We rented a small terraced house in Torrington on a two year lease. The rent was £8 a week. I was earning £12 and OH was earning £25. This was long before the Equal Pay Act which I think came along in the mid 70’s and you could still pay the married Here is some more about our move to Devon many moons ago.
womans NI stamp [and yes they were still stamps] I’m afraid the neighbours were not very friendly, but we started to make friends through work and soon had a social life centred around the many pubs that were in Torrington at the time. We decided that Devon, but not Torrington, was for us and started the long onerous task of saving a deposit for our own house. You used to have to have a deposit in those days and if you wanted two incomes to be taken into account you had to be married. We had a shoestring wedding at the Bideford registry office. The whole shebang cost £25. The ring which was made by a real jeweller in the High Street cost £8. We went back to Torrington in convoy stopping at a village pub for lunchtime drinks and we had a bottle party in the evening.. We both wore clothes that we already had. I don’t feel deprived. I’ve known people spend thousands on weddings and for the marriage to last a very short time. Besides we were saving hard for our deposit.
I previously mentioned that I got work in the offices of the abattoir. Well I know it appears to be pretty dire but I stayed there for 10 years, I quickly became in charge of the sales ledger. Now it wasn’t an ordinary abattoir, but the biggest and most modern in Europe at the time. It was a very big place employing about 400 people, and the people were why I stayed. I can honestly say that I had never before or since worked with such a great bunch of folks. We had them all. From 16 to 65, miseries, comedians, practical jokers, posh, earthy and downright barmy. It was a male dominated place, well on the factory side it was and mostly females in the offices. The politically correct police would have been quickly decimated: there were always ribald comments and saucy jokes doing the rounds but there was never any malice and friends I made there are still friends today.
There was an enormous sales ledger that was all done by hand by four of us. It was done on the old fashioned Kalamazoo system, all hand written, but we eventually moved up to computers via an NCR accounting machine that weighed a ton. I’m amazed looking back that this shrivelling old brain could have performed so many feats of mental arithmetic, columns and columns of figures all added and balanced by me.
I left after 10 years to have my daughter. The abattoir was eventually taken over when it hit hard times, then closed down, then burnt down. Where do all those 400 people work now?
womans NI stamp [and yes they were still stamps] I’m afraid the neighbours were not very friendly, but we started to make friends through work and soon had a social life centred around the many pubs that were in Torrington at the time. We decided that Devon, but not Torrington, was for us and started the long onerous task of saving a deposit for our own house. You used to have to have a deposit in those days and if you wanted two incomes to be taken into account you had to be married. We had a shoestring wedding at the Bideford registry office. The whole shebang cost £25. The ring which was made by a real jeweller in the High Street cost £8. We went back to Torrington in convoy stopping at a village pub for lunchtime drinks and we had a bottle party in the evening.. We both wore clothes that we already had. I don’t feel deprived. I’ve known people spend thousands on weddings and for the marriage to last a very short time. Besides we were saving hard for our deposit.
I previously mentioned that I got work in the offices of the abattoir. Well I know it appears to be pretty dire but I stayed there for 10 years, I quickly became in charge of the sales ledger. Now it wasn’t an ordinary abattoir, but the biggest and most modern in Europe at the time. It was a very big place employing about 400 people, and the people were why I stayed. I can honestly say that I had never before or since worked with such a great bunch of folks. We had them all. From 16 to 65, miseries, comedians, practical jokers, posh, earthy and downright barmy. It was a male dominated place, well on the factory side it was and mostly females in the offices. The politically correct police would have been quickly decimated: there were always ribald comments and saucy jokes doing the rounds but there was never any malice and friends I made there are still friends today.
There was an enormous sales ledger that was all done by hand by four of us. It was done on the old fashioned Kalamazoo system, all hand written, but we eventually moved up to computers via an NCR accounting machine that weighed a ton. I’m amazed looking back that this shrivelling old brain could have performed so many feats of mental arithmetic, columns and columns of figures all added and balanced by me.
I left after 10 years to have my daughter. The abattoir was eventually taken over when it hit hard times, then closed down, then burnt down. Where do all those 400 people work now?
Today's picture is Ossie our cockatiel.
7 comments:
Oh my goodness working in an abbatoir. I am hopelessly emmotional and get upset when I see the lorries with sheep and cows on - which is hypercritical as I eat meat - although more on health grounds than from choice.
I love your Cockatiel - I used to run a parrot rescue at one time - I miss my birds. But Happy Snaper has just said that we can think about having Doves - how cool is that!
I used to work for £5 a week in a library . . .back in the 70's I think my rent was £5 a month . . .
Hi Toady - have just now caught up on your blogs and really enjoyed them. Looking at your profile I can see that we do have a lot in common. I loved the story of your wedding, and agree that the money spent on a wedding has nothing whatsoever to do with the potential of the marriage. I look forward to reading more of your blogs.
hello toady its so intresting reading about were you worked and how life gets started i wonder were thoese people are who worked with you eh x jep
what a fine bird. now aren't you interesting. always wanted a parrot.
Those were the days! I encountered my first computer in 1969. It took up a whole dedicated specially air-conditioned room and was made by Lyons, who also made cupcakes and ran corner shops. Never figured out why. Enormous reels of tape spun this way and that, handled by people with white gloves - all very reminiscent of some sci-fi movie.
Love Devon, but am always conscious when visiting that I'm a grockle (if that's how it's spelt).
The best kind of wedding.
One of my very best friends has a cockateil called Telullah, and believe it or not, she is besotted with the dear old Janitor!
Shall come back and read it all properly - obviously worth it! I actually came to say, I look forward to haveing you. When are you coming? Let me know, so's I can have the wine ready and the glasses out. Rho
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