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Friday, November 28, 2025

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: Every Town Had a High-Street Record Shop With Listening Booths?

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  We had HMV , Woolworths , and tiny independents where you could test a single before you bought it. Back in the early to mid-1970s, I wo...
Thursday, November 27, 2025

Did You Know…Life in 1960s/70s Britain: The 'Art' of the Comic Advert - The Age of a New Consumerism

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  I wrote yesterday about the advertisements on the back of kids’ comics back in the 1960s and 70s, specifically, X-Ray specs . The adverts ...
Wednesday, November 26, 2025

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: Kids Could Buy X-Ray Specs from the Back of a Comic?

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  “See-through clothes!” promised the ads in Whizzer and Chips , The Beano , and just about every comic a kid could get their hands on. Enti...
Tuesday, November 25, 2025

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: People Would Phone the Speaking Clock, Known As TIM (and some still do)?

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So yes, did you know people really did phone the Speaking Clock  — thousands of calls a day — just to set the time? Another wonderfully pe...
Monday, November 24, 2025

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: Until 1987, You Needed a Licence to Own a Dog in The UK?

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    So yes, did you know that until 1987 , you needed a licence to own a dog  — and it cost 7 shillings ? Another small detail from a time...
Sunday, November 23, 2025

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: Flared Trousers Were Once So Wide They Got Caught in Your Bike Chain?

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  So yes, did you know that flared trousers were once so wide they regularly got caught in people’s bike chains? It’s one of those silly ...
Friday, November 21, 2025

Did You Know… Life in 1960s/70s Britain: Central Heating Wasn't Common in British Homes Until the Late 1970s?

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  So yes, did you know that for most UK households , central heating didn’t become the norm until the late 1970s? Many of us grew up in c...
Thursday, November 20, 2025

Christmas Comes But Once a Year — But Does It Have to Start in November?

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I nipped into my local ASDA yesterday and was greeted, actually ambushed, by their Grinch-inspired Christmas extravaganza plastered across...
Thursday, November 13, 2025

The Writer's Life: Becoming AI — What's a Writer To Do?

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I never used to check my writing with an AI detector before joining Medium . And even when I first published on the platform, I didn’t chec...
Tuesday, November 11, 2025

What’s in a Name? Forgotten British Names of the Past

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  Ever wonder what happened to names like Hilda , Norman , or Enid ? This nostalgic look back explores the once-popular British names that d...