Old days

[Maggie/915]

Old days

Old ways

Love stays

[Maggie/915]

Holiday anyone 1960 Rome

[John Fox (foxy)]

Maggs I was given the choice of either going on that trip or having a new Bike. I think the cost was roughly £30, for either .. I foolishly chose the bike and missed out on a visit to the Olympic Games

[Maggie/915]

What a choice Foxy!

Here is a strange plug!

[mercuryg]

3 minutes ago, Maggie/915 said:

What a choice Foxy!

Here is a strange plug!

By far the greatest picture on here, ever.

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

Maggie,

are you related to Eddison and this has been passed down by generations of your family? 

or was that for an electric poss-tub? 

or was that for you first holiday abroad in 1956? 

Even me dad, a typical Scotsman, didn't have one like that in his 1940's box of old plugs -  two strand wire - etc. that he was sure would come in useful one day!

Think he eventually used the wire to tie up staked garden plants and veg.

[Canny lass]

12 hours ago, Eggy1948 said:

 

Think he eventually used the wire to tie up staked garden plants and veg.

I think there were many that had the same fate, Eggy!

[Canny lass]

13 hours ago, John Fox (foxy) said:

Maggs I was given the choice of either going on that trip or having a new Bike. I think the cost was roughly £30, for either .. I foolishly chose the bike and missed out on a visit to the Olympic Games

I paid the £30! Worked all hours delivering newspapers to get the money together. Unfortunately, I also got pneumonia and couldn't go.

[John Fox (foxy)]

4 minutes ago, Canny lass said:

I paid the £30! Worked all hours delivering newspapers to get the money together. Unfortunately, I also got pneumonia and couldn't go.

Well now that we can upload pics perhaps Maggie can show us what we missed?

[Canny lass]

14 hours ago, Maggie/915 said:

Old days

Old ways

Love stays

A few familiar faces in the second picture, the two on the left in particular. Can anybody put any names to these guys (and gal)?

[threegee]

15 hours ago, Maggie/915 said:

What a choice Foxy!

Here is a strange plug!

It's known as a Wylex plug and they came in two types: ring main (13A) and non-ring main (15A).  Looks like that's a "non" one (without a fuse). I think there were probably other manufacturers of the design, but that seems to be a genuine Wylex one.  They're a collectors item, though not that rare - so don't throw it away.

It would be interesting to know which local builder/electrician fitted them. The BUDC had a thing about those terrible fused pin ones which frequently fell to bits. Everybody was surely glad to see the back of those! They became ridiculously expensive, and the fused pins hard to get hold of, which brought on their rapid demise in the late 1960's.  The Wylex design probably failed in the 1950's, or maybe just post-war.

[threegee]

Hmm.. looks like there may also have been 5A and even 2A variants of the Wylex, to match the normal round-pin (British Standard?) range that everyone of an age will remember. 

And top and side entry versions of every one too - a true collectors cornucopia!  Never knew that, though chances are I've come across at least one other at some time!

On this subject: how about our 13A plug being the envy of the world?  Something to remember when you are cursing that they don't fit into the bag, box or suitcase.  Though, there's likely some overpaid Eurocrat in Brussels drafting a directive to standardise us on German Shuko's as I write this.

http://www.fastcodesign.com/3032807/why-england-has-the-best-wall-sockets-on-earth

[Ovalteeny]

his is either the Top Club or Market Club, circa 1948-50

[mercuryg]

Bloody hell 3G, you're a plug nerd? I'm impressed!

[Maggie/915]

Eggy the name you quoted should have been Joseph Swan. Literary and philosophical society demonstration. Forget Eddison.

The plug was fused and attached to a Kenwood Chef Mixer until a few days ago . It was never used here in the NE . The Lancashire area was responsible. Years under the stairs change of plug and guess what it works!

My guess is the Kenwood would be worth money . Possibly only for weight lifting exercises.

Rome 1960 : I will see what I can do Foxy and Canny Lass.

Photo two above is a trip to Blackpool. Possibly from the Sun Inn.

[threegee]

Yup, it's a smaller 5A one - I thought the prongs looked far too small to be the 15/13A size.  And, with a fuse in it, then it's a Wylex 5A side-entry ring-main plug.  You'd be hard pressed to find one of those here even 60 years ago.

The thought strikes me that if anyone bought a non-ring main one and used it on a ring main they could be in big trouble - unless there was a design difference to prevent that. That's something H & S would make a song and dance about these days, but in those days most people had a thing called common sense, and the very very few who didn't helped improve the gene pool.

The horrible fuse-pin ones BUDC fitted were I think branded DS - probably.  I've no idea what DS stood for.  There must be lots of those still lying around Bedlington in sheds and attics.

[Malcolm Robinson]

GGG Wrote:

"On this subject: how about our 13A plug being the envy of the world?  Something to remember when you are cursing that they don't fit into the bag, box or suitcase.  Though, there's likely some overpaid Eurocrat in Brussels drafting a directive to standardise us on German Shuko's as I write this. "

 

There certainly was in the early 00's!  Absolute madness........ the French sockets didn't even have an on of switch or an earth until very recently!  

[Vic Patterson]

No ring mains or switched, fused shuttered sockets here! lights and plugs on the same circuit (in the same room!) plug pins thin and bendy (quite femer!) light bulb sockets neutral (ouch!) but only 120v...

Edited March 31, 2016 by Vic Patterson

[Maggie/915]

Right how about these :-

[threegee]

2 hours ago, Malcolm Robinson said:

GGG Wrote:

"On this subject: how about our 13A plug being the envy of the world?  Something to remember when you are cursing that they don't fit into the bag, box or suitcase.  Though, there's likely some overpaid Eurocrat in Brussels drafting a directive to standardise us on German Shuko's as I write this. "

There certainly was in the early 00's!  Absolute madness........ the French sockets didn't even have an on of switch or an earth until very recently!  

Ah "Funny French": French plumbing, and lifts that you can only go up in - yes, I remember it well.

I knew that Hong Kong used our 13A but I never realised how many other countries adopted them:

Quote

Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belize, Bhutan, Botswana, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Cyprus, Dominica, Falkland Islands, Gambia, Ghana, Gibraltar, Grenada, Guyana, Hong Kong, India, Iraq, Ireland, Isle of Man, Jordan, Kenya, Kuwait, Lebanon, Macau, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Malta, Mauritius, Myanmar, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saudi Arabia, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Vanuatu, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

To that you can add countries - like South Africa - that still use our old British Standard round pin plugs.  That was in the days when we looked outward and led the world in innovation (and democracy).  A tragedy our kids are never taught this, to apologise for the past, and are fed all this inward-looking EU bilge.

[Maggie/915]

Then there are these :-

[moe19]

I can remember when we had no sockets and used to pug everything in to the light socket, I can remember my Grandmother ironing with the iron plugged in to the light and I can remember when she bought the houses first hoover (vacuum cleaner) that was also ran from the light socket.

No such the as the EU or health and safety in those days, ya just got electrocuted  

[Canny lass]

12 hours ago, moe19 said:

I can remember when we had no sockets and used to pug everything in to the light socket, I can remember my Grandmother ironing with the iron plugged in to the light and I can remember when she bought the houses first hoover (vacuum cleaner) that was also ran from the light socket.

No such the as the EU or health and safety in those days, ya just got electrocuted  

Oh happy days! I remember my mother buying a pair of hair-curling tongs that plugged into the light socket. Problem was that when it was plugged in there was no light! We had to sit on a chair in the doorway to the 'kitchen' (scullery it was called in my day) and use what little light came from there. I've had many a burned ear from those tongs.

[moe19]

4 hours ago, Canny lass said:

Oh happy days! I remember my mother buying a pair of hair-curling tongs that plugged into the light socket. .

Granny never had tongs but she had her hair curled more than once when plugging things in to that light socket  

[Canny lass]

We northern women certainly know how to live dangerously!