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Housing : Living conditions

  • Thread starter Thread starter colinwilliams1
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Pom is correct (I think). As I understand it in Victorian times the quality of water was so poor it was quite unwise to drink it. It was then that Brewhouses became an almost essential appendage to any house. It gave the occupiers the means to brew weak beer which was far less risky to drink than the local water. In fact, they were probably responsible for preventing scores of illnesses and even fatatilities.

So let's hear it for the humble brew'ous, a working class life-saver. :)
 
Hip Hip Hooray :D :D

It was always lovely and warm because the boiler was always lit. My grandad had his bath in there every day when he got home from the pit.
 
I hope you didn't brew grandad with the beer. :idea: Although, on the other hand, it would've probably given more of a kick to it. :lol:
 
:D You’r so right Kandy part from improving the ‘Beer’ and its taste 8) I also got a good head of hair out of it :?: :)
And that is more than can be said for some people, who shall remain nameless. :P
 
Beer v Washing

:D Excuse me Robert, sorry to disappoint you but as I said in my first post one 'Brewouse' was used for the washing by our mothers and the other definitely was not a
I believe the place to brew beer is just a fanciful thought
Click to expand...
but used by our fathers for the brewing of beer.
So even if the rest of your statement may have substance the fanciful idea is wrong.
 
As Pom was only around in the autumn of Victoria's reign, it's quite likely that she merely saw the tail-end of the tradition. :lol:
 
Beer v Washing

:D A rose by any other name ... :)

Paul I'll have you know that me and Vicky were like that X- so be careful or it will be "To the Tower and off with your head" - No no that was my friend Lizzy the first. Gosh my mind must be failing at last... :lol: :lol: :lol:
 
Pom,

Come on now, let's keep it serious, Alberta asked a very interesting question.
My contention is, as the Victorian working classes had poor water and no clothes, the brewhus was more likely used for brewing beer than washing.

It was only later when people needed to wash their clothes to obtain the best deal at the porn shop that brewhuses were most likely used for the later.
 
No Clothes!

:D Paul I can assure you it was not only the Victorians' that had no 'Clothes' The families and kids where I grew up didn't have many clothes either and that is no joke but a very true and serious fact.
I only ever had two dresses at any one time, one for school and one for Sundays.
They were only washed once a week or they would have fallen apart and then! well...
Tell a lie, I did have a Brownie dress and later one for Girl Guides, which were always worn to school on Shrove Tuesday around about Easter time.
 
For what it's worth :D the houses in Hamstead each had a brewous, but in the 19th century there was a building called the maiding house, brobably called maidin' by the villagers. The washing was all done there, because there was well water near by, before water came in from Wales. Mom had what she called a 'maid', it was a wooden version of the posher, or posser as I heard it called recently, I guess she got the word from her mom.
 
Our maid was like a giant wooden dollypeg with a T bar handle on it. I think a posser or posher was a bit too up-market for us. 8) It was like an inverted copper colander on a long broom handle. :wink:
 
That's right Paul, and didn't it get some welly when it pummelled the clothes in the wooden tub. I bought an old maid years ago as a memento of those awful Mondays. It's outside the back door now, because it got woodworm. :D
 
I was tempted to say that's the trouble with old maids and why I prefer a young one, but I'll resist that temptation of going off topic. 8)
 
Old maids

:D In our Brewouse we never had either of those items that Di and Paul mentioned, just an old Duck board and a Scrubbing brush, Mom did use the 'Dolly blue' though.
We also had one of those old mangles too, but that was kept in the kitchen and the neighbours would come and use it there, as mom trusted no one. She thought if it was left in the Brewouse someone would sell it to the 'Scrap man' for a few bob one dark night.
To tell the truth I don’t think that would have happened, as it was the only one in the street and a street full of angry housewife’s would have been enough to put anyone off the idea even if they had thought about it. :)
 
In my lifetime at our house in Phillips Street the Brewhus had been emptied of it's brick built washing machine :wink: It had been extended with a wooden framework covered with netting. Dad kept budgies in it. Mom did her washing in the kitchen, in a little gas boiler that had a rubber hose which was connected to the gas supply, just pushed on!! :shock:
 
There was such a lot of boiling going on in those days. I asked in a previous posting 'Was everything white'.It must have been for so much 'boiling' to be taking place.I can't remember when I last boiled laundry,probably terry towelling nappies 30 odd years ago.My late mother in law judged people by how white the nappies were on their washing line.
When I moved to a flat in Kingshurst 38 years ago the council had decorated and left a brand new gas boiler with rubber hose in the kitchen.
I think they were still supplying them to tenants until a few years ago.
 
Now doesn't that just show the age gap between Rod and me? We had to progress to one of those gas boilers. I remember it had a tap near the bottom where a hose would be attached to fill the zinc bath - such luxury!
:roll:

Yes, health & safety measures were fairly primitive in those days. I recall Mother not allowing my brother to install our new gas cooker because he couldn't be trusted. However she allowed my sister's husband to do it because he was more "knowledgeable" in that area. When the job was finished, he tested for leaks with a lighted match!!! :cooked:
 
Gas boiler

:D Gas boiler, we had one of those in another house we lived in, my sister burnt her tummy leaning over to turn the gas tap off. The stove and the lights were also gas in that house too.

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: Paul (Sorry Rod just kad to laugh at that)
 
I love these old memories, keep 'em coming. Every family did things differently. We had an old iron mangle in a lean to outside the back door, then came the day when mom got a new one, the top folded over into a table. A real fancy bit of kit that was our kitchen table for years.

(you got away with it again Paul) :D
 
:shock: I remember when we had a gas fire fitted in the front room, we were the envy of all the neighbours it was about 1961. We still had the coal fire in the back room with a very large guard around in which dipped in the middle where my dad loved to warm his b... :oops: Jackie
 
:D Hi its me again, I thought I would just add that my other half had a terrible childhood, he and his brothers used to play games with the blackbats, cockroaches etc. The 3 of them slept in a double bed with their Mom, no blankets only old coats. His Mother died in 1961 and hubby was put out onto the streets and his brothers in to care :( U . While they were living in this house in Great Russell Street they never had Electric on ly gas. I could go on...........Jackie
 
It IS on topic...I promise..

I remember working as an apprentice with the council in the 60's, we used to fit little Gas Boilers in the kitchen..
I was actually helping fit one in a Kitchen near Dartmouth St the day the news came over BobbyKennedy was shot..
They weren't much really, just a Tin tub , round with a little lid that fitted under a worktop.
To this we fitted a Gas supply on a small hose
I guess the whole point of it was you boiled your Underpants, vests and Knickers..(made a lovely soup in hard times)
We had one in Hindlow Close...It was a new house so I think they thought at the time it was cutting edge technology..
I dont think we used it once for that Purpose,,
Dad stored tinned food in it..in fact Dad stored food everywhere he shouldn't..
'Dad! the toilet wont flush!'...ahhh...it must be that bag of Onions..
He actually started many of the shortages himself in the 60's..he read somewhere that trouble was brewing in Ghana so he'd buy up bags of Sugar and he'd walk out with two carrier bags groaning under the weight..
People would see this and within minutes the store would be cleared of the stuff..
Tell you what..World War 3?..I think we'd have put on weight..
 
We had a "gas miser" mom bought from the gas board show rooms at Perry Barr. It was re-conditioned...... It had a device on the front in which you could make toast? and by moving a flap up and down, it turned the toast over so the other side was cooked.
 
Gas and its many uses.

Besides being a Plumber by trade I'm also a registered Gas Installer...
(Look, I know that's a wild turn on for women but I'm married)
In the 60's we used to fit a thing called an 'All night fire'..
It was'nt so much a Gas fire as a Normal, Log/coal thingy that had a little 1/4inch steel tube with little holes drilled along it..it was controlled with a little gas tap and once you'd prepared your fire (no paper required) you just turned on the tube and lit it..
Very, very basic but it worked.
What frightens me was back then was I was fitting these things with no formal training..even at the age of 18.
Today I have a complete set of qualifications called the AC's, I work under CORGI regulations..and I have to renew these every 5 years at a cost of several thousand pounds..in the 60's my entire qualifications were to watch Albert or Ted fit a couple of these fires and that was deemed enough experience to let me loose..
I fitted Cookers, Fires and as mentioned in another topic those Gas boiler/heaters.
The gas back then was even more deadly..Town Gas killed you in it's own right..today, Natural Gas which has no natural odour (a smell is added) cant do that (putting your head in the Oven just gives you a headache.. anything that deprives you of pure oxygen wont do you much good mind)
But I do remember people in the 60's thinking they were the Bees Knees because they had a Gas fire..
I've got (no doubt like most of you) one of Coal effect Gas fires in my Living room..you can do toast on it..it was fitted really well too...in fact it was done so well Mrs Robinson slept with the Gas fitter that night.
But Gas appliances had many uses back then..my mates Mom killed herself with one of hers...
 
:D We had one of those Coal effect Gas fires in the Living room in Wickham house. Mom was one of the first on the block to get one, she got it when they first started the 'Smokeless Zone' campaign and were offering a money incentive if people changed with in a certain period 8) .

Postscript
'...Here's to you Mrs Robinson..."
Simon & Garfunkel
 
I worked for British Gas, and in the 70's with the change over from Town Gas to Natural Gas it was a major task to go into every house to fit new jets and pilots to the appliances. In this area the gas board had to get contractors in to do most of the work, so company's bid for the work and employed youngsters who had never seen a gas burner. They gave them brief training and let them loose. It wasn't long before customers were coming in telling us they they could smell gas, and our trained fitters were kept busy day and night going out to gas leaks. The commonest thng they found were rolled bits of silver foil wedged into pilot jets. We didn't have an accident on our patch, but we so easily could have done. Natural gas is very explosive, and just putting on a light switch with a house filled with gas is all you need. I remeber mom having her gas converted, they left Birmingham and London until the last, I think they dreaded the problems.

We don't have gas in our bit of the village, so we toast our feet by log fires. :D
 
Les...I think we might have had one of those gas fire thingies you wrote about. We had it installed probably in the early l950's in our ice box cold
front room. It only used coke. The fireplace "throat" was very sloped in order to throw the heat into the room. Well, you never had to draw this fireplace, you just lit the gas and it would stay on until the fire was going.
The room heated up like an oven and the rellies would all drop off to sleep when they came to visit on Sundays.. Eventually, the house went all electric and the fireplace was boarded up and an electric fire setup was installed. The rest of the house except the kitchen was freezing in the winter. No one wanted to go out and make a cup of tea in the evenings!

We had a Belling log look a like fire in the lounge after the open fireplace was filled in. Must have been in the mid l950's. This Spring when I was visiting our house, my brother said "Do you remember this?" Good grief it was the Belling all cleaned up and looking brand new. Hadn't seen it for years. It still looks good. I think it had been relegated to the loft for years. My brother loves fixing up such items..mows the lawn with the old Webb, all fixed up, blades as sharp as can be. It's nearly 70 years old!!!!!
 
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