1950's Childhood.

Memory playing tricks now. Yes it was Bunty according to Google. Anyway back to memories of the 1950s....

Oh nelliemoser of course they were. I had School Friend every week and my sister had Girl. Mixing up my comics!

Girl comic on Wednesday.
Listening to Dan Dare on Radio Luxumberg. The advert was "We are the Ovaltinees little girls and boys"
Popeye on Thursday TV.
Collecting and swapping beads.
New blue cardigan with bobble tie ups for summer holiday.
Penny and twopenny box of sweets.
Saturday cinema where it was so noisy you couldn't hear what was being said half the time.
Satchels and wooden two tier pencil boxes with a space for a rubber that never fitted somehow.
Gymslips and navy blue knickers.
Navy mac with hood for school.
long socks with garters and lace up shoes yuk.
I have straight as a die hair and Mum insisted on me having a perm which I HATED with a vengence.

bellanonna I remember all those too and I'm 73. Do you remember glass wireless batteries full of acid that had to be taken to the ironmongers to be recharged? What did you call the lemonade powder? We called it Kali (pronounced kaylie) and dipped liquorice sticks. Tasted pretty disgusting, really.

Liquorice wood - great for the teeth!
Lemonade powder in palm of hand, consumed with dipped in forefinger
Gobstoppers
Dolly mixtures
Collecting and swapping "silver paper" at school, collections stored loving between book pages
Dolls that broke when dropped
Wireless valves that took ages to warm up
Uncle Mac on children's hour
And so on .......
I'm 75 now so maybe some of the above had disappeared by the 50s

Bursting tar bubbles in the road in hot weather.
Not allowed chewing gum, so scraped other people`s throwaway up off the pavement and chewing on it, I know, YUCK, YUCK and YUCK again!!
Feeling special at junior school for owning my own bottle of ink (Quink, blue/black), instead of having to use what was in the ink pots on our desks, clogged up with bits of blotting paper.
The only sweets available without coupons(points) were lollipops. We`d go in the shop and say "Are lollipops on points?" and the shopkeeper would say "No, they`re on sticks!" Standing joke between us and her, it was used for ages!

Being bathed in the copper
Using the mangle for sheets and my nan getting cross when the buttons were pulled off the shirts
Flit spray
Putting fertiliser pellets in the ground next to the tomato plants (Plantoids?) with my nan
Riding up and down the road on the petrol tank of my uncle's motor bike
Listening to Journey into Space (re-listening this century on Radio 4 extra)
Reading the Eagle comic and being rude about my sister's Girl's Crystal
Using the scaffolding on the new housing estate we moved to as a climbing frame
Jumping in a puddle only to go in up to my neck in very dirty water as it was an uncovered manhole
Jacko skates
Playing out all day and not allowed to hang around indoors
All sorts of other mischief as well

The Four Marys were in Bunty.
I thought they were and have just checked. Started in 1958.

Men who whistled all the time.
Eating bags of 'scraps' free from fish shop and just bits of crispy batter.
Trip to cinema with parents once a week ( it was cheap back then.)
Being bored to tears in said cinema once a week.the films were not aimed at children.
Metal roller skates that made a heck of a racket when skated on.
Hoola hoops, who could keep it going the longest?

Add to the list:
Pubs that were really only for men( although certain types of women went in there now and again!) pubs only served drinks, no food, except those deep in the country who would only do things like ham and eggs if pushed.
Trolley buses.
Sweet shops (part of newsagent) that had a penny section where children had to wait patiently to be served.
Bars of toffee that lasted ages.
Seeing (out of our reach both in height and in price) large boxes of chocs with pics of kittens and tied with pink ribbons.Always wanted one of those!

I thought The Four Mary's were in Girls Crystal?I always liked those stories too, I do remember Jackie but was too old for it by that time.Also Bunty and all the other comics too.About half of the memories here I can remember, I suppose that we all had different upbringings town/village etc.There is already a book about the 50's called something like Tin Baths And Dripping.
Poking sticks into large half dried cow pats
Picking bluebells and taking them home, also any other wild flowers we came across.
New dresses and cardigans and sandals for Whitsun.
Making liquorice water and taking it in a bottle along with apples for a picnic with friends and playing games by the stream/in the woods/farmers fields etc.
Helping put clothes through the wringer/mangle in Grandma's garden.
Pinching black currants and gooseberries and eating them in Grandad's fruit garden.Ditto tomatoes and grapes in his greenhouse.
Mixing cocoa and sugar in a cup and eating it with a small spoon.
Sprinkling white sugar on buttered bread, yum.
Putting Blanco on gym shoes.
Freezing house in Winter, and Jack Frost windows.
Painfully chapped hands and chilblains.
Free range dogs and cats.
Free range children.

Mrs Mopp! I still have that book. The coronation mug was broken yrs ago.

KatyK I am fairly sure the four Marys were in School Friend. Does any one else know for sure?

I once bought 4penny worth of chips when walking into town after school to meet my parents. (I was about 7yrs old or younger.) My mum did her usual shocked look as she seemed to think that eating chips in the street was common. Another put down from her. (I have mentioned before on GN about my mother being a failed snob.)

Going locally with friends to pick raspberries for pocket money. My mother grumbling that it cost her more to supply sandwiches and drink than I brought home in hard cash but I was out of the house all day with my friends.

Wearing garters to keep my stockings up in winter.

Clarks sandals in summer, lace ups in winter.

Special outfit to wear to Mass each Sunday.

Bedroom decorated like a B&B, not allowed to pin anything on the wall.

Stone hot water bottles

Same menu each week, must have fish on Fridays.

When we had a car, very late 50's, we could drive to the nearest town to buy fish and chips. Being Scotland, we usually had white pudding.

It never seemed to rain!

Mrsmopp - I still buy blancmange to use in trifles. It's getting harder to come by though.

I love blancmange, haven't had any for years...and milk jelly too
Did anyone buy a pennyworth of 'scrump' from the fish and chip shop - all the bits of batter that had dropped off the fish? Used to eat it walking home from Brownies/Guides.
Jackie magazine, was there one called Judy too?
Beano and Dandy
The pleasure to be had from a new drawing book and fresh crayons
Bunty Annual for Christmas, Guiness Book of Records annual too.....

Coronation book was Elizabeth Our Queen, written by Richard Dimbleby.
He was the TV commentator for the event.
We then sat at long tables outside and had sandwiches, jelly and blancmange.
Do kids still eat blancmange? Remember that?

We all left our back doors open.

AshTree - I can remember the four Marys names. Mary Cotter, Mary Field, Mary Simpson and Mary Raleigh (although someone on GN reminded me that it was actually Radleigh, I think). It's very strange because I can see them vividly in my mind.

Coal fires in railway station waiting rooms.
The smell of steam trains.
Arriving covered in black smuts.
Remembering to wear. dark clothes if travelling by train.
Mum licking the corner of her hanky and wiping the smuts off my face.
Oh yes I remember all this so well.
Just don't ask me what I did last week cos I've forgotten!!

mrsmop you and others have great interest in this subject, and although it was not my error, I very much enjoyed reading the posts. Perhaps you should write a book about growing up in the 50's. I would definitely buy a copy.

Coke stoves in the corner of classrooms and the milk bottles being lined up to melt the ice.
Roller skates that strapped to your feet and extended to fit.
Taking empty bottles back to the shop to get a refund.
Playing hopscotch - scratching the squares with a stone and using a stone to play.

Thanks for this thread, it has brought back a lot of memories

I can remember nearly all of the things on it, my childhood came back in one big swoop!

We had a coronation party and we all went in fancy dress, my elder sister actually went as the Queen and I was a daffodil ... made out of green and yellow crepe paper. I still have the photograph as they hired a photographer to attend the party.
I lived in a house with a bathroom and electricity but an aunt and uncle still had gas lights and ash midden well into the 60s.
Steam trains and running to the end of uncle's market garden to wave to the drivers. My uncle getting a new Bedford lorry to take his produce to the shops in 1953 and it is still being driven today although mostly at rallies.
Welts on my legs from the wellies in the winter and shrunken wool mittens from playing snowball fights.

Almost all of the foregoing
Reading them has brought back so many memories
The scorched legs
Liberty bodices - ugh
Icy windows and freezing bedroom
Stuart hibberd on the wireless
Reserving latest Enid blyton at the library
My only "owned" books were annuals at Christmas
Five bob postal orders for birthdays - straight into P.O. book
Lino on the stairs
Having school friend and girls' crystal delivered. - great weekly treat
Being given my ration book to buy paltry amount of sweets at Woolies

I've enjoyed this nostalgic half hour or so. It's good to remember but thank God for central heating and duvets .... and the ipad without which I wouldn't be reading/ writing this

What lovely memories, I can recall many of them.
Also, The School Friend comic and the School Friend Birthday Club with the little blue bird badge.
My lovely books, Jane Eyre, Little Women, and the rest of the series which I still treasure today.
My dad's moped and later his first car, a little black Austin I think.
Tripe and onions, spagetti made with bacon, plucking a goose at Christmas, feathers on the floor.
Passing the 11plus exam
Mothers block black mascara, Evening in Paris perfume, Dansettes, Elvis, BillHayley and Rock and Roll, Top of the Pops on Thursdays, and Juke Box Jury, Sugar soaked pink net petticoats .Cliff Richard in concert, coming home in a Police car as the buses had all stopped.
Running away from home.
Fred next door's garden, crammed with prize winning dahlias
The blood red paeony outside the back door
Parents who always seemed to be busy working.

Numberplease
Your comment about the the rhubarb with the sugar dip has just brought the smell and taste right back to me.

It is so sour my face has wrinkled up with the sourness of it. I have never had a smell and taste memory come back to me as vividly as that before.