During the war my father worked brutal hours building bombers. He worked for 20 days and then had a day off. His shifts were 12 hours on, 12 off, which alternated every 20 days between days and nights. He made good wages because he was paid union rates, which included overtime. In 1945 his wages plummeted when he returned to building sites.
I was born in 1945 and mum stayed at home until I was seven, then she went to work. That’s when I became a Latch Key Kid.
A ‘latch key kid’ had the door key on a string round their neck. When you got home you came into an empty house. As I couldn’t reach the lock, my dad built me a box, which I stood on. It was understood that if there was a problem, that I should go next door. Obviously there were other places as well. For example, my friends’ mums invited me in. But it was difficult to go every day. So, I didn’t.
The national press were against ‘latch key kids’ because it meant mothers weren’t doing their ‘job’. It was assumed ‘latch key kids’ were neglected and a symptom of the breakdown of society. It was also assumed it was a sign of grinding poverty, which wasn’t the case with us. Although we were poor, we always, as the saying goes, ’had food on the table’. People in grinding poverty didn’t eat every day. ‘Latch key kids’ like me were accepted. I was never bullied but we were seen as very ‘poor’. I was a ‘latch key kid because my mum was aspirational.
Part of the stigma was that mum was seen to be failing. There were ferocious expectations. My dad hated the fact that mum went to work and what was worse, she went for money. But the war had changed everything. Mum was keen to ‘get on’ and achieve things. This meant that I had to grow up and take responsibility for myself.
Children weren’t pampered by over-anxious parents. Protective micro-managing of children would have been laughable.
‘Taking a child to school. You must be mad! Why? Are you afraid of kidnapping’?
And, of course, that is exactly what people nowadays are frightened of. There’s an assumption of disaster, mayhem and chaos. Parents live in a state of terror. Trivialities like crime data are dismissed and people use very rare incidents to prove that they must take their children to school. Rare events are believed to be commonplace.
A ’latch key kid’ in Leeds in the 1950s came back to a freezing cold house during the winter. We had ‘proper’ winters in those days, with many days of snow, frosty days and bleak slab gray skies with drizzle. I made a coal fire but it was slow to warm the house. My mum baked a lot and so there was often a scone, or a piece of cake left out for me. Failing that there was home baked bread which was sliced ready for me. Obviously we didn’t have a fridge and so butter was on the table….in summer it was very, very soft.
There are no infallible ways of bringing up a child. A 2025 version of a ‘latch key kid’ would attract hostile attention. A child aged seven not being picked up from school by an adult….Shock, Horror!
The past is a different country; they do things differently there.1
Note
1 L. P. Hartley – Wikiquote
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