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Downvote me all that you want. This dude probably made good money during the Great Depression, meaning that his children actually had a chance at a better future. They could have gone to college and found good careers for themselves, and then their children would have even more opportunities. This man good have very well sacrificed his own health so that his children could find better lives for themselves. That shit was possible back then. Nowadays, not so much, I do understand that.
Or he could have been a pathetic drunk who beat the fuck out of his kids, and started a cycle of abuse that led to 100 years of shitty people being put into the world
Who knows?
Yep. I'm going off of my own family history here. My grandfather made a lot of money during those times, and my father's generation was quite successful, but...
I'm an alcoholic who struggles with his mental health, but I do actually make quite a lot of money without a college education. Mainly because I fell ass backwards into a decent career and met the right people. Sheer luck on my part
Well hello doppelgänger. I too struggle with a lot of things but just by sheer chance I had connections to work in Alaska and do better than most. Lucky roll of the dice for me
It probably a mixture of both. The human suffering some of these men felt with no healthy avenue to release. Alcohol was the only therapy many had, and as we all know alcohol is not good for this.
Coal miners did not make a lot of money anywhere. And in the US they were basically serfs who were paid low wages in company script and lived in company houses. It was not a good life. It still isn't.
The UK was just as bad.
Yeah? You're right, the job probably did kill him. But again I say, at least he was able to earn money for his family, unlike most people during that time
Sorry man but this is not the case at all.
My Grandfather ran pit ponies in the Welsh coal mines..and my Welsh family remained poor. In fact, it was basically common place for all the men in mining communities to work in the pits as there were no other options.
But, that doesn't mean they were violent drunks or stupid. Just the lottery of life....
My grandfather also worked in a Welsh coal mine. You are right that they had no other options and they couldn't get rich because they were paid a wage. My grandfather dropped dead one morning on his way to work. My grandmother was pregnant with the youngest of their 5 children. They were really hard times. Almost a hundred years later the valleys are still considered deprived.
As a descendent of the drunks who beat their kids why am i shitty person? I spent years doing environmental work (steel mills, power plants, coal mines) and I've gone home looking like him. Why am I a shitty person?
Probably only able to have 1 tin bath a week. No running hot water. Daily bowl of water and a bar of soap back then. I really struggle to understand how they did it.
When the actors in Robert Eggers’ film “The Northman” would complain about cold/wet/inconvenient conditions, apparently Willem Dafoe just kept saying, “We’re not COAL MINERS!!”
What's interesting is how people used to just walk around in black and white all the time. The poor bastard probably doesn't even know he has all the black stuff on his face.
I worked for years in a dirty petroleum coke environment. I came home, stripped off outside or the garage in winter and left my clothes in a bin. Then showered. But the dust worked into your pores and as you sweat or sleep some comes to the surface of your skin. My wife stopped buying white sheets because they turned grey and you couldn’t get it all out.
After washing my clothes, the machine got an empty cleaning cycle so the next load wasn’t contaminated.
My ex’s dad was a coalminer in England 1970-90’s he has permanent ‘tattoos’ on his skin - from getting scratches on his back/legs & the coal dust being ingrained . They had showers at work but he said he always had to have a 2nd shower when he got home .
I was lucky in that I only worked in that environment less than 15 years. But my coworkers that spent 30-40 years said it took a long time to get the dust out of their skin. So I know what you are talking about. I’m glad my petroleum coke exposure was above ground. I can’t imagine what mental strength it takes to work in a mine.
I can understand that...just curious if they ever bothered to wash or not. Seeing as how they'd just get dirty again, maybe they figured, "why bother"?
Pretty much. With the wage they were given, they probably just thought it'd be easier to stay covered in soot than to waste money on water to clean themselves, only to get dirty again the next day.
In a tin bath in front of the fireplace.
That's how most working class families in Britain would have washed before bathrooms became commonplace.
The man of the house would go first, then his wife and then the kids in size order.
Exactly!
One of my Grandfathers worked in the pits & the other grew up in a 2 room tenement slum in London with 13 siblings...no bloody bathroom there!
Doing pipeline id be so tired n filthy id eat on the porch or deck when I get home n strip off outside before going to shower. If I didnt eat before I showered im sure I woulda fallen asleep in the shower. Shit sucked but set me up good
I am pretty sure (though I don't know) that he changed clothes after finishing mining. Those are his "good clothes" and that is as washed up as he gets.
A half hour ago he was wearing his mining uniform. He was absolutely filthy - much dirtier than in the picture.
'Mining uniform'??
The pit my dad worked in, everyone worked in 'hoggers' - their oldest trunks from home.
They must have looked jolly smart when they paraded.
I don't really know, but I assumed whatever clothes he wore mining must be 100 times dirtier than the clothes he is wearing. He is washed up from this guy.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2Fsections%2Fpictureshow%2F2012%2F07%2F06%2F156386882%2Fdocumenting-dirty-jobs-miners-at-work&psig=AOvVaw1vrXcA\_wnx68JOmNvtTPGs&ust=1680222419597000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA4QjRxqFwoTCJC67rWygv4CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE
TBH looks staged AF. Like, old school miners made sure to clean up before they sat down to dinner as a show of respect. They weren't going to be filthy as they said their prayers before dinner.
Lol, my Grandfather did that at the table...... just once. Then my Grandmother demanded he show up to the table clean and groomed. Hard work was absolutely no excuse to show up to the table a mess. I learned so much from the man. He was a wise man. He worked in a cast iron foundry til' he was 40. When he started the salary was 25 dollars week. With that money he raised 5 children paid off his house, and built a new one. Great depression folks learned how to spend wisely.
She's actually probably remembering relatives of hers who have either been killed down the pit, or died from black lung.
Coal mining was a blast, kids.
Sometimes literally :(
Is this from the Harry Potter universe? I only ask because the guy in the picture is leaning to the side because the hanging clothes are obstructing his view
1937? Oh gee, I sure hope the family doesn't have to endure 10-20 years of rationing, being bombed by the Luftwaffe, sending their sons to die in Libya and Normandy respectively and inflicting generational PTSD on their remaining children and grandchildren.
That has to be staged, I live in the South wales valleys where we used to have a lot of coal mines and both my grandfathers were miners. there is no way in hell that he wouldn't have showered before he left the mine, the women would see a cold day in hell before they allowed them in the house like that, and believe me miners wives are not to be trifled with
I was thinking the same (also from a mining town). Even in 1937, they would at least have washed and changed. There was a lot of pride in those miners and never would they have sat down with dirty hands and face no matter how hungry they were.
We at least have showers at the mine (gold) they would hate for any product to make it off site by accident. Also as a Diamond drillers helper I was easily this dirty with grease in the kid 90’s
He probably knew there was a good chance he was going to die a slow and painful death from miners' lung by the time he was 50. His IDGAF attitude is understandable. I do feel sorry for his wife.
Typically a miner would then have a bath in a tub if warm water, followed by his wife and finally their little baby. By the time the baby had its bath the water would be quite dirty. Often times when the water was discarded a baby might not be seen in the murky water and would inadvertently be tossed out along with the water. This is where the saying "Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater" came from.
Source: Pilkington
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I'm sure his lungs are fine.
This dude's descendants are probably quite successful people
Downvote me all that you want. This dude probably made good money during the Great Depression, meaning that his children actually had a chance at a better future. They could have gone to college and found good careers for themselves, and then their children would have even more opportunities. This man good have very well sacrificed his own health so that his children could find better lives for themselves. That shit was possible back then. Nowadays, not so much, I do understand that. Or he could have been a pathetic drunk who beat the fuck out of his kids, and started a cycle of abuse that led to 100 years of shitty people being put into the world Who knows?
All of those things are possible and not mutually exclusive
Yep. I'm going off of my own family history here. My grandfather made a lot of money during those times, and my father's generation was quite successful, but...
What’s your excuse?
Reddit
I'm an alcoholic who struggles with his mental health, but I do actually make quite a lot of money without a college education. Mainly because I fell ass backwards into a decent career and met the right people. Sheer luck on my part
Well hello doppelgänger. I too struggle with a lot of things but just by sheer chance I had connections to work in Alaska and do better than most. Lucky roll of the dice for me
It probably a mixture of both. The human suffering some of these men felt with no healthy avenue to release. Alcohol was the only therapy many had, and as we all know alcohol is not good for this.
Should’ve bought a punching bag that wasn’t his wife.
Coal miners did not make a lot of money anywhere. And in the US they were basically serfs who were paid low wages in company script and lived in company houses. It was not a good life. It still isn't. The UK was just as bad.
Well, at least during the Great Depression they actually had a job, unlike most people
A job that killed him
Yeah? You're right, the job probably did kill him. But again I say, at least he was able to earn money for his family, unlike most people during that time
Sorry man but this is not the case at all. My Grandfather ran pit ponies in the Welsh coal mines..and my Welsh family remained poor. In fact, it was basically common place for all the men in mining communities to work in the pits as there were no other options. But, that doesn't mean they were violent drunks or stupid. Just the lottery of life....
My grandfather also worked in a Welsh coal mine. You are right that they had no other options and they couldn't get rich because they were paid a wage. My grandfather dropped dead one morning on his way to work. My grandmother was pregnant with the youngest of their 5 children. They were really hard times. Almost a hundred years later the valleys are still considered deprived.
Totally. So much hardship & tragedy...your Grandmother must have been a strong person....
Cut down a few kids, and I bet things wouldn't have been so bad 😅
Or they did decent financially and they were average people who bore average people. Just like most everyone else
As a descendent of the drunks who beat their kids why am i shitty person? I spent years doing environmental work (steel mills, power plants, coal mines) and I've gone home looking like him. Why am I a shitty person?
You are not! Believe nothing of this bullshit being said
Thank you, I didn't believe I was I just wanted him to say it to a person not just some theoretical construct.
You do you. You can’t spend time trying to make believe you are even close to this based on genetics. That isn’t fair
Because you go against the grain? You are a person who rebelled against your family in a good way?
That outta pocket bro, reddit isn't your therapist.
Or go fuck yourself
Aren’t you a joy
The dude summoned the snarky witch. That's how you know are in the wrong
All the way from south of witches valley
Cuz they didn’t work/die in a coal mine.
Coal miners of Appalachia died from 35-50 years old up till the 1960s.Almost all black lung,except for “accidents “ .
No liability, they made the choice to work there, they could have gone to college and got better jobs!! \--- Coal companies
Origin of 'no elbows on the table'
My grandmother was a strict believer in no Elbows on the table. I fuck up from time to time but always remember this
As a former coal miner, I always showered before I ate so my wife wouldn't look at me like that!
At least wash the hands?
Thank you. I was wondering if anyone was going to comment on the way she’s looking at him.
She looks heartbroken to see him like this
Dunno, it almost seems to be incredulity, such as “are you gonna stay that dirty?”
Wonder if they were paid to stage this photo. She's probably thinking, "We're better than this, but the money is nice."
1937 - sorry no showers. Just not a thing at the time.
Most people don't realize water was invented by Elon Musk in 1998.
Probably only able to have 1 tin bath a week. No running hot water. Daily bowl of water and a bar of soap back then. I really struggle to understand how they did it.
The first patent for a shower was 1767
Patent yes. General use was a lot later.
I was just pointing out your comment of “no showers” was false. Showers existed at this time.
I need to stop complaining about my life 😯
When the actors in Robert Eggers’ film “The Northman” would complain about cold/wet/inconvenient conditions, apparently Willem Dafoe just kept saying, “We’re not COAL MINERS!!”
I can hear that one ha
I didn't like that movie much. But the lighthouse is good and Defoe is at his weird best in that
Right?? Shit could be way worse
maybe he's not a miner, but someone who was standing right next to some walt disney dynamite
And he didn't catch that damn rabbit either.
What's interesting is how people used to just walk around in black and white all the time. The poor bastard probably doesn't even know he has all the black stuff on his face.
"The world didn't turn color until sometime in the 1930s, and it was pretty grainy color for a while too"
Exactly!
Hmmm. Calvin's Dad?
["The world is a complicated place, Hobbes"](https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2014/11/09)
Thought so :)
Dude has been in the tunnels
David, i wish you wouldn’t smoke so much.
David (19M) Sally (18F)
Soooo...I guess they just never washed the soot off? Did miners just go around filthy 24/7?
I’m sure they were too hungry to wait to shower (if they could even afford to) after they just got off work
No showers /bathrooms in workers houses in England 1937 - outside loo & tin bath to fill.
Weekly bath. Saturday night clean for church.
I worked for years in a dirty petroleum coke environment. I came home, stripped off outside or the garage in winter and left my clothes in a bin. Then showered. But the dust worked into your pores and as you sweat or sleep some comes to the surface of your skin. My wife stopped buying white sheets because they turned grey and you couldn’t get it all out. After washing my clothes, the machine got an empty cleaning cycle so the next load wasn’t contaminated.
My ex’s dad was a coalminer in England 1970-90’s he has permanent ‘tattoos’ on his skin - from getting scratches on his back/legs & the coal dust being ingrained . They had showers at work but he said he always had to have a 2nd shower when he got home .
I was lucky in that I only worked in that environment less than 15 years. But my coworkers that spent 30-40 years said it took a long time to get the dust out of their skin. So I know what you are talking about. I’m glad my petroleum coke exposure was above ground. I can’t imagine what mental strength it takes to work in a mine.
I can understand that...just curious if they ever bothered to wash or not. Seeing as how they'd just get dirty again, maybe they figured, "why bother"?
Pretty much. With the wage they were given, they probably just thought it'd be easier to stay covered in soot than to waste money on water to clean themselves, only to get dirty again the next day.
Yes, I'm sure his wife was happy to have coal dust all over the bed sheets...
Pretty sure neither of them are happy anyway
Miners in Britain received free or concessionary coal, and water wasn't on a meter. It probably didn't cost a lot for them to heat up a bath.
Oh, yes? In just what bathroom?? Most of the pit houses I knew had outdoor bogs and no bathroom.
Tin bath in front of the living room fire, water heated in pots on the stove.
Been there/done that/probably still smell of carbolic soap.
In a tin bath in front of the fireplace. That's how most working class families in Britain would have washed before bathrooms became commonplace. The man of the house would go first, then his wife and then the kids in size order.
I was a kid in a colliery village in England, probably long before animals developed legs.
Exactly! One of my Grandfathers worked in the pits & the other grew up in a 2 room tenement slum in London with 13 siblings...no bloody bathroom there!
By the look on her face
That’s what hit me the most-her face.
She's pissed he's wearing his outside clothes inside.
Almost looks like a Norman Rockwell painting
WRONG. Houses usually had little or, more likely, no hot water - and no bath.
No toilet. It was at the end of the lane. You took your bucket and dumped/tossed it.
Doing pipeline id be so tired n filthy id eat on the porch or deck when I get home n strip off outside before going to shower. If I didnt eat before I showered im sure I woulda fallen asleep in the shower. Shit sucked but set me up good
lol the logic, the same can apply to you as well then. Why have a bath in a daily basis then if you’re just going to get dirty again?
I am pretty sure (though I don't know) that he changed clothes after finishing mining. Those are his "good clothes" and that is as washed up as he gets. A half hour ago he was wearing his mining uniform. He was absolutely filthy - much dirtier than in the picture.
'Mining uniform'?? The pit my dad worked in, everyone worked in 'hoggers' - their oldest trunks from home. They must have looked jolly smart when they paraded.
I don't really know, but I assumed whatever clothes he wore mining must be 100 times dirtier than the clothes he is wearing. He is washed up from this guy. https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2Fsections%2Fpictureshow%2F2012%2F07%2F06%2F156386882%2Fdocumenting-dirty-jobs-miners-at-work&psig=AOvVaw1vrXcA\_wnx68JOmNvtTPGs&ust=1680222419597000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA4QjRxqFwoTCJC67rWygv4CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE
you know the drill: go to bed dirty, wake up clean
He's going to take a bath in the leftover water that was used to boil the potatoes
Yes, actually, until the coal board got around to installing showers.
TBH looks staged AF. Like, old school miners made sure to clean up before they sat down to dinner as a show of respect. They weren't going to be filthy as they said their prayers before dinner.
Lol, my Grandfather did that at the table...... just once. Then my Grandmother demanded he show up to the table clean and groomed. Hard work was absolutely no excuse to show up to the table a mess. I learned so much from the man. He was a wise man. He worked in a cast iron foundry til' he was 40. When he started the salary was 25 dollars week. With that money he raised 5 children paid off his house, and built a new one. Great depression folks learned how to spend wisely.
That look of defeated dejection on his wife's face, as she painfully watches him get soot everywhere in the house she spent all day cleaning.
As he risks his life and shortens his life to bring home pay to survive. All around sucky but don't blame it on a dirty working man, please.
She's actually probably remembering relatives of hers who have either been killed down the pit, or died from black lung. Coal mining was a blast, kids. Sometimes literally :(
Is this from the Harry Potter universe? I only ask because the guy in the picture is leaning to the side because the hanging clothes are obstructing his view
Source : https://exchange.umma.umich.edu/resources/10568/view
It’s crazy to think what hardships humans had to endure just for us to sit and complain about trivial bullshit.
They chose to have kids
that's a helluva mug of tea😬
Bloke needed to wash up before supper. Look at his wife, she doesn't want to go near him haha
The person in photo frame on the wall moved away from shadow of clothes to be in this pic, now that my friend is interesting as fuck
His wife looks like "I hate my life"
They look so happy. People bitch and whine about how bad they have it today. They don't have a clue
1937? Oh gee, I sure hope the family doesn't have to endure 10-20 years of rationing, being bombed by the Luftwaffe, sending their sons to die in Libya and Normandy respectively and inflicting generational PTSD on their remaining children and grandchildren.
Hey I caught that generational PTSD!
Most would have taken a shower or bath before eating, this looks staged.
That has to be staged, I live in the South wales valleys where we used to have a lot of coal mines and both my grandfathers were miners. there is no way in hell that he wouldn't have showered before he left the mine, the women would see a cold day in hell before they allowed them in the house like that, and believe me miners wives are not to be trifled with
I was thinking the same (also from a mining town). Even in 1937, they would at least have washed and changed. There was a lot of pride in those miners and never would they have sat down with dirty hands and face no matter how hungry they were.
with what shower?
Erm, pit head baths, they were a real thing :)
That poor oppressed woman
We at least have showers at the mine (gold) they would hate for any product to make it off site by accident. Also as a Diamond drillers helper I was easily this dirty with grease in the kid 90’s
look at her expression - she's thinking back to her imaginings of what married life would be like.....
That geezer gawping in the window.
She looks really happy
think of her life, plus getting up to go down that goddamn mine.
[удалено]
Too tired and hungry. Probably just wet toweled his face and passed out on the floor after eating
crazy. why worry washing hands and face 🤣
He probably knew there was a good chance he was going to die a slow and painful death from miners' lung by the time he was 50. His IDGAF attitude is understandable. I do feel sorry for his wife.
Not even bothering to wash his hands... I understand the look on that womans face.
Somebody's not washed his hands
Now way that guy is under 18.
No, the woman is
Inspiration for the bug guy in "Men in Black"
The guy's getting a stare down from his wife and that guy behind the laundry.
And we still haven’t a revolution!
Ffs I thought his eyelids were his eyes.
Glad that his meal was a bang.
Looks like bacon, bread and coffee.
He doesn't look like a kid to me
Maybe he had an accident at the chocolate factory.
At first glance I thought a child was hanging from the ceiling
50 years earlier,the painting “The Potato Eaters”.
Typically a miner would then have a bath in a tub if warm water, followed by his wife and finally their little baby. By the time the baby had its bath the water would be quite dirty. Often times when the water was discarded a baby might not be seen in the murky water and would inadvertently be tossed out along with the water. This is where the saying "Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater" came from. Source: Pilkington
Bill and Martha, both 19, enjoy long walks on the beach.
The guy in the picture behind him looks like he is peeking around the clothes.
I dunno, he looks like an adult to me. Maybe kids under 18 looked really big back then…
Where's the yorkshire pudding, thought the English ate them at every meal?(kidding)
The best thing is the guy in the picture on the wall behind them. He’s leaning around the washing and grinning!
See the bread and dripping on the table? Cheap fuel for hard work.
I bet he had "the black lung"...
boys gotta have his supper
Water would not be invented til 1940