There are memories not just of sights and sounds, but of smells. My childhood in the 1950s was full of smells that I encounter much less frequently today. On the way to school each day, I would smell coal dust from the fires that heated every house. Coal dust made winter days foggy and old buildings blackened with soot. It was easy to dismiss the architecture of the past because it was so filthy.
The other memorable smell was from people. This was usually a combination (among men especially) of tobacco and sweat. Tobacco because most people smoked cigarettes most of the time. They scattered nub-ends, used packets and used matches around them. The top decks of buses and public buildings usually had a layer of this detritus on the floor. One of my first summer vacation jobs, in 1965, was as an airport hand (temporary) at Birmingham Airport. I spent most of each day pushing a broom, cleaning up after smokers.
The smell of sweat was because deodorants were regarded by many men as being unmasculine, and because people bathed and showered much less often than now. This was more a matter of attitude than opportunity. When I became an undergraduate at the London School of Economics in 1965, I moved into digs with a family in Streatham. I was shocked to find that they (father, mother and daughter) would share a bath serially. When one had finished, another would then occupy the bath. This all occurred quite quickly before the water got cold. Like most families I knew at that time, they bathed once a week.
When I became a social worker in the early 1970s, there were new smells - of filth and neglect. I visited houses where my feet stuck to the carpet, where a choking smell of dog faeces would emerge when I opened the door, where unwashed nappies were piled in a corner. I suspect that these smells remain and are suffered by a new generation of social workers and health visitors.
There were better smells. I remember especially the perfume of the first girl I took to an Italian meal in London (appropriately in Sicilian Avenue, Holburn), and the wonderful smell of olive oil, garlic, tomatoes and pesto sauce. I last saw that girl in 1968, but the Italian food has thankfully remained one of the continuing pleasures of my life.
The other memorable smell was from people. This was usually a combination (among men especially) of tobacco and sweat. Tobacco because most people smoked cigarettes most of the time. They scattered nub-ends, used packets and used matches around them. The top decks of buses and public buildings usually had a layer of this detritus on the floor. One of my first summer vacation jobs, in 1965, was as an airport hand (temporary) at Birmingham Airport. I spent most of each day pushing a broom, cleaning up after smokers.
The smell of sweat was because deodorants were regarded by many men as being unmasculine, and because people bathed and showered much less often than now. This was more a matter of attitude than opportunity. When I became an undergraduate at the London School of Economics in 1965, I moved into digs with a family in Streatham. I was shocked to find that they (father, mother and daughter) would share a bath serially. When one had finished, another would then occupy the bath. This all occurred quite quickly before the water got cold. Like most families I knew at that time, they bathed once a week.
When I became a social worker in the early 1970s, there were new smells - of filth and neglect. I visited houses where my feet stuck to the carpet, where a choking smell of dog faeces would emerge when I opened the door, where unwashed nappies were piled in a corner. I suspect that these smells remain and are suffered by a new generation of social workers and health visitors.
There were better smells. I remember especially the perfume of the first girl I took to an Italian meal in London (appropriately in Sicilian Avenue, Holburn), and the wonderful smell of olive oil, garlic, tomatoes and pesto sauce. I last saw that girl in 1968, but the Italian food has thankfully remained one of the continuing pleasures of my life.
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