When a comic story holds more than a truth .............. stories from the Eagle

Now I have no recollection of post war rationing after all I was only four when it was finally abandoned.

But there will be plenty who not only remember it but will have stories of its impact on their daily lives.

Some of them will also have been regular readers of the Eagle comic which began in 1950 and continued into the following decade and here is the connection because running through several of the stories beginning with the first was how at a critical moment the Earth’s government was forced to introduce food rationing.*

Now even though I have read and re-read the stories countless times it never quite occurred to me that older readers of the Eagle would have vivid memories of both wartime and post war rationing.

That first Eagle story  was followed by the Red Moon Mystery when the planet was threatened by a rogue planet which had once destroyed all life on Mars and caused havoc before it was destroyed, which was repeated later by other stories which saw the earth’s population forced to be evacuated from their homes and ultimately  off the planet.

And when it wasn’t a natural disaster of sorts then there were always evil galactic nasties out on inter planetary domination of which the worst was the Mekon a not very nice dictator from Venus and his army of followers whose slavish devotion to their leader and ruthless behaviour would have been all too familiar to a generation that had been children during the last world war.

Of course such events are the stuff of good adventures and in slightly different forms will have appeared before and since but for those of us growing up in the 1950s they were pretty much a backdrop to the real thing.

Location; The 1950s

Pictures; from Eagle Comics in the collection of Andrew Simpson

*The Venus Story, April 14, 1950 – September 28 1951

One hundred years of one house in Well Hall part 10........... from bread and dripping to Museli

This is the continuing story  of one house in Well Hall Road and of the people who lived there including our family.*

Now I suspect pretty much every generation thinks that there’s was the one which has seen the most profound change and I am the first to accept that mine has no monopoly on the new inventions, mould breaking fashions and seminal music.

But there is no doubt that those of us born just after the last war, who started school in the early 1950s and are just beginning to enter retirement have experienced a bewildering revolution in what we eat and how we prepare that food.

I will have been four when rationing was finally abandoned, and in the succeeding decades came to take for granted a huge range of new foods sourced from all over the world and delivered within hours of being harvested.

And of course with all that came a deluge of specialist utensils, ever larger cookers and the microwave.

All of which makes me think back to our tiny kitchen at 294, which was just large enough to take an old battered Cannon gas cooker, and small fridge which nestled either side of the sink.

In their wisdom the architects had provided a largish store cupboard under the stairs and here went the bulk of our dried and tinned food.

And what couldn’t be found the cupboard or the fridge was still bought fresh and eaten on the same day.

But the fridge is the key to the change.

In the 1950s the growing reliance on frozen food would lift some of the drudgery out of preparing food.

Now I still like washing carrots, peeling potatoes and shelling peas but for sheer speed nothing beats opening the packet of frozen peas.

And sixty years ago the adverts for frozen foods focused on that simple message that they were quick to use and because of the way they had been frozen on the day they were harvested were bound to be fresher than the peas and carrots which had made their way from the field via the market to the small greengrocer, whose turn over dictated that the produce might sit for days before it was bought.

Of course few people in 1956 had a fridge let along a freezer which was why the bags of frozen vegetables came in small sizes which were bought and used on the same day.

And in much the same way out went the old fashioned breakfast of porridge, eggs, bacon and toast in favour of the breakfast cereal.

Now these had been around since the 1930s, and there are ads in the collection for Corn Flakes and Rice Crispies, but the 50s offered up a new and exciting range, often marketed with a toy or other novelty and clearly aimed at the young.

Mother was quick off the mark to try the "new TV dinners  for one" which came out in the late 50s but equally died a death in our house as too expensive and not that nice.

Instead we reverted to simpler home cooked food but there was no going back on the changes that had happened.

As each of us left to set up our own homes the variety and the quantity of what we bought and ate just kept on growing.

But Dad preferred his tins, and on one memorable evening after I had cooked a pasta dish he smiled and said quietly that "it was good but  didn't really like  food messed about."

Location;Well Hall, Eltham, London


Pictures;  adverts for Birds Eye Foods and Sugar Puffs, from Woman’s Own, January 12 1956

*One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/One%20hundred%20years%20of%20one%20house%20in%20Well%20Hall

One hundred years of one house in Well Hall part 9........... bold new designs and a bit of Formica

This is the continuing story of one house in Well Hall Road and of the people who lived there including our family.*

I often wonder what  those who lived in our house in the 1950swould have made of the new household designs which were featured in Woman’s Own for January 12 1956.

Of course they may never have taken the magazine but they would not have escaped the exciting new ideas for transforming their early 20th century house into one which fitted with the 1950s.

Looking at them today they seem quite ordinary and just a little old fashioned but back then they were at the cutting edge of all that was new and innovative.

The basic designs were all there two decades earlier but were way out of reach of most working people.

But by the mid 50s that was changing.

It was partly as a result of the growing prosperity, along with new mass produced materials like plastic and Formica and the ever present offer of hire purchase, which meant for a “few pounds down and the rest over easy instalments” bits of the new life could be pretty much within the reach of every one.

All of which marks the 1950s off as more of a mould breaker than perhaps “the swinging 60s.”

Here were bold new colours, exciting fabrics and designs which relegated the old heavy furniture many peoples’ dreams to a place in a museum along with the odd dinosaur and other ancient relics.

And along with all these were those sheets of hardboard, which were cheap and could be applied to everything from period doors to the space in front of ripped out fireplaces.

For a few bob you could obliterate the beautiful features around doors create flat level spaces and add wonders to the fitted kitchens.

In 294 the master bedroom had lost its fire place and in its place a gigantic headboard with drop down drawers and a reddish swirly affect which I thought was the pinnacle of modern design.

But then I was only 14.

Sadly the DIYers responsible had also managed to take out the other upstairs fire places leaving just one small fine cast iron one downstairs.

Now it is pointless to rail against this vandalism.

At the time it seemed new and different and after six years of a bitter and hard war along with the preceding period of grim austerity all this was what we deserved.

And I have to admit I mounted similar attacks in the 1970s on good taste pulling out old features which gave the house its authentic feel and covering the walls with wood chip.

All of which means that I would have been no better in 1956, but just maybe now I might have cherished what was already there and just added the odd new idea.

Location;Well Hall, Eltham, London

Pictures; from Woman's Own, January 12 1956

*One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/One%20hundred%20years%20of%20one%20house%20in%20Well%20Hall

In the kitchen ……………. in 1959

Now I had all but forgotten this metal food processor.

Long before the swish big electric models, most homes had one of these.

Ours was used to mince the meat from the Sunday roast, and I suspect everything else.

It was made of metal, was operated by hand, and sat on the kitchen table.

Unlike this one, ours had a clamp, which meant that when it was not in use it would be stored away, freeing the table for other uses.

And like so many objects from the family home, I have no idea what happened to it.

I do know that in the fullness of time the basic gas cooker on the left of the picture was replaced by a similar model on the right.

Mum and Dad, I recall bought into a Cannon cooker around 1963, which survived the move from Peckham to Well Hall and lasted well into the 1980s.  Its novel feature was that it had the grill above the hob, which at the time we thought was quite neat.

All of which leaves the source for the picture, which comes from Manchester and was one of three featuring the food processor.

I am not sure why they were taken but I suspect they were part of a series focusing on modern kitchens.

In these energy conscious days, I rather think I would like a hand operated model, if only because they were so easy to use.

At which point I am sure someone will provide advice.

And they have, Barbarello pointed out that a modern version is now being sold, and more than a few have pointed out that we called them a "mincer" which I thought was just a name unique to our family.

Then to finish off Chris Payne sent over a picture of his family mincer, which I instantly recognised as the model we had in or house.

Location; Manchester

Picture; the food processor or mincer, 1959,"Courtesy of Manchester Archives+ Town Hall Photographers' Collection", https://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterarchiveplus/albums/72157684413651581?fbclid=IwAR0t6qAJ0-XOmfUDDqk9DJlgkcNbMlxN38CZUlHeYY4Uc45EsSMmy9C1YCk 

 , and the more humble one, from Chris Payne, 2020

Back in Well Hall in the 1940s

Now I have James Garner to thank for these three photographs of which the ones of his grandmother and Mrs Powell are my favourites.

James Garner's grandmother

They come from that excellent site about the Progress Estate and got me thinking just how many photographs will exist of Well Hall and Eltham.

Some were made by commercial photographers and were reproduced on picture postcards plenty of which are still in circulation.

Many more will be the family snap, often taken in a hurry and sometimes a tad out of focus but as important as those professional images.

If you are lucky there will be a name and with a name you can begin to track the history of the person staring back at you.

And if you are very lucky some of that story will be supplied by the family, so James was able to add that his great grandparents moved to The Progress Estate, moving from Oxford shortly after it was built.

"Digging though my grandmother's photos, I have found a number of photos from their house at 80 Whinyates Road, and of their neighbour Mrs Bartholomew.

Mrs Rose

I'm not too sure of the years, but I'm guessing 1940s.”

But even if the identity of the individuals is unknown they can still offer up a wonderful treasure of detail about how we lived.

I remember my mother and grandmother both wore similar wrap around aprons to the one worn by Powell.

They were cheap, effective and are as much a part of history now as the telegram or the wireless.

Today an apron might be worn just for the duration of preparing and cooking a meal and perhaps not even then.

Back when I was growing up the wrap around apron went on at the beginning of the day and pretty much stayed on all day, taken off perhaps only to go to the shops.

St Barnabas circa 1957

And for most of us there are also the detail of the houses in the background which fasten the location to the estate and look so little different from today.

All of which just leaves that last picture of St Barnabas sometime around 1957 just as it was re-emerging form its years of bomb damage.

So that just leaves me to thank James again point you to the link below and make an appeal for similar images.



Pictures; courtesy of James Garner

* Progress Estate, London, SE9, http://progressestate.blogspot.co.uk/, Whinyates Road, http://progressestate.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/whinyates-road.html