A Swansea Valley Man
Household shopping in the 1920s/1930s
Posted by: aswanseavalleyman on: March 29, 2012
When the family happened to be at home all together, we would crowd into the little kitchen. My mother would be glad to get us out into the garden or the shed. I spent a lot of time in the shed. My father had made it into a workshop. It had a water tap inside, which he had fixed up himself. It was really a shed/washhouse. He had built a coal-fired boiler in one corner. It was my job to fill it ready for wash-days and bath-days. It held six big buckets of water, about 20 gallons. A fire would be lit under the boiler (y paer) and when it was bubbling away the shed would be as cosy as any room, so that even in the winter we could have our baths out there.
The groceries were delivered from the Co-op once a week, in a large cart pulled by a very big horse. Tom the Co-op was the carrier. A typical order would be eight pounds of sugar, four pounds of butter, four pounds of cheese, two pounds of tea, four pounds of bacon, half a pound of yeast, dried fruit and condensed milk. These were the bare essentials. Flour and potatoes came as they were needed, by the hundredweight sack, and meat from the butcher’s shop around the corner. Whatever other food was needed was shopped for in the normal way.
I never knew what it was to buy a loaf of bread from a shop. It was all baked in the oven at home. Huge loafs weighing four pounds. Salt came in 14 pound blocks, which would be about 8 inches x 8 inches x 20 inches long. It would be my job to cut it into small pieces, about 1 inch square. If we wanted swanky table salt I would rub two pieces together so that it could be put into a salt cellar, which would normally be cut glass. Very posh.
Sugar came in 4 pound blue bags. It would be weighed in the shop by one of the assistants, using a big scoop, out of a huge bag. We used to call the cheese American cheese. The only other cheese I knew was Caerphilly, but that was for special occasions, like when the chapel minister called, or for a funeral. Soap came in long bars, which were cut up into handy pieces.
I can even remember our Co-op membership numbers. My mother’s was 339, my sister’s 333 and ours was 111. We got 1/6d dividend for every pound we spent there, and every six months it would be entered into our dividend book. Then we would buy a piece of furniture or some bed-clothes, and that’s how we built up a stock of items we needed to build a home.
If any of the family needed a new suit we would go to the Co-op or Griff H Davies to be measured, and within a week it would be ready, sooner if it was a black or navy blue suit for a funeral. The Co-op would send the measurements to their tailors in Swansea. Griff H Davies would have it made up by a local tailor working at his own home. Shoes or boots would be purchased from Dai Rees, Siop Yscydian – Dai Rees, the shoe shop, or Dan Cash, so-called because you paid him as you purchased the shoes.
Dai Rees sent us a bill each quarter, as did Griff H Davies and also Mr Davies, the ironmonger, who had a shop on the Cross. That is where we bought what today would be called DIY materials. As a family we did many things ourselves. Leather to repair shoes and hob nails to make the soles last longer. Paint would be mixed to the colour you desired. Brushes, carpets – you name it, they had it or could get it in a day or two.
The groceries were delivered from the Co-op once a week, in a large cart pulled by a very big horse. Tom the Co-op was the carrier. A typical order would be eight pounds of sugar, four pounds of butter, four pounds of cheese, two pounds of tea, four pounds of bacon, half a pound of yeast, dried fruit and condensed milk. These were the bare essentials. Flour and potatoes came as they were needed, by the hundredweight sack, and meat from the butcher’s shop around the corner. Whatever other food was needed was shopped for in the normal way.
I never knew what it was to buy a loaf of bread from a shop. It was all baked in the oven at home. Huge loafs weighing four pounds. Salt came in 14 pound blocks, which would be about 8 inches x 8 inches x 20 inches long. It would be my job to cut it into small pieces, about 1 inch square. If we wanted swanky table salt I would rub two pieces together so that it could be put into a salt cellar, which would normally be cut glass. Very posh.
Sugar came in 4 pound blue bags. It would be weighed in the shop by one of the assistants, using a big scoop, out of a huge bag. We used to call the cheese American cheese. The only other cheese I knew was Caerphilly, but that was for special occasions, like when the chapel minister called, or for a funeral. Soap came in long bars, which were cut up into handy pieces.
I can even remember our Co-op membership numbers. My mother’s was 339, my sister’s 333 and ours was 111. We got 1/6d dividend for every pound we spent there, and every six months it would be entered into our dividend book. Then we would buy a piece of furniture or some bed-clothes, and that’s how we built up a stock of items we needed to build a home.
If any of the family needed a new suit we would go to the Co-op or Griff H Davies to be measured, and within a week it would be ready, sooner if it was a black or navy blue suit for a funeral. The Co-op would send the measurements to their tailors in Swansea. Griff H Davies would have it made up by a local tailor working at his own home. Shoes or boots would be purchased from Dai Rees, Siop Yscydian – Dai Rees, the shoe shop, or Dan Cash, so-called because you paid him as you purchased the shoes.
Dai Rees sent us a bill each quarter, as did Griff H Davies and also Mr Davies, the ironmonger, who had a shop on the Cross. That is where we bought what today would be called DIY materials. As a family we did many things ourselves. Leather to repair shoes and hob nails to make the soles last longer. Paint would be mixed to the colour you desired. Brushes, carpets – you name it, they had it or could get it in a day or two.