The way we were..60 years ago

[RogerS]

Interesting table in the paper today.

1952 weekly wage £7.50 Today £500. So that's about 65x.

So how about costs? (Figures in brackets are 1952 prices factored x65)

A house 1952 £2000 (£130,000) today £163,000 ...... quite a hike but we all knew that.

A pint of beer 1952 9 pence...that's just under 4p (£2.47) today £2.80 (I wish!) ......... not doing so badly then

A pint of milk 1952 4 pence ..that's 1.6p in decimal (£1.08) today 50p .....which explains why so many dairy farmers are giving up and the abuse of power by the supermarkets.

 

[Max Power]

Wonder how wood-working tools have fared

 

[RogerS]

Wonder how wood-working tools have fared

You'd have to ask Jacob that question as none of us are that old ! :lol:

 

[Steve Maskery]

LOL!

I have a combination plane, Stanley 45, I think. I've never learned to use it, but can't bear to part with it. IIRC my dad paid two weeks' wages for it. Not sure when; it would be post-war, but probably not by very much.

S

 

[studders]

And we still 'ad enough change for a portion of Chips.

 

[Digit]

Ah, but we started at mill at 4am......

Roy.

 

[9fingers]

Heard this again t'other day. Seems to fit the mood

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2AcJSkUw6M

Bob

 

[studders]

Aye, t'kids today.

 

[CHJ]

A house 1952 £2000 (£130,000)

1963, 3 bed Semi on new housing estate in Tewkesbury (Mitton) was £2225.
Aircraft fitters wage was £14.00* a week.
25 year mortgage was £14-8 sh. a month. and had to work hard to convince lender and solicitor that a month was longer than 4 weeks to allow the mortgage because it was not legal to have loan greater than a weeks wages.

* I was on equivalent with no significant rises for 5 years.

An equivalent house in the Worcester area was about £800 more.

 

[devonwoody]

My grandfather as a sitting tenant in 1950 was offered the house in London, N.22 for £700. Looking on the web last weekend I see it is now valued at £660.000. No body in the family could persuade him to purchase.

 

[woodbloke]

...and 60 years ago there were no modern antibiotics and penicillin was as rare as the proverbial. The only reason I'm sitting here typing this now is that my mum got rushed to the head of the queue in Boots when I contracted double pneumonia as a child.

There were no 'good old days' just 'different old days' and for the most part... 'worse old days'.

Hands up if you'd swap todays lifestyle for that of 60 years ago? Rationing, appalling, dirty rail transport, pea soup fogs etc etc,
What?...no hands up?...there's a surprise :roll: - Rob

 

[Digit]

I would, I'd be eleven years old! :lol:

Roy.

 

[woodbloke]

I would, I'd be eleven years old! :lol:

Roy.

...and the chances are Roy, that if you'd caught double pneumonia at eleven years old (or something equally as ghastly) that's the age you'd be pushing up the daisies, unless your mum, like mine was fortunate enough to get the right medication in time - Rob

 

[Digit]

You don't have to tell me about it I'm afraid. I was brought to my father's bedside to say good by to him. Like you, he had double pneumonia, this was 1947-49, something like that.
The GP had tried all he could, but dad was dieing. Then the doc returned with a medice that he had never tried before but was told that it had given excellent results in similar cases.
Apparently he told mum that he had no idea if it would help, but it was dad's last chance.
It was penicillin.
Dad got out of bed three days later!
So effective have these drugs been that many years later my 3 month old daughter was very ill, and the young doctor failed to recognise pneumonia. He in fact stated that she had a head cold and that it would pass!
I exploded and called in his older partner. As he was leaving I said, 'it's pneumonia isn't it?'
He agreed and I told him what I thought of his partner, he of course had never seen a case.
As a child I saw children from my school taken with diptheria, whooping cough, polio, scarlet fever, even measles.
Yep! The good old days.

Roy.

 

[woodbloke]

Glad everything worked out well Roy...when I hear people harp on about the so called 'good old days' it generally gives me the screaming abdabs (one of my old dads favourite expressions :lol: ) One of those nasty 1950's diseases that you forgot...polio
Edit...yup, you included polio, apologies - Rob

 

[Digit]

I included polio 'cos I had it!
Some things were better years ago, but certainly not medical or welfare, those who otherwise are kidding themselves.
The press has recently been on about the number of elderly starving to death in hospitals, I don't know if you've followed the series on sSky, 'confessions of a nurse,' at all but it's been revealing.
One elderly lady was not taking fluids and the nurse was trying to persuade her to increase her intake, IIRC the lady basically told her that she was tired and wanted to go and passed away in her sleep that night.
The nurse was heartbroken. My point? I suspect the old lady's wish was not uncommon, there are worse ways to go.
To help combat this I was asked yesterday to write up my experience of the NHS when I had cancer, my experience to published here in the west Wales catchment area for the hospital that treated me.
I'm happy to oblige. I recieved little food whilst in hospital, such that my blood sugar levels dropped to 20% of normal, I didn't ask for any as being bed bound I was not hungry, it was only when I got out of bed that it hit me!

Roy.

 

[woodbloke]

I included polio 'cos I had it!
Some things were better years ago, but certainly not medical or welfare, those who otherwise are kidding themselves.

Roy.

Agree, there were some things, but I could probably count them on the fingers of one hand...less cars on the road certainly and didn't the summers seem to go on forever when you were a kid :lol: but against that, London an many other cities were filthy, black and bombed out. I remember being taken to the 'Smoke' (aptly called) and being driven on a bus past St Pauls in the 50's...all around it was just a bombed out wasteland full of rubble. Rationing...that was still in place when I was born, forget nipping down to Tescos for stuff to make a quick curry, meat, two veg and suet pud is what I had a lot of the time. Pollution...heating, industry and the railways were all powered by coal. Remember the state of the London stations in the 50's?..much as we all like steam locos now, it's the best thing that ever happened when they were done away with. Air travel in the 50's?...forget it. My dad was stationed in Malta in the 50's and we flew back in some rickety old two engined thing that took all day (inc a refuelling stop at Nice) to get back to the UK...in fact I can still remember seeing converted passenger carrying Lancaster bombers (Avro York?) on the hard standing at Luca airport. The 50's?...not for me...

...(apart from Jimmy Stewart movies ) - Rob

 

[Digit]

I stood at a crossroads in London after the War and as far as I could see in all directions were burnt out buildings and bomb sites. People today are oftimes offended at what Bomber Command did to Berlin, not many Londoners of the time dissented!
As Harris said, 'they have sown the wind, now they will reap the whirlwind!'
The Clean Air Act did wonders for breathing!
Do you remember when sweets came off ration? :lol:

Roy.

 

[woodbloke]

Do you remember when sweets came off ration? :lol:

Roy.

Can't remember that one Roy, but it was clearly a day to get the bunting out :lol: Sweets then were good though (and into the 60's)...Black Jacks (four for an old penny) pink shrimps and frozen Jubilee bags (funny triangular things)...yum! - Rob

 

[Digit]

They came off ration for about a week Rob, such was the rush that shops were cleared within hours, they went back on ration!

Roy.