Flash From The Past

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Flash From The Past

This topic has 56 replies, 29 voices, and was last updated 8 June 2024 at 11:22 by Martin Dilly 2.

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28 February 2024 at 16:12 #716686
Harry Wilkes
Participant
@harrywilkes58467
Dont ask why but sitting eating my breakfast this morning I had a flash back to my childhood I have been to the local shop to pick up an ‘accumulator’ for the radio. Any one else got memories of past items we no longer use today ?

H

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28 February 2024 at 17:44 #716714
Nigel Graham 2
Participant
@nigelgraham2
Possibly my parents’ gas-stove before they bought a modern model.

Its lighter was a long, thin hose terminating via a (probably ‘Bakelite’) handle in a nozzle that clipped into a combined valve and flintlock screwed the side of the cooker.

Lifting the house through a right-angle turned on its own gas supply, then the flint-lock ignited a small flame at the nozzle and released the unit from the ignition assembly. You could then take this flame-on-a-string to whichever ring, grill or oven burner was needed.

It had a secondary use: as Dad’s cigarette-lighter.
28 February 2024 at 18:21 #716720
Harry Wilkes
Participant
@harrywilkes58467
Nigel that was ‘a modern model’ our gas stove was lit with a swan vester 🙂

H
28 February 2024 at 19:13 #716734
Diogenes
Participant
@diogenes
..the ‘openers’ that pressed a triangular hole in cans of evaporated milk..

..the 9mm rimfire ‘garden gun’..
28 February 2024 at 19:18 #716736
MichaelR
Participant
@michaelr
Harry. Yes I remember having to go and collect the fully charged accumulator and leave the uncharged one to be recharged, I also got sent to the local shop for a new Gas Mantle and being told in no uncertain terms “don’t shake the box” on your way back home.
28 February 2024 at 19:37 #716745
Bazyle
Participant
@bazyle
Having a record player in the car. Before cassettes and 8-track it took 45s in a slot a bit like a CD player.

VHS tapes!
28 February 2024 at 19:45 #716747
bernard towers
Participant
@bernardtowers37738
Paying 3s 6d for a gallon of 5 star!!!!
28 February 2024 at 20:17 #716754
Bazyle
Participant
@bazyle
er, when it was that price had they invented the star grading?

Valve radios and TVs.

Inkwells, phased out after my first year at school when I got a fountain pen.
28 February 2024 at 20:30 #716756
norman valentine
Participant
@normanvalentine78682
Inkwells! It used to be very special to be chosen as ink monitor for the week. It was good fun going round the classroom filling the inkwells on each desk.
28 February 2024 at 20:40 #716759
ChrisLH
Participant
@chrislh
I was a London lad evacuated to a mining district on the Derbyshire/Nottinghamshire border during the war. No bathroom in the house that I was sent to so the system was that Douglas (the resident boy) and I were put in a tin tub in front of the rather compact range for our Saturday scrubbing down. The whole operation was masterminded by Grandma Bacon from the next village and she was always anxious to get the job done in the shortest possible time. There were distractions however as Saturday was the day that “Jack Accumulator” called to swap the named article as there was no electricity in the house to run the radio. Douglas and I were being slow enjoying ourselves and consequently exciting Grandma who uttered her ultimate threat “Jack Accumulator will be here soon and if he catches you two in the bath he’ll pull your tassels !”. Nothing sinister about Jack by the way.
28 February 2024 at 21:06 #716763
Nigel Graham 2
Participant
@nigelgraham2
“Coppers” (wash-boilers fired by gas, via a hose plugged into a suitable gas-tap I think), ponches (a bell-shaped copper agitator on a wooden handle for plunging the washing up and down in the hot soapy water) and mangles.

Front rooms kept “for best” – whenever that ever was.

Though in Grandad & Grandma’s Victorian terraced home (on the marginally posher side of the street in an estate rather like that in the Coronation Street title image) in the long-vanished Hyson Green area of Nottingham, the front-room was also the passage, past the head of the coal-cellar stairs, to the cosy back room and scullery. Thence via a tiny garden to the w.c. with high-level cast-iron cistern in a brick shed (aye, a brick-built ….).

Cars with starter push-buttons and “trafficators”. Once I found a curious, die-cast hemi-cylinder with a couple of pipe connections on top, and an internal vane screwed to a shaft that protruded from one side. I learnt later it was the vacuum-motor for windscreen-wipers operated by the induction depression, so its operation depended on the state of the engine’s running at the time.

RAC and AA members’ roadside telephone boxes.
28 February 2024 at 21:27 #716766
Diogenes
Participant
@diogenes
..taking the quart can down to the milking parlour..
28 February 2024 at 22:00 #716773
Harry Wilkes
Participant
@harrywilkes58467
Nigel we had what was known as a brewhouse across our yard with a large ‘cauldron’ type wash boiler with coal fire beneath it, my Uncle had installed a bath in there for us but the part I remember the most was after having a bath in the winter the fire going under the boiler the place hotter than hades you had to make a mad dash across the yard through 12″ snow to get back in the house

H
28 February 2024 at 22:02 #716775
JohnF
Participant
@johnf59703
On 28 February 2024 at 19:13 Diogenes Said:

..the ‘openers’ that pressed a triangular hole in cans of evaporated milk..

..the 9mm rimfire ‘garden gun’..

Heck still use those can openers and sell lots of 9mm rimfire ! Must be still in’t dark ages up north !!!
28 February 2024 at 22:07 #716780
Harry Wilkes
Participant
@harrywilkes58467
MichaelR I don’t remember gas mantles in the old house the I do remember workmen putting the electric in, I do however recall gag mantles in our caravan.

H
28 February 2024 at 22:45 #716787
larry phelan 1
Participant
@larryphelan1
Yes, I remember those gas mantles very well, also the thin hose hanging from the cooker. I also remember the really old stoves installed in many of the old Tenement houses [penny in the slot type ] These stoves were built like a tank, no cheap flimsy steel sheets, just solid cast iron..

Yes, petrol was 3 and 6 a gallon, I remember that because I used to serve it. Also the milk man calling each day with his horse drawn cart with two churns.

Outside loos were the order of the day back then, and no fancy showers either ! Were we any the worst for it ? I dont think so

Ah yes The Good Old Days !!!!
29 February 2024 at 01:27 #716791
dodmole
Participant
@dodmole
Quote :- “Yes, petrol was 3 and 6 a gallon, I remember that because I used to serve it.”

Me too and didn’t you just hated it when a customer told you to fill it up and the tank filled with 4 and 13/20ths of a gallon.

Mental arithmetic was tested out of skool
29 February 2024 at 06:19 #716795
Diogenes
Participant
@diogenes
On 28 February 2024 at 22:02 JohnF Said:

On 28 February 2024 at 19:13 Diogenes Said:

..the ‘openers’ that pressed a triangular hole in cans of evaporated milk..

..the 9mm rimfire ‘garden gun’..

Heck still use those can openers and sell lots of 9mm rimfire ! Must be still in’t dark ages up north !!!

..sounds more like a reminder of a ‘Golden Age’ to me..
29 February 2024 at 06:25 #716798
Speedy Builder5
Participant
@speedybuilder5
Visit to the dentist – treadle drilling machine, silver paper reflector inside the angle poise lamp, bottle of Detol to clean the dental probes and a metalled spirit flame to make sure the microbes were dead!!
29 February 2024 at 10:11 #716810
duncan webster 1
Participant
@duncanwebster1
On 29 February 2024 at 01:27 dodmole Said:

Quote :- “Yes, petrol was 3 and 6 a gallon, I remember that because I used to serve it.”

Me too and didn’t you just hated it when a customer told you to fill it up and the tank filled with 4 and 13/20ths of a gallon.

Mental arithmetic was tested out of skool

That’s when you got out your trusty ready reckoner

Chap in our local hardware shop used one until recently
29 February 2024 at 10:14 #716813
bernard towers
Participant
@bernardtowers37738
Bazyle, Yes they had dont you remember the inside of a rover 2000 petrol flap that said 5 star only
29 February 2024 at 10:33 #716816
Mike Hurley
Participant
@mikehurley60381
IZAL toilet roll! Totally useless for intended purpose.

p.s. If you can get it , the TV channel called ‘Talking Pictures’ has a feature ‘The footage detictives’ on a Sunday afternoon which regularly looks at items such as these, usually prompted by viewers’ memories. It’s a charming hour that will give you many chuckles! Highly recommended

Mike
29 February 2024 at 10:58 #716822
HOWARDT
Participant
@howardt
Milk delivered by horse and cart. Although born in 1951 my grandparents lived within a mile of the creamery so the delivery remained the same until they gave up horses fully in the late 50’s.

Buses that didn’t start running until about 10am on a Sunday and no shops open.

And if you had a car in those days, a starter handle when the inevitable flat battery happened.

Oh so many things we had to work for.
29 February 2024 at 11:08 #716840
Russell Eberhardt
Participant
@russelleberhardt48058
On 28 February 2024 at 19:13 Diogenes Said:

..the ‘openers’ that pressed a triangular hole in cans of evaporated milk..

Still got one of those, useful when the ring-pull comes off a can of beer.

Russell
29 February 2024 at 11:51 #716850
Nicholas Farr
Participant
@nicholasfarr14254
Hi, well I have an unused Veritas mantle like the one that MichaelR has shown, and a wall lamp somewhere that the mantle fits, these were given to me by my elder late brother-in-law, many years ago, he used to use at the bottom of his stairs, where they had a right hand turn to a door into the downstairs room, they used to get regular power cuts where they lived, and he would light it when they had one when it was dark, mainly so his two girls could see where they were going.

I’ve also got one of those triangular can openers, it came with a gizmo that you could attach to the “Party Four” and “Party Seven” cans of beer, and you had those little co2 bulbs, like what was used in a soda stream. You could then draw off your beer like a draught beer in a pub.

I’ve never seen a record player in a car, and although I’ve never had one, I’ve repaired a few car radios which had B7G valves in them, mostly the filaments in the valves would fail, due to the many road vibrations they would receive. Still got a number of unused ones, of the most common ones that were used. The tallest one in the photo is 65mm from the pins to the pip at the top.

I’ve also got a couple of Steward & Patteson bottle openers somewhere as well.

Regards Nick.
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