h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Even if you had the money, most families had to make do! In our first house my mothers kitchen had upended wooden orange crates for cupboards. Washing machines were unheard of - copper, caulrons and mangles and only on a monday. 'Common' people could was on other days my mother said and Sunday was taboo for almost everything.

(Grumpy, we seem to have several threads on the one?)

Sundays were days to stay at home! No playing with friends in the street(even no playing card games)Sunday school was a must, too. But then everything being closed, what could we have done?

Turning worn sheets and the join always in the wrong place.

I was about twelve when our kitchen got modernised n I had the old cauldron ' the workmen took out' behind the shed and kept sticklebacks etc in it .

At the same time we had a bathroom added on with an indoor toilet, think that might have been when we changed to real toilet paper . Yep the council made us feel real posh

Our "bathroom" annexe was a big success with other neighbours who didn't have one! They used to pop in with their towel and soap, and a shilling for the gas!! Now that I think of it, we could have started a business, there!

Did you do Bath on Sunday, clean pyjams, pre-warmed clean sheets. One of the nicest things.

My mum used to cover orange boxes with wallpaper or fablon to use as bedside cabinets.

We also had a number of peices of 'utility' furniture - remember the logo like two 'pac men' one chasing the other. My sister still has oa chest of drawers.

Without a washing machine, my Mum used to make do with a boiler! Everything went in at the weekend, and went through the wringer afterwards (I loved doing that!)Heated by a gas ring underneath, it practically filled the kitchen-cum-scullery. And before our "bathroom annex", when we had our baths in a tin bath at the weekend, all the neighbours knew when we'd finished our weekly ablutions, 'cos the water was thrown in the yard, and trickled down into the street!Needless to say, we'd shared the water,& the last one to go had a very cool bath!

We had an electric 'copper', no gas in the village, for a long while and a mangle in the lean-too. It was grey and cylindrical and stood on three sturdy legs. It must have had a tap on the bottom, but I don't remember. Then affluence arrived and we had a single tub hoover washing machine with mangle that folded down into the tub.

Any thing white was boiled. Soap powder was Lux or Fairy and detergents were just coming in liquid form Stergene, if I remember.

Dish cloth stew was done on the cooker in a large pot reserved for that task alone.

I can remember my mum grating Sunlight soap !