I was born in 1955, a time when the war was still omnipresent, rationing was still in force and all the adults had been in the war and had stories to tell. In many ways it was the end of the Victorian period. Clothes were stiff and formal.
There is a photo of me with Father Christmas from about 1959. I am wearing a hat, a coat with a belt, gloves, a shirt and a tie. I can still remember that bloody coat, I couldn’t breathe in the wretched thing. The whole period was one of austerity when you got what you needed by knowing someone. Your friend would know someone who could get you the building permit you needed for your house or what ever it was you needed. It wasn’t exactly corrupt but everyone did favours for everyone else and expected them back.
I never understood how factories actually produced anything they all seemed too busy doing favours for people. Our house was almost entirely furnished with “favours”. My father worked for a company who were shopfitters, that is they would furnish a shop with shelves, rails glass cabinets, lights and anything else to sell goods.
Quality meant having shopfittings that were in the finest polished woods. Display cabinets would be polished wood with glass fronts. They were proud of the quality that they produced. This meant that when a customer would only pay a reduced price, the estimating section would reduce the amount of polished wood and the lighting. The production department, (who were essentially a woodworking organisation) would see the reduced specification decide the customer had lost his senses and produce the same high quality product they always had. The customer always got the best, although today we would think the fittings heavy and unappealing.