Pure-vintage lady in Scunthorpe

[David Conwill]

A friend just shared this article with me about an interesting lady who is living a pure-vintage lifestyle in the UK. It's a shame they headlined it in the context of "finding her man" but the photos are pretty neat. She seems like someone I'd like to know.

 

[LizzieMaine]

"Al Boley." Didn't he used to play shortstop for the Philadelphia Athletics?

Nice to see, though, that she hasn't been attacked by the usual rabid hounds of the Daily Mail comment section.

 

[David Conwill]

I can't read comment sections anymore. They were destroying my faith in humanity.

 

[GHT]

It's a shame they headlined it in the context of "finding her man" but the photos are pretty neat.

How do you fancy playing cupid? Send her this link.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Nice to see, though, that she hasn't been attacked by the usual rabid hounds of the Daily Mail comment section.

That's usually reserved for the "human interest" stories about us inbred Yanks.

 

[Fading Fast]

Maybe that house didn't, but plenty of British houses had indoor plumbing in '39, I might have opted to keep the bathroom, but to each his own. And the Land Girl's uniform is outstanding.

 

[GHT]

That's usually reserved for the "human interest" stories about us inbred Yanks.

That maybe how the British press describe our American cousins, but you can rest assured that although we tease about American football, Wembley stadium, home of our national soccer team, is a sellout when the NFL bring over a couple of teams to play. That inbred insult is a fallacy, you couldn't get more of a melting pot nation. You even gave us Winston Churchill: His mother was the American socialite: Jeanette "Jennie" Jerome. Best of all though, despite much pressure from the French, and despite four separate attempts to impose it, the American people refuse to adopt the metric system. It's curious that so many immigrants come from countries that are metric, yet the imperial system still holds sway, and long may it do so.

 

[vitanola]

Maybe that house didn't, but plenty of British houses had indoor plumbing in '39, I might have opted to keep the bathroom, but to each his own. And the Land Girl's uniform is outstanding.

In pre-war Britain was common for the water closet to be entered from a door in the yard, even though the device and room were actually in the house proper. These would be flush toilets, which simply did ot open into the main portion of the house. I suppose that this feature would quite effectively keep any odors entirely away from any living areas.

 

[Fading Fast]

In pre-war Britain was common for the water closet to be entered from a door in the yard, even though the device and room were actually in the house proper. These would be flush toilets, which simply did ot open into the main portion of the house. I suppose that this feature would quite effectively keep any odors entirely away from any living areas.

As always, great specific period knowledge (you and Lizzie are irreplaceable). The only-enter-from-outside flush toilet still sounds like a trade up from chamber pots and an outside loo. But again, there were some indoor bathrooms back then, so, go for it since it is defendable as period appropriate.

 

[Edward]

In pre-war Britain was common for the water closet to be entered from a door in the yard, even though the device and room were actually in the house proper. These would be flush toilets, which simply did ot open into the main portion of the house. I suppose that this feature would quite effectively keep any odors entirely away from any living areas.

Indeed. I believe it was a hangover from an older notion that a toilet was a dirty facility for a dirty job, and was best kept out of the house. (Similar cultural notions are still common among the Romany, for instance. I firmly believe you can learn a lot about a culture based on its toilet habits.) Of course, even when the toilet came indoors, so to speak, it was stil lcommon right up until, I think, the sixties for it to be housed in a separate room. My parents moved into a house in 1979 which original had a seaprate toilet and bathroom - that must have been quite ahead of its time, as it was built in 1904, and these features were original. ONe set of grandparents lived in a house built in the early post-war years; I remember them finally knocking the bathroom into one when they bought the house from the council in the mid-eighties. My own flat here in London was built post-war, opened in 1951, and the toilet and bathroom are separate. Remarkably handy, especially with guests - anyone can have a bath without tying up the toilet for that time.

 

[GHT]

My own flat here in London was built post-war, opened in 1951, and the toilet and bathroom are separate. Remarkably handy, especially with guests - anyone can have a bath without tying up the toilet for that time.

The house that I owned when I lived in Wanstead had a similar arrangement, problem was, there was no hand basin in with the WC. One of the first conversions we did was to put a basin in there, and, as there was room, we had a lavatory pan put in the bathroom. We further enhanced the house by fitting an en suite in the rather large , main bedroom. Cracked me up when we sold up and the agent described our work in the American vernacular, declaring it to have, two and a half bathrooms.

 

[Edward]

I actually considered fitting a small sink in mine, then one of those fancy toilets that have a sink built into the top of the cistern. In the end, Herself (being much more practically minded than I am on most occasions) came up with the idea of keeping a bottle of that alcohol-based hand sanitiser in there, which does the job much more simply!

 

[PeterB]

I was astonished to see the pictures of the lady's house, because the interior looks rather like the house in which I grew up, or at least when I was a small boy, back in the 60s. At that time my grandmother had many left over magazines from the 30s and 40s, and even from WW1 in her house, and the furniture was probably all pre war. I thought nothing of it at the time, and still don't. While one would not wish to have to endure some of the inconveniences of houses in wartime England, the rationing diet was really not all that bad, my father tells me, and the lady seems to be enjoying some harmless escapism. I understand that finding a husband might be difficult, but surely not that hard, if she is pleasant company. Britain, and England in particular, has a strong tradition of eccentrics.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-35734889

 

[Capesofwrath]

"Al Boley." Didn't he used to play shortstop for the Philadelphia Athletics?

Nice to see, though, that she hasn't been attacked by the usual rabid hounds of the Daily Mail comment section.

Al Bowlly was very popular in the thirties. He sang at all the big nightclubs and fashionable cafes in London which the idle rich frequented, and was very big on the wireless. His biggest successes were with the bandleader and songwriter Ray Noble, in whose bands he sang for years. He went with him to the US and had some success, and had his own radio show as well as singing with Bing Crosby. But he went back to the UK later in the thirties while Ray Noble stayed on and did very well. He was killed in a bombing raid in 1941 when a stray bomb exploded outside his flat in Mayfair.

His songs became quite popular in some circles in the early seventies too, and you would hear them played in fashionable boutiques. That was when the fashion for thirties sounds led to bands like Roxy Music doing well.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I'm a long time fan of Mr. Bowlly -- in addition to his popularity in the UK, he was very well known in the US, both thru his imported recordings, and thru his work with the stateside orchestra Glenn Miller put together for Ray Noble in 1935. I was pointing out that the "Boley" spelling indicates that the Daily Mail's editors or proofreaders clearly have no idea who he was.

 

[Capesofwrath]

I'm a long time fan of Mr. Bowlly -- in addition to his popularity in the UK, he was very well known in the US, both thru his imported recordings, and thru his work with the stateside orchestra Glenn Miller put together for Ray Noble in 1935. I was pointing out that the "Boley" spelling indicates that the Daily Mail's editors or proofreaders clearly have no idea who he was.

Clearly too subtle for me....