The Lemon Fool

Dod101 wrote:

servodude wrote:

Dod101 wrote:He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

I pity those that don't

Apparently some carried a ladder but I do not recall that.

And he was up there twice a day, they say. Every single day, keeping the whole neighbourhood happy. Apparently his only real rival, apart from Ernie the milkman, was Two Ton Ted from Teddington.

BJ

bungeejumper wrote:

Dod101 wrote:

servodude wrote:

Dod101 wrote:He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

I pity those that don't

Apparently some carried a ladder but I do not recall that.

And he was up there twice a day, they say. Every single day, keeping the whole neighbourhood happy. Apparently his only real rival, apart from Ernie the milkman, was Two Ton Ted from Teddington. BJ

Not so.
In another post I recalled that "I have faded memories of Lance Percival (on That Was The Week That Was) calypsoing about the randy Dustman of Camberley Town whose ‘joy and his pride it was sixteen-foot wide’. Now that would be an experience to write home about."
Length of one's pole is not everything.

Dod101 wrote:If we are down memory lane, I remember most of what has been mentioned, but, of these days, I remember the 'leerie'. He came around at dusk to light the gas street lamp outside our house, the 'leerie' being the gas lamplighter. (old fashioned coal gas of course).

He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

Dod

The gas lamps in our town had pilot lights and a clock to turn the lamp on or off. 4 mantles in each lamp.

TJH

bungeejumper wrote:

Dod101 wrote:

servodude wrote:

Dod101 wrote:He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

I pity those that don't

Apparently some carried a ladder but I do not recall that.

And he was up there twice a day, they say. Every single day, keeping the whole neighbourhood happy. Apparently his only real rival, apart from Ernie the milkman, was Two Ton Ted from Teddington.

BJ

Well he certainly must have turned up in the morning because the lamps were switched off but I do not recall seeing him then.

Dod

servodude wrote:

Dod101 wrote:
He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

I pity those that don't

My mind does not work like that. Sorry, missed the joke!

Dod

tjh290633 wrote:

Dod101 wrote:If we are down memory lane, I remember most of what has been mentioned, but, of these days, I remember the 'leerie'. He came around at dusk to light the gas street lamp outside our house, the 'leerie' being the gas lamplighter. (old fashioned coal gas of course).

He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

Dod

The gas lamps in our town had pilot lights and a clock to turn the lamp on or off. 4 mantles in each lamp.

TJH

Your Council must have had more resources than mine did. Or maybe I am just thinking of an earlier era. My thinking of our Leerie would be at least 70 years ago.

Dod

tjh290633 wrote:

Dod101 wrote:If we are down memory lane, I remember most of what has been mentioned, but, of these days, I remember the 'leerie'. He came around at dusk to light the gas street lamp outside our house, the 'leerie' being the gas lamplighter. (old fashioned coal gas of course).

He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

The gas lamps in our town had pilot lights and a clock to turn the lamp on or off. 4 mantles in each lamp.

I remember both. Obviously the man with the pole was earlier. (I suspect there was a pilot light even in the time of the man with the pole.) Where I lived (Birmingham) the changeover presumably happened sometime in the 1950s.

XFool wrote:

tjh290633 wrote:

Dod101 wrote:If we are down memory lane, I remember most of what has been mentioned, but, of these days, I remember the 'leerie'. He came around at dusk to light the gas street lamp outside our house, the 'leerie' being the gas lamplighter. (old fashioned coal gas of course).

He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

The gas lamps in our town had pilot lights and a clock to turn the lamp on or off. 4 mantles in each lamp.

I remember both. Obviously the man with the pole was earlier. (I suspect there was a pilot light even in the time of the man with the pole.) Where I lived (Birmingham) the changeover presumably happened sometime in the 1950s.

Yes. That would make sense but I assumed that he pushed a lever of some sort but I do not know. We all knew the man and he was always popular as he was literally the bringer of light.

Dod

They were always called dustmen. They came around to the backs of the houses where the dustbins were kept, and carried the bins out to the dust cart where they were emptied into the back. The dustmen then carried the dustbins to the backs of the houses again. They would also take other rubbish if it was placed next to the bin. The dust carts had what I remember was like a big, slow moving fan at the back of the hopper, although it was probably more like an auger.

Many households would need only one bin, but I remember my parents buying a second one. There was no council recycling, just a compost heap and the occasional bonfire in the back garden. Everything-else, such as No. 800 bicycle lamp batteries (like two "U2" batteries side-by-side but slightly taller) went in the dustbin.

Bin bags were introduced later, and this saved the dustmen the job of having to return empty bins.

Coal men too, which operated from the coal yards which I remember seeing from the bus. We needed coal to heat the living-room in winter; the rest of the house was cold.

If you burn coal, you need the services of a chimney sweep. These are still around but I have not seen one in action since I was a child. He had a big bin-type vacuum cleaner and a cloth that covered the fireplace while he fed the rods, through a hole in the cloth, up the chimney. I would be taken outside to see the brush pop up through the chimney pot. At my grandparents', the chimney sweep would come back later with some sacks of soot for the garden.

BBC1 and ITV, 405 lines black and white via the big (VHF) aerial on the roof. It would take a while for the TV to warm up when it was switched on, and the picture would shrink to a little dot when it was switched off. If the TV was left on after close-down (after the national anthem), there would be a high-pitched tone to tell you that programs had finished for the night. The TV repair man was a regular visitor in those days. If there was a thunderstorm, my grandparents would switch off the TV and unplug the two-pin mains plug and aerial lead.

Almost everyone had a milkman. Ours was the Co-op. Pint and half-pint bottles were delivered early each morning. If we ran out of milk, we would go to what we called the "cow" outside a local shop. This was a vending machine for cartons of milk. The cartons were triangular pyramid shaped and we would cut two corners off, one to let the air in while we poured the milk out of the other one. The "Cow" met its demise when the milk cartons were no longer available. At school, we had third-pint bottles until these were discontinued. We then had cartons, the same shape as the ones from the "Cow" but smaller.

You needed a can opener if you had a can of drink. This would be used to pierce a triangular hole in the lid to drink from, and one opposite to let the air in.

This is making me feel old!


Julian F. G. W.

The wooden fishing boats landing the timber fish boxes at the daily, early morning our fish market. The old, flat leaf lorries and the odd horse drawn cart taking the catch to the fish yards. All preparation done by hand filleting, then the daily shipments packed with chunks of crystal clear ice.

The lorries taking the boxes, all lebelled, to the train station for the mid afternoon train from our NE Scotland port to Billingsgate. Then the steam train leaving the station pulling the long row of brown freight carriages and the smell of the steam and smoke. Before beaching's handiwork.

Dod101 wrote:

tjh290633 wrote:

Dod101 wrote:If we are down memory lane, I remember most of what has been mentioned, but, of these days, I remember the 'leerie'. He came around at dusk to light the gas street lamp outside our house, the 'leerie' being the gas lamplighter. (old fashioned coal gas of course).

He had a long pole with which to do the necessary.

Dod

The gas lamps in our town had pilot lights and a clock to turn the lamp on or off. 4 mantles in each lamp.

TJH

Your Council must have had more resources than mine did. Or maybe I am just thinking of an earlier era. My thinking of our Leerie would be at least 70 years ago.

Dod

I think that ours changed to electricity after WW2, but can't remember exactly when. Certainly while I was still living at home. They were of course off during the war, and had the clocks in 1945 when re-lit.

TJH

The 1970s dustman:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2IrQA2yHL8