Lads in Short Trousers - Sepia Saturday

This weeks’s Sepia Saturday prompt picture  is of a young boy in shrrt trousers.  I have quite a collection of vintage  images from the turn of the 19th-20th century to more recent times.  

In the first half of the 20th century, for boys the main fashion characteristic was short trousers, worn whatever the weather,  with knee length socks.  Boys did not go into long trousers until the age of around 13-14 - something of a rite of passage.  I remember this upgrade with my brother in the 1950s.  

 

   

The note on the back of this photograph says "Arthur in his first pair  of trousers", c.1910.  This wording referred to the fact it was the custom to have baby boys in dresses - see below  -  though I thought the practice had died out by the early 1900s.   Arthur was my cousin's father.  

 

Young Athur looking none too happy posed in his tartan dress, reflecting his Scottish heritage - his grandfather was born on the Scottish northernmost  island of Unst in the Shetland Isles.  

Harry Rawcliffe Danson, (my Uncle Harry), born 1912

Harry's middle name came from  his grandmother Maria Danson, nee Rawcliffe.  This is a section of a larger family photograph taken in 1916 when his father  William Danson went off to war in Flanders.  24 years later Harry survived the Battle of Dunkirk.  He retained his good dark looks all his life.

 My husband's uncle Matthew Iley White, born 1915.

Photograph taken by T. W. H. Liddle, Photographer, South Shields.  

Frederick Henry Weston (my Uncle Fred), born 1905. in Wolverhampton, Staffordshire

This photograph came to me via a connection of my cousin and is one of the very few early photographs I have of my father's Weston family. The story was that photographs were thrown out  following a death.  What a crime!   

In the 1911 census the Weston family were living in Lunt Lane, Lunt Gardens, Bilston, Wolverhampton in the industrial English Midlands. A photograph in Wolverhampton Archives indicated that Lunt Lane was the location of the Bilston Sewers - so not exactly garden country. 

Surely Fred must have been dressed up for a special occasion in this fancy coat and white socks and big hat?  Unfortunately there is no longer anyone alive  from the immediate  family to ask. 

 

 A photograph from my husband's family collection - but he does not know who it is.  The only clue - it was taken by a photographer in South Shields, County Durham. The guess is, it could be his grandmother's half brother - Robert William Hibbert, born in 1896. 

    

The  sailor suit was a uniform traditionally worn by enlisted seamen in the navy, characterized by its distinctive collar.  It gained popularity and  developed into a popular clothing style  as worn by the children  of Queen Victoria and the Russian royal family. 

 Arthur Smith again in his sailor suit - and what a wonderful mop of curls, 

 Jackie Threlfall, wearing the popular sailor suit.
Taken by ? Watson, 13 Wellington Terrace, Blackpool.

 

A photograph from the large collection left by my Great Aunt Jennie Danson, who grew up in Poulton-le-Fylde, near Blackpool,  Lancashire. She had written names on the back, but otherwise little is known about them.   I suspect they  are the children of friends,  and taken around 1918. I was unable to make much  headway in searching for the surnames  in the 1911 census.   

 

 

  

 Onto the 1950s.  My brother, looking very angelic,  in short trousers  bar sandals and short white socks.     I am all dressed up with my hair in ringlets, for  taking part  in Staining  Gala, near Blackpool,. Lancashire. 

 

 

 

A family group of my parents with m aunt Fran, with my little brother in his shorty trousers.   I have my plaits tied up over my head Austrian style.   

 

 

My husbad in his winter coat. with short trousers hidden.  

Warm enough for icecream - but husband still dressed in his pullover and jacket over short trousers. 

 

 

 

My cousin Stuart with his sister and how angelic they look, with their blond locks obviously inherited from their father Arthur (see above).  I remember my brother wearing similar short trousers held up by straps.

Adapted from an earlier post 

 

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Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity

to share their family history through photograph

 

Click  HERE to see more of this week's tales from 

Sepia Saturday bloggers. 

 

 

 

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A "Must Have" Man's Accessory - A Pocket Watch: Sepia Saturday

A miner, a ship's riveter, a general labourer, two business men, a group of schoolboys and a station bookstall manager - all feature in my post for this week’s Sepia Saturday challenge.  What is the link?   They are all wearing pocket watches on a chain. 
  

This week's Sepia Saturday  prompt photograph shows a man, formally dressed,  standing across the wall of a house, with a chair nearby - well, I did "chairs" the other week   My eye caught the pocket watch chain that the man was wearing, so I turned to my family collection to see what I could find.  

Pocket watches were invented in the 16th century and were the most common type of watch  until the First World War and the introduction of wrist watches.  They  generally had an attached chain so they could be secured to a waistcoat, lapel or belt loop.  The casements varied from brass to gold, so they appealed to a range of budgets.  Pocket watches were often a prized family possession, passed down through the generations.   

 

I remember my grandfather wearing one on a Sunday with his best suit - but unfortunately I do not have any photograph of him wearing it.  

From the extended family of my cousin:

Edward Henry Coombs(1857-1922) was the great grandfather of my cousin' s wife.  In 1879 Edward  married 19 year old Ann Elizabeth Shaw and in 18 years, they had a large family of 10 children.   He was foounder of Coomb Bros - a wholesale brocery business and manufacture of sweets and jams in Essex.  

The period 1917-1918 was a tragic time for Edward,   with sons Percy and William killed in the First World War; the death of his wife  and of his daughter Lilian.  Edward died in 1922, aged 65.  

 

As you can see from this photograph, Edward was an extremely big man, said to take up two seats on a bus  - and his pocket watch is very evident in this photoraph.  

 

Anna Holt and Charles Oldham (c.1861-1937)  

 

Charles Oldham was brother of my cousin's great grandfather Joseph Prince Oldham (1855-1917).  Born in Blackpool, he joined the family business and in the 1891 census was described as a self-employed coal merchant. But by 1901 he had had a complete change of both address and occupation, setting up a mineral water manufacturing business in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire. Looking here very much like a serious businessman, and wearing his pocket watch and chain. 

 Wiiliam Dower (1837-1919) and his wife,  Jesse Edward. 

 

Jesse  who was sister to my cousin's great grandmother, married William Dower, born in Banchory, Aberdeenshire. William   worked as a joiner before training as a minister of the church.   He was appointed as a Wesleyan Missionary in South Africa and he and his new wife Jesse set sail there  in 1865. 

 

In March 1870, William and Jesse set out on an ox wagon journey to East Griqualand and the town of  Kokstad, where he was asked to take on the role of pastor.  William helped build both his own home and the church there.  He went on to write a definitive history of the area in "The early annals of Kokstad and Griqualand East".

The photograph above of  William Dower and his wife Jesse was taken in 1913 when they visited Jesse’s sister in Blackpool,  Lancashire.  

 

William died in Africa in 1919 at "Banchory"  - his home named after his Scottish birthplace.  He left behind a legacy in the country he had come to love and a family who made their mark i many different fields.  

 William Bailey Bastow - my mother's second cousin.

 

Elizabeth Bailey born in Poulton-le Fylde, Lancashire  was William's mother. She married Peter Bastow, a Blackpool stone mason, and they had three children.  But Peter could not have survived much beyond the birth of his youngest son in 1882, as by 1890 Elizabeth married her second husband Henry Robinson.   In the 1901 census William was described as stepson, 20 years old and a general labourer.

Here he is dressed formally in the traditional style of waistcoat and pocket watch.

From my husband's family:

 

 

Alice Armitage and Matthew Iley White  - 

my husband's grandparents of South Shields, County Durham.

Matthew (1886-1956) and Alice (1888-1967) married in 1908 and this photograph is thought to  mark their  engagement, with Matthew wearing a watch chain with the watch itself hidden in his waistcoat pocket. 

The couple had a background of mariners and miners.   Matthew, a ship's riveter,   was named after his father  Matthew Iley White;  his mother was  Louisa Moffat,and both came from a family of seafarers. 

Alice hailed from South Kirby, Yorkshire where her father Aaron Armitage (1851-1889)  was a miner, the eldest of a family of ten children born to Moses Armitage  and Sarah Galloway. 

Aaron aged 36 married  19 year old Sarah Ann Cuthbert in 1887 but within two  years he was dead,  leaving fatherless his infant only daughter Alice.   His widow Sarah remarried a year later another miner George Hibbert and the family moved to the Durham minefields, settling in South Shields.  The 1901 census saw the family there, with Alice now 13 years old with a step brother Robert and step sister Violet. The two half-sisters remained close throughout their lives.

 Moses Armitage, (1824-1878),  Alice's grandfather.  

 I was lucky to get this photograph from an Ancestry contact and it is the oldest photograph we have of my husband's ancestors. 

Moses was a Yorkshire miner  and in 1844  married Sarah Gallaway (1826-1896)  and in the next 20 years between 1845 and 1868  they had 10 children  in Barnsley.  It was a hard life both at work and home,   and  Moses, like his son Aaron,  made frequent appearances in the law courts,  because of their criminal activity  - well recorded in the local press.  

And Finally - photographs from my Danson family collection  of my great uncle George Danson (1884-1916).

Young George Danson, my great uncle is on the left of this group of  boys and  three of them are wearing watch chains, yet they look  only around 12-13 years old.

George has featured many times on my blog.  He was the youngest of eight sons  of William Danson and Alice English of Poulton-le-Fylde, Lancashire and worked on railway station bookstalls, run my W.H. Smith.  He served as a stretcher bearer in the First World War and was killed on the Somme in 1916,. aged just 22.  

Is this the same watch  - found in a box of Danson memorabilia?

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Adapted from an earlier post published in 2018.   

Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity

to share their family history through photograph

 

 

 Click  HERE to see more of this week's tales from 

Sepia Saturday bloggers. 

 

 

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My Life as a "Speccy Four Eyes" - Sepia Saturday

This week's Sepia Saturday prompt image shows a desk strewn about with papers, a typewriter  - and  a pair of spectacles.  

My focus is on the spectacles,  for I was a "Speccy Four Eyes"  -  the popular call at my primary school in the 1950s for  those of us unfortunate enough to have to wear glasses.   I was a quiet,  shy child, but funnily enough I cannot recall being upset by the taunt - it was just part and parcel of playground culture. 

My mother was emphatic that I was not going to wear the hideous national health service glasses  with wired pale pink frames and was prepared to pay for a slightly more flattering pair.  I always made sure, though, in those early days,  that I took off my glasses for photographs.   

 

Around the age of 15,  Mum suggested I get my long hair cut professionally   - great - except we were both clueless afterwards how to style it at home.  Here I am being brave in highlighting publicly  this dreadful passport photograph, (left ) taken when I was to go on a school trip to Germany. This was the 1960's era of the Cold War and  I look  like the archetypal Russian spy.   

After five years, you could get a passport photograph updated,  and I could not wait to do this.  I took  great care on my hair and what I was wearing  -  only to be further mortified when, instead of replacing the photograph,  the new one was just stuck beneath it.  This  brought forth more family hilarity and more quizzical looks from passport control! 

 

If you were into fashion,  you could buy spectacles that came with different coloured clip ons to match your outfits - very trendy - but  I never went down that line. 

 

Graduation photographs of my bespectacled brother and myself. 

 

I became a librarian, so had to work hard at counteracting the traditional dowdy image of the profession, and wearing glasses did not help.    So here (below)  is the young professional look for my first job - worn with an (all the rage)  mini length sweater dress  and long necklace  - this was 1967.  

 

 But vanity crept in, especially when I was taking part in my   local Gilbert & Sullivan operetta productions and needed to see my way across the stage. 

 

So I turned to contact lens. They proved to be a great source of stories with friends,  as we recalled  tales of losing them.  I remember one occasion where I was scrambling around on the floor of a pew at church, (not praying) but  trying to find this miniscule lens. 

 I was pleased to be without my glasses for my wedding though!

 Pregnancy and being an "at home" Mum meant I lost the incentive to bother with inserting, cleaning, and removing contact lens - I had trouble getting used to them again and I reckoned I had better things to do with my time, so it was back to spectacles.  

                                   With my daughter, 1973 

We were now at the time on TV of Dallas, Dynasty and Charlie's Angels, with big hair, big shoulder pads and big glasses - hence this rare look for me taken for a work Annual Report. Less glamorously, I was also likened to Deidre Barlow of "Coronation Street" soap opera fame, known for her huge specs! 

 This look was too much hard work  - I gave up on perms but not on my glasses.

 And Finally:

                      A Happy Double "Speccy Four Eyes" !

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Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity  

to share their family history through photographs

 

 

 

Click HERE to find out what other bloggers have

spotted in this week's prompt photograph.

 

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Skirts on Show - Sepia Saturday

This week’s Sepia  Saturday prompt photograph features a women kneeling on her long skirt  and holding an early camera to take a photograph. I might not have camera images but I have plenty of skirts to  show.   So another fashion report from me this week!

At the turn of the 19th/20th centuries, a plain dark floor-length skirt was the standard wear for many women such as my great aunt Jennie  Danson (1897-1986).    On leaving school, Jennie went to work in the  Post Office at Poulton le Fylde, Lancashire. Her daughter Pam recalls a story that during the First World War, a telegram was received at the Post  Office for Jennie's widowed mo0ther, Mrs Maria Danson.  Fearing the worst, Jenny was allowed to run home with it.  Fortunately it was good news to say that brother Frank was in hospital in Malta but was doing well.    

Was this a group (above)  of Jennie's work colleagues, given they were all dressed in the  same skirts and blouses?   Even better, Jennie had put names on the back of the photograph -  Gerty Roskell, Jennie Danson, Annie Jolly, Margaret Porter, Madge O' Rourke, Edith Jackson, with Jennie second on the left  with her long plait.

 

 A close look will reveal why Dorothy Chisholm is up a ladder, showing off her long skirt   - she is pruning the plant on the wall. Dorothy was engaged to my great uncle John Danson of Poulton-le-Fylde, Lancashire, who was a widower with a young daughter.  Sadly in 1917 John committed suicide  at Tidworth whilst in army training.    The Danson family remained in contact with Dorothy throughout her life.  She never married and    I have vague memories of visiting her with my mother, when she was living in a bedsit - one of the many women whose lives were changed by the First World War and often  termed as "Surplus Women".   I have looked at finding out more about Dorothy but so far without success. 

   

 

 

 

My husband's grandparents Alice Armitage and Matthew Iley White of South Shields, Co. Durham.   The photograph is believed to have been taken to mark their engagement.  Alice is wearing a distinctive skirt with a broad ruched hem and arrow insets. 

 

Below ~ Alice and Matthew with their three young daughters, c.1914, with Alice in the tradtional plain long dark skirt of the period.  

On to the 1920s

After the war, skirts beame shorter  and here is my husband;s great aunt Violet  Hibbert again, in a typical 1920's look of  cloche hat, long bodice, straight skirt.   

 

    

Another 1920s unmistakable image - my mother's cousin Annie Danson  married on 4 October 1928 and the local press report provided a fascinating picture of the fashion of the day, with a colourful and evocative description of the dresses, with the headline "Gowned in Delphinium Blue". 

“The bride, who was given away by her uncle Mr R. Danson, was gowned in delphinium blue georgette, the sleeveless bodice being plain, while the circular skirt was side slashed and bordered all round with deep silver lace.  Her hat was ruched georgette to tone and she wore silver shoes and hose to tone.  Her bouquet was of pale pink chrysanthemums“.

 

The bane of family historians - two photographs in my son in law's collection , but with no note as to who they are!  

  his bride is in a simple stye of dress with a slightly shorter skirt that was coming  into fashion  at the end of the First World War.  

 

 

 

Another  unmistakable image from the late 1920s for this unidentified photogaph with the bride wearing a short skirt, a cloche hat  and carrying a huge bouquet.   

 

Onto the 1930's 

 In their stylish midi skirts  are my mother Kathleen Danson (left) with her sister Edith.  My mother was apprenticed as a tailoress at the age of 14 and both sisters made their own clothes on a treadle machine at home, which did not have electricity until the late 1950's.  

A late 1930s image of my mother and aunt - this time skirts have got shorter. 
 

1940s simplicity 

Postwar simplicity for my aunt Peggy Danson and her husband Harold Constable, always known as Con. It was a wartime courtship whilst  Peggy was working on the barrage balloons on the east coast. They emigrated after their wedding to Australia.  I  have two cousins there,  but unfortunately  contact was lost following Peggy and Con's deaths.  A pity!

Forty  years on to 1971 and here am I sporting a mini skirt.   This was the era when girls were frantically shortening skirts in their wardrobe to appear in fashion. Even my mother favoured the trend!

 

I loved wearing pinafore dresses and had several in different colours  in my wardrobe - slimming and versatile worn with jumpers or blouses.  Here with Inverary Castle, in Argyll on the west coast of Scotland in the background.

   

 

 

I am standing at the  stone marking the border of Scotland and England, and the entrance to Northumberland National Park.

 1970 - and can't you tell from our outfit  colours!   I am in the orange  and brown which seemed to characteristic the decade and my mother equally vibrant in royal blue and shocking  pink.  I had been to the hairdresser's to achieve that bouffant hairstyle. 

1977 - Another mother and daughter alike pose - same colour outfits, four knees on show! 

We were soon to move fashion wise  into the midi and the maxi era  and  the hippy look - long flowing skirts - not my style at all.  But  for a brief period,   and at  the only time of my life,  I was on trend  with my mini skirts. 

 

And Finally - back to the start - and wearing long black skirts  - this was pretty much the standard uniform for choirs in the late 1970s, before other fashions took over. 

 

The alto section of my choir - Roxburgh Singers - I am on second on the left in the back row.  

 

Copyright © 2025 · Susan Donaldson.  All Rights Reserved

 

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Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity  

to share their family history through photographs . 

 

 

 

Click HERE  to find out what other bloggers have

spotted in this week's prompt photograph.