Women drivers in 60's

Hi Cyclone, really interesting comment. Here inAustralia I think every mature woman I know drives BUT the younger people are choosing not to learn to drive. They find cars too much of a hassle and would rather catch public transport and text or watch a movie as they go! Very different to when it was a rite of passage to get your test. I wonder if it is the same in UK?

---------- Post added 24-05-2015 at 21:59 ----------

Would anyone know any basic facts about the Austin A30... How much would that have cost in the 60's What about insurance? Petrol? Would a midwife have to buy her own car or was there an allowance of some kind.

Cheers Julie

AFAIK learning to drive at 17 is still a very popular thing to do here.

More and more students come to university with their own cars, that was something totally unheard of when I started uni (nearly 20 years ago ), I had an old family car in my final year and I was unusual.

My ma-in-law learned to drive in her late 40s in the early to mid 1960s. She was a nursing sister in a psychiatric hospital in Scotland, quite a few miles outside the city where we lived. As she worked shifts, getting there without transport was difficult. My OH used to practice his driving in her Moggy (Morris Minor) and often had the use of it after he passed his test.

My Nan drove but my Grandad didn't. She was born in 1904 and possibly didn't ever take a driving test.

I remember her giving up driving in the late 70's because the traffic had become 'too much' .

God only knows what she would have thought about Sheffield traffic in 2015 !

My ma-in-law learned to drive in her late 40s in the early to mid 1960s. She was a nursing sister in a psychiatric hospital in Scotland, quite a few miles outside the city where we lived. As she worked shifts, getting there without transport was difficult. My OH used to practice his driving in her Moggy (Morris Minor) and often had the use of it after he passed his test.

Did your ma-in-law work at the Psychiatric Hospital in Lochgilphead by any chance?

Some great memories here. We had a Ford Prefect in the 70's...great little car, I think that managed to get up to 50mph on a good day!

 

---------- Post added 23-05-2015 at 08:15 ----------

 

So a midwife she is.... which of course leads me to the question. What was it like to be a midwife in the 60's? Any stories?

Blimey! do you just want us to write this novel for you love?

Think hot towels and hot water.

Lots of gnashing of teeth, thrashing around wailing and screaming, even swearing. And that's just the fellas.

Women like midwives often drove. Successful Tupperware reps got a car when they

became area reps (they were often women)

Women teachers almost always had cars.

Farmers wives.

Women delivery drivers.

What do you mean by working class though?

Poor people of either sex didn't have cars in the 60s but poor is not always working class.

when I started work on coop milk in 1944 they were all women drivers and there were two older women and they called the elsie and doris

If you wish to help the OP with their research, please contact them via PM.

Thank you, closing.