Ask yer Granny!

pws52

And further to your last comment, Mardatha, the solid oven shelves were taken out of the oven early evening and placed in the bed(s) to provide a bit of warmth in the winter.
Hanging from the ceiling above the fire were some lines where Gran would put laundry to air after ironing.
On wet washday Mondays she would bring out the tall wooden clothes horse to dry the washing in front of the fire.

mardatha

I like to think that their toughness is in us and was passed down in the genes. As times get harder we will need it!

VJsmum

I think it is inherent in us and is either to do with genes or upbringing or both. I notice that no-one here has come from a "well - to - do" background.

My FIL came from a family of shopkeepers and so were quite well off for the time, he was brought up by a cousin of his as his dad had died when he was 4 and his mother was in a home due to severe mental ill - health (which came home to roost in my BIL years later with him taking his own life). So even though there were few money issues, other issues took over. My MIL lost her mother when she was 8 and was brought up largely by her granny. My in-laws were very well off, in a middle class way, compared to us. MIL protests that money was tight, but that was because they had school fees to pay :rotfl:.

My OH doesn't know what it's like to have no money but even he appreciates why i do all of this money saving stuff. The kids say "mum's being poor" again. I am sure, however, that it will rub off and DD certainly is learning how to cook, sew and knit. Although she does have a shopping habit that worries me.

FIL's cousin / guardian by the way was a formidable woman apparently. She ran the shop and the husband ran the house and she did all her business by letter as she never got used to the telephone. She could sell ice to eskimos, i'm told. When she went round to collect the money from the "tab" and she was going to the posh end, she used to say she was going to the "Promise land" as they promised to pay but never did :rotfl: The poor always paid.
The husband was a fantastic cook. THey died long before i came on the scene but i wish i had met them. But MIL says that when she first went up for dinner they would serve the yorkshire pudding first and follow it with the roast dinner. I can't imagine doing that.

seajaxx

suzybloo wrote: »

Seajaxx the mention of Frances Gay books reminded me my grannie had one that sat on the table at the side of 'her' chair - was it called Frances Gays Friends book or something like that?
I also remember vaguely war veterans selling the evening tele, and was transfixed by their lack of limbs - we always bought a 'tele' from one.

Yes, the Friendship book of Francis Gay. Just checked the title.

JackieO wrote: »

A few had left home and emigrated to Australia,Canada and the US, as apart from the linen works there was little work in Brechin at the start of the 20th century .

JackiO, I have a photograph of a group of workers (my Great Grandfather included) from the linen works at Brechin. My Great Grandfather was a sewing machine mechanic there, and all my aunties worked there before they moved to Dundee. In fact, the generation previous to that worked there too if I remember correctly. I also have a photograph of the "Great flood of Brechin" in 1913. My Great Granny has written on the back of it that "The poor people in River Street had a lot of things destroyed but the town is collecting money and goods for them. They have suffered much in Ayrshire too.
At the time it was written my GGF and his son were landing in America. My GGF came back but his son, David went on to live in Vancouver, and we are still in touch with that branch of the family. I think there was a lot of migration in one way shape or form.

I'd be happy to e-mail you copies of the pics if you would like them. You may recognise someone in the mill one, and even if you don't It would give you an idea of Brechin faces at the time.

mardatha

What did all our grandparents work at? Mine were coalminers on the Glasgow Irish side and on the fishing boats on the Fife side. The women on both sides were in service or on farms. The Irish side before they came over here god knows what they were LOL nobody ever told me The Fifers worked on farms in the busy times or when the fishing was poor.

seajaxx

My Grandad on my father's side was the manager of Dundee Co-operative Society up on the Perth Rd (He must have done other things than this, but I don't have any record of it). His father was a train driver. My Grandma on dad's side worked in the linen works as a spinner, then, once she moved to Dundee got a job as a shopgirl in a bakery. She didn't work again once she was married. She was a great organiser. She scrimped and saved so that Dad could go to Harris Academy, which was fee paying. They only had my dad, and he was the apple of her eye. Her father had various jobs (according to his children's birth certificates) He was a papermill worker in Brechin, and, according to my dad, a sewing machine mechanic in the linen works. His father is an interesting one, if only because it shows the migration of the population of Scotland from around the 1840s or so. He was born in Tiree, moved to Glasgow, became a policeman, moved to Dundee, was made a constable there (caught drunk on duty! I have his police record!) married, moved to Brechin and was made superintendent of police. I have two letters, one appointing him as a sherrif criminal officer, and one appointing him procurator fiscal (although if you look at Brechin records of procurators fiscal he's not mentioned on it, so I don't know what happened there.) In the census, after retirement, he's listed as a jobbing gardener, and eventually dies a pauper in the almshouse in Brechin.
On my mother's side, My Grandfather was a jute preparer (in dundee) when he married, but went on to become undermanager at Greens Playhouse in Dundee. My grandmother was also a jute preparer but again, didn't work outside the home after she married. Her family originally emigrated to Scotland from Ireland in the 1840s. They have an unusual surname, so were fairly easy to trace. Unfortunately there were a lot of records damaged in Ireland, so all I know was that my GGgrandfather was a schoolmaster around the Antrim area.

pws52

Neither of my Grans worked...it was a full time job keeping house.
One Grandad worked at the local brick yard and then went to work on the land.The other worked on the land all of his life.

suzybloo

On my mothers side my grandfather was a ploughman and my granny worked on the land at various times of the year. They were brought up in the same area as JackieO and seajaxx's families, but a wee bit further south towards Kirriemuir and Forfar. In latter years my grandad organised squads to do landwork through out the Angus region, he was also known as a very good poacher - but not as good at getting away as i seem to recall he was jailed at one point - . On my Dads side, they were Irish immigrants from the West Coast of Ireland that came over to Dundee in 1897 to work in the jutemills and some of them in the whaling industries which were important in Dundee, as it was one of the mian whaling ports in Scotland, the blubber was used to make oil for the jutemills. When my grandad was older he moved out to the country - if I recall correctly to work in the mills along the river here, then going on to work in a dairy, and met my granny who's folk were off the travellers (Stewarts), this granny worked on the land too and then she worked in the local cannery (Smedleys). The fields round here are one of the best areas in Scotland for Tatties, rasps, strawberries and turnips so these were the mainstays in the diet. Mardatha I recall many miners from Fife coming up here for the long summers to pick berries, they mainly came from Methil and Kelty - and they were not folk to be crossed LOL!

wouldbeqaulitymoneysaver

Hi :money::beer:
Great idea for a thread.

Fizzbitz

I just love this thread - thank you.

I'm sat here with a mixture of tears and smiles as I read through the posts as they bring back memories of growing up wth my mother and grandmother. Never a day goes past when I am not grateful for them installing the basics into me.... cooking, baking, preserving, sewing, knitting to name but a few!

Sadly they are both gone, but their legacy lives on and I hope that they know that.

Fizz