Joan Leahy

I was born in 1942 and these are some snippets of my life in the fifties.

We would go to Abingdon to pay 6/- rent (30p) rent to Adkin, Belcher & Bowen.

The toilet was out the back and in cold weather you would don a coat and scarf, take newspaper (as loo paper) and a torch and be as brief as possible! Water was fetched from a standpipe up the road and all the waste water was carried to the bottom of the garden for disposal.

We would go to the co-op with a list which would be given to the ladies behind the counter who would assemble all your requirements, add up the bill either in their head or using paper and pencil, and you would pay them. A shopping bag was always taken. Biscuits were loose in a tin and would be placed in a paper bag and weighed, cheese would be cut and wrapped as very few products were pre-packed.

I remember we went to chapel to get new ration books, and we took our accumulator to Mr Redknap’s garage to be charged to run the radio.

My father had a car as he ran a taxi business. There was no anti-freeze or efficient car heating so in cold weather he drained the water from the radiator every night and re-filled it the next morning. He opened the windscreen a couple of inches to see out when it was frosty. Our telephone number was 95 and after a while it became 295.

Easter meant a time for new hats for mother and me.

We would go to the Copse and pick primroses in the days before the practice was banned and the Copse cleared thereby depleting the flowers. There were two shrubberies on the Big Green surrounded by an iron fence. Cherries were 2/6 a pound (12p) and could be bought from a booth on the Little Green.

Girls Crystal, School Friend and Girl were popular comics. The cinema at Abingdon ran ‘Abingdon Minors’ which was a variety of films suitable for children on a Saturday morning. I think the bus fare was 6d (2p) and the films a shilling (5p). School sports were held on the Big Green with a tea in the village hall afterwards. There were two postal deliveries a day.

We had a TV with a small screen but we had a magnifier which could be tied over the front and would enlarge the picture. However, if you were sat to the side you saw rainbow colours where it acted as a prism. On cup-final day lots of relatives and friends would come and see the match and my Mum would provide refreshments – sausage rolls etc – and cups of tea. It was quite an occasion.

Baths were weekly in front of the fire. A tin bath was used and after I had mine more hot water was go in and Mum would have hers, then more hot water for Dad.Laundry was done in the wash house. The copper would be filled with water, a fire lit underneath, and when hot the washing would go in. It would be poked with a copper stick then hooked out and rinsed, put through the mangle and pegged out to dry. How tiring it must have been. The copper was then emptied and the fire raked out.