I've noticed many of the pregnant women didn't have telephones in their homes and they or the midwife had to run down to the public phone. This surprised me because I thought by the late 50s the majority of homes had phones. I know it was a poor area, but not that poor.
shareI'd be very surprised if the majority of homes, especially in working class areas, had a phone in the 50s. My wife's parents didn't get a phone until c1975.
shareWe had our first phone in 1962 and that was only because we moved into a corner shop and my parents needed it for business use, none of my friends families had telephones at that time. This was in a market town with semis.....
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I don't think it was until the 70s that people with telephones began to be a majority in the UK. We were a little bit behind the USA! (And that also goes for washing machines, fridges and freezers, etc.)
If there aren't any skeletons in a man's closet, there's probably a Bertha in his attic.
We didn't get our phone till the early 70s. We got out fridge about that time too (no more keeping milk cold in a bucket of water in the pantry in summer!) And it was about 1975 we got a colour TV.
shareWe didn't get our phone till the early 70s. We got out fridge about that time too (no more keeping milk cold in a bucket of water in the pantry in summer!) And it was about 1975 we got a colour TV.
This was mentioned in the books too. Very few of the families who lived in Poplar had telephones. These people were generally very poor, and phones were expensive. And since their lives tended to revolve around a very limited geographic area (i.e. they could easily see and speak to most of the people they knew face to face) there was no real reason to pay for a phone.
This article mentions that in 1964, fewer than half of homes in London had a phone.
http://www.20thcenturylondon.org.uk/theme/home-family
Phones were relatively expensive and the waiting list was quite long (well, it certainly was when I was a child in the late '70s). Most households in my area had phones by around 1980, I reckon. That said, I was an university in the 1990s, and a couple of friends' parents had no home telephone still.
Delia's parents are not on the telephone (this was covered in the last series) and they are in a higher socioeconomic group than the residents of Poplar, judging by how the mother was dressed, the fact that she was able to spend several weeks away from home with her sister in London, the fact that their child trained as a nurse etc.....even the more affluent working classes/lower mc often didn't have phones in the '50s.
Or perhaps Delia's mother lied to Patsy when she told her they didn't have a phone, because she did not want Patsy to contact Delia. I think she suspected their relationship.
shareBecause poverty. Full stop.
shareMy sister in Kent didn't have a phone until the mid 70s. A friend's family in rural Buckinghamshire didnt have a phone as late as 1983.
At that time, phone service and phones were a government run thing, rather than a free market. You didn't even just buy your own phone in a shop, they were given out by the British Post Office, who were also the only service. Calls, even local calls, were expensive. Local calls still cost today, unlike in the US where local landline calls are no charge.
My family had a phone from the early 60s, but many others had to run out to the nearest phone box, like my sister when she married.
I first visited the UK in the 1970s; we stayed with various families throughout England and Wales, who ranged from middle to upper class, and they all had phones. Despite having family and friends in the UK, I had no idea phones took so long to reach so many families. I grew up in PA during the sixties and seventies; we had a phone from the time I was born. We also had a TV and cable (our small city was in a mountainous region). I later found out my grandparents had given the TV to my parents, while my father was a young CPA just making his mark. When I was five, we moved into a house from our small apartment. My parents were trying to provide me with a sibling. My grandparents surprised me at Christmas with my own small black and white TV, as well as my own stereo (I adored music). Most of my friends felt envious. I remember pretending to be asleep, while watching Star Trek with the sound down low. My siblings, parents and I all received gifts of TVs (later color ones) from my grandparents every few years. It was really nostalgic, since a sweet local appliance repairman always delivered our new sets; he was already elderly when I was a child. We always enjoyed his visits. If we saw Mr. Smith's car parked in front of our house, we knew there was a superb gift awaiting us.
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they were given out by the British Post Office
It seemed to me when I visited the UK in the 80s, local calls were charged per minute. Having to use a public phone meant prioritizing which calls were important enough to warrant the cost.
By contrast in Canada, my dad paid a set monthly amount and then we could make unlimited local calls for that month. Both my grandmothers had dedicated telephone tables/desks with a chair beside each because they were used to having long chats with friends. They'd never have been doing that if they paid by the minute like in the UK.
My parents got their first phone in 1963 -- but up until the early seventies there were "party lines" so you could actually hear other people's conversations. I remember my mum yelling at people to get off the line so she could make a call.
share"Party Lines"! That's something you'd have to explain to today's young!
I read somewhere that the number of people owning phones in the UK didn't exceed non-owners until around 1980.
If there aren't any skeletons in a man's closet, there's probably a Bertha in his attic.
Birmingham three-bed semi, nice enough area.... didn't get a 'phone until 1975. Before that was the Big Red Call box on the corner.
I remember my dad going mad because at age 8 my first call was to the talking clock. Very extravagant.
'tler
The lack of awareness of US residents regarding living conditions in the rest of the world, even the UK, is embarrassing.
The wealth of the US, particularly post-WW2, was very isolating.
England was almost bankrupt by the end of the first year of WW2 and it didn't finish paying off its WW2 loans from the US until recent history. Hell rationing didn't completely end until 1954 or 1955. It may be understandable to take for granted the wealth and relative luxury many people in the US enjoyed but hopefully people will learn.
So, yes, poverty and an overall lesser post war economy prevented much of England from benefitting from what those of us in the US took for granted.
So, yes, poverty and an overall lesser post war economy prevented much of England from benefitting from what those of us in the US took for granted.
Not all Americans are insulated from the poverty of that time in England and the rest of Europe. Many of us had family come back from that war to tell their stories. (And some of us had family who didn't come back). Some of us have read extensively about that time and although we didn't experience the same kind of shortages can still have a measure of understanding of the deprivation. I have my grandmother's last ration book and she taught me many of her depression and ration recipes. Some us of do understand. The broad brush is not appreciated.
shareI lived with my grandparents in New York State in the early to late 60s and I remember their party line. It was a big black phone. No one called anyone long distance until Sunday when the rates were lower and only with important news. If you got a call long distance in the middle of the week it was because someone had died. We had a B&W TV until the late 60s. And that was with 4 adults - 3 of them earning a paycheck - in the house.
I lived with a middle-class French family from 1973-74 and they had no phone.
My parents had made an air reservation for me and the airline called the neighbors to reach me and tell me where I had to go to pick up my ticket.
How they ever got hold of me that way remains forever a mystery!
"I hate those guys." --Dean Wormer