Tuesday 15 December 2009

WARTIME LONDON as a child


Piccadilly Circus, maybe the rush hour?There was so little traffic then,mostly only taxis and buses.
private motoring was out,fuel rationing saw to that.
A big advantage was that getting round the town was easy and swift,a bus would be the best way as they were usually frequent and to wait more than ten minutes rare.
The tube was the same and seemed more reliable than now but was usually packed and at night time shared with people sleeping down there to escape the bombs.
The tourists were nearly all troops on leave,mostly American and Canadian who were very friendly especially to us children and gave us a good supply of sweets and gum. The different uniforms and caps worn by the troops from all nations were also of interest to us.
Eros in the centre of picture was boarded up against shrapnel damage but was still the main visitors area,again mostly troops,Ladies of the night walked in nearby Soho but us kids knew nothing about that.
My father who was a cartoonist once had his work on those Eros hoardings advertising LCC evening classes.

2 comments:

  1. Guinness was still good for you, Schweppes still went schhhh.. but what, I wonder, happened to Votrix Vermouth?

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  2. Thats a funny thing,my father did advertising drawings for both Schweppes and Guinness and for many years after Schweppes sent him a case of whiskey for Christmas

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