Nella Last's routine

GreyQueen

Floss wrote: »

Don't forget that Nella's books were written before the Clean Air Act, so there would have been much more airborne dust from smoke and non-tarmac roads than nowadays. Houses were generally heated by coal or coke, not gas.

Good point. I was born post the Clean Air Act but I did spend my first 12 years in a home whose only heating was a coal fire, and riddling out the cold ashes of the prevous day's fire and setting the new one was my chore when I came in from middle school.

Coal fires do make more dust and dirt than GCH, but not enough to justify so much extra time cleaning. I still think a lot of it was nervy women with not enough mental stimulation and too much time on their hands (we had a fair few of these in my own family).

Mr_Singleton

Eliza wrote: »

Haha! Love it.

Thankyou for taking my post in the spirit in which it was written! :beer:
BTW despite being a single bloke I've read all of Nella's books.

FairyPrincessk

I think there is something to the 'keep women' busy idea, but I also think our idea of clean is probably very culturally determined and that there has been a shift since the early to mid 20th. This is pure speculation, but I as I was mulling it over I was thinking about the Tudor obsession with clean linen. Bathing was sporadic, but the linen was regularly changed and that was an indication of a clean person. A clean outside also meant a respectable outside, just like a pleasant countenance meant a soul in a good state.

I wonder how much of the repetitive cleaning was down to the relatively recent advent of antibiotics and the still often inadequate medical care and minimal vaccinations. In that day and age I've no doubt that a boil wash wasn't quite the waste of energy it might be today. I'm no fan of antibac this and that, but but I think if things like typhoid were in my living memory I'd probably be a lot more fond of disinfectants. Thinking in terms of housewife guides from the early 1900s they often stress the role of wife and mother as the 'guardian' of the family's health as they tried to educate against things like the improperly sterilized milk bottles that killed babies in the Victorian era. If you'd generally grown up in that, I think some of it would rub off on you. You might not be dusting because you're afraid of disease, but the idea that your house needs to be thoroughly cleaned daily might be more ingrained if that is how you see your role in society.

Thinking back to Nella Last's Peace and her reaction to her inlaws who were unable (and perhaps unwilling although I think dementia was at play) to keep themselves clean, Nella comments on the loss of dignity and she is definitely judging her sisters in law for letting their parents' home get into that state.

Mr_Singleton

cheerfulness4 wrote: »

Do you know of any other diaries that are as interesting to read as Nella's? There seems a few about but I've read none.

I read "These Wonderful Rumours!: A Young Schoolteacher's Wartime Diaries 1939-1945" by May Smith but was sorely disappointed.... the most unlikeable person I've come across in quite some time.

Anyone else read it? What did you think?

FairyPrincessk

the blog Frugalinnorfolk has a photo of her collection of wartime books, some of which are diaries. I haven't found any of them in CS yet, but I'm particularly keen to read Mrs Milburn's Diaries.

monnagran

Can't resist poking in my five penneth.

I think a lot of women's housework was done out of a sense of guilt. The men went out to work and earned the money and the women who were denied that luxury(?) felt that their contribution to the household was to do the housework, cooking and raise the children.
This they did to their utmost.

Also, as GreyQueen said, there was a complete lack of mental stimulation and housework filled the void. Those women whose husbands earned more money could spend their time doing voluntary work or joining clubs and societies. Heaven help the poor working class woman who was highly intelligent, looking after the home was all there was for her.
My own mother was one of these women. Born in 1914 into a humble though aspirational family she was unusually intelligent and talented. Won a scholarship to the Grammar school in 1924 and Matriculated with honours in 1928. The school wanted her to go to university but her father died and she had to leave school and help to support the family. She never really got over it and filled her life with all sorts activities until she was married in 1938 - so she was housekeeping at the same time as all the Nella Last Diaries.
The first day of her married life she thought that she had to do everything every day. So she dusted, polished, scrubbed, cleaned windows, shopped and prepared lunch for my Dad. When he returned at lunchtime she was asleep on the hearthrug.
She wised up after that and taught me all the labour saving dodges that she worked out for herself.

How Nella did all she said that she did and still had time (and energy) to write long reports in her diary beats me. She didn't sleep very well so perhaps that is when she did her writing. In fact I think she said that she actually did write at night once she had moved into her own bedroom.

She certainly had no need of FlyLady's advice.

x

Mr S> Thoroughly agree about These Wonderful Rumours. I know the area around there quite well but was very disappointed in the book.

luxor4t

Floss wrote: »

Don't forget that Nella's books were written before the Clean Air Act, so there would have been much more airborne dust from smoke and non-tarmac roads than nowadays. Houses were generally heated by coal or coke, not gas.

A coal fire throws out a lot of muck - I had to dust the mantelpiece daily when we had an open fire. Also, Nella was writing in the time before double glazing too, so dust had another way of getting into the house, in addition to the cigarette smoke etc.
My grandmother did housework all morning - including jam making, bottling etc - but sat and knitted with the radio on, or read, in the afternoon

Floss

Mr_Singleton wrote: »

I read "These Wonderful Rumours!: A Young Schoolteacher's Wartime Diaries 1939-1945" by May Smith but was sorely disappointed.... the most unlikeable person I've come across in quite some time.

Anyone else read it? What did you think?

I have a copy I've tried several times to read and I just can't get into it - thinking about why, it's because of that same conclusion!

[Deleted User]

luxor4t wrote: »

A coal fire throws out a lot of muck - I had to dust the mantelpiece daily when we had an open fire. Also, Nella was writing in the time before double glazing too, so dust had another way of getting into the house, in addition to the cigarette smoke etc.
My grandmother did housework all morning - including jam making, bottling etc - but sat and knitted with the radio on, or read, in the afternoon

Absolutely My late Mum was born in 1900 and married in 1935.She gave up her job, as in those days women rarely worked outside the home (she was a buyer for a large store in Glasgow) and my late Dad was a chemist, and of the generation that believed that it was his job to support his wife & family .He was a widow with a 14 year old daughter and a 9 year old son so my Mum had a ready-made family already.Unfortunately the children wern't keen on having a step-Mum and decided they would rather live with their own Mums family,having done so for several years anyway,plus they didn't like the big city of Glasgow having lived in a very small north eastern town in Angus.
So there was Mum suddenly at home after working full-time.She learned to cook and clean for her new husband and was pretty good at it (I have learned all of my skills from her )
In 1937 she gave birth to my eldest brother,then again in the 1940s along came another boy and then myself.so she had her hands full.Plus they moved down to London in 1938 as my Dad had wanted to move south for a long time.Living in the east end of London cannot have been easy for her, as she had by then, developed very exacting standards as to 'how clean was her house'
She cooked, cleaned and raised her family,while Dad went off to work.It was never discussed at all Mum going back to work as she was the homemaker and raiser of children and Dad was the man who brought in the money.

I think my Dad would have been mortified at the thought of his wife going outside the home to work,even though it would probably have been better for her. I think she decided that her new role was home maker and that was it.
As a little girl growing up each day had its job Monday washday,cleaning,Tuesday cleaning Wednesday baking,cleaning Thursday more cleaning,Friday guess what more blessed cleaning.Only day of the week she never cleaned the house was on a Sunday when it was church, and making sure her children were scrubbed clean ready for school on Monday.

All of her housework was done in the morning before lunch then after getting lunch ready she would change out of her cleaning clothes and into another dress which she wore whilst listening to the wireless and knitting or sewing I never ever saw her hands idle when I was little

She taught all of her children to read and write before school, plus simple sums.She taught me to cook,clean ,knit and budget almost from when I could walk. Shopping for me as a small child because of rationing meant a lot of time spent queueing.I would be in one queue and Mum in another I could donkey stone a step by the time I was 10, plus starch nets and zebra-clean the kitchen range (I hated that job and could never see the point of it) but our kitchen range was cleaned and shiny to a deep ebony. We had open fires in three rooms of our house which took up quite a bit of cleaning and setting.She also had lots of brasses which I had to clean (I hated that job as well and swore never to own a bit of brass when I was an adult and I never have ) From 1947 we lived in a large barn of a house with 13 rooms which my Mum hated as it was just too big and very cold and expensive to keep warm We lived on the ground floor and the rest of the upstairs rooms were empty, and as children we use as playrooms when wet and rainy.There was a very large garden which Mum also kept and we grew a lot of our own stuff and she kept some chickens for the eggs and eventually to eat.I honestly don't think she would have had time to work outside the home as she seemed to be busy all the time when I was little .Shopping was done daily and she never owned a fridge,washing machine or microwave.In fact not even an ironing board as the ironing was done on the big kitchen table with an old army blanket over it and an old sheet on top. She had a boiler and a mangle and in the late 1950s my Dad bought her an electric iron and that was about it .There was a ewbank carpet sweeper (Only carpet was in the best room which was kept for high days and holidays ) the rest of the house was lino and the odd rug. Lino was scrubbed and polished and she too had a fear of germs and dirt so our house was kept pretty clean (a lot cleaner than mine is at times Different generation of women with totally different ideas .Today I love my CH ,wall-to-wall carpets,automatic washing machine and all the mod cons there is. I wouldn't want to go back to all that hard work Life is for living not cleaning :):) She was a good woman though and although pretty strict always had time to give you a cuddle if you felt poorly or sad,and the children in our neighbourhood always came to my Mum if they had fallen over or hurt themselves as she could be pretty good for both a cuddle and a biscuit in exchange for a watery smile if you had scabbed your knees.She sadly died in 1962 and I often wonder what she would have made of life today as it was so different from her life.She had lived through two world wars and a depression yet still had a smile and a kind word for most folk. She had exacting standards when it came to politeness and courtesy for others, and you never under any circumstances lied or stole or brought disrepect to your elders.I am today made up from the ideas and ways of my late Mum, and I think a lot of my ideas have rubbed off on my children hopefully as well. I can hear her voice even now at times saying
"Never do behind my back what you wouldn't do in front of me " I have even said it to my own grandchildren at times along with my children.

Eliza_2

I know whose book I would read avidly and delight in, that's JackieO's. Please write it Jackie, I absolutely love your contributions to this forum.

However, at the time I'm reading about in Nella Last's Peace, her children had left home, there was only herself and Will. The only mod con I have that she doesn't is a freezer, (she even talks about electric blankets and electric pads which she puts on her stomach, whatever happened to hot water bottles?) she has Mrs Salisbury every week but still all this cleaning, cleaning, cleaning.