Merry Christmas to all who read this blog. Thank you all for stopping by. Here are some thoughts on how things have changed since I was a child.
Paper Chains
It seems to me that Christmas lights outside houses and in gardens get more popular every year. When I was a child the main focal point was the tree. How we loved helping to decorate it. I still have a few of the glass baubles from the 1950s which went on our tree every year. We also used to put holly and balloons up (not next to each other!). And then there were the paper chains which were pinned up in the ceiling and went from corner to corner. These paper chains would be carefully folded afterwards and saved for next year. You could also buy packs of coloured, gummed paper rectangles to make your own paper chains and we children loved doing that.
Christmas Day Post
There used to be a postal delivery on Christmas Day in Britain right up until 1960! It’s hard to imagine now. My grandfather was a rural postman with a round which covered a wide area of scattered farms and houses. Back in my dad’s childhood his father would be out all day on Christmas Day delivering cards. People used to send cards then to arrive on the day, like birthday cards. The family also went to chapel three times on Christmas Day so their Christmas dinner and present exchanging was always on Boxing Day.
Stockings
Children’s Christmas stockings were knitted ones. They now come in a huge variety of shapes, styles, sizes and materials. Ours were light brown woollen knee high stockings. A relative had knitted two pairs for my dad to wear under wellington boots when working outside. They were coarse and itchy so he never actually wore them and they were repurposed as Christmas stockings for his three children.
Circus on TV on Boxing Day
On Boxing Day there was always a circus on TV in the afternoon. We only had one channel when we first got a TV in 1961 so it was the circus or the circus! There wasn’t normally anything on TV in the daytime apart from the preschoolers’ Watch With Mother just after lunchtime. So watching television in the afternoon was a rare treat! TVs then gave out such a weak light that in order to see the picture in daylight you had to close the curtains.
Twelfth Night
The tree and decorations would be put up just before Christmas (not like now when they start appearing in November!) and it was considered extremely bad luck to take them down before the Twelfth Night, 6th January.
Father Christmas v Santa Claus
When I was little we never called him anything but Father Christmas. Now you rarely hear him referred to as that. I knew the name Santa Claus from Christmas songs on the radio but he was always Father Christmas then. I always preferred the pictures which showed him wearing a long hooded cloak. Other kids preferred the tunic, belt and knee boots image. It’s just down to personal preference.
Credit to Wikipedia and Google Images. If anyone objects to my use of a particular image please contact me and it will be removed.
Childhood Memories of growing up in the 1950s and 1960s. 
I thought it was bad luck to take decorations down after 12th Night!We made decorations from crepe paper too.One year, during the hula-ho
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Which is what I said. ‘and it was considered extremely bad luck to take them down before the Twelfth Night, 6th January’.
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I remember the paper chains lasted for several years. We also had a line stretched across one entire wall and on which we hung all the Christmas cards that arrived – and there were quite a lot in those days. One year, my brother (aged about 15-16) was hired by the post office to deliver Christmas mail. He had two runs per day – deliver one sack-full, return to the postal depot and get another full bag and deliver that. When he got home he was exhausted. He said it gave him a new respect for the letter carriers.
Ah, John Bull magazine – we subscribed to that and it was always interesting, although I can’t recall much about the contents. Strangely, we also had a subscription to Colliers, an American magazine. I don’t know why we did, but I enjoyed it immensely. The photography was outstanding and I recall one particular cover that got my attention; the face of Rocky Marciano (filled the entire cover) showing how his nose had been split from top to bottom during a recent title fight.
We didn’t have TV growing up and neither did many of our schoolfriends.
The other thing I recall is not being allowed to leave the table after Christmas dinner until The King’s (later the Queen’s) speech had been broadcast and listened to attentively.
We didn’t have much but we had all that was necessary.
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Oh yes, the Queen’s speech! Christmas dinner was timed to fit in as we needed to have finished eating before the broadcast. I’ve never heard of Colliers, it sounds interesting, but I think I’m happy to have missed seeing the split nose photograph!
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I remember making paper chains to decorate for Christmas! We also strung cranberries and popcorn garlands for the tree. Very fond memories . . .
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I love the idea of cranberries and popcorn garlands on the tree!
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They were a tradition for a long time in the US. I don’t know if they still are. They did look very pretty on the tree.
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Thank you Meryl. The good old days – love the reminiscing
I hope you have a lovely Christmas and a very happy New Year xx
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You too! x
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Wow, this made many memories come back to life:) My grandparents also had paper chains, and I remember my grandmother patiently helping us create our own. In Sweden we did not have cartoons on tv, so when Christmas with Donald Duck and his friends, was first broadcasted on Christmas Eve in 1960, it was a great hit. It was one hour with shorter clips from some Disney films and they all had a Christmas ring to them. This then continued with mostly the same clips, every year (except for one clip, which was usually a new Disney release for the coming year) – and it is today the one thing everybody does the same way in Sweden. At 15.00, we all watch this one hour cartoon show…
Of course, today, there are lots of cartoons to see everywhere, but nothing like Christmas with Donald Duck and his friends 😀 🌲🧑🏻🎄
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Thanks for sharing your memories. I love that the Christmas Eve cartoon tradition continues to this day!
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I remember the tinned fruit we had at Christmas in the 1950s, which was such a treat and I loved drinking the juice (drained into a jug).
Also the roast capon (no turkey in those days), with stuffing, roast leg of pork and a boiled ham with roast potatoes, sprouts and parsnips. Plenty of gravy and we’d never heard of cranberry sauce!
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I remember now you mention it that turkey came on the scene a bit later. When I was little it was chicken for Christmas dinner and roast ham or pork on Christmas Eve. And we’d definitely never heard of cranberry sauce.
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Wonderful Memories! and Traditions! Great post!
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Thank you!!
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Many memories of my Christmas in the 1950s. Stringing popcorn for the tree, eating fruit cake, which I may have been the only kid in Fort Worth that actually liked it. Christmas traditions around the world all come down to one thing, celebrating the birth of Jesus.
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You’re the second reader today to mention strings of popcorn on the Christmas tree – which is something I’d never heard of before!!
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Turkeys are definitely a modern thing. When I was young we had chicken at Christmas, as it was a bit of a luxury. One year, when the whole family got together, I can remember that we had two chickens! (And who can remember when chickens had white and brown meat?)
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It was definitely a luxury and not your average Sunday dinner fare. Years after I’d left my childhood behind, my mum told me that one Christmas they were so strapped for cash – settling in to a new part of the country and my dad getting used to his new job, three small children eagerly waiting for Father Christmas etc etc – that they bought a few chicken portions instead of a whole chicken and divvied it up between the five of us. We children didn’t even notice! But she looked back on the memory very fondly.
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Although we were quite average financially (all the necessities, few of the luxuries) we did have turkey at Christmas. Except for one year when it was decided to try goose; the overwhelming verdict to that was – not again.
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Although we were quite average financially (all the necessities, few of the luxuries) we did have turkey at Christmas. Except for one year when it was decided to try goose; the overwhelming verdict to that was – not again.
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I’ve heard it’s very fatty.
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It was fatty. And greasy.
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That’s hilarious – and so similar! My Nana was also in service at a large country house and at about the same time as yours. I recall her saying she happened to say good morning to a guest one day and his telling her he was her king (Edward Vll.)
She spoke often about her time there and how well she was treated. Small world!
Happy New Year to you and all participants here. It’s a pleasure to read everyone’s stories.
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Happy New Year to you too. Both my grandmothers went into service. It wasn’t easy but there were worse jobs (mines, out in the fields in all weathers etc). And they got a roof over their heads and were fed. I hope it wasn’t too dreadful for them. Nana certainly had some very funny stories to tell!
Meryl
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I recall a story my Nana liked to relate. Sometime before the war, she had purchased a turkey and, in those days, it came with everything: head, feet, feathers, the whole nine yards. The first two were simple to remove but pulling the feathers proved to be quite a challenge. So, she hit on the idea of jamming the neck of the bird between the door and the jamb. This worked quite well until she noticed the bird being tugged whenever she pulled. It turned out to her dog, a Kerry Blue Healer, who had the other end in his teeth on the other side and thought it was a game, pulling back and forth.
A far cry from the store to table routine of today.
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That’s so funny!!! It reminds me of one my Nana used to tell, which I haven’t thought of for several years. She went into service in a big country house at the age of 12. This was about 1904/ 5. She was in the kitchen preparing whatever bird it was and she threw the giblets out into the yard for the dogs like she did at home. Seconds later the mistress of the house came wafting through saying ‘I do hope you’ve got the master’s giblet soup cooking it’s his favourite.’
You can imagine the rest. Nana doing tug of war with the dogs and washing and rescuing what she could of the giblets.
You can see why your Nana’s story reminded me of my Nana’s story!
Thank you for sharing it! Great fun. Happy New Year!
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