Submitted by Ken Arkell, Havant u3a
The early Fifties found me as a lower ranking Civil Servant living in a Civil Service hostel in, if my memory is correct, rather grand but converted houses in Rutland Gate in Knightsbridge, London.
How I arrived there is another story but in brief I was 'drafted' there from a similar post in Portsmouth Dockyard but to work in the Post Office Savings Bank. In those days the Post Office was a Government Department and what brought this recollection back was the article on Smog. Our place of work was in Hammersmith, a direct walk along from Knightsbridge following the main road., simple in normal times but how different when the smog descended. A thick and choking fog blanketed everything, one's sense of direction vanished; one followed the pavement, the streetlights being just an overhead blur.
Traffic in those days was a fraction of what it is today, but cars mounted pavements, buses when moving, followed the Conductor who walked just ahead guiding the Driver and even then found themselves in difficult situations. (Remember when buses had Conductors who collected fares and issued a ticket? ) Apart from the smog another memory of that time was going to Victoria Palace to see the variety shows, and sitting in the' Gods', the cheapest seats right up it seemed near the theatre ceiling. Happy Days? I'm not sure.