Job titles that have disappeared

Goodness Jackie. Sounds like you should have been running the company... Secretaries do still exist.

Corsetiere - a lady used to come to our house to measure my Mum for her corsets and bras!

Messengers are still here, sought after post for retired police officers and the like.

Paperboy, delivered newspapers, usually Sunday's. At one time I employed eight boys, in a large housing scheme, before there were any shops. When the first general store opened, they tried the council, then the police, to get me shut down. As no one was buying papers from them. They were unsuccessful. It was quite a lucrative part time job.

Knockeruppers, I'm 83 and I vaguely remember them in Glasgow. They could rap the ground floor windows and had the pole for the first storey, I don't know how they managed the second and third storeys.

A typing facility can you believe!

The Betterware Man. I know the company still exist but it's 'choose from a magazine' now.

My Dad was a door to door Betterware Man when I was little. I still remember him coming home with his case. He had some funny stories to tell. .

Shorthand typist

Junior Secretary, doing the jobs delegated by the proper Secretary. Back in the 60s, we had an office all to ourselves outside the big boss's office.

Secretary. Now called assistants I think.

I was employed by a major retailer in 1992 as a Girl Friday; then the name changed to Personnel Clerk, and later changed to Human Resources Assistant.

dustman

Has anyone mentioned The Pools Man. I know he used to come along our street on a Thursday evening calling on people who "did the Pools".

Bank Secretary (NatWest got rid of theirs in the 1990s.)

Gosh Juney I can remember the Betterware man coming to our house with his big suitcase of brushes polishes, dusters etc when I was little. He used to give me tiny sample tins of floor polish - and the other day I found one in a box of miscellaneous stuff..! When I managed to get the lid off, the smell was still there - if very faint - and it took me right back to my childhood (I'm 68, so no mean feat..!)

Saddle makers bottom knocker. It's real, honestly, Google it

Sagger not saddle

Hairdressers!! How do you change from one to another, I have recently started to go to another salon as my usual hairdresser wasn't listening to what I wanted and also kept me waiting ages even though I. Was always on time arriving, I am very happy with my new hairdresser and love the salon and the happy atmosphere in there,
My problem is how do I tell my old hairdresser if I meet her outside, my new hairstyle is bound to be noticed as is the colour, What do I say to her, I live in dread of meeting her out and about, What would you do gransnetters , ?

There is still a pools man around here clover

Just remembered that when I was at school we had to fill out a form every year to say what our parents did
My dad had a shop where he sold bikes and radios etc. We used to write down 'radio and cycle dealer'
As we thought it sounded posher!!

When I was a little girl in Glasgow in the 1950s, there were a number of important authority figures - the park keeper, the tram inspector (he seemed to be the boss of the conductors) and the Sunday School Superintendent. I remember him saying he had started to read the Bible when he was five and got to the end by the time he was eleven. He was a very scary person. I cannot even now claim to have read the Bible from cover to cover but I do wonder what a five or six year old could have made of all these "begats". I do realise that Sunday School Superintendent is not a salaried occupation but I wonder if they still exist?

Sorry ,just realised I bombed in on another topic , I didn't know how to start a new one, must get to grips with this

Hi Lily

To start a new thread, try clicking on "Forums", then select a category e.g. "Chat", then "Add thread".

I just realised, when I was looking for 'Getting Started' to direct you there, that it doesn't actually tell you how to start a brand new thread, it only tells you how to add a comment. HQ should amend that page.

Good luck and enjoy Gransnet.

BTW I also dodge all my ex-hairdressers

We had Kleeneze man not Bettaware but same thing. Butcher, grocer in a van, knew a man who started his business going round farms selling suits to farmers - he went on to have a few lovely clothes shops (male & female).

Most correspondence from Government Depts is computer generated I was a Clerical Assistant (term used from at least the 60s if not before)

My first office job was working on NCR Punch Tape machines for a Wholesale Chemists. Tapes went off about 4.30 & were back as Delivery Notes, Credit Notes etc next morning. We also had to be able to read the binary codes on the tapes in case of keying errors

We had what we called The Paraffin Man.' He used to call weekly to fill a large can with pink paraffin for the heater. There was also the rag and bone man, like Steptoe & Son. In exchange for junk he gave a white stone called a Donkey stone, used for whitening steps.

The coalman. In the 1950's a big lorry used to arrive and the coalman brought a big sack of coal on his shoulder and emptied it into our coal bin. His face and clothes were black with coal dust. The only heating in the house was the coal fire in the front room and I used to love watching the flames.