For the over 40"s

[ChrisM66]

Kids of today are wrapped in cotton wool......... Read on.

If you lived as a child in the 50's, 60's or 70's, looking back, it's hard to believe that we have lived as long as we have...

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.... See more

Our cots were covered with bright-coloured lead-based paint.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors, or cupboards.

When we rode our bikes we had no helmets.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.

We would spend hours building go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes.

After running into the bushes a few times we learned to solve the problem.

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. No mobile phones.

We got cut and broke bones and broke teeth, and there were no law suits from these accidents.

They were accidents. No one was to blame, but us.

Remember accidents?

We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it.

We ate patty cakes, bread and butter, and drank cordial, but we were never overweight...we were always outside playing.

We shared one drink with four friends, from one bottle and no one died from this.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, video games, 65 channels on pay TV, video tape movies, surround sound, personal mobile phones,

Personal Computers, Internet chat rooms ... we had friends.

We went outside and found them.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door, or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.

Imagine such a thing.

Without asking a parent!

By ourselves!

Out there in the cold cruel world! Without a guardian - how did we do it?

We made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and ate worms, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever.

Footy and netball had tryouts and not everyone made the team.

Those who didn't, had to learn to deal with disappointment.....Some students weren't as smart as others, so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade.

Tests were not adjusted for any reason.

Our actions were our own.

Consequences were expected.

No one to hide behind.

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard of.

They actually sided with the law - imagine that!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and problem solvers and inventors, ever.

The past 50 years has been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.

And you're one of them.

Congratulations!

Please pass this on to others who have had the luck to grow up as kids

 

[LE Greys]

And you are responsible for the state of the world today. Thanks!

Who introduced all the rules and ridiculous mollycoddling? Not our generation, we just had to put up with it.

 

[SouthEastern-465]

Times change, its how it goes I'm afraid. Its the same with everything, just make the most of things whilst you can.

 

[90019]

Kids of today are wrapped in cotton wool...

...because the people from the 50s, 60s and 70s wrap them in cotton wool!


I'd like to point out that I'm 20 and did plenty of the things listed when I was younger.

Including making a go kart and crashing into a tree because the brake didn't work

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

You talk of the 50's...I can even remember the end of the 40's.

Of areas in Manchester near railway goods depots with horses (Oldham Road in particular)

Of the dangers of playing near canals..yet deaths occurred every year.

Of goods engines belching out black smoke that caused women to rush out to take their washing off the line before black flecks covered it.

Of women "donkey-stoning" the front step.

Of playing marbles in uneven cobbled streets.

Of the "knocker-up" coming just past dawn to wake up the girls and women to start work at McConnell's cotton mill.

Of these mill girls wearing clogs.

Yes, these all happened in the late 1940/early 1950 period in Manchester.

Of street lights with gas mantles...and most houses were also lit by gas.

 

[strange6]

You talk of the 50's...I can even remember the end of the 40's.

Of areas in Manchester near railway goods depots with horses (Oldham Road in particular)

Of the dangers of playing near canals..yet deaths occurred every year.

Of goods engines belching out black smoke that caused women to rush out to take their washing off the line before black flecks covered it.

Of women "donkey-stoning" the front step.

Of playing marbles in uneven cobbled streets.

Of the "knocker-up" coming just past dawn to wake up the girls and women to start work at McConnell's cotton mill.

Of these mill girls wearing clogs.

Yes, these all happened in the late 1940/early 1950 period in Manchester.

Of street lights with gas mantles...and most houses were also lit by gas.

You forgot the rag and bone man with his nag

 

[ainsworth74]

You forgot the rag and bone man with his nag

Still have one of those around where I live (both home and uni)!

 

[gg1]

Most of those applied to me growing up in the 80s with addition of:

Using an old cardboard box as a makeshift sledge to slide down the 30 degree slope of a disused railway embankment

 

[ChrisM66]

Did them all except the drinking from a hose,and a few more ,scrumping ,hedge hopping ,climbed trees,oh those where the days
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

And you are responsible for the state of the world today. Thanks!

Who introduced all the rules and ridiculous mollycoddling? Not our generation, we just had to put up with it.

I think you will find the state of the country today is more to do with the political parties et al following there own hidden agendas for short term reward,especialy the last liebour government selling us down the river and giving our rights bit by bit to the nanny EU state which we find ourselves tied to.

 

[SS4]

Most of those applied to me growing up in the 80s with addition of:

Using an old cardboard box as a makeshift sledge to slide down the 30 degree slope of a disused railway embankment

I used an MEB [Midlands Electricity Board] board.

Did them all except the drinking from a hose,and a few more ,scrumping ,hedge hopping ,climbed trees,oh those where the days
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---


I think you will find the state of the country today is more to do with the political parties et al following there own hidden agendas for short term reward,especialy the last liebour government selling us down the river and giving our rights bit by bit to the nanny EU state which we find ourselves tied to.

Especially and Labour. Obviously this can be forgiven since you all had to work 28 hours a day down the pit and walk there and back in the freezing snow - even in summer! :roll:

I'm with LE Greys on this one. I would also like to ask exactly who in the civil service gave themselves very generous pensions and are now asking those following them to live on less and to work for even longer? It was the generation you mention that invented stranger danger, the generation that opened the immigration floodgates for some of the older members. The generation you mention in the post are the same that forbade their children to do what they did as children.

These threads are always viewed with rose tinted specs. After all I grew up in a world without smallpox, a world where babies born at 24 weeks can survive outside the womb, a world of worldwide communications, a world which realised you could be black, white, yellow, pink, green, female, disabled or even, shock horror, atheist and still contribute to society. A world which respected the poor by giving them a minimum wage

 

[ChrisM66]

I know its labour put i prefer LIEBOUR,along with tony B LIAR .Thanks for the spelling lesson.

 

[Scotrail84]

You missed eating worms! Growing up in the 80s and early 90s was great. Played football for 7weeks during the summer hols. Got caped n mud in the process. Good times

 

[90019]

I know its labour put i prefer LIEBOUR,along with tony B LIAR.

Ah yes, changing names slightly to try and make an insult, the resort of the 5 year old when they can't think of anything else :roll:

 

[Oswyntail]

There was a lot that was better when I was a kid in the 50s/60s, and a lot that was worse. And I put my hands up and admit that the baby boomers such as I am have made a horrible lot of mistakes. For me the turning point came in the mid 60's (64 ish) when a large sector of society came to believe that "doing your own thing" did not require the balance of contributing to society. This swiftly (and inevitably) morphed into a belief that society should support me in "doing my own thing", and so on. And now (IMHO) we have forgotten what "society" is, and replaced it with "the state", and large numbers of us have never known our responsibilities to each other.
SS4 - don't believe all the claptrap you read about the Civil Service. Historically Civil Servants have been low paid (as they relatively are now), but in return they were given job security (now removed), respect for their professionalism from society (now removed) and comfortable pensions (now under attack). Sorry to say that the main change came in 1997 when the new government, convinced that, after 18 years working for the Conservatives, the Civil Service would attempt to thwart them at every turn, portrayed them as the residual forces of conservatism (far, far from the truth).

 

[SS4]

There was a lot that was better when I was a kid in the 50s/60s, and a lot that was worse. And I put my hands up and admit that the baby boomers such as I am have made a horrible lot of mistakes. For me the turning point came in the mid 60's (64 ish) when a large sector of society came to believe that "doing your own thing" did not require the balance of contributing to society. This swiftly (and inevitably) morphed into a belief that society should support me in "doing my own thing", and so on. And now (IMHO) we have forgotten what "society" is, and replaced it with "the state", and large numbers of us have never known our responsibilities to each other.

Unquestionably true.

SS4 - don't believe all the claptrap you read about the Civil Service. Historically Civil Servants have been low paid (as they relatively are now), but in return they were given job security (now removed), respect for their professionalism from society (now removed) and comfortable pensions (now under attack). Sorry to say that the main change came in 1997 when the new government, convinced that, after 18 years working for the Conservatives, the Civil Service would attempt to thwart them at every turn, portrayed them as the residual forces of conservatism (far, far from the truth).

I agree with your comments on the civil service, I was referring to those at the very top who give themselves obscene wages and those senior members who gave themselves the final salary pension.
I don't remember much about politics in 1997 but based on the rest of your post I see no reason to disbelieve you. I do remember last year at the election where there were very few people who openly admitted to voting Tory.

 

[ChrisM66]

Ah yes, changing names slightly to try and make an insult, the resort of the 5 year old when they can't think of anything else :roll:

Got out of bed the wrong side have we

 

[exile]

In those days kids were killed in larger numbers on the roads than today, despite there being less traffic. Perhaps we've gone too far in the other direction today - but imagine if your child were to be killed in an accident and you felt you were at fault. I'm not surprised people try to wrap kids in cotton wool.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Just remembered a few more:-

Of getting into a tin bath with water that other family members had used.

Of eating home-made caraway seed cake.

Of bringing in the stone jars of Dandelion and Burdock from the van.

Of getting pitch on your shoes in hot weather from the cobbled street.

 

[passmore]

Ah yes, changing names slightly to try and make an insult, the resort of the 5 year old when they can't think of anything else :roll:

No, the resort of someone being ironic, and it's a very apt pun TBH.

 

[90019]

No, the resort of someone being ironic, and it's a very apt pun TBH.

Yeah, it's fine the first time, but it gets incredibly tedious very quickly.

 

[passmore]

I understand now, and I agree 90019.

 

[RyanB]

You missed eating worms! Growing up in the 80s and early 90s was great. Played football for 7weeks during the summer hols. Got caped n mud in the process. Good times

Event the late 90's were fairly brillaint. I remember playing football with pals in the park with Jumpers for goalposts. The pitches were terrible, more mud that grass as such as soon as it rained, it was a mud pit but it was great fun. The number of balls that were lost onto the tracks were inumerable, got one or two back off the tracks but after we had express pass by shortly after having got back over the fence we didn't do it again. Those were the days.

 

[Hydro]

Kids of today are wrapped in cotton wool......... Read on.

If you lived as a child in the 50's, 60's or 70's, looking back, it's hard to believe that we have lived as long as we have...

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.... See more

Our cots were covered with bright-coloured lead-based paint.

<edited for brevity>

I did, and experienced, most of that list in the early 90's. Rose tinted specs, or what?

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Our cots were covered with bright-coloured lead-based paint.

That reminded me of large wooden toys that were available, made from old timber....then painted with just this type of lead-based paint. I had a engine that I sat in, painted in bright red paint of this type, with four small wheels. It must have been heavy, as you had to be pushed.

 

[Oswyntail]

That reminded me of large wooden toys that were available, made from old timber....then painted with just this type of lead-based paint. I had a engine that I sat in, painted in bright red paint of this type, with four small wheels. It must have been heavy, as you had to be pushed.

Sat in or sat on? We had one that looked like a bright red "Spamcan", produced (I think) by Lines Bros, with a "realistic chug chug" that sounded more like a hen clucking and threatened to take your fingers off.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Sat in or sat on? We had one that looked like a bright red "Spamcan", produced (I think) by Lines Bros, with a "realistic chug chug" that sounded more like a hen clucking and threatened to take your fingers off.

It was "sat in", as there was a cab with a little seat inside. Don't forget, it was made locally by a carpenter not long after the end of World War II, with scrap wood. You mention an item commercially made by Lines Bros, who I think made items under the "Tri-Ang" name.

 

[ACE1888]

Always makes me smile these 'retro' posts on Forums...remember around 95% of most of 'em too

 

[LE Greys]

It was "sat in", as there was a cab with a little seat inside. Don't foget, it was made locally by a carpenter not long after the end of World War II, with scrap wood. You mention an item commercially made by Lines Bros, who I think made items under the "Tri-Ang" name.

My grandad made me a sort of wooden tricycle thing for my first birthday. You sat on it and pushed it along with your feet. Great fun, and I used it until I could blatantly no longer sit on it, then started standing on it and pushing myself along with whatever I could get hold of. He also made a large wooden lorry at one point, probably covered in the same lead-based paint (the tricycle was varnished). That wasn't so much fun, because it was too big to move, you had to get someone else to pull it. It was useful for moving stuff, though, I remember using it to bring a Christmas tree in once.

 

[Hydro]

My dad made me a cartie. In 1993.