Fifty Years Ago

I remember. I was on prefect duty in the school tuck shop. Fun and games!

I was calculating the wages for 200 people, I was pleasantly surprised at how much easier it was.

I was a junior clerk in a bank. We soon had the conversion table memorised.
I was sorry to see the £sd go.

I think children's brains must be the poorer for only counting in 10's as they do now - no yards & inches, pounds & ounces etc either.

I was at work in a busy grocers shop. We had to explain to the older ladies that bacon at 12p per pound was actually 2s 6d per pound and not 1s 2d.
It was a very confusing time for a lot of people.

I had a Saturday job in a corner shop - I was 17y. Think back - a till like Arkwright’s in ‘Open All Hours’ - where you tilled in the money by pressing down the heavy levers and had to work out the change all by your own big self. Gosh, I was scared stuff!

I was a Saturday girl at the time so I missed the training the rest of the staff got, which was on quieter days during the week. I was doing A level maths and the conversion was hardly rocket science, so I didn't have any problems.

However, after school and Tech, I left the UK for good in 1973, and even now when I go back, I still think of it as "new money".

I should add that I then had to contend with the change from Deutsche Mark to Euros in 2002, and I still have to check the number on the coins in the "new money" here to make sure I've got the right change!

I remember going to the Dental Hospital on the bus, fumbling in my purse for the right coins for my fare and feeling as though I was using foreign currency.

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I went to the Ideal Home show with my mum and there was a stall selling little pieces of cheese on toast for 20p which we thought was OK. Then we realized they were not two bob each but four shillings! We were shocked! But ended up laughing about it. Happy days...

I was a Saturday girl in the village shop and remember it took twice as long to serve everyone because they checked all the prices on the conversion tables that were pinned up around the shop.
I was sad to see the demise of the half crown , my favourite coin .

I was working as a Management Trainee at John Lewis. We didn’t open on Sundays or Mondays back then,so we all went in and changed all the prices! We were paid and given free lunches.

I had been dating DH for about 5 months and we used to help out at the coffee bar at the YMCA in Watford where we met. We were on duty that evening found the swap over quite easy but many customers were confused.

My mother was very insulted because the media kept questioning how pensioners, poor old things, would cope. She was a pensioner and had no problems at all. Neither did I, but I do regret the loss of the lovely characterful names like half-crown, shilling and florin. Pees aren’t as interesting!p

At the time I spent most of my days at work juggling with short tons, long tons and metric tonnes, converting one into the other. So the currency change was childs play in comparison.

I knew all the conversion rates so well that when later that year I gave birth to my first child, I spent all the time they spent taking me from delivery room to ward, worrying because I had been given his weight in kilos and then lbs and oz and I knew they had got the conversion wrong and wishing I had my slide rule with me so I could sort it out!

In the end I did the maths in my head - and I was right. They had got it wrong.

My Saturday job was working in the cash office of the Co-Op department store. That was a steep learning curve, when we changed and people were trying to make their Club Card. payments.

I was working as a Window Dresser in London and volunteered to go and buy biscuits for our break so I could shop with the "funny money" I felt like I was in a foreign country and remember being very excited by it!

So much easier than £.s.d.

I had a Saturday job in WH Smiths working on the tills. No automatic tills then, I had to work everything out in my head but they didn't sack me so I must have been doing ok.

I remember going into a small supermarket on the first day with my daughter in her pushchair and fumbling about in my purse to get organised.
I agree Grandma70 the old names were more interesting.

I was still at school, and remember old ladies (who were probably not really old at all!) asking me to convert prices to 'real money' in the shop opposite the school .

I can still convert to and from LSD now.

It was my first year of teaching, a Junior class, and I remember having to teach the new currency. They all found it quite easy.

I can’t work out how big or small a new born baby is in kgs! I need to know in lbs. and ounces.

We still drive at miles per hour. Some people still like to know the weather in Fahrenheit. I can visualise someone who measures 5’ 10” but not if it were in metres and centimetres.

We’re a bit mix & match really aren’t we? Neither one thing nor the other.

I was 14 still at school the local sweet shop ripped us off when the decimal coinage came in. I had a Saturday job in a hairdressers. What I earned paid for return bus fare to go there ridiculous!

I about 7, and it was very confusing when we played in our pretend 'shop' at school.
I never really understood pounds shilling and pence properly at that stage anyway.