THE FLATLEY DRYER

[Bodger]

In the 1940 s at primary school there was a book with pictures of non white children, the teacher used to collect pennies for the "black babies" , anyone else have this ?

[Whyperion]

There was a number of the Sunshine books sold to raise money - I think one was for something like National Childrens Homes in the UK, one was for Blind Babies in Africa (1960s).

[Stanley]

That rings a bell Bodge and I can clearly remember us being taught the words of 'Swanee River' and singing it in class. (Or was it 'Old Man River'?) Paul Robeson made it very popular and I came across that many years later.
Robeson himself is largely forgotten now but he was an amazing character. Athlete, Film star, poet, writer and activist and later one of the best known singers of his generation (Including in operas). He sympathised with Russia and was investigated by McCarthy. See THIS Wiki article on the Peeksgill Massacre for a flavour of the opposition he and his supporters attracted including deliberate mis-reporting by the press.
If you have never heard it seek out the song 'Joe Hill' and listen to it, then dig into the history. (LINK) A fascinating insight into American Labour History. Also seek out Robeson's album 'Songs of Free Men'. Eventually Robeson was recognised internationally and even sang at a Welsh Eisteddfod (LINK)
In case you're wondering I admire the man more than I can say. Be careful, if you start digging and listening to him you may catch the infection!

[Stanley]

Cecil Wood's Influenza powders. A safe, quick and sure protection against feverish colds, influenza and other winter ills. Keep a supply of Cecil Wood’s Powders or Tablets handy....

This advertisement on the Manchester Evening News in 1944 was typical of the flood of patent medicines that were relied on by the public in the days before the NHS arrived in 1947. I remember these particularly because my father swore by them and occasionally I was treated to one if I had a bad cold. I suspect one of the main ingredients was quinine, they were very gritty and bitter. Cecil Wood was a chemist in Hazel Grove to the south of Stockport. My mother swore by Beecham's Pills and I can clearly remember little twists of Fenning's Little Lung Healers, they were tiny balls and again, if I had a cold I was given them. Fenning's also made Fever Cure which was always in the medicine cupboard.
By then things had improved a bit since the days when cures for cancer were advertised in the 19th century but not much. It was a huge market. Looking at the shelves in chemist's shops I get the impression that there are still just as many but mostly aimed at the 'well-being' market rather than ailments.... As GP appointments get more problematic we may see the market expand and many a time a patent Medicine is cheaper than a prescription.

[Stanley]

Underworld at War is bringing back a lot of memories. They were strange times, almost impossible to imagine these days. I often wonder how it all affected our development and think that one of the main effects was that anyone reared in that time has a very clear sight of what is important. I think that many people see me as unemotional and hard, that may be true but we had to avoid panic then and deal with whatever was thrown at us. In some cases literally! Imagine going to school with shrapnel dropping from the sky, every piece lethal. Can you imagine the panic there would be today? We just collected it for souvenirs.
Funny thing is that I don't remember it as a sad time, humans are very adaptable! Even nights in the Anderson Shelter in the back garden bring back good memories....

[PanBiker]

Imagine going to school with shrapnel dropping from the sky, every piece lethal.

During an air raid? I don't think so Stanley, after the event surely?

[Whyperion]

Where were the morning raids and incidents ( I presume there would have been photo-recon from axis planes in the daylight )? I thought most occured evenings onwards ? Going through bomb and similar instances around mum's locality I have identified some people she knew who lost their lives, the impact was sometimes never recovered from by their surviving children - though mum spent the early years of WW2 in the West Country on an unofficial evacuation ( which was interesting as she was not formally put into a school, missed a term , then was taken on for 6 weeks as a pupil- teacher looking assiting the young ones from the East End who were offical evacuees). With a school leaving age of 14 she was back into London for working for the three last years - first in drapery sales - which she hated so then into lamp production and dispatch- mostly for the war efforts initally working in temporary accomodation with the roof part missing and other nearby to her locations.

[Stanley]

Quite often the sirens sounded during the half hour it took to get to school (we used to play out a bit on the way) and the rule was if we had got as far as the pub on the bridge we kept going and went in the brick shelter in the school yard. I have an idea that the Jerries used to schedule some raids later to give them a bit of daylight to have a crack at the viaduct, they could never see it in the dark. In winter we were in half light as we went to school. This wasn't frequent but it happened and my point was that these days the risk would not be taken.
Of course the thing to remember is that shrapnel was from the Ack Ack, 'friendly fire'! The shells were designed to fragment into nasty lethal pieces and were usually large enough to damage roofs let alone little lad's heads!
There were also the delayed action bombs and we sometimes had them while we were at school. We never had one of them near us and so teaching didn't stop unless the sirens had sounded.
The Air Raid Wardens had some near misses. Father was very close to one that hit the railway line as he was walking under the railway bridge on Georges Road one night. I have an idea the ARP post was up there somewhere.
I can't remember what happened to my collection of shrapnel, I suspect father used to take it to work and put it in the scrap bin. I can remember one big piece being hot when I picked it up.....
Best find I ever had was what I realised later was a full clip of 20mm cannon shells. I staggered into school with it and it caused a bit of a stir. They sent for the Bomb Disposal to deal with it and I was told never to do it again!

[Whyperion]

Quite risky to get to the NWest of England overflying other areas. I am sure near mum's it was friendly fire that killed at least two persons on the ground , possibly from defending aircraft machine guns, I doubt if official records would detail the exact cause of death.

[Stanley]

Following Kev and Ian's travails with the licensing system I reflect on how simple it all used to be. If you had a Driving Licence you could drive anything at one time. Then it started to get complicated, I could never understand why I was licensed to drive any weight of wagon, steam propelled or track-laying laying vehicle but not a tram. Not that it was ever an issue.... The very early licences were converted to 'All Groups' on granddad rights but I was too young to have one of them.

[Stanley]

The older you get the more change you see, some of it you can see coming like the improvements in transport and many services but some come out of left field and take you by surprise.
I can still remember going into Lloyd's Bank on Underbank in Stockport once a week.



The inside of the bank was as old-fashioned as the outside and you did your business with a clerk who knew you and entered all the details in a large ledger using a dip in pen. A bit like the bank in the Harry Potter films. It was possible for a clerk to look after the same ledger sitting in the same place for the whole of his working life. The atmosphere was church-like and nobody would ever dream of raising their voice.
Look where we are now over 70 years later, banking has changed completely and in Barlick we count ourselves lucky (At the moment....) to have one bank, Barclay's, still doing business on the High Street. It won't be long before this one goes as well. I never saw this change coming and still can't reconcile myself to it.

[chinatyke]

... in Barlick we count ourselves lucky (At the moment....) to have one bank, Barclay's, still doing business on the High Street. It won't be long before this one goes as well. I never saw this change coming and still can't reconcile myself to it.

Will you still need physical banks when there is no 'real money' and all transactions are done electronically? Can you see that change coming in the near future?

[Stanley]

No. Because that assumes too much trust in the system. People like me still enjoy using real money.

[Stanley]

During the war there were no fireworks on sale for Guy Fawkes Day. But that didn't mean there was a shortage of pyrotechnics! It was amazing how many Home Guard thunderflashes use in training to simulate battle conditions were liberated and because of the naval connections father used to find Very Light cartridges that when thrown on a fire gave a very satisfactory display. We used to have a small fire in daylight hours to get round the black-out restrictions. Then there was something I haven't seen for years, Bengal Lights. These were matches with a thicker wooden stem and a large amount of pyrotechnic material on them. They burned like blue flares. I seem to remember seeing them in war time, perhaps old stock. Larger versions were used at one time for signalling at sea and the name 'Bengal' is thought to come from the fact that the province of Bengal in India was a major source of saltpetre, an ingredient in the compound.

[Bodger]

Indoor fireworks, they created awful smells !

[Tizer]

Do any of you remember making `volcanos' with a pile of orange ammonium dichromate crystals in a darkened room? Spectacular! When you put the light back on you found the orange crystals had been replaced with a much bigger pile of green flakes of chromium oxide. It's not recommended now because the chromium compounds are carcinogenic.
See this video: Video

Also see: `A Chemical Volcano: The Decomposition of Ammonium Dichromate' LINK

[Stanley]

I remember them well.... the pellets that became snakes.... And yes the smell was awful!

[Stanley]

Thinking about the indoor fireworks (which are still being sold on the web) I am reminded of the popularity of 'Chemistry Sets' which came with some ingredients that would definitely be banned today! In those days before 'pharmacies' we had Chemist's Shops like Elmers in Newtown and you could get chemicals from them to top up your sets when supplies ran low. I have an idea that if you went into a modern pharmacy and asked for an acid, or saltpetre and carbon you would not get very far. Further you would be immediately suspected of making bombs at home! That was exactly what we did in those days, we all manufactured crude gunpowder and this resulted in some extremely satisfactory flashes and bangs! Imagine that now....
The funny thing is that we never suffered any significant harm and I believe our activities taught us a lot. How many modern kids have built their own electric motor or crystal set? All right, modern H&S policies are on the whole a good thing but today's kids, having swapped real life for virtual worlds in their bedrooms might be safer physically but these 'safer' activities carry their own perils. Making our own explosives didn't expose us to the dangers inherent in unlimited access to the internet. On the whole I would rather have my chemistry set!

[Stanley]

One of the things that has changed completely in my lifetime is public attitudes to the LGBT community.
I heard a piece on World Service this morning that prompted me to have a web furtle. Have a look at THIS article about the baritone Lucia Lucas. (She doesn't want to be called 'transgender', she is a woman who is a baritone and a very successful one.)
I was reared to be very suspicious of anyone who deviated from what was seen as 'normal' but I'm glad to be able to report that common sense has prevailed and I find Lucia's story pleases me, nowt wrong with being an individual!

[plaques]

Within my life's working experience I've worked with every permutation of 'gender' that is possible. In all other respects I've never found them to be different to anybody else. Lucia's story is not that far removed from the Castrato singers we used to hear on the radio. What's the big deal?

[Tizer]

I seem to recall my education telling me that gender was a grammatical term for the distinction between masculine, feminine and neuter, whereas sex was the distinction between male, female hermaphrodite. Somewhere along the timeline the word gender started to be used in place of the word sex for the latter distinction. I wonder if it was due to a prudish American avoidance of the word `sex'?

[Tripps]

I seem to recall my education telling me that gender was a grammatical term for the distinction between masculine, feminine and neuter, whereas sex was the distinction between male, female hermaphrodite. Somewhere along the timeline the word gender started to be used in place of the word sex for the latter distinction. I wonder if it was due to a prudish American avoidance of the word `sex'?

I think you're on the money here Tiz.

This seems to be filed under 'not a lot of people know that'.

[Stanley]

I agree with you David. File under the same heading as white meat for chicken breast and zerk for grease nipple. (and I still believe they invented Canola because they had completely misunderstood the origin of the term Rapeseed Oil!) We must have been lucky and weren't indoctrinated as children.
The same thing applies to race. I don't come up against it much but was shocked yesterday when in a conversation the woman told me that our MP was well aware of the high infant mortality in Pendle, she speaks to him regularly and he says that it is because of 'in-breeding' in the Asian community....... I told her that was what Hitler said in the 1930s about anybody who wasn't 'pure Aryan' and walked away..... It upset me and I reflected that this was just an insight into the depths of a rabid Right Wing tendency. Will we never learn?

[Tizer]

In humans, civilised behaviour is just a thin film of polish on the heavy furniture of primitive animal behaviour below. We gave it a fresh coat of polish after the two world wars but it's wearing thin once again.

[Tripps]

Have you heard of Godwin's Law? It says that anyone who introduces Hitler into an internet discussion, is deemed to have lost the argument.

I think there is some evidence which might support the lady's comments ..From the BBC