Did I have a miserable childhood?

Tell your Story

A Day in the Life

Inspiration & Innovation

A Great Discovery

LAM Action

Ageing & Death

Literature

Architecture

Love

Art & Design

Miscellaneous

Awards & Achievements

Music

Business & Economy

Nature & Wildlife

Changing Faces (Living with Disfigurement)

Peace

Childhood

Philosophy

Culture

Poetry Readings

Education

Politics

Environment

Religion

Faculty of 1000

School Life

Family History

Science

Family Life

Sport

Fashion

Technology

Film

Television

Folklore

Theatre

Food & Drink

Thyroid UK

Friendship

Travel

Health

Vox Populi

Heroes

War

History

Work Life

In my Area

View all channels

About

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

PLAY MODE:

SINGLE

ALL

EMBED:

GEORGE DANIELS

1 - Did I have a miserable childhood?

Yes well, when my mother was 92, she died at 93, she wrote me a letter and I hadn't heard from her for 20 years or so, and she wrote and apologised for my miserable childhood. I must say I was astonished to get this letter because I didn't know I'd had a miserable childhood, it seemed to me to be quite the opposite. Of course we were very poor and lacked even the basic requirements, or as we consider to be requirements nowadays and the diet was very frugal. I mean for example it would be bread and dripping for breakfast and a cup of tea and bread and jam for tea and another cup of tea and whatever might be going cheaply available from the local shops for lunch. So it wasn't a very varied diet, and we ate all meals standing round the kitchen table, there were no chairs. The only chairs available were occupied by my father, who made quite certain that he didn't suffer any discomfort. Even his diet was different to ours; he had to be specially catered for. And I would be sent off in the morning to buy a loaf of bread. One would get a large loaf of bread, stale, for a penny, and I would have to negotiate very heavily trafficked roads to get to this bakers shop. There were no traffic lights in those days, just motor vehicles, not stopping at junctions. When I got back, the loaf apparently was so stale that my mother in a rage threw it at me and knocked me over. So I was a bit like a ninepin that morning. But during the day I would leave the house and find things to amuse myself with. There were lots going on and lots a workman could do, and I would quite often make money helping the local retailers who had stalls, set their stall up in the high street and I would help, either by carting boxes or helping with the vegetables or generally getting in the way and trying to be useful and make a few pennies like that. For transport, we sat on the rear bumpers of the local busses, and this was a very precarious hold we had on life on that thing. Why we didn't get rolled off and run over, we will never know, but there it was. We travelled up and down on the backs of these busses on the bumpers.

« previous

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9 1. Did I have a miserable childhood?

Duration: 2 minutes, 52 seconds.

7925 1 3

2. Early schooling; a talent for drawing

Duration: 2 minutes, 10 seconds.

2389 0

3. First experiences with watches

Duration: 2 minutes, 24 seconds.

2861 0

4. Making an exploding clock

Duration: 2 minutes, 29 seconds.

1928 0

5. Gramophone springs

Duration: 1 minute, 43 seconds.

1713 0

6. Escape from the bedding factory

Duration: 2 minutes, 34 seconds.

1598 0

7. My career: tyres to cinematographs to electricity to...?

Duration: 5 minutes, 5 seconds.

1655 0

8. Happy days in the army; playing the mouth organ

Duration: 2 minutes, 36 seconds.

1323 0

9. Learning to blow up tanks with a mortar

Duration: 1 minute, 49 seconds.

1267 0

10. Farming while in the army

Duration: 3 minutes, 16 seconds.

1078 0

« previous

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9 Peter Hall
Theatre director

'Surrounded by adults, adults, adults'

Keywords: childhood; poverty

Diana Athill
Writer

A happy childhood

Keywords: childhood

Ben Barres
Neurobiologist

My childhood interest in science

Keywords: childhood

Gerald Edelman
Biologist

Love of music in early childhood

Keywords: childhood

Leonard Hayflick
Microbiologist

Childhood in Pennsylvania

Keywords: childhood

Oliver Sacks
Neurologist

A childhood friend

Keywords: childhood

vitek says:
George Daniels, who died a few days ago, was not only a great watch maker and all-round mechanical... Read more

George Daniels, who died a few days ago, was not only a great watch maker and all-round mechanical genius, he was also a kind, wise and wonderful companion. His friends will miss him terribly.

Tell your Story

Embed code

George Daniels

Biography

Information

Description

« previous

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

next »

« previous

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

next »

Related Stories

'Surrounded by adults, adults, adults'

A happy childhood

My childhood interest in science

Love of music in early childhood

Childhood in Pennsylvania

A childhood friend

Leave a comment

Comment