Whatever happened to...........?

Re talcum powder.
An Avon book was put through my door last week so I thought I'd treat myself to my old favourite Soft Musk , I used to get the body wash, body lotion and talc all matching . Nowadays no talc at all ?

The rag and bone man who used to give us a pot of bubbles or a goldfish that invariably died soon after. No knowledge then about bringing the water up to room temperature!

We now have Kev the scrapman and people text him to let him know what’s been put out. Included a push lawn mower I spotted yesterday.

I can remember people coming to clean the phones at one of the offices I worked in.

Black and white TVs with tiny screens
Fish knives and forks

I still buy talc but you do need to hunt for it. My favourite is Estée Lauder but quite hard to find and expensive. Currently using Cuticura and Imperial Leather.

You can often get lemon puffs in the Indian food section in Tesco. I’m told they are still very popular in the subcontinent!

Those tins with individual slotted compartments which your mum sorted her housekeeping into each Friday.

Order books for groceries.

Doylies

Those steam powered rails in shops which we put the customer's money into and it was magically returned with the right change.

Modesty triangle thingies to avoid revealing too much cleavage.

Round tables with foldable tops, which you sort of swivelled to make it compact. It also housed the sewing stuff and had a pincushion under the lid, plus little pockets to put sewing items into.

Treadle sewing machines

Knitted 'pilches' (little pant things for baby boys).

Fablon

granfromafar

A rag and bone man comes around the street here too - can't understand a word he shouts!
Grandnafrench: You make you own talcum powder?!!

Caramac chocolate
Aquamanda perfume (or was it aftershave? )

granfromafar We had a rag & bone man - ours used to shout a load of unintelligible stuff including "ruh bo Ann " and we'd try to find something to give him each time. I won't say he was a terrible scruff but he made Old Man Steptoe look positively classy !

Yes, don't think it's just me but I find it impossible to buy talcum powder anywhere now. The softest and most absorbent ingredient has all but disappeared. During the years in which Johnson & Johnson have settled so many successful lawsuits brought by cancer sufferers - their famous original baby powder and others have slowly been withdrawn from sale.

So.....I have an empty pretty box and a huge puff from when I used to buy Floris talcum powder. I now take a glass jar with a tight fitting lid, put inside a cotton wool ball on which I have sprayed maybe 25 or 30 squirts of my favourite cologne or perhaps a perfume sample which I liked but haven't worn. Then fill maybe half of the jar with cornflour. Make sure the top is sealed and give it a few shakes. Shake it now and again over at least 4 or 5 days and then decant some of it into the talc box or any pretty box with a puff. You can top up the cornflour regularly and are unlikely to need to top up the cologne for a considerable number of weeks. Not expensive, you can design your own "smell" and of course you're putting nothing risky on your skin, or inhaling it - like talc.

I make sure it's kept in a dark cupboard and out of the kitchen, to avoid it being used to thicken sauces or added to cakes etc., !! I share my kitchen with a very enthusiastic cook .... so you never know!

The door-to-door knife grinder. I'm not much good at sharpening my own knives
The Breton 'Ingin Johnnies' who came round on a bike and sold us long strings of onions.

As for talcum powder: Ebay has masses of it, including, Yardley and Imperial Leather.

I can only think of the lassic:

White dog poo.

But whoever said dirndls should come to Germany. Everyone wears them for Oktoberfest and Cannstatter Wasn. There are huge crowds of friends at stations taking trains to Munich and Stuttgart in the season. Not this year, of course, but the fashion was gaining momentum until last year, especially among the young folks.

And as for cars: Saabs. Although they have been out of production for a while, I thought they were supposed to be indestructible.

In the mid 1960's I lived near Chester. About once a year a French onion seller used to come round on a bicycle, onions strung around his neck. Never seen one since those days.

I still have all my pretty hankies, kept in an embroidered cotton handkerchief pouch. The familiar 'Crinoline lady' motif.

tiredoldwoman

Remember my dad buying an expensive set of ‘The Book Of Knowledge’ from a door to door salesman in the 50’s, to help with our schoolwork.

Still sat on my bookshelf, no use to anyone, but feel so guilty to chuck them out.

Cannot give them away, no one wants them.

Our rag and bone man came round on a horse-drawn cart. He'd park up, the horse would graze the verge, he'd shout "cups and plates today! Giddeo-ay" to the horse when they took off again.
If you were lucky?) the horse would dump on the verge. My friend had to go out with a shovel. Her dad grew roses

Like someone upthread mentioned, why oh why can't we buy thin sliced bread any more?

I can remember the knife grinder too and liberty bodices with those rubber buttons that curled up in the boiler.

Embassy cigarettes, which my friend's mum smoked had coupons or stamps? in them. You sent away for the book of goodies you could get with the redeemed coupons/stamps.

Glass feeding bottles for babies, impossible to get the teats on without spilling the contents
Metal bedpans ( I once put them all in the steriliser so they were too hot to use )
AA men in uniform who saluted
4 pennyworth of chips with scraps.

‘Kiku’ perfume with the bright yellow plastic top/box.
Pitman’s Shorthand.
Trimphones.
Party lines (BT)
Trout Hall grapefruit segments.
Watneys Party 7 cans
Sobranie cocktail cigarettes.

Watneys beer in a barrel when we had parties.
And do they still do Davenports beer? It was brewed in Birmingham and Brummies had difficulty pronouncing the H at the beginning of words, so the man on the telly proclaiming "and beer at 'ome means Davenports" was a thing of joy.

Just thought of another one, indelible pencils. You licked them (yuck!) and they wrote in blue. As the name indicates you couldn’t rub them out. They were definitely forbidden to children, who gave themselves away by having blue tongues and lips.

The chimney sweep, watching the brush come out the top
Toasting forks, used with my Nan by the roaring fire
Women on a Saturday going shopping with their rollers in ready for the night out
Bathsalts
Newberry Fruits (not sure if that’s the right spelling)
The corona man coming round (No not the virus)
Waiting till 6pm to queue up to make a phone call (as it was cheaper After 6
Real candles on the Christmas tree in little clip on holders
Meat (bodies) dripping blood as they hang outside the butchers (yuk yuk yuk)
Buying everything loose, by weight
The wonderful smell in grocery shops

I actually saw a motorbike and sidecar a couple of weeks ago! There aren't many around, though.

Waspie belts can be found on Amazon - I bought one a couple of years ago, for a Steampunk event.

@granfromafar Caramac is still available, I often buy it

Mixing baby milk before the easily dissolved SMA was available. Trying to ensure it was lump free. Using a hot needle to enlarge the teets then worrying that the baby would choke.

Calendergirl I still have a Cassells "Book of Knowledge" which is approx 1930 and belonged to my Dad. It's actually very interesting like a time capsule. For instance it refers to The Great War as of course the second world war had not happened yet. Full of wonderful things but also sad as it describes a world that no longer exists.
I can write Pitmans shorthand and know a couple of people that still use it for meetings but I guess we are a dying breed.

Circular skirts (made of felt)

Pineapple ice buckets.
Those big glass soda syphons
The Guinness toucan ornament sat on a shelf behind the bar

Kali - no idea of the spelling - like sherbet but hard coloured crystals from the sweet shop. Frozen orange Jubblies.

Babycham.