Whatever happened to Rodger the lodger?

Travelodge just isn't the same!

I was never anybody's lodger, but I did see the last days of the theatrical boarding houses, the 'digs' where touring performers stayed. The landlady was usually known as 'Ma', beds were often lumpy and damp, as, come to think of it, was Ma.

Morecambe and Wise were ejected from one such... the Ma, a Roman Catholic lady, had a wall decked with photographs of the performers who had stayed there - and in the middle, a repro of Da Vinci's "Last Supper". Eric peered at this and then said "Oh, I see you've had Doctor Crock and the Crackpots here..." Out!

Still,. they understood the odd needs of show people - the after work sandwiches, the breakfasts late in the morning - that sort of thing. Plus they were cheap...

We always had lodgers in our house. It was a seven bedroomed Edwardian terrace, with four rooms downstairs as well as the kitchen, so there was always room for at least two lodgers.
One, called Joe, was a bread delivery man so we always had lots of bread. Another, George, was a cleaner on the buses. They stayed with my parents the longest, until they had to go into care homes.
There were lots of students, nurses, doctors, etc., of all races.

We had an interesting upbringing.

Actually, thinking about it, my experience in this is so limited, as to be of no consequence of whether it is richer people who do it most.

One of my sons lodged for a year at uni.
One of my daughters is about to lodge.

In my limited experience, it is now richer people with rooms to spare who do it.

Roger, our lodger
Eats piled-up plates
Of nuts and dates.
Mother says it's quite in order
She calls him our herbaceous boarder...

{Remembered from a Lilliput magazine in the 1940s!)

We had a lodger (Joe) when I was young. He ate with us, though spent most of the time in his room, going back home at the weekends, as he was only working in our area. Almost every mealtime, my mother served rhubarb for pudding, as we had a glut of it in the garden. Then came the sad news that Joe had died suddenly. I remember hearing my mum saying to Dad, "You don't think it could have been all that rhubarb that did it, do you...?"
Anyway, we never did get another lodger.

DD friend moved North last month to start a new job. She is lodging with a friend's mother.

Isn't a room in someone else's house with shared bathroom and kitchen lodgings ? Or part of an HMO
I class a bedsit as having your own lockable door, one room where you eat, sleep and cook (sometimes a separate area or room for cooking) and a bathroom.

Apparently you can still get a lodger.

There is a websire www.spareroom.co.uk/monday-to-friday/. It seems to cover all types of home sharing.

No. Not studio apartments. They are quite posh. I'm talking about a room in someone else's house, sharing kitchen and bathroom. It still happens.

Roger the lodger reminds me of a daft rhyme from my youth:

It was not the Almighty
that lifted her nightie
it was Roger the Lodger the sod.

Yes, taking in lodgers was always an option to raise a bit of cash.

When I went on Civil Service courses back in the 60s, we were usually put up in lodgings, often with older civil servants and their families.

I think they're called 'studio' apartments these days jings. My friend moved to London when she was 20 and lived in a girls/ladies/women's hostel. She often talks about the fun they had there and her parents were satisfied that she was somewhere safe and pleasant. Don't think they have them any more. Also for older people I've read about 'residential' hotels. Very Muriel Spark or Barbara Pym!

They still have bed sits in big towns don't they?

I lived in bed sits for a while. Ok when you are young, but sad way to have to live when you are older.

I was a lodger at university, very common in the 1960s as Jane10 says. When we moved house in the 1970's we took over the previous owners' lodgers, two students, because it was near the end of the academic year and it would have been difficult for them to find somewhere else. Then we were on the university's books so we carried on until we went to live abroad. We had some really interesting lodgers, especially exchange students from the US and Europeans over here to improve their English. But when my DS went to university in the 1980s shared houses were the thing and they both lived in shared houses when they started work, as well.

My uncle went into 'digs' when he moved to London. I was very worried about this as a child as I couldn't understand why he'd be living underground. Its a funny word. I know its an abbreviation but 'diggings' is just as odd.

Also some took in students. Certainly in the 60s I was 'lodged' with a family for my first year, and when my son was in his 3rd year at Uni and working in industry as part of his degree, he too lodged, with an Asian family, who used the money to put their son through private education.