Five More Signs of an English Baby Boomer - Things Can Only Get Better

 

1)  A cost of living crisis would happen every few years. 

Money was tight, inflation was often high, and austerity was the norm for many. People were told, “You have never had it so good.” Depends on how you define ‘good’. If it’s a little better than bad, then I suppose it was good.

2)  You watched television showing a man landing on the moon. 

I do remember seeing someone walking on the moon. Years later, pop group The Police sang about walking on the moon. And conspiracy theorists told us that the moon landing was recorded in a studio on earth. 

Next they will be saying that the Clangers aren’t real.

Five Signs of an English Baby Boomer - Nostalgia is not what it used to be.

 

1) We would often have sugar sandwiches for tea, usually because we had run out of jam — or money to buy jam. White bread, margarine, and sugar. 

It kept the dentist in business.

2) You had an aunt who would cut your hair. 

My aunt Carol cut my hair. 

“What style? Who do you want to look like?” She would ask. ‘David Bowie or David Essex?’ was my reply. They seemed to do well attracting girls; perhaps it would work for me? It didn’t. Well, I don’t think it did.

My First Television. The Big Box in the Corner

The big box in the corner.

That’s what our first televsion was called.

It's the early 1960s, and I have a memory of a rather big box that stood in the corner of our rented home.

It had a very small screen.

In fact, the screen was so small that at times a pair of binoculars would have been useful. The room was small, but it seemed to be so far away.

But there was an answer to that - we just moved the sofa and chairs closer to the television.

It was mostly a box, but it had to be.

One day the television stopped working. When that happened, the main way of getting it to work again seemed to be to hit the top of the box. Dad tried that, but it did nothing to solve the issue. The picture remained blank.

He then called in the local repairman, who in due course arrived with his handyman bag of tools.

His first job was to take the back off the big box with a screwdriver. It only took a few minutes for him to decide that one of the valves needed to be replaced. While he was doing that, I had a quick look at what was in the back. Considering the actual screen was so small, I was surprised to see all the valves, transistors and a massive tube.

It surprised me that putting all that stuff together only produced such a small picture.

Looking into the back did show me one thing, though. I had been told by my granddad that all the people who appeared on television actually lived in the back of the television set. Of course, being very young and not knowing anything about how that was possible, I just accepted his expertise on the matter. It never occurred to me that while the box may have been big, it wasn’t that big. They must have been very small people.

The handyman, having changed the valve, then turned the television on. There then followed a wait of several minutes for the set to “warm up” and a picture to appear.

It was like magic.

A Journey Back in Time to a Summer Job That Helped Fund My Holiday.

When I was a young boy, my mother set me a challenge. It was during the long school holiday one year, and she was hoping to keep me busy and out of her way.

The challenge was that if I did a certain amount of housework and errands over the following seven days, I would be rewarded with ten shillings.

Ten shillings was a lot of money back then, in the early 1970s. It was equal to fifty pence today, but it bought you a lot more. 

For a young boy, it was a big deal, and I would either be paid in coins or a “ten bob” banknote.

When I Was a Lad: Billy's Boots, a Blast From the Past.

I was on Twitter X the other day, when I came across a post about the comics that were a big part of life for children back in the 1970s. The question was asked, how many did you buy? There was a picture of the comics available at the time. Not sure if it was all of them, but there were a lot. Most of them were for boys, some, like Sally, Bunty and Diana, for girls.

Here it is.

It's an impressive number. The ones that I remember buying were the Beano and Dandy. I also remember Look-in, Joe 90, Marvel and Spider-man. Most of the names here are familiar to me, and the chances are that I occasionally bought them. It has to be said, though, that I couldn't afford to buy all the ones that I probably wanted. 

Ten Signs of an English Baby Boomer.

1) You ate sugar sandwiches, because jam was not available.

2) You had an aunt who would cut your hair.

3) The local library was the internet.

 4) You are old enough to remember when England won the World Cup.

 5) You had to put money into a coin meter for electricity.

6) A cost of living crisis was the norm.

7) You watched television pictures of a man landing on the moon.

8) The girl next door was probably your best friend.

9) There were only two, then three television channels, and even then, the adults complained that there was nothing worth watching.

10) The toilet was outside, in the backyard. 

Such was life.

The twelve posts of Christmas...day eight. There is no boxing on Boxing Day.

When I was a lad, I would wonder why Boxing Day was called Boxing Day? 

No one in my family had an answer to it. 

I came to what I thought was a logical conclusion at the time that it must be named after the sport of boxing. But I also wondered why it was that on Boxing Day there was actually no boxing on the television. Not only that, but I would just be laughed at if I asked what time the boxing was on.

Then one day at senior school, in England a Secondary Modern, I was in the library, but not because as a young teenager I had any great interest in books at that age. No, the librarian was a rather attractive German lady, who had short blond hair which may or may not have been natural. She also wore short dresses, the mini skirt being quite popular back then. 

The library was often quite busy when she was on duty. 

On this day, I plucked up the courage to ask her the Christmas question that had been on my mind. Well, it was on my mind every Christmastime. 

The conversation went something like this.

“Miss, can you tell me why Boxing Day is called Boxing Day?”

She gave a friendly smile, got up out of her chair and said, “follow me.”

How could I refuse?

The Twelve Posts of Christmas: Day Six. Working For the Man.

My first job, other than doing errands and helping out at home for pocket money, was a paper round.

That's not me in the picture, but I remember the cold dark nights and early Sunday mornings, out in all weather delivering to even darker places.

Then during my final school year, I got a real job at a working men's club. Just like this one.

My job? I can't remember the job title, but it was working as a glass washer and general dogsbody in the main concert hall bar. I mostly worked weekends when it was really busy and a little rowdy at times. Furthermore, I must have been earning at least 70 new pence an hour.

At the end of each weekend shift, it gave me one of these.

Which meant I could do more than just look at things in my local toy shop.

In reality, I was never a big spender, but it did help me buy one of these.

The TV was black and white, had a very small screen, and had an indoor arial that was not always reliable. 

I think I bought it from Comet.

Thanks for reading!

The Twelve Posts of Christmas: Day Four. Andy Pandy is Coming to Play.

Amazingly, this is my most viewed tweet on Twitter X in 2023 and for a brief period, a few weeks after posting, it was trending.  It has 7200 views. Go figure.

Andy Pandy. pic.twitter.com/xeZTauSFc6

— Lost In Words (@LostInWords2023) November 9, 2023

Andy Pandy (1950)

Each episode began:

Andy Pandy is coming to play, la, la-la, la, la-la,
Andy Pandy’s here today, la, la-la, la-la.

And ended:

Time to stop play, just for today,
Andy and Teddy must now go away.
Time to stop play, just for today
Andy is waving goodbye …, goodbye …, goodbye.

If you grew up in the 1950s or 1960s, this was most likely part of your childhood. Not that there was much to watch on television. Andy Pandy is coming to play. Don't have nightmares.

The Twelve Posts of Christmas: Day Two. A Load of Rubbish

Back in the 1960s and 70s, every house in Britain had one (at least) of these. 

The tin rubbish bin. This was long before recycling and different bins collected on different dates. Everything went into this one bin, and it was small. It would be collected every week and occasionally would go missing. Sometimes there would be a heated argument between neighbours if they picked up your bin, which just happened to be newer or shinier. 

Son of My Father: A Further Extract — The Bully and My Aston Martin

I had a friend at school by the name of Colin. Although we were the same age, he was quite tall and a lot bigger than me. I suspect that because of his size no one picked on him at school. We would often play football in the street opposite Number Thirteen. There were several garages with pull down sliding doors which we used as a goal. I'm sure the residents were overjoyed with the noise every time the ball hit the garage door.

Colin seemed a decent lad, but as the saying goes, appearances can be deceptive, as I was about to find out.

One day I invited him over to my house while mam and dad were out, and we ended up playing with my toy car collection made up of Matchbox, Dinky, and Corgi cars. Pride of place was a new car that Dad had just bought me, a James Bond 007 Aston Martin. A quick check on the internet tells me that back in 1966 this cost all of 3 old pennies. I think I was about seven or eight at the time, so I would have got mine in 1967 or 68.

As we were playing, Colin took a liking to my new car. At one point he said to me, “do you want this?” I thought he was joking and just laughed. There were loads of cars in my toy box, but Colin only seemed to be interested in my new James Bond car. When I asked for it, he just said no and carried on playing with it. He seemed to especially like the passenger ejector seat, which shot out of the roof. He wouldn't give me the car. I asked for it again and his reply took me by surprise.

The conversation went as follows…

“They Think It's All Over, It Is Now...”

From Son of My Father, a further extract.

I played for the school football team, but it almost didn't happen. We played on a Council run park that was on the outskirts of the city. The facilities were basic at best, and there were three football pitches.

Boys in the school team or close to selection played on the main pitch. The game was usually between two sides picked by the school football captain and the football coach. I was never picked, probably because I wasn't a mate of the captain, and the coach hadn't seen me play. I went and played on one of the other pitches. Pitch number three it was called. I played against boys who were not very good. At that level I was pretty good. I seemed to have a knack for scoring and most weeks, against inferior opposition, I would score several goals.

Son of My Father: "Fancy Man" - An Extract

I’m in the back seat of a car parked down the road from a pub. This pub was in the city, but some way from home. It was the pub where, according to dad, “this is where your mother meets her fancy man”. It was a cold, dark night and the streets were empty, other than the occasional drunk singing the night away.

In the car, my dad was in the front passenger seat. In the driver’s seat was a man who I didn't know. He must have been one of dad's mates. He was tall and broad. He looked like a man that you would want by your side in the event of trouble. It's possible that he was there for a more sinister reason. Given that dad’s plan was confrontation, this man may well have been there to back him up if things turned nasty with “fancy man.”

I was about nine years old at the time.