Life before plastic

I remember how excited my mother was when she got her first "polythene" washing up bowl. Until then she'd been using an enamel one with Tide detergent to wash dishes. Within days she'd managed to melt the edge of it, putting the roasting tin in it too soon after taking it out of the oven. Obviously we were not very experienced with the properties of plastic in those early days :D

In the 1950s our washing up bowl was enamel but I think there was Fairy washing up liquid. Glass bottles were used for many of the things that are now in plastic. Also there was much less packaging. If you bought something in a shop the assistant wrapped it in brown paper and string or popped it in a small paper bag. Many items were refillable. My Saturday job in an ironmonger's shop in 1962 involved refilling paraffin cans from a tap. (Everyone seemed to have an Aladdin paraffin heater.)