THINGS YOU DON'T SEE ANYMORE (Part 2)

[loiner99]

Gloves attached together with string that ran up one arm along your back and down the other.

[loiner99]

young kids in short trousers

[loiner99]

Beech nut chewing gum machines where if you were lucky and the arrow was pointing the right way
you got 2 packets

[loiner99]

Corona Lemonade delivered by lorry

[loiner99]

playing in a back to back street and having to lift all the washing lines clear with a pole when a
large lorry came along

[loiner99]

To pick up on two prev posts I have many memories if groups sheltering under awnings when it invariably rained in Brid or Scarboro. In fact the cruelest action I have ever seen was in the middle of one downpour the evil shopkeeper came out and wound in the awning. How he escaped with his limbs intact I do not know. I must add this was in Rhyl not Brid/scarboro!
To further develop the theme of summer downpours, a question. Do they still sell pac a macs ?

[loiner99]

Many single people waiting for their dates "under the Guinness Clock"....or
"outside Marks and Spencers"

[loiner99]

I have to smile when I see some young couple on a buy your house programme go ecstatic at the thought of owning a real fire.
Having lived thro the real fire era I know I speak for many, we could not wait to get rid and embrace miracle of central heating. The only joy of a real fire is seeing it in a magazine or an old Andy Williams Christmas special. The reality was much different. Especially for the muggins who had to get out from under the multi blanket/eiderdown covers (topped with your dads demob overcoat) and clear out last nights ashes, then build a new fire (sods law no coal in the scuttle) and then trying to light it , in room so cold ice formed on the inside as well as outside. To expedite matters you invariably took the shovel gamble. Standing a shovel upright in front of the fire and covering with a newspaper (broadsheet not tabloid) all went well until the flames caught the paper and up it went. Black bits of burning newspaper floating around.
At least you never went flying outside your house with a plentifull supply of ashes for grip on the snow.
Of course on windy days more joys of a real fire as a sudden gust returned all of your escaping soot, with a vengeance. Covering the fireplace. The mirror above the fireplace and you in a black film.
You, because you had been huddled inches away trying to get warm. Maybe it is just me but the fire never had much effect past 3 feet. (not helped by lack of double gazing and cavity wall - items of science fiction in the fifties)
We had a small stool either side of the fire and after getting one side warm would quickly swap to heat the other side. I don't know if it had anything to to with it but I don't hear so much of chillblains these days ?
So my question is do the couples have a rude awakening or do modern "real" fires not need lighting or produce ash/soot ?

[francof]

I agree about the sometimes horrific reality of owning a proper fire. When I originally put my name down for a council flat I was told by the sneering banshee behind the counter that I would be on the waiting list for at least three years. So imagine my surprise and delight when only a month later I was invited to view a flat in my local area. Perfect apart from one thing, a tiny Parkray coal fire built into the wall. "Its put a few people off renting" mumbled the man who was showing me round. But I didn't care. Finally, my own place and all that. Not knowing much about real fires I held off using it until one freezing night I decided to fill it full of coal,(sold to me by a bloke in the pub) light up,, and see what would happen. After an hour I resembled a Pompeii victim . I've never experienced such intense heat. I couldn't breath, All air had been vaporised. The Parkray fire was like a red glowing portal to Hell. It also heated up the water so much that for days afterwards every time I washed my hands I ended up with third degree burns. Never used the accursed thing again.

[j.c.d.]

In the early 60s we moved into a 3 bed semi in the Allenbys Beeston and it had a coal fire. I was managing a carpet shop in Castleford and soon found out that the miners got a ton of "coil" a month free and anybody who wanted to sell it would leave it outside their house with newspapers on it. when I enquired about getting some a customer of mine said "Leave it to me Lad, two ton delivered to Leeds at about a quarter of the price". though I guessed my coal'ole would not accommodate that amount I said yes gladly.
On the day it was delivered my wife rang up and ordered me to come home quickly. she sounded a bit upset. I arrived to find that they had duly delivered and that the two tons was halfway in the drive and half on the pavement /grass.
not only was there this black mountain but when reversing in the lorry driver had demolished both brick posts that had held the double gates.
I was still shovelling Black Gold at 2 o'clock. in the morning and 50 years on I wonder if the grass ever grew again. Never ever had a coal fire after that.