Life For The 1950's British Housewife

[launderess]

Just reading this article made one want to have a lie down!

What exhausting work to carry on with day in and out. I mean donkey-stoning? Thought that went out with Queen Victoria's time.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/a...re-new-book-recalls-grateful-s-not-1950s.html

 

[sudsmaster]

Donkey-stoning?

 

As in, "Your ass is grass"???

 

Seriously, even though it was in America, I remember my mom doing a lot of chores in the home. But by around 1955 we had our own washer (Bendix, of course) in the basement. There was plenty of hot water and a gas range in the kitchen. The first fridge was a single door GE with a tiny freezer compartment good for a pint of ice cream and some ice cubes. She made her own jam (with grapes harvested growing wild in the nearby woods), even her own soap.

 

But by 1963 the marriage had disintegrated, we'd moved to a big city where she got an office job and we were all latchkey kids.

 

And so it goes in the latter half of the 20th century.

 

PS-The '50's British mom was still probably pretty grateful she wasn't forced to be a scullery maid for the German overlords....

 

 

[liamy1]

Washing....

The doorstep.

Yes! You would be the talk of the street if your wash water from the washing of the step was not "joined up" with the neighbours wash water by a certain time of the morning.

It was taken extremely seriously.