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Going back to the horse and carts - does anyone remember the winkle man? For a penny we would get some winkles in a piece of newspaper, and us kids would sit on the kirb and hook the winkles out with safety pins. I feel sick now thinking about eating them.

Shirley
 
Don't know if it has already been mentioned, but one thing I'm glad has disappeared because the smell drove me crazy. TWINK hair perm, with the pink or blue rollers. That reminds me, my sister spent most of Saturday getting ready to go dancing, and you can guarentee I had to go to the shop and get some....Margot's Hair lacquer, remember that eleven pence halfpenny a sachet.
 
I remember the old zinc bath, we had one that hung on the fence in the back garden. Friday was our family bath night. Not only did we bathe from the cleanest to the dirtiest (it was always my poor dad that was the dirtiest, as he worked in a factory) we only had one bath towel, and to today I still scrape every drop of water from my body with my hands before I dry myself. Habit I suppose. My daughter has always wondered how the towel is so dry when Iv'e finished. We also changed our vest and liberty bodice on a friday. I have a photo of myself in the zinc bath as a child with a turban on my head.
 
I also wore a vest underneath, and you couldnt leave off your liberty bodice until sunny weather came. The buttons were rubbery.
 
I also wore a vest underneath, and you couldnt leave off your liberty bodice until sunny weather came. The buttons were rubbery.

That was exactly the same for me. If I remember correctly there were also buttons in appropriate positions for attaching suspenders for wearing thick winter stockings.
 
Ladylinda I dont remember the buttons for the suspenders though. I know the buttons went a funny shape after they had been through the mangle.
 
How l remember those liberty bodices..hated the feel of those rubber buttons...Carolina like you l had to wear a vest a liberty bodice also mom had attached to the vest by safety pins thermogene, if anyone remembers thermogene was like pink cottonwool ..think it was medicated...l suffered from asthma and mom made sure my chest was well and truely kept warm...put an underslip a dress and cardigan on top of all that, not to mention a coat...its a wonder l could breath..Brenda
 
Vests were cotton until aertex came in and worn until you got your first bra.
 
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Mikejee, yes it was cotton but it had like a woolly effect to it and was all closed in (if you know what I mean) whereas aertex had little holes in.
 
And in some cases long after your first bra!! Vests were like teeshirt material - cotton interlock I think it was called, but it was much better quality than you get today (so was everything else).
 
i remember Spanish gold,,sweet tobacco,,coconut,,,and the old rock hard liquorice and when the giant tip tops came out,,they were 4 times thicker
 
i remember Spanish gold,,sweet tobacco,,coconut,,,and the old rock hard liquorice and when the giant tip tops came out,,they were 4 times thicker

I recently re-discovered the rock hard liquorice in an old fashioned sweet shop and couldn't resist buying some - it tasted just how I remember - lovely.
 
Shortie, l was in the seniors and l still had to wear those "opera top vests",much to my disgust and of course my first bra ..did'nt have anything to put in it though....but as soon as l left school got my own money l went to M&S and bought a really nice feminine vest it had ribbon straps and was like a silky open pattern..mom thought l would catch my death wearing such a flimsey vest..a few years after that l got rid of the vest...guess what l'm still here..Brenda
 
Well Brenda, I went off to boarding school at the age of thirteen, and so the vest went west after that as I was the only one in my bedroom (5 or 6 beds) who wore one.I must have suffered quite badly, as although the building I lived in was centrally heated, it could not have been called warm at all and there were no open fires. However, I do now wear 'camis', as I have always been a cold soul - I have very small veins and I have been told this may have something to do with it. My mother and grandmother(s) used to think that not wearing one meant you would die early - that's a bit bizarre, but I am sure there was a lot of sense in a lot that they used to believe. What I can never get my head around is the fact that both of my grandmothers wore a corset, a vest and a full length petticoat all through summer as well as winter. Thank goodness I never had to wear all that armour!
 
I had a bucket bag - also had to wear a liberty bodice the horrible rubber buttons dug into my legs when I sat down, it held up itchy kharki couloured long stockings that I was always falling over in - when I was ab out 8 I carried on so much I had three quarter socks and no more liberty bodice.
Sheri
 
My liberty bodices had buttons at about waist level and only two of them, one each side. Surely that was not for stockings? I am sure stockings would come up that far on me because I have pitifully short legs (short everything for that matter), but not on everyone. More suggestions are needed!!!
 
Shotie, had a good laugh about your g/mothers corsets..my mother wore a corset over her vest..or stays as they were called ....they loooked like med ievil torture and mom was always having a stay work out, l always hoped l would never have to wear such things,but thanlk goodness they went out of fashion when my turn came arouind, always wore pullons....Sheri, l was never allowed to wear long stockings mom always said they stopped your legs from breathing,,l always had chapped knees and legs and l know if l'd been allowed to wear those long woollen stockings l would'nt have suffered so much, but as we know moms knew best...Brenda
 
My liberty bodices had buttons at about waist level and only two of them, one each side. Surely that was not for stockings? I am sure stockings would come up that far on me because I have pitifully short legs (short everything for that matter), but not on everyone. More suggestions are needed!!!

If I remember correctly we had to attatch suspenders to the buttons and then to the stockings.
 
A product I am glad faded away was the 'tube' in the television. Do you remember when the tube was going, the picture keep slipping and rolling round. If there was ever a problem with the tele' my dad used to say its the way its coming through.

Like many families we had our first TV for the Coronation - a 12" Pye with a tiny purple screen in a huge bakelite cabinet that weighed a ton. It took half an hour to warm up, then the old man had to fiddle with it for another half-hour to get a picture. It was a matter of pride for him that he would never get anyone in to tune it properly. We've still got a modern 'tube' TV, and it's great, much better picture than the flat-screen things.

Big Gee
 
When I was eating lunch the other day, this one popped into my head for no apparent reason:-
UNOX pork luncheon meat.
On hot summer days, Mom used to make it the interesting part of a salad tea. "Taste the pork" was its sales message according to some adverts (late 50's) that I found via Google.
"Luncheon": how many families in the austere 1950's sat down to luncheon? Not many in our street (Station Road, Kings Norton)!
David.
 
When I was eating lunch the other day, this one popped into my head for no apparent reason:-
UNOX pork luncheon meat.
On hot summer days, Mom used to make it the interesting part of a salad tea. "Taste the pork" was its sales message according to some adverts (late 50's) that I found via Google.
"Luncheon": how many families in the austere 1950's sat down to luncheon? Not many in our street (Station Road, Kings Norton)!
David.

UNOX rings a bell, but I don't sit down to luncheon today, let alone in the 50's.
And as for Shortie's and Lady Leaver's memories, the stockings and suspenders sound like a turn on but I'm not so sure about the Liberty Bodices.
All the best to everyone from Rod.
P.S. There is an old fashioned sweet shop towards the top of the old market site in Walsall where you can get things like pure liquorice, black jacks, cinder toffee, sweet tobacco, kali (if that's how you spell it), liquorice root, I think if you name it, they've got it.
 
I don't remember UNOX pork luncheon meat, but I do remember Dana luncheon meat. They had a jingle on TV singing 'Lets have Dana for dinner, Dana is the big meat meal'
 
hi guys and gals ;
here is a couple of products we do not see any more nor do we buy

1; there advert of rael brook shirts you do not iron with there jingle adverts on the tele; no more
2; the Esso sign means happy motoring ;the esso signs means happy motoring so call at the esso signs
best wishes astonian
 
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I have to giggle when I read about ladies corsets my Mother used to wear them it still amazes me to this day how she could have worn such torturous things with the steel ribs that they had in them I believe at one time they had bones in them I remember when my Mother changed from the old corset to the girdle they made her sweat recon it was because they where to tight LOL
 
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