Cultureshock

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Video transcript

I started work at 14 years old – a morning girl in a big house owned by Mrs Hartley – a school teacher and her husband – a bank manager. The mornings were from 7:30am until 3pm – long mornings! For the pricey sum of 8 shillings a week – wow! For forty pence in today’s money.

I had two uniforms – a big white apron to wear when I was doing housework and a dainty apron and cap to wear in the afternoons and to open the front door.

My problem was I could not tell the difference between the phone and the doorbell, so I would dash to the door with my maids dainty apron and my cap on at a funny angle and it would be the phone ringing or vice versa. I was always in trouble over that!

Why did I have two aprons? Mrs Hartley wanted to fool the neighbours into thinking she had two maids!