What was a grandmother in the 1940's like?

Answer 1

I can only really tell you about my grandmother (loved her a great deal.) She was my mother's mother and would visit often staying over-night.

Grandmothers back in the 40s usually wore dark clothing, longer dresses, wore a cardigan sweater and black Cuban heeled shoes that laced up the front and always a hat when you went out anywhere. They usually had grey hair and wore it in a bun at the nape of their neck and at night take the bun out and brush and put it in one long braid and I was mezmerized by this. Grandmothers usually had full, cushy breasts and I can remember feeling so safe when my grandmother held me on her knee and let me rest my head on her.

When I was 4 she moved into my bedroom (2 single beds) and each night I would watch her brush her long silver grey hair 100 strokes and then put it in one long braid. She would tell me a story, then read a little from The Bible, but she read it so I could understand it. Then we said our prayers (actually kneeling side-by-side with elbows on the bed) and I would always include my grandmother in my prayers and I'd see one blue eye twinkle my way.

During the day in a 1940s life women cleaned the house, prepared meals for the men in the house (only my father at the time) and there were no fast foods and during this time food was rationed up until the mid-40s. My grandmother would use brown butcher paper and a nub of a lead pencil to make her grocery list. I can still see her touching her tongue to the end of the lead pencil to make it write darker. It wasn't off to a huge grocery store to do shopping, but driving out to a farm for chickens and eggs. Thankfully the chickens were already butchered and plucked, but when we got home I helped my grandmother clean out the chickens and I thought it was the greatest thing (you couldn't get me to do that yukky job now! LOL) She would make sausage and grind up meat and allow me to blow-up the gut that came in long links (I wouldn't press my lips to those again either) and make sausages. Since there is Irish and Scottish in our family my grandmother spoke fluent Gaelic and she would often tease her own daughter (my mother) by teaching me a few bad words (not too bad)in Gaelic and have me go over and tell my mother who would get red faced and angry at my grandmother. Heck, I thought I had learned another language!

Grandma left her deceased husband's Bagpipes in my closet in the bedroom and my mother told me I was never to touch them. Well of course I did! I would sneak into the closet and blow so hard on those things (not realizing you had to blow to put wind in the darn thing) and I would have bulging eyes and felt like my lungs had been sucked through my throat. I never got as much of a peep out of those bagpipes. My grandmother would take me to the Scottish dances and I learned many of the dances and danced very well "Sword Dance", etc.

I remember my grandmother once a month would say, "I'm off to Auntie Maggie's to meet Captain Morgan." By then I was 6 - 7 years old and would raise my eyebrow thinking my grandmother (of ALL people had a boyfriend!) Off my grandmother would go in her black coat, straw hat with large fake roses in it and her bun sticking out the back and those black Cuban heels clicking down the stairs as fast as they could not to mention the big grin on her face. I was thoroughly disgusted to think my grandmother was sharing a boyfriend with Auntie Maggie. My grandmother would be home around 8 PM and I was still up doing my homework. Her coat would be buttoned up wrong and her hat would be lop-sided with the roses looking wilted and worn and those little tiny Cuban heeled shoes weren't doing the "fast click" like they use too.

My grandmother finally came to live with us permanently (I didn't really know why and it was natural) and we had an extremely close bond. She was soft-spoken, always smiling with a twinkle in her eye and teaching me THAT Gaelic! There were many fond memories. Then my grandmother was bed-ridden and my mother told me I could no longer sleep in the same room "grandma was ill." I thought she had a cold, but unfortunately she had stomach cancer and in those days the patients were sent home to die. When she passed away she left a large hole in my heart and I felt that the one safe place I had for security had been snatched from my life. It wasn't until I was in my late teens I began to understand about life in general ... being born and dying and I came to peace with it.

Oh, by the way, Old Captain Morgan that was seeing my dear grandmother and Auntie Maggie was none other than a large bottle of Captain Morgan rum and grandma got smashed! LOL

See the Related Link for "1940's life" to the right for more.