Food Preparation

Post war-- were there any improvements that you saw in the kitchen?

Oh yes, I had a fridge. When my first baby was born in 1957, I came home from hospital to this big surprise, which was a fridge, not a fridge freezer, in the corner of the kitchen. I don't know which was more surprise, which was more delight, my baby son or this fridge in the corner. I really thought I'd arrived. "Oh, a fridge, I've got a fridge." It was good having a telephone, but now- a fridge. "Goodness me." And how everything was taken for granted. Incredible the change.

So along came the refrigerator. What was the advantage for a young mum suddenly to have this refrigerator in your kitchen?

Oh, a great advantage. I lived out quite in the country. I had to walk about two or three miles with the pram to do the shopping, didn't have a car in those days, so anything I could bring back especially in the dairy line, milk. Milk was delivered of course, that was lovely, it didn't go sour. I didn't have to find water to stand it in, put it out in the shed or anything like that. I put it in this refrigerator, cheese you could keep at the bottom of the fridge. It was a great asset. It was one step up the ladder for someone like me. Although I'd lived in hospitals up to then, so when I did my training, I was of course in a hostel, you felt you were going to go somewhere. It just took a little bit of the strain off you a bit, so much so that I sit down one day, "What the women do nowadays." It sounds awful, "In our day- we didn't have that." You do wonder sometimes.