Stuff you did as a child that wouldn’t be contemplated now

Magenta8
Parents and teachers could be really cruel back in the fifties and it persisted through to the seventies.
I've been shopping for two days running and on both days I was appalled and felt threatened by the behaviour of the teenagers .
It's gone from one extreme to another.

Magenta8

I was smacked by my mum for laughing at a man who was standing in his front garden waving his willy at us. I was holding hands with mum when she whacked me round the head and pulled me down the road as fast as she could. I had no idea what was going on, I was only four. I got another smack because mum told me to stop crying and I couldn't. Parenting was rather different back in the 1950s.

Not all of us had parents like that!

Sadly, some of us did. I got the same treatment after I told a woman to stop beating her dog as I was walking home from school one day. Of course, being a small village, she knew my mum and told her - and I got a smacking for daring to speak to an adult like that.

ViceVersa

Sadly, some of us did. I got the same treatment after I told a woman to stop beating her dog as I was walking home from school one day. Of course, being a small village, she knew my mum and told her - and I got a smacking for daring to speak to an adult like that.

I Hope you kept your fighting spirit ViceVersa!

yogitree

ViceVersa

Sadly, some of us did. I got the same treatment after I told a woman to stop beating her dog as I was walking home from school one day. Of course, being a small village, she knew my mum and told her - and I got a smacking for daring to speak to an adult like that.

I Hope you kept your fighting spirit ViceVersa!

Oh, I did - but from then on, I kept it very well hidden around my mother (or anyone who knew her)!

yogitree

ViceVersa

Sadly, some of us did. I got the same treatment after I told a woman to stop beating her dog as I was walking home from school one day. Of course, being a small village, she knew my mum and told her - and I got a smacking for daring to speak to an adult like that.

I Hope you kept your fighting spirit ViceVersa!

I hope it didn't get knocked out of you ViceVersa!

Yes, I do realise how lucky I was.

When I was 5 and my brother 8 my dad decided the family should travel more. He had a motorbike and was a bit of a bodger, so he made a sidecar for the bike out of the old pram - one of the deep bodied black prams popular in the 50's. He converted the wheels somehow and attached the whole contraption to the bike.

He'd nailed a plank across the back, which my brother sat on, gripping on to the sides like grim death, and I had to sit in the front cramped up, no helmets or protective clothing. Every journey was agony for me.

We went on several painful rides across London.

Thankfully dad got bored of his project after a couple of long journeys and life returned to the normal no days out with the freedom of playing in the street or local park.

Where is live the local council has just cancelled all school buses. My granddaughters aged 12 have no other way so walk the mile and a half to school and home again down a narrow lonely path and beside a busy road with very little pavement. It's not the distance that concerns me but the lack of a safe route.

We lived in Bowring Park, Liverpool. As children we would cycle to Southport (about 16 miles) or Ainsdale with sandwiches and a bottle of pop in the carrier. Great day out in te 1950s.