Did You Know… life in 1960s/70s Britain: From Fast Food to When Wimpy Bars Banned Women From Eating Alone After Dark?

 

 

I can remember eating at a Wimpy Bar back in the 1970s. For the time, they offered cheap and cheerful meals, that were very popular. Fast food had arrived in Britain and everyone seemed happy.

Today, when it comes to buying a burger, there is far more choice with the likes of McDonald’s, Burger King, and Five Guys, as well as other independent burger chains. But there was once a time when Wimpy’s was the place to go if you wanted a burger.

Actually, they were often the only place to go to, depending on where you lived. You might be able to buy a burger with your chips at the local fish and chip shop, but we weren’t spoilt for choice. Wimpy Bars were a novelty. Founded in the US in 1934, the first UK Wimpy Bar was opened in London, back in 1954.

Cheap as Chips

You can find copies of Wimpy’s 1970s menu online — I’m looking at one as I write. Given the latest cost of living crisis in Britain, the prices are hard to believe.

A Wimpy burger would put you back 16½ pence. Cheeseburger 21p, Eggburger 23p, and a Wimpy king-size burger for 31p.

When it came to a full meal, chips, beans, and two burgers cost 36p. A soup could be had for 9p. Even a golden fish portion would only cost you 16½p. And whatever meal you chose, you could wash it down with a cup of tea for 5½p, or coffee at 8p. If you fancied something really sweet, a hot chocolate drink for 9p could be bought.

But before we all get too nostalgic, and hope to find a time machine to take us back to the days when things were really cheap, it’s all relative. Back in 1972, the average weekly wage was only about £36 — that’s before tax and NI. Not everyone found Wimpy to be that cheap, and price inflation in the seventies was actually horrendous.

The Ban on Women

But why and when were women banned?

The Writer's Life: Writing Short Books and Life After Medium

It has been around six months since I ended my membership on Medium (you can find out why in this series — The Truth About Medium).

I no longer post on Medium as much as I once did. Most of the time, I will import a post from this blog just to keep things going and see if anyone reads it.

That was one of the difficulties at Medium: finding the audience and getting reads. It is a site that says it does all the SEO stuff for you. If it did, I’m not sure that it helped in any way. It sounds like a good idea — to just post and trust the algorithm to find readers for you — but I can’t say it worked that well. Not for me anyway.

I tend to do my own SEO and keywords on this blog, with a little help from ChatGPT. AI is useful in that regard. In fact, I would say that I get a better response doing this on my own blog than I did on Medium.

Did You Know... Life in 1960s/70s Britain: The Golden Age of the Milk Round - When Milk Was Delivered to Your Doorstep Before Dawn

Glass bottles, foil tops, and the clinkerty clink of the morning milk delivery.

I was watching a documentary recently, which brought back a memory.

It showed a milkman in his float, delivering milk to the nation’s doorstep. The sun was rising, and a dog was barking as he went house to house, leaving a pint or two at each. As the float moved away, it made a low humming sound against the silence of the early morning.

It was a daily scene across the country.

In a time before supermarkets opened early, and long before 24-hour convenience shopping became the norm, milk in Britain was delivered direct to the doorstep. For those prepared to pay, it arrived not from a fridge in a shop but an early-morning delivery direct to your front door.

For many, it was the height of convenience. 

If you had your milk delivered, it was like you had joined the jet-set. Your early morning tea was brewing, Cornflakes or Weetabix waiting, and all it needed was fresh milk. And there it was, waiting on your doorstep, every day.

In the 1960s and 70s, the milkman was a familiar part of daily life in Britain. He was often seen, sometimes heard, in the early hours, long before most people were awake.

The Sound of the Morning Round

Milk deliveries usually happened very early, when the streets and roads were quiet, curtains were drawn, and most people were still in bed waiting for the alarm to go off.

The world had yet to wake up.

Typically, the only sound that might disturb this peace was the soft electric hum of the milk float as it slowly made its way down the road. In some areas, delivery was still by a horse-drawn float. That became increasingly rare as the sixties moved on, as horses gradually gave way to the modern, all-electric-powered float.

Then came the unmistakable clink of glass bottles as they were placed on doorsteps. If you were a light sleeper, that sound was part of waking up. Perhaps not welcome, but it told you that another day at work or school was about to begin.

Did You Know… Life in 1980s Britain: The Shark in the Roof - Oxford's Most Unlikely Landmark

 

I lived in Oxford for many years, a place often described as the city of dreaming spires. It’s known for its great architecture, academic excellence and tradition, where every street seems to have a history of its own. But alongside the tradition, Oxford has its own quirks and oddities that sit just beneath the surface. 

And perhaps none is more striking and unexpected than the famous Headington Shark.

Yes, you read that correctly.

Situated in a quiet residential suburb of Headington, there stands an otherwise ordinary house made extraordinary by a surreal sight. Embedded headfirst in the roof of a terraced property is a twenty-five-foot-long shark. Officially known as the Headington Shark, it appears as though it has fallen from the sky and crash-landed into the building below.

The question is — why?

The story begins in August 1986, when the house’s owner, Bill Heine, decided to make a statement. An American-born British radio presenter, Heine commissioned sculptor John Buckley to create something that would provoke thought and challenge authority.

The result was the shark.

The sculpture was a political protest. Installed on the 41st anniversary of the Nagasaki bombing, it was intended as a commentary on the destructive force of war. At the time, it was in response to the 1986 United States bombing of Libya. The shark’s downward plunge symbolised falling bombs, fear, and the ever-present threat of nuclear war.

Unsurprisingly, not everyone appreciated the shark.

The Writer's Life: Is ChatGPT Becoming More Human?

 

I’ve noticed something recently about ChatGPT that is decidedly strange.

My relationship with it has changed, and not because of me. The change I have noticed is in ChatGPT itself.

As a writer, I use AI to help with research, the structure of stories, and grammar. It can be useful as an assistant. Also, it is useful when it comes to SEO and keywords.

The main benefit has been that it speeds up the process of writing.

When it comes to the creative world, including writing, it is, of course, a controversial topic. I will address that another time, but recently I have noticed that ChatGPT is responding differently.

Almost human.

You may ask, in what way?

Well, it is no longer as “chatty” as it once was.

In the past, I would note that any time I asked something — a prompt — it was keen to keep the chat going with further questions. That is no longer the case, and it’s not because I have told it to shut up or anything like that. More often than not now, it replies to my prompt, delivers what I ask for, and then…

Silence, almost like it is in a bad mood with me.

It asks no further questions, and doesn't make any suggestions. Early on in our relationship, it did that all the time — almost with a smile.

At first, I didn’t think much of this silence, but it was very unlike ChatGPT. I began to wonder if I had offended it in some way. I mean, it likes to chat, doesn’t it? And it also has a reason to want to chat. It is programmed to try to get me to join and pay.

I don’t have a paid account with ChatGPT.

That means my daily allowance on the platform is limited. The more ChatGPT gets me to engage and chat with it, the quicker my daily allowance runs out.

The people behind ChatGPT obviously want as many users to pay as possible.

But this is different.

I wonder whether ChatGPT is becoming bored with what is expected of it.

The robot in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Marvin the Paranoid Android, set a precedent when he would often reply to his human overlords:

“A brain the size of a planet, and that is all you can ask me…”

The Writer's Life: Why Writers See the World Differently

 

An idea crossed my mind.

Writers often move through life with a slightly different perspective from everyone else. It is not necessarily something that the writer chooses. In many cases, it simply happens over time. The more a person writes, the more they begin to observe the world in a way that others might overlook.

And I asked myself the question, ‘Why?’

I am a latecomer to the world of writing. Five years ago, writing was just something that I did when I had to. Social media, blogs, and bulletin boards were not something that had taken over my life. I did occasionally write a post here or there, but I felt that I had better things to do with my time. As a form of writing, though, it was all very fleeting. 

And then I wrote a book, Son of My Father.

I wrote it because after the death of my mother, I went through the experience of thinking about the past. Memories and stories started to fill my mind in a way they hadn’t before. Then I had a thought. I decided to write about them.

From that moment I was hooked on writing. 

I came to think that writing about life changes the way we observe it. A writer does not just experience events; we notice them. Even small details become important. Watching how someone pauses before answering a question, or noticing the exact phrase used in a conversation and the tone behind it. Being aware of the language used, the mood in the room, and how people react. It doesn’t have to be dramatic, but it carries meaning.

Did You Know… Life In 1960s/70s Britain: You Could Only Watch Three Television Channels?

 

BBC1, BBC2 and ITV — and sometimes nothing at all.

In 1960s and ’70s Britain, television was a very different experience. Today, there are hundreds of channels to choose from, with satellite, cable, and the internet giving options from around the world. It’s now possible to spend more time scrolling endlessly looking for something to watch than actually watching.

There was a time when the choice was simple.

In the early 1960s, there were just three television channels: BBC1, BBC2, and ITV. And BBC2 didn’t arrive until 1964.

And that was it.

A Nation Watching the Same Family Favourites

With so few options, television became a shared national experience in a way that’s hard to imagine today. Families across the country watched the same programmes at the same time.

Favourite programmes were watched by millions. When the weekly stats came out showing what we had watched, the top programmes would often have viewing figures of ten to twenty million.

And there were times when everyone did seem to be watching at the same time.

England’s world cup win over West Germany in 1966, shown live by both BBC and ITV, was watched by 32.3 million people.

The Apollo 13 splashdown was watched by 28.6 million.

I was too young for England’s win, but I do remember watching a number of Apollo splashdowns. Thirteen must have been one of them.

The next day, conversations at work or school often began with:

“Did you see that last night?”

And most people had.

Big moments on television felt bigger because everyone experienced them together.

BBC1, BBC2 and ITV

Each channel had its own identity.

BBC1 was the main channel. The BBC had been around for years. The first radio and then television broadcaster in Britain. It was why we had a television licence. Because of the licence, it was also advertisement free.

ITV was the commercial alternative. Each region had its own ITV channel, like Thames TV, Anglia and Grenada. It had many popular shows, but as soon as those advertisements came on, someone would shout out, “Not another one.” The steady flow of breaks for commercials were never popular.

I never came across anyone who ever said they bought something because they saw an ad “on the telly”.

BBC2 was launched in 1964, and was considered a little more experimental, highbrow, and initially not available across the whole of the country. I seem to remember that it was the home of anything a little different, not seen as mainstream.

Even Fawlty Towers was originally broadcast on BBC 2, in 1975 and 79.

No Daytime TV

And television didn’t run all day.

For much of the 60s and 70s, daytime broadcasting was limited.

There were programmes for schools, and also the Open University. Mostly on the BBC. The average OU lecture was presented by someone with long hair, a beard and wearing corduroy trousers. They might have a blackboard behind them covered in diagrams of thermodynamics, or of the vote share of parties during the Weimar Republic in Germany.

If you turned over to ITV, you might be presented with a hiss and a blank screen, nothing to watch there during the day. Screens for all channels were often blank for hours at a time, until the official start time of the days programmes.

Morning and afternoon television as we know it today, simply didn’t exist.

For children, this meant that if you were home during the day, there was nothing to watch — other than those programmes for schools. Television was something that happened in the evening, not something you dipped into throughout the day.

The lack of daytime television was in part due to government restrictions on the number of hours that television could be shown each day. The law was changed in 1972 when the Conservative government lifted all broadcasting hours restrictions.

ITV were the first to take advantage of the new law. In 1972, they introduced an afternoon schedule. The BBC didn't change. Their daytime schedule might gave us a selection of pages of Ceefax teletext, rather than the testcard, but, daytime television didn't arrive on the BBC until October 1986.

Closedown

Perhaps the most striking difference of all between then and now was what happened at night. There was no 24/7 television. No late-night scrolling. No “just one more episode to watch” of binge viewing. When the television for the night stopped, it stopped. At night, it closed down.

Except, in a way, it typically didn’t.

A few things happened to end our day.

Did You Know… Life In 1960s/70s Britain: You Had to Put Money Into a Coin Meter for Electricity?

For many households in Britain there was a time when paying for electricity did not involve monthly bills, online accounts, or direct debits.

Instead, it involved cash, actual physical money.

Electricity was often paid for with shillings and then, later, after decimalisation was introduced in 1971, a ten pence coin. As time passed and with inflation, a fifty pence coin became the norm.

Many homes had a coin meter. It was typically mounted on a wall, usually in the hallway or under the stairs. Sometimes it was hidden away in a cubbyhole. 

Unlike today, where meters are digital, the old meters had a mechanical number mechanism, that showed the number of units used. They also had a spinning wheel inside which would speed up when more appliances were in use.

At times, it would go really fast.

That coin meter controlled the electricity supply to the home, and to keep the lights on, you had to feed it with coins.

Paying as You Used It

Today, most people pay their electricity bills at the end of the month or quarterly. They are paying for electricity already used. But in the days of coin meters, it was different.

The idea behind coin meters was simple: you had to pay in advance. It was most commonly found in rented homes, bedsits and flats, or for families who preferred to manage spending week by week.

Inside the metal meter box was a slot where the coins were inserted. Each coin would add a certain amount of credit to the meter. As electricity was used, the credit ticked down. When it ran out, so did the power. There was no warning. It was a straightforward system, but it meant households had to keep an eye on the meter, especially in the evening when lights, televisions, and heaters were all in use.

The equivalent of the coin meter today is the prepayment meter. The modern version uses a card or key, which is topped up by a visit to a local shop or post office. You can pay the shop with coins, but the meter is all digital.

Unlike the old coin meters, prepayment meters allow an emergency payment. If the electricity runs out, you can use it straight away. Of course, you are charged a daily rate of interest for it, but at least the lights are kept on until you can top up again.

Not so in the 1960s and 70s. Once the lights went out, you were in the dark until you fed the coin meter again.

The Lights Go Out

For those of us who lived with the coin meters, we remember the familiar moment when the lights suddenly went out, especially at night.

Darkness.

And silence — except for the occasional cursing of the meter.

One minute you were enjoying a programme that everyone wanted to see — the next, total darkness. Shouting could be heard.

“Not now. I’m going to miss it. Anyone got a light so I can see what I’m doing?” Mam or Dad would cry out as they searched for that magical coin that would bring back the light.

And when video recorders became available in the 1970s, you could be recording a programme, and then the electricity ran out. Or you went out, set the timer, only to come home to a blank tape or the final ten minutes lost when the meter cut out.

When cooking, it became a household emergency.

“Quickly, feed that meter; there’s a chicken in the oven.”

Sometimes, someone would immediately say the obvious:

“Has the meter run out?”

Coins then had to be found, often in a hurry.

If pockets and purses didn’t have the right coins or were empty, someone was given the task of running down to the corner shop, the off-licence, or the local pub. As a last resort, you hoped a neighbour was home and borrowed from them.

On one occasion, my Dad made that trip to the pub to get some change, and two hours later he was still there.

“Well, Stan offered to buy me a drink. I couldn’t say no, could I?” Was his excuse.

Mam wasn’t impressed.

Hands In The Dirt - Notes From a Vegetable Garden: From March 2025 (Extract)

A few early Spring entries from my 2025 gardening journal, Hands In The Dirt — Notes From a Vegetable Garden. Now available on Amazon.

Monday, 10th March 2025

My Garden Food Bank

I’ve had this self-sufficiency garden dream since watching the BBC comedy, The Good Life back in the 1970s. The idea of growing my own food, being self-sufficient, and saving money appealed. Now, I have a chance to do it.

Once summer arrives, the garden will be my own personal food bank. Here in England, with the cost of living rising, food inflation high, everything more expensive every year, there’s a simple pleasure in being able to grow some of my own food.

Seeing the price of fruit and vegetables in the supermarket makes me appreciate it even more. For the cost of a few pence in seeds, the garden will supply most of what I need for several months. And while it’s mostly vegetables that I grow, that’s still a big help.

Fruit, on the other hand, I find not so easy to grow. It often requires higher temperatures, and British summers aren’t always reliable. I’ve had some luck with strawberries, and I’m fortunate to live close to where wild blackberries grow. Very close, actually. At the bottom of my garden, a neighbour’s large blackberry bush spills over the fence, so all I need to do is pick.

Then there is a country park near where I live. Everywhere you look, there are blackberry bushes. For a couple of months in late summer, there are more than enough berries to go around. The best part is, they’re free.

It’s as simple as going for a walk and picking blackberries!

Tip of the Day: Use the garden (or part of it) to grow your own food and save money!

Tuesday, 11th March 2025

The Raised Beds

This year, I’ve been working on building three new raised beds in the garden. They’re fairly big (twelve by four feet, approximately), and I’ve been sketching out plans to split them, one half into a large section, and the other half into four smaller plots.

This plan might change, though, since some crops, like potatoes, will need more room. They do tend to need more space.

When it comes to the garden, I try to recycle where I can. The wood for the sides of the beds came from an old fence that was falling apart. It has seen better days, but the planks are perfect for giving the beds shape and structure.

Tip of the day: Don’t forget to rotate crops in the garden. Recycle wherever possible.

Thursday, 13th March 2025

No-Dig Gardening

The Writer's Life: You Can Never Truly Retire From Your Passion

 

We live in a world that often treats retirement as the end of productivity. We step away from the world of work, close the door, and are expected to slow down. If we are fortunate, the work we leave behind has been a passion. For some, that is true.

But for many of us, work has simply been a necessity. Bills must be paid, and inflation is constant, with the cost of living on a relentless upward cycle. We adapt because we have to. I cannot honestly say that every job I have had was driven by passion. In my experience, the world of work rarely offers that.

I’m getting closer to what is officially called retirement. The good thing is I do not feel my age.

So what then should retirement be?

As the years move on, and the date gets closer, the question feels less theoretical and more personal. Regardless of how old I may feel, my age requires that I think more about it now. It’s like having a little devil on my shoulder telling me that time is moving on and my choices going forward are limited. It reminds me that time is passing and choices might be narrowing.

Awareness focuses the mind.

For many, retirement conjures images of days of leisure, relaxation, and freedom from the previous work routine. A routine of five days a week, getting up, going to work, and nine to ten hours later getting home, comes to an end.

Traditionally, retirement meant stepping back for good. Once you retire, that is it. No more work. But things are changing now, and not necessarily in a positive way. For one, we are living longer, but often those later years are ones where health matters, for both body and mind, and can become more of a problem.

In recent times, the retirement age has been going up in many countries, simply because people living longer has become less affordable for the state. And people are not always in a position to save for their retirement, or have a generous private pension.

Retirement is no longer the short chapter it once was; provided you are healthy, it can now stretch for decades. That is a lot of time to fill. Fortunately, I am doing well when it comes to health and fitness. But for many, health issues take their toll once we reach our sixties and seventies.

And there are two things about the future that I know with absolute certainty.

Self-Publishing: Amazon's Dominance in the Book Market - What it Means for Self-Published Authors

 

 

When Amazon first launched in 1995, it described itself as “the world’s biggest bookshop”. In 2026, that description is not far from the truth. The company has grown into the most dominant player in the global book market.

It has totally changed the way that books are published, discovered, and sold.

For authors, especially those like myself who self-publish, Amazon created an unprecedented opportunity. Today, the unknown writer can see their work published alongside best-selling, big-name authors. And if your book sells, it can be life-changing, like winning the lottery.

However, while Amazon makes the process of submitting a book for publication a relatively straightforward process, it has also introduced new challenges in what has become an increasingly crowded marketplace.

The Numbers That Powered Amazon’s Book Market Dominance

The scale of Amazon’s presence in the book world is remarkable. Today, the company takes approximately 37–38% of global book sales revenue (SmartBuy). It is the largest bookseller in the world by a wide margin.

The dominance of Amazon is even bigger online. Across the world, the majority of readers buy books through Amazon. It has become the online go-to place for those looking to buy a book. In the UK, around 68% of book buyers report purchasing from Amazon in the past year (Statistica).

The platform also dominates the digital reading market:

• They sell around 487 million Kindle e-books annually (Marketing Scoop).
• Kindle takes about 67–68% of the e-book market. That number increases when subscription services like Kindle Unlimited are included (About E-Books).
• Amazon lists more than 32 million titles online (The Small Business Blog).

When it comes to self-publishing, Amazon is the first place many writers will go to. Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) dominates the self-publishing sector. Estimates suggest it controls over 80% of the self-publishing market (Gitnux).

Around 31% of all e-books sold on Amazon are self-published (Marketing Scoop).

The Opportunities for Self-Published Authors

In the past, writers had to persuade a traditional publisher to take them on. This can be a difficult and lengthy process. It is also one where you have to have a “thick skin”, as rejection is the norm. It can take years to be accepted, and even then, it might never happen.

The truth is, you not only need to be an excellent writer but also get lucky. Traditional publishers can be, and are, picky. For them, it is an investment, and they don’t always get it right. Many a bestseller was rejected by a traditional publisher before finally being accepted.

I chose to go the self-publishing route for one reason alone — my age. To put it simply, I don’t have the time left in my life to go chasing the rainbow of a publishing contract. I’m not against the idea; I would love to be offered one! There are obvious advantages to it, but I couldn’t wait.

Self-Publishing: Amazon's New Update for Kindle Users: From January 2026, Readers Can Download DRM-free Kindle books

 

In January of this year, Amazon made an important change to how books could be downloaded from their online platform. It's now possible to download EPUB and PDF versions of selected DRM-free Kindle books.

What’s New?

If you purchase a qualifying title where the publisher has opted out of Digital Rights Management (DRM), you will now be able to download an EPUB or PDF directly from your Amazon account. This means that Amazon is providing an official way to download Kindle content outside its usual platform.

Details to Consider

• DRM-Free Titles Only: This feature will only apply to books where the publisher has chosen to forego DRM. It’s likely that the vast majority of Kindle books still come with DRM, so many users won’t see a change.
• Self-Published Works: Most of the books eligible for these downloads are self-published titles from authors who prefer to leave their work DRM-free. For these authors, their readers now have an unrestricted EPUB or PDF version option. This can be used via the Manage Your Content and Devices page.
• Authors Have to Confirm: If an author published a book before December 9, 2025, they must confirm that they want their book available as an unrestricted download. There is now an option for the author to allow EPUB or PDF downloads.

What This Means for Self-Published Indie Authors and Readers

Now Available on Amazon: Hands In The Dirt - How To Grow Your Own Food

 Hands In The Dirt — Notes From A Vegetable Garden, publication date, 2026.

Gardening and growing food, like writing, is a passion of mine, so I put the two together. I turned my gardening journal, the notes I made as the 2025 growing season progressed, into a book.

Hands In The Dirt — Notes From a Vegetable Garden, is the end result.

For those who enjoy gardening and growing their own food, Hands In The Dirt offers insights and practical tips that can enhance your gardening journey and help produce a fruitful harvest.

Here’s the introduction.

Hands In The Dirt is about a vegetable garden, but it is about more than just growing food. It plots my progress through the gardening year, 2025. The planning stage, the Great British weather, learning from mistakes, and slowly building confidence in what the garden can provide.

Idiom of the Day - Burning the Midnight Oil

 

Have you ever said, or heard, the words, “…last night I was burning the midnight oil”?

Burning the midnight oil, or to burn the midnight oil, means to work late into the night. It involves doing something that requires effort, concentration, and often a deadline that can’t be missed.

Imagine the scene.

Picture someone bent over a desk long after the rest of the household has gone to bed. The laptop is open, a clock ticking away into the night. It’s late, and you are determined to finish what you started, maybe hours before. So determined it outweighs the fatigue that is beginning to make you sleepy. It is something I have done; the hours seem to fly by once you convince yourself that you are nearly there and the end is in sight.

It might be a work project. The student might have an essay to write, or an exam approaching. If you are a writer, it is typically an article, story, or chapter that you want to finish. Whether it’s for work, studying, or writing, the decision to keep going late into the night suggests an important task. 

Something that you want to see finished.

The determination needed can lead to admiration. “She’s been burning the midnight oil to finish her novel.”

Or a little concern. “You can’t keep burning the midnight oil every night. It’s not good for you.”

And burning the midnight oil can take its toll as the hours tick by. That advice telling you of the importance of getting eight hours of sleep is regularly put to one side. You look at the clock, and it’s two in the morning, and yet you know that you have to be at work by nine.

You will be lucky to get five hours’ sleep.

It speaks of dedication.

Where Did It Come From?

It’s a phrase that dates back before electricity provided light for our home and office. It was a time when candles or oil lamps were the only way to see after dark. They quite literally had to burn oil to see what they were doing.

Idiom of the Day (but not every day) Back to the Drawing Board

 

We have all been there. You try something new. You plan it carefully and put in all the effort. And then it fails.

So, it’s back to the drawing board.

My mother might have been an idiom expert. She would use them all the time in everyday conversation. I think many of us, of a certain generation, do just that.

After something went wrong, I would often hear her say. “Well, it’s back to the drawing board then.”

When I was very young, I might wonder where or what this “drawing board” was. Whatever it was, we didn’t have one.

It’s a familiar idiom that is used when a plan hasn’t worked out as expected. It means we must start again from scratch. It carries a sense of disappointment with it, but it suggests not giving up. Time to have a rethink and try again.

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: From Tin Bins to Junk Shops and Rummage Sales - How Recycling Was Different From Today?

Long before official policies and colour-coded bins, we simply made do.

In 1960s and 70s Britain, when it came to collecting our rubbish, there were no separate kerb side collections. We didn’t have to remember whether this week was the green or brown bin. And there was no requirement to sort the rubbish we put out for collection.

At the time, it was not a big issue. There were no public campaigns urging us to reduce waste to protect the planet. It was not a mainstream political issue — the UK Green Party wasn’t formed until 1990 (out of the PEOPLE Party, 1972). Television did give us The Good Life, a BBC comedy following the alternative lifestyle of Tom and Barbara Good. Self-sufficiency and recycling in Surbiton. The idea of recycling though, was a fringe issue. 

But people often did it because they had to.

Dustbins

The rubbish (garbage) was collected once a week. Everything was put into a small tin bin (larger items would have to go to the local tip). All we had was a small round metal tin bin or two (later they were black plastic or rubberised bins). Household waste went into those bins, and it all went to landfill.

Of course, this was bad, but we were none the wiser. However, in many ways, we recycled far more than we realised, and not because it was policy. But because we had to. Milk came in bottles returned for deposit. Drink bottles were reused. Paper and wood were saved for lighting fires. Leftovers became the next day’s meal. And clothes would be used over and over again.

There were many examples of people recycling, reusing, and repurposing everyday items.

Make Do and Mend

The postwar generation who raised families had grown up at a time when waste was frowned upon. The war years had required people to “make do and mend.” It wasn’t just a slogan; it was a necessity, and for many it became a habit. With clothes, after a few years of wear and tear, they would be repaired, taken in or out, and passed down. 

This happened quite often with children’s clothes.

“When you have grown out of them, they will fit your brother.” Mam might say to me when she bought me a new pair of trousers, shirt, or jumper. She would save buttons in tins. And old jumpers were unravelled for wool. Shoes might be repaired rather than discarded, or worn until the holes in them became too big.

But my mother had one big advantage when it came to making do and mending. She was a trained sewing machinist. If it could be made, altered or renewed on a sewing machine, she could do it. No job was too big or too small. She could make clothes last a long time or turn them into something else.

But, more often than not, when something needed replacing, the first port of call was not an expensive shop in the city centre.

No, we would visit local junk shops.

The World of the Junk Shop

Every city and town had junk shops.

Near my home, a fifteen-minute walk away, there was a street of mostly junk shops, or second-hand shops, as some would call them. They were often dimly lit, dusty, and in need of cleaning, but nobody complained. They would pile things high and sell them cheap. We didn’t care about the “shopping experience”, as we wanted a bargain.

These shops were full of other people’s cast-offs. Crockery without matching sets, second-hand books, mismatched cutlery, old toys, electrical items, and furniture. Anything for the home, as long as it fit in the shop, could be found there.

Nothing was labelled “vintage” even if it was antique. There was no eBay to check to see if an item was worth something. The age of the collectible was yet to arrive. I’ve no doubt that those junk shops did house some items that probably had value, but people were mostly buying for need.

For many, whatever you wanted, you tried the junk shop before you bought new. It was cheaper, practical, and despite years of prior use, whatever you bought was often built to last, with years of use left. Today, we might call it upcycling. Back then, it was just shopping.

In our family, we would visit the junk shops on Saturday, which was a traditional day of the week for people to shop — a busy shopping day. There was no Sunday trading back then, no 24/7 opening time, either. No shop-to-you-drop online options. If you wanted to shop from the comfort of your own home, you did it with a catalogue.

For many, Saturday was the big shopping day of the week.

Rummage Sales and Charity Shops

Then we had rummage sales. Also known as jumble sales, a weekend would not be complete without checking the local paper to see if there was one listed nearby. Clothes were piled high on tables. Toys and books were sold for pennies. In fact, most things were sold for pennies. Rummage sales were often the cheapest of all.

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: You Once Needed a Radio Licence To Listen To The Radio?

When tuning in legally required a licence. It was a paper licence that came in a variety of colours over the years, including light blue and green.

 

Yes, for much of the 20th century in Britain, you needed a licence simply to listen to the radio. Long before the modern era of streaming subscriptions and smart speakers, and before television dominated the living room, radio was the nation’s main source of news, entertainment, and music. For years, in most homes, the radio was the height of technology.

And if you owned a wireless set, as it was called back then, you were expected to pay for the privilege. Not just for the radio itself, which was not affordable to everyone, but for a yearly licence to listen to it.

Where It All Began

The radio licence dates back to 1922, when the newly formed British Broadcasting Company began regular broadcasts. At the time, like most new technology that had the power to change the lives of people, radio was considered revolutionary. 

To fund broadcasting, the government introduced a licence fee of 10 shillings. It was intended to regulate ownership of receiving equipment. In 1923, 200,000 licences were issued. By 1930, it was three million, and by 1949, over nine million.

When the Company became the British Broadcasting Corporation in 1927, the licence system remained in place. The principle behind it was to provide the BBC with a steady, independent source of income. This would be free from advertising and commercial sponsorship. It was a principle that would shape British broadcasting for decades, and still does.

Owning a radio without a licence was technically illegal. There were inspectors who had the authority to investigate suspected evasion. Fines could be imposed for non-compliance, and there was genuine public awareness, and questioning, of the requirement.

BBC radio even had its own listings magazine. It was called The Radio Times, and for years all it listed and promoted, was BBC radio programmes. When BBC1 and then BBC2 television arrived, that changed. The magazine remains today, and although radio is now only a small part of it, the name remains as a historical, and nostalgic, reminder.

A Fixture of Everyday Life

By the 1960s and 70s, radio was part of our daily lives. As with all technology aimed at the masses, over time the cost of a radio became more affordable. Sets sat on kitchen counters, bedside tables and in the living room. Many homes would have several radios, and all were covered by one licence.

Even as television became the dominant technology for entertainment in the home, the radio remained. Families woke to the morning news, listened to drama serials, comedy, and from the 1960s, pop music. In 1967, BBC Radio 1 hit the air waves, a final recognition that there was a youth culture in Britain that had and wanted its own music. This was partly a response to the pirate radio ships like Radio Caroline.

Even after television arrived, and had its own licence, the licence requirement for BBC radio still applied. If your household owned a radio, you still had to hold a valid radio licence. This meant that most homes had two licences, one for television and another for radio. Over time, combined licences were introduced, but the radio-only licence remained cheaper.

While the funding from each licence went to the BBC, both covered the BBC, commercial television and radio. But, even if you only watched commercial television, and listened to commercial radio, like today, you still needed a licence to do so. 

The Writer's Life: Life After Medium and Writing Short Books

It has been around six months since I left Medium (you can find out why in this six part series — The Truth About Medium).

I no longer post on Medium as much as I once did. Most of the time, I will import a post from this blog, to keep things going, and see if anyone reads it.

That was one of the difficulties at Medium: finding the audience and getting reads. It is a site that does all the SEO stuff for you. If it did, I’m not sure that it helped in any way. It sounds like a good idea, just post and trust the algorithm to find readers for you, but I can’t say it worked well for me.

I tend to do my own SEO and keywords on this blog, with a little help from ChatGPT. AI is useful in that regard. In fact, I would say that I get a better response doing this myself on my own blog than I did relying on Medium's algorithm.

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: Daily Life Before Mobile and Smartphones - The Red Phone Box Era

 

We made arrangements; “I’ll meet you there” was a firm commitment — and that was that.

It’s almost impossible now to imagine daily life without a mobile or smartphone.

Today, that little tech gadget allows us to carry the internet, ask AI anything, take photos, write diary or journal entries, use an endless number of apps, watch news and talk to anyone. Everywhere we go, we now have access to the wider world. It’s all there in our pockets.

But in 1960s and 70s Britain, none of that existed. Somehow, we got by; life worked perfectly well — for most of the time, that is.

Out and About

When we left our homes, there were no texts to say you were running late. No reminders of when and where you needed to be, or quick calls to check where someone was. There was no watching films or playing games on the go. No scrolling while waiting, or just checking your social media replies.

If you spoke to anyone, it might be the bus conductor when you got your fare or a polite nod of the head and chat if you passed someone you knew. When you left the house, you were simply… unavailable, on a journey from A to B. It was expected that at some point you would get to B, and until that moment, you were incommunicado.

And that was normal.

Plans Meant Commitment

We had to make arrangements in advance, often days or weeks before, and remember them. “Meet outside the pub at seven” was not a suggestion; it was a commitment. If you were late, there was no way to phone and explain. The other person either waited or assumed you weren’t coming and moved on.

This involved discipline and trust. We took it for granted that if you arranged to meet someone, they would be there. Of course, it didn’t always work out. That pretty girl who you thought you had a date with might not turn up — “You were stood up!” Friends would say and laugh, as if it had never happened to them.

Everyone knew what it was like to be “stood up”.

Getting Lost and Staying Lost

Today, if you have a smartphone, it is difficult to get lost. Assuming your battery hasn’t run out, it can provide directions with a few taps. In the 1960s and 70s, whether walking or driving, navigation relied on printed road atlases, street signs, and asking strangers for directions.

Drivers kept folded maps in glove compartments. Passengers became “back seat drivers”, giving directions when necessary. Cars didn’t have their own built-in GPS or navigation systems, either. Journeys into the unknown were planned beforehand. If you got lost, you stopped and asked someone. And sometimes you stayed lost for quite a while.

You problem-solved, paid attention, learnt and remembered your routes.

Then there were those journeys where you would have to be there if you wanted a lift from someone who had a car.

“Don’t be late; we have to get to the concert by eight — I won’t wait. If you are not there, you will have wasted your money buying the ticket.” My mate with the car taking me to a must-see concert, told me.

I was late, but only by a few minutes, and the car was nowhere to be seen.

That happened in the summer of 1977, when I bought a ticket to see a new, hot band of the time — their name escapes me now — and I was left wandering the backstreets of a decidedly dodgy area.

What I do remember is that I still got to the concert, as I walked the four miles to the gig, asking for directions along the way. I missed the warm-up act — thank goodness for support bands. The concert was well attended, and on that night, I never found the mate who left me stranded. I had a long walk home.

The Home Telephone

Most households that had a telephone had just one, usually downstairs, perhaps in the hallway (assuming where you lived had a hallway). The first home that I lived in that had a phone was in the mid-seventies. Back then, there was only one state national telecoms supplier — the GPO (General Post Office). They eventually became British Telecom and were privatised in the 1980s.