Don Dray has provided us with entertaining talks before and this new one was no exception! ‘You’ve Never Had it so Good’ covers the after war period when those of us who lived through it were able to see real changes from the almost Victorian attitudes of the pre-war period although nowhere near as far as today. Indeed nowadays I suspect youngsters would hardly believe the apparent privations we went through with food shortages and rationing for a surprising number of years after the cessation of hostilities.
The remarkable thing about Don’s presentations is that he has worked up a chronological story complete with pictures, music and sound effects from the time. Just how long it must have taken him to produce such a seamless story is not related but he clearly enjoys his self-imposed tasks – and we did too!
Starting in 1945 Don explained that money was tight and the destruction caused by air raids was well in evidence. Nearly 4 million men were demobbed in a period of a year and a half and came back to a very different Britain and a changed family with the womenfolk having learned to live independently with many children who had grown up without a father, some having never set eyes on him!
In July 1945 Clement Attlee became PM indicating that the population was looking for a change and several sweeping changes were introduced including establishing of the Bank of England and the formation of the National Health Service. Rationing continued for many items with both meat and sweets the last to be freed in 1953 and 54. New and stylish items were what was called for and if they were not available – like nylons, leg make up and fake seams did the trick! Perhaps the most scandalous design of the 1950’s was the introduction of the bikini named after Bikini Atoll on which the atomic bomb tests had taken place.
Money and its value has changed out of all recognition since the 1940’s and 50’s. 10 shillings – 50p today – would buy you meat for Sunday and vegetables and bread for the week but most people were hard up compared to today. The Beveridge report concluded that the government should find ways of fighting the 5 evils of want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. From this report came the establishment of the NHS, which began on July 5th 1948. This meant that the post war children grew up in a more healthy society.
The production of ‘prefabs’ that could be erected in 4 hours provided an answer to housing those who had been made homeless by the Luftwaffe. Despite their design life of 10-years, this was very often exceeded with houses still in use in the 1960’s. Traditional trades began to disappear many under threat from mass production. Most women lost their jobs as men returned to reclaim them. However the younger women found opportunities in factories, offices and shops although their pay was half that of the men.
Growing up in the 1940’s was closer to the experience of children in the 1900’s than it is of children today. Whilst a certain amount of corporal punishment was considered perfectly normal, out of school children had much more freedom than they do today, roaming the fields and woods for hours. With very few cars around, children could play in the streets quite safely, even in cities. Many foods were unknown such as bananas and once sweets came off rationing in 1953 and new weekly comics appeared, the demand for pocket money grew! Swing style American music from the war years was adopted by the English bands and the waltz and foxtrot gave way to jive sparking a revolution in British culture.
As the 40s gave way to the 50’s the population transformed themselves from dour worried people to enthusiasts for all sorts of new things such as irreverent radio shows, cinemas and bingo halls, danced the night away, saved for cars, motorbikes and holidays and began to think that life might not be so bad after all!
Whilst at the beginning of the 50’s television was still the poor relation to radio, by the end of the decade TV personalities were very familiar although there was little daytime TV and most programmes ended by 11 o’clock. Commercial TV was first introduced in 1955 and by the end of the decade most families owned a set and TV was undoubtedly the biggest and most influential phenomenon of the decade – and changed our lives.
Don showed examples of all these changes with everything from Frank Sinatra to the Goon Show, Hancock’s Half Hour to traditional jazz, the Festival of Britain the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, the introduction of consumer gadgets such as the washing machine and vacuum cleaner. Cycling clubs, the huge growth in football, the beginnings of the holiday industry with expansion of Holiday Camps such as Butlins and the growth of Heathrow to provide longer runways for larger planes that could fly those who could afford it to other parts of the world, still a long way from the cheap air flights of today. And much more!
Towards the end of the decade, Harold Macmillan claimed most people had “never had it so good.”
Jam tomorrow became jam today as life moved into the 1960’s.
