When I Were A Lad…: Snapshots From A Time That Health & Safety Forgot
£8.70£9.50 (-8%)
When I Were a Lad… looks at the glorious-yet-risky childhoods of yesteryear before the Health and Safety officers told us we couldn’t do everything because it was too dangerous.
The sleeper hit of Christmas 2009 – more than 4,000 copies sold through Bookscan.
A book to send shivers down the spine of any parent who has spent years protecting their children from the slightest bump and bash.
A glorious romp though some of the most reckless photos from the 1930s, 40s, 50s and 60s, tagged with side-splitting captions.
Ah, the past. A time when children could play in the snow without a helmet, crampons and a risk assessment report. When footballs were made from rhino hide and cricket was played with one pad, if you were lucky. When I Were a Lad… looks at the glorious-yet-risky childhoods of yesteryear before the Health and Safety officers told us we couldn’t do everything because it was too dangerous. It reflects on a time when children were allowed in with the animals at London Zoo; a time before the car seatbelt was invented (let alone used); a time when you were allowed to dress up endangered species in goalkeeping kit and take penalties against them. The authors have trawled through the major historic archives to find some glorious photo opportunities where the safety angle of the participants was the last thing anyone thought of. Children perch happily on lethal, limb-mangling machinery, stand all-smiles on live crocodiles, feed brown bears with their hands and get scooped from the street by passing tram conductors! These truly were the days that Health and Safety forgot, back when I were a lad…
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Additional information
| Publisher | Portico, Reprint edition (7 Jun. 2010) |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Hardcover | 144 pages |
| ISBN-10 | 1907554009 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-1907554001 |
| Dimensions | 20 x 1.5 x 15.4 cm |
by Rita Green
Birthday present
by G
Gift for my Uncle & just heard from my Auntie that he loves it & laughs out loud reading it.
by Barbara Brown
I gave this book to my brother for his 77th birthday. He absolutely loved it, identified with much of it, and can’t wait to share it with his friends, once we can mingled again. His daughter-in-law loved it too! I’m very pleased that my gift was such a success ????????????????
by S E Purcell
Great gift. Was a little aged around the edges.
by Felipe
Ok, so you’ll read it once, maybe twice then never look at it again, but it is a very funny little read, and I know I’ll be showing it to everyone who visits.
There are some genuine laugh out loud pages, and if, like me, you are rapidly approaching 50, you will no doubt end up having conversations about how things were “when I were a lad”. Just before I bought this book I was driving through the area that I grew up in with my wife, and before I knew it, I had uttered the immortal line “When we moved here, all this was just fields”.
Ah well, I’m getting old.
by Lindsay Gowlett
Wonderful photographs and cheeky, fun comments of the way we were – great stuff! Nothing was out of bounds, the world was our playground, we learnt from experience and survived – today’s generation are missing such a lot. Hopefully a glimpse at books such as this will help them to appreciate life outside of the Facebook and Twitter worlds! There is a second volume which shows a photograph of the Queen as a child being help on the top rail of the famous balcony by Queen Mary – no harness, no safety net! Think of the outcry if she did that to Prince George! Great book, recommended.
by Suzanne
It was an 80th birthday gift. The gentleman it was bought for loved it.
by J H
Bought for a friends birthday ,he loves it .
Quite northern language but that didn’t impact on his enjoyment .