A Dangerous childhood?

By present day standards children between the wars lived quite dangerous lives in their leisure time.Hours spent without adult supervision, roaming hither and thither with just a few friends.Country children were off into the countryside, often miles away

from home, following footpaths through farmland, playing in woodlands, climbing trees, crossing streams and sometimes rivers. If their were no tiddlers to be seen then the water was OK to drink!

Chasing rabbits using slingshots or makeshift catapults which often caused more damage to the firer than to the wildlife they were aimed at.  Bows  fashioned from small
saplings and string fired arrows made from any woody material which fortunately was rarely straight enough to allow the flight to be true. Making camps in the woods  from anything available and lighting camp fires to toast some bread or whatever they had, which if they had the skill, might even be a hedgehog.  Picking blackberries in fields which also contained a bull, but  of course it was quite safe providing you weren't wearing red.

City children had only slightly less freedom.  Off to the park where although the playgrounds were often supervised the equipment was mostly of the kind which is regarded as being too dangerous today.  Swings with heavy wooden seats hanging from strong chains.

 Umbrella swings, cast iron rocking horses and rope maypoles provided the thrills that youngsters wanted and would still want if they were allowed. Twenty foot high slides which  had no safety rails, but no one seemed to fall off no matter how much pushing and shoving there was on the stairs climbing up.
Even five year olds were entrusted to go to the local shop to make purchases, "running errands" it was called which was OK as long as there were not too many items to remember.

The street was also a play area suited to cricket, football, hopscotch, skipping, rounders as well as makeshift swings from lampposts. The traffic, of course, was considerably less than today and much of it horse drawn, which provided the more adventurous the opportunity to gain a ride by hanging onto the back of a cart.

  Those living in the riverside area also had the traffic on the Thames to watch, tugboats, steamers, barges and still the occasiona rower.  The watching was

often from precarious perches on walls or the steps leading down to the river itself.  There had been warnings from parents that falling in the water would result in having 25 needles because of the dirty water, but this was no deterrent.

If the Tower of London was within walking distance then there was the man made beach.  There were always adults about of course, but not necessarily the parents of the children who were there.

Where these children neglected by being left unsupervised in that environment?  It was not considered like that then and who is to say that it was wrong.

These images are mainly from the Facebook group Old school eastenders

Free Councillors

Underpaid Councillors

Heard a local councillor on the TV saying that he would not be standing for election again as he could not afford it. Couldn't follow his point very well as Councillors in most councils get close to £10,000 a year and committee chairpersons get considerably more.  surely this is sufficient to cover any loss of earnings for attending a few daytime meetings.

Once upon a time public spirited folk stood for election in order to serve their local communities, not for payment or perks.

When my Dad was on the council of the Metropolitan Borough council of Stepney in 1928 there were no payments of any kind.  Councillors, which included Clem Attlee  as well as my dad, did their day jobs and attended council meetings in the evenings, quite often until late.

When I was a councillor and later Alderman of the Borough of Lewisham in the 1950s there were still no payments for being a councillor.  During my term legislation was introduced to allow the payment of travelling expenses. . To attend committee and council meetings   I would drive to the town hall, pay parking fees but was only able to claim bus fares, despite the fact that there often no buses running by the time extended meetings finished.  I did not claim my expenses at any time as I refused to be part of such an insulting system.

When I had a term as Deputy Mayor I was even further out of pocket. We had an official car to take Jean and I to various functions that the Mayor could not attend, but there was no provision for paying for a babysitter whilst we were away from home.

There is no reason why anyone should be out of pocket by being an elected representative of the people, but I doubt very much back then, that anyone was ever deterred from standing for election because there were no payment for actually doing the job.