to be honest. Paper books completely outdo screens. Petrol cars are far more useful than electric rich men's toys. Food tasted much better when it wasn't a flavour-free "improvement". TV was better when it only had 3 or 4 channels, which I watched, compared to the hundreds available now, which I don't. Phones were better when people could only talk into them then put them down instead of doing so much they're permanently glued to them. Don't get me started on the music...

Maybe it's just me but I don't see any improvements there.

[dsr]

What does your dad say about dog dirt?

You're looking only on the black side, and only from your own point of view. I'm not going to tell my mother that life would be better if she had no live sport on TV, only 1 channel to watch, I couldn't take her out in a car because I didn't have one, and her bedroom was freezing. Remember that many of the things that were "better" in the fifties are still available to day - for example, I still have an attachment on my phone that lets me put it down.

[Boodi 2]

Not sure why planting trees to encourage pride in a area is a negative thing, that sounds like a positive to me. A pity more people don't take pride in where they live.

Petrol cars are far more useful than electric rich men's toys.

If I've understood the original comment about planting trees correctly, it was to illustrate the fact that there was also vandalism and antisocial behaviour in the 1950s and the idea of planting trees was to try to improve the situation and get young people to take more care of the area where they lived.

Petrol and diesel cars are unfortunately contributing to global warming and climate change, although whether electric cars are the answer remains to be seen. Mind you, the main culprit seems to be air travel, but people seem very reluctant to face facts and change their habits.

[Jack400]

Well explained, Boodi2

[Boodi 2]

Thanks Jack!

[Fiona1986]

Sorry but that's absolute nonsense. There can be difficulties in seeing your GP, yes. But we are in very difficult times right now post pandemic. Can you image the death toll had Covid struck in the 40s or 50s?

I mean just look at the number of measles deaths in England and Wales between 1940 and 2020. https://www.gov.uk/government/publicati ... 40-to-2013

Year/ notifications /deaths
1940 409,521 857
1941 409,715 1,145
1942 286,341 458
...
2018 2,557 3
2019 806 5
2020 698 1

[Viv of Ginger Pop]

I dare say this film of Liverpool from 1958 has been recommended before in the Forums - but I've just enjoyed it

apart from the fate of the poorly budgie at 25mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9RZ5ul4SOs

Viv

[dsr]

I'll tell you what struck me in the first clips of the film - the terraced houses on the hill. The roofs are stepped, each roof horizontal with a step down to the next one. Shoddy work IMO.

Here in Colne, where we have hills to match the world, the terraces have sloping roofs parallel with the road. Much more artistic.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=htt ... AdAAAAABAE

https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=ht ... HQAAAAAQGg

[Boatbuilder]

Of course the advantage of the stepped roofs is that in the roof space you would have the same height across the entire house width in every house, whereas in the sloped ones there would be little head space at the lower end of each property. Also those houses in Liverpool were probably in the Netherfield road/ Great Homer Street area of the city where the roads were extremely steep in the 1950s and if you look closely at them, it would not have been possible to build them like the Colne ones. I've been to Colne many times and I cant say I've seen any roads as steep as those particular ones in Liverpool which I remember from my childhood in the 50s. Of course everything there has now changed.

Some of those houses in your second link are in Skipton and they are stepped roofs as well:
https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-rows- ... 06208.html

[Anita Bensoussane]

I'll tell you what struck me in the first clips of the film - the terraced houses on the hill. The roofs are stepped, each roof horizontal with a step down to the next one. Shoddy work IMO.

Here in Colne, where we have hills to match the world, the terraces have sloping roofs parallel with the road. Much more artistic.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, as I find the stepped roofs more artistic! The roofs that form one continuous slope look blank and bland to me.


An interesting film, Viv. I've seen similar ones in the past, but not that exact one. At around 11.07 we see a woman cleaning the doorstep and hear a voice (her voice, I presume) talking about her family sleeping five to a bed when she was a child - "and the night men'd come and knock at the door, and if that man found three of us in that bed, my mother was brought to the court and fined five shillings, and you'd have to go out in the back yard, in the shivering cold, and sit in the lavatory till he went." The woman is talking about an earlier time, perhaps the 1910s or 1920s, but I hadn't heard of that before. Does anyone know anything more about these "night men" who apparently came into people's houses and checked their sleeping arrangements?

[Viv of Ginger Pop]

I think that is a reference to housing or child welfare inspectors, looking out for overcrowding

[Fiona1986]

Because everyone knows that taking money away from struggling families is the best way to help them move into a larger home??

[Viv of Ginger Pop]

That's if they were lucky, because it could get far worse.

As I recall, the inspectors wouldn't see a crowded home and help the family find something bigger; rather, they could remove a couple of the children into 'care'.

This was an era when orphans could be relocated to Australia!

[Katharine]

Gosh, I hadn't heard of those inspections, I don't know if anything like that took place around here - presumably not, as my grandfather was one of 10 (surviving) children, living in a 3 bedroom terrace house, so presumably his parents had one bedroom and then the children were split between the other two. I can't remember the ratio of boys to girls off the top of my head, but even if it was 50/50 that's 5 children per bedroom, and I'm sure I've heard it said that some of the children had to sleep 'top to toe' in a double bed.

This would have been from the early 1900's until the 1920s when the older children started getting married or going out to service.

There were 13 children born in total, probably over a period of about 20 years, so I don't know how many were at home at any given time, but it would still have been a squash.

I do know they were so poor that my grandfather and his closest sibling (a sister) had to share a pair of boots, so could only go to school on alternate days as my grandmother wouldn't let them go to school barefoot.

[Viv of Ginger Pop]

I'm trying to find some evidence from what is a hazy memory of something seen on the telly - but coming to the end of my tea-break and there's things to do!

Viv