[rowlandwells]

i was a it hard to find a heading for this topic but nevertheless hear we go after reading the topic wishing ones life away it inspired me to think back over my gardening years around fifty years ago  progressing from one plot then two finally ending up with an acre

and when i look back over my shoulder i can see many changes in all aspects of gardening today there  doesn't seem the camaraderie like it was when i first started on our allotments gone are the days  when one was on the waiting list for someone to give up there allotment in our village  because in those days people where growing more for the table and not so much for pleasure gardening like today

 when i was a younger gardener digging the plot was something i did without blinking an eye and when i bought merry tiller that was something ells every bit of allotment was cultivated not a raised be in sight and many gardeners used to cycle to the allotments in those days bike clips and all with there tools tied on the bike many after a working day as well as the retired guys there didn't seem as many women interested in the allotment as there is today it seems on our allotments that women are on pare with the men

it was to me  more a ritual for most of the old gardeners and they loved telling us young gardeners how to garden  its also bit sad to see allotments going back to nature crying out for someone to take them i must say looking at some of the plots its hard work for a women to tackle to bring it back to a growing plot 

 i think garden therapy is one of the best ways to keep healthy far better than shopping therapy 

[Tenhens]

I'm guessing from reading your post that you are in the retirement age range and that you have had much enjoyment from your 'growing' hobby. My plot is no where near as big as yours , I think to my self 'by next year  I will have it as I want it ' , which I have been saying for the past few years , yet still it remains 'a work in progress' . We all know that a garden or plot is never finished ,which is part of the appeal.

The vacant plots could be the result of 'modern' living , people working longer hours, social media use and the ease in which a journey can be made to the supermarket and the busyness of the fruit and veg section.

Your comment about garden therapy certainly is valid , there was a feature in Gardeners' World magazine earlier this year on this very subject.  I use my feet to get me to the plot and sometimes the wheel barrow comes along as well ,exercise in it's own right.

[Plot 1 Problems]

I'm at the other end of the spectrum, being a relative young un on our site. It's quite a compliment to see the old boys looking at what I do integrating some of it into their own practices; One chap has covered his plot with green manure this year rather than just chucking old carpet over the top of the soil.

[azubah]

The reason why there were not many women on allotments in the old days is because they had to do the washing by hand and carry the shopping home on the bus etc. They had no spare time or energy to do anything other than housework.
My mom used to wheel us in the pram to the local shops 1.5 miles away and put the shopping in the pram. We sat on top of the tins. It was far from comfortable. Washing took all day and was dried around the fire if it was raining. Ironing took all of the next day. The floors were cleaned with a brush. No vacuum cleaner. Kids were walked to school and meals cooked from scratch. No refrigerator. The fire had to be cleaned of ash and re-kindled each morning in cold weather and baths had to be filled with kettles and pans of boiling water. Aaah.. the good old days...

[Aled]

Nice one all. Must say we don't seem to have as many of the old countrymen in my corner of Wales as we used to. They could grow their own food, catch their own fish (by methods both fair and foul!), as well getting their own meat, by gun, ferret, dog, or trap. Many also kept hens. I used to spend time sitting with them listening to their stories. For example the best day to go poaching on the river was the day of the local show, everybody would be there and it was quiet. Yes the good old days!
Cheers
Aled

[Goosegirl]

I look back over my shoulder and wonder how the heck I managed to do work full-time (including the odd Saturday and Bank Holiday), do all the housework as well as home maintenance, and manage to maintain quite a large garden. Can't do it now but thing is I did! Yo!

[rowlandwells]

many nice replies well worth reading remembering those days when you  had to boil up the water before you could have a bath in a tin bath near the open fire if possible it was 1954 when we had a bathroom including an inside toilet luxury or what

my mum and dad both went to work and being  the only child so I supposed we where better of than some with larger families both my parents where hard working mum worked in the shoe factory my dad on the railway going to most places where done on a bike the local shops where quite a distance from our house my mum would manage to get two bags of shopping on the bike and  my dad was a chimney sweep in his spare time and tied the chimney sweep kit to the bike

washing was done by hand until mother bough a gas boiler then a hoover twin so housework and washing all had to be done on the weekend  dad kept poultry and pigs in the back garden and it wasn't to long ago that I burnt the salt bath that was used to cure bacon

I was bought up on plain cooking seasonal veg no frills that came later my dad used to help out on a local farm on Saturdays I would go with him on my new bike I had for Christmas and talking about the farm we had a film show at our local history society meeting the other month the film was shot with the old cine camera put onto DVD the film showed the M1 being built near Watford gap and cannel and farming footage what surprised me was to see my dad on the film standing on a newly built hay rick obviously filmed on the farm and there was a young lad about ten years old climbing on a hay trailer yes that was me abut 60 years ago

its good to remember what happened all those years ago and I was always fascinated to hear the old folk talk about the old times some good some bad now I'm getting on in years I can reflect back on my old times and I'm sure so can you many many things that would make good reading on this site lets go for it in these dark and damp dismal winter days give us a tale or two come on 

[Growster...]

Looking back is one thing, actually going back isn't quite what you may wish for.

Recently, I went to a funeral for an old chum. There were so many faces of friends from forty-fifty years ago, and sadly I hardly recognised them, and a chum said that nobody would have recognised me either, although the names are all the same.

It's all a bit recent, and hard to take actually.

Luckily, a charmed life with a lovely home family, then Mrs Growster and two girls and three grandchildren easily makes up for most of the harder times, but yes, the tin baths, the cold, no money for beer, no car for ages etc, may be the sum of my 'See-back-ro-scope' - 1/9 from Ellisdons - remember them)!

But it's still damned cold on 'The Patch', and winter veg still live up to their names...

[sunshineband]

I agree with Growster... great to look back over our lives and fondly reminisce, quite a different matter to have to heat every drop of hot water in a pan on top of a dodgy gas stove, to wring out the washing in freezing weather using an enormous iron mangle and bring it in from the line frozen as stiff as a board, to pluck a dozen pigeons at a time (6d for two in the greengrocers if you didn't shoot your own), or have mashed swede on toast as  Saturday tea time treat. Fishing for flounders in the winter months with the lugworms frozen onto the newspaper was another experience I am very happy to leave behind. Springs were exciting, Summers full of freedom, Autumns beautiful and full of Nature's bounty, but Winters... no thank you, especially ones cold enough for the sea in the creek to freeze over 

[AlaninCarlisle]

You've missed out the utter misery of the outside lavatory at the bottom of the yard in winter. The carrying of buckets of water down the yard to flush it because the cistern was frozen. The scraping of ice off the seat so you could do a sit-down job. Taking a torch down there with dodgy batteries to try and ward off any unwelcome intruders

[rowlandwells]

its not all doom and gloom is it? I to share the same doom and gloom as the rest of you but I tend to look back at the more interesting times and what happens in the mean time is life we can't change what happens unfortunately happens some good times some bad times

I like to look back at those times I had with people that are no longer around but memories of those who where around when I was growing up sad as it mite be that's life

and yes I like to think that we live in better times now central heating toilets indoors posh cars eating out foods from supermarkets seven days a week anything you want its endless no more frozen toilets outdoors up the yard with a torch tripping over the cat little sheets of newspaper on a nail on the wall then there's even time to have a pint or two what's the world coming to I ask you 

and I just can't believe they stopped sending kids up chimneys anymore 

[Christine]

If you listen to a lot of the older folks from the social housing bungalows where I live, they can never known a life with outdoor toilets, no central heating, coal fires, heating water for baths, laundry  by hand, cooking on a range and such like. I feel I'm lost in time.

I can understand the "townies" knowing nothing about catching and skinning rabbits and hares, fishing, plucking and gutting partridge, pheasant, pigeon, making their own butter from the house cow ....

You'd think that with double glazing, condensing boilers with hot water at the turn of a tap and heat at the turn of the dial, indoor loos, space for a washing machine and a choice of gas or electric cooking facilities they might appreciate life a little more.

[Goosegirl]

One of my aunties had an outdoor loo with a big wooden board you sat on (plus the hole of course) and, in the seventies when I first got married, my cottage had an outside loo attached to the back which fortunately was later replaced with a bathroom extension. At that time I had no money, no fridge, no washing machine, no central heating (just an open fire) and all the furniture was umpteenth-hand. I so appreciated my first fridge and even the free (but rather heavy) iron electrical washing tub with a mangle but can't forget one icy winter when my bath sponge froze to the bath because I couldn't afford to use the oil-filled radiator in there. Even now I don't have central heating because we have no gas supply and there is no space for either an oil or a Calor gas tank. I used to ride a little scooter to work 'cos I couldn't afford a car, but am grateful for all I do have now because I worked hard for it which wasn't always easy. One of our rellies has done-up their house by also working hard and doing a lot of jobs themselves and they well-deserve it. It's the people who believe life owes them a living and want everything just to fall in their lap without doing a thing that really gets my goat!

[rowlandwells]

i have to say I totally agree with you Goosegirl  and from what I'm reading there does seem a divide from north to south because I believe we have got more in the south than the north but as I said  that's just my opinion

but I really do think we appreciate things we have to work for and its always been a known fact that wages are higher in some parts of  the south than north and heavy industries have always been a big player in the northern part of the country I just think its so sad when the coal pits where closed ending generations of mining families that most new nothing ells but leaving school and working down the pits 

so I thing both replies really tell it as it is and was and that's what its all about working together helping each other exactly as it should be well done all

[compostqueen]

We were only talking about the joys of outside lavs in winter  today as a matter of fact

I used to babysit at a house in a terrace and the privvy was down some steep steps which were lethal in freezing weather. I used to avoid drinking anything so I didn’t have to go.  The folks I babysat for used to use the pub lav before heading home 🙂
Windows that used to freeze on the inside.  Having to get dressed to go to bed 😁 I used to keep my jumper on in the bath   Happy days 🙄