Bits

There are many things which contribute to the 'feel' of daily life in Southall in the 1950s and 60s which are not particular to it alone, but which serve to illustrate life in the area as it was.

I have already spoken of 'George', the mobile greengrocer, who used to come door to door with his horse and cart selling vegetables - and things like locally sourced eggs - every week. The electric milkfloats which delivered milk (very quietly) would also be familiar from then. The Fowler's bread vans delivering on their rounds: locally baked bread delivered locally by horse and cart. How ecological was that? Then, on Sunday evenings a man would come on a trycycle boxcart and sell shellfish street by street. He'd come a bit of the road and ring a bell and people who wanted winkles, cockles and such would go out to him. Someone else came from time to time selling watercress from a large tray which they carried over their head. A 'Breton onion man' would come door to door on a bike laden with strings of onions and dressed in a beret. I remember a man walking very slowly down the middle of the road singing and collecting. The proverbial man with a suitcase full of cleaning things would put in an occasional appearance on doorsteps.

There were also various collectors who came to the door: Co-op, Pearl, the 'rent-man', salesmen. Coal was delivered by coal-cart (again sometimes horsedrawn) and carried in on coalmen's backs. My cousin did this for a while and clean and easy it wasn't. When I was young we separated the household waste into 'the bin' and 'the pig man', who came in a lorry to collect all the organic stuff. Presumably it went to fairly local pig farms as swill. Milk came in varieties of bottles: gold, red and silver tops, pint and half-pint. Milkmen also delivered orange juice in similar bottles. Bottles were washed and recycled.

Bin-men tended to live and work locally. They lifted heavy metal bins on their backs to throw into the carts. Likewise the streets were swept by hand and locally, by men who came with carts they pulled along.

Until 1965 Southall had its own council and the Town Hall and the administration in the buildings around it were quite accessible to most people, on foot. I think the old Manor House was used by the council as well. I remember the mayor of Southall coming to my school in regalia and chains. The Cottage Hospital, near the Manor House, was used for small injuries and day procedures and was very intimate. As a child I was there a few times.

I used to go to a GP surgery which had a group practice and a surgery-clinic, very novel at a time when most GPs worked alone and from houses. My surgery was staffed by three Jewish doctors of radical and intellectual bent, with a social agenda. The oldest was Doctor Ginsburg, then Doctor Cline and lastly Doctor Freeling. I knew them all over the years. They had differing 'techniques': Ginsberg was fatherly and retiring; Cline could be perhaps a little overdirect; Freeling was gentle, had a great clientel among children and was more than a little involved in the lives of those in trouble. In years gone by, before the NHS, when people paid for GPs, Ginsberg was also known to treat and not charge when the situation demanded it.