Does Anyone Remember:

[carosio 186]

On Bin Day, you could hear clanging of bin lids a mile off, always woke everyone up early in the morning, there was no double glazing in those days.

 

In our yard, there was, outside every back door, a bin on its concrete stand and the binman would run in, throw off the lid, hoist it onto his shoulder (protected with a leather saddle) and run off to the lorry at the end of the street and tip in the contents, (half of which could be fire ash) then return the bin to its stand. Due to complaints over the racket the Council supplied a type of rubber lid, possibly after 1970.

 

The coalman also had a very physical job; he would hoist a full 1 cwt sack of coal onto his shoulder, walk with it a fair distance from his lorry, then tip it straight down the outside coal grate. Many couldn't do this type of job.  A friend tried the binman's job and only lasted a week. Nearly killed him.

 

 

[carosio 186]

On 29/10/2019 at 08:16, hillsbro said:

Sheffield's original (early 1900s) vehicle registration letter was W, then later others such as WA, WB, WE and WJ were added (I remember these from my 1950s car-spotting days!) Wikipedia gives more details - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_the_United_Kingdom

You might recall the 1920s Bullnose Morris that often travelled along Langsett Rd  in the 60s/70s, think the reg was W 62.

 

There was a big black Wolseley police car (stationed at Scotland St I think) that had the reg. WE 9999

 

 

[Dreb48 35]

On 29/10/2019 at 08:16, hillsbro said:

Sheffield's original (early 1900s) vehicle registration letter was W, then later others such as WA, WB, WE and WJ were added (I remember these from my 1950s car-spotting days!) Wikipedia gives more details - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_the_United_Kingdom

Happy days, hillsboro 

 I often tell tales of car spotting in the 50s to anyone that’ll listen.

They give me that ‘yeah right ‘ incredulous look.  It’s just impossible for anyone under pension age to imagine that there were so few private cars on the road

I lived on the GreenOak estate at Totley and I’d stroll up our road to Baslow Rd with pencil and notebook, sit on a bench and diligently make a note of passing vehicles most of which seemed to have a W in their registration. 

It didn’t quite have the appeal of trainspotting as you know very well.

The joke I always tell is that I kept on doing it till the day my dad took me spotting on the   M1 !!

 

[Ontarian1981 10]

On 29/10/2019 at 04:16, hillsbro said:

Sheffield's original (early 1900s) vehicle registration letter was W, then later others such as WA, WB, WE and WJ were added (I remember these from my 1950s car-spotting days!) Wikipedia gives more details - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_the_United_Kingdom

I remember ET being Rotherham and Petula Clark paying handsomely for an old car with the reg. PET 1.

[Ontarian1981 10]

On 28/10/2019 at 16:16, Gormenghast said:

I remember binmen emptying the bin into something like a tin bath, then humping it on their shoulder  and tipping it into the lorry.

I had a dinky toy of one of those bin lorries and all six compartments opened and closed.

Edited November 1, 2019 by Ontarian1981

[carosio 186]

1 hour ago, Dreb48 said:

Happy days, hillsboro 

 I often tell tales of car spotting in the 50s to anyone that’ll listen.

They give me that ‘yeah right ‘ incredulous look.  It’s just impossible for anyone under pension age to imagine that there were so few private cars on the road

I lived on the GreenOak estate at Totley and I’d stroll up our road to Baslow Rd with pencil and notebook, sit on a bench and diligently make a note of passing vehicles most of which seemed to have a W in their registration. 

It didn’t quite have the appeal of trainspotting as you know very well.

The joke I always tell is that I kept on doing it till the day my dad took me spotting on the   M1 !!

 

Even on Langsett Road near Hillsboro they could be infrequent. We had a game called "4 Wheels"  (hide and seek) where several would go and hide down entries, behind walls etc and the person that was "on" could only start to seek when a vehicle with 4 wheels was spotted passing by at the bottom of the Grammar St.

[hillsbro 28]

2 hours ago, carosio said:

You might recall the 1920s Bullnose Morris that often travelled along Langsett Rd  in the 60s/70s, think the reg was W 62.

 

Yes, it was W62 and I remember the Bullnose well; I think the owner lived on Dixon Road. The W62 number was actually older than the car, as it would have been issued in the early 1900s, while the open-top  Bullnose dated from c. 1920. I often wonder what happened to the car.

 

[hillsbro 28]

1 hour ago, Dreb48 said:

Happy days, hillsboro 

 I often tell tales of car spotting in the 50s to anyone that’ll listen.

 

Yes, they were happy days indeed, Dreb48. My dad had an RAC handbook that gave the allocations of the various letters, and car spotting gave my brother and me something to do on coach trips to the seaside etc.  We even had copies of the I-Spy "Cars" book and would rejoice if we spotted a rarity such as an Armstrong-Siddeley, scoring lots of points!

 

 

[iansheff 86]

I remember the Betterware  salesmen coming round knocking on the door, also there used to be a Sikh I think it was who used to come round selling things out of a suitcase.

[Ontarian1981 10]

22 minutes ago, carosio said:

Even on Langsett Road near Hillsboro they could be infrequent. We had a game called "4 Wheels"  (hide and seek) where several would go and hide down entries, behind walls etc and the person that was "on" could only start to seek when a vehicle with 4 wheels was spotted passing by at the bottom of the Grammar St.

I grew up around Catcliffe and Brinsworth in the 50s and I could go out on my bike on Sunday for an hour or more and never see a car. Lol

[Dreb48 35]

3 minutes ago, Ontarian1981 said:

I grew up around Catcliffe and Brinsworth in the 50s and I could go out on my bike on Sunday for an hour or more and never see a car. Lol

I’ve got a photo. of the family standing beside our first car outside our house. It’s looking down our road and there’s not another car to be seen.

We lived on a through road but we could play uninterrupted games of football on our road for hours.

[Ontarian1981 10]

2 minutes ago, Dreb48 said:

I’ve got a photo. of the family standing beside our first car outside our house. It’s looking down our road and there’s not another car to be seen.

We lived on a through road but we could play uninterrupted games of football on our road for hours.

My grandad used to drive the local doctor to his home calls on weekday afternoons.Grandad was a miner who worked regular nights and learned to drive in the army. The car was the doctor's of course, grandad never owned a car of his own his entire life.