Lilian, Princess of Réthy

Lilian, Princess of Réthy was the second wife of King Leopold III of Belgium. Born in the United Kingdom and raised in Belgium, she became a volunteer as a car driver who transported wounded Belgians and French to the hospital in Bruges during World War II. Lilian married King Leopold III in 1941 and became consort of the Belgian monarch. The couple had three children.

Domestic servants' uniform requirements

Female domestic servants were required to purchase their own uniforms, which consisted of striped cotton dresses for morning chores and a black dress with a white cap and apron for afternoon duties.

Working-class menswear habits

Working-class men often wore their father's old suits for manual labor, leading to common sights of mismatched coats and trousers.

Affordable dance halls in the 1920s

During the 1920s in Glasgow, young people flocked to dance halls where they could dance for six hours for the price of sixpence. These halls were known for being fiercely respectable, and participants focused on skill and style.

Concertina music at village festivals

In the early 20th century, concertinas were widely used at house dances, village festivals, and in pubs, where dancers might even perform on farm wagons. Collectors sometimes had to be stationed at doors to ensure dancers paid the musicians, as collecting fees became harder with the popularity of round dances.

Horses ruled the early 1900s streets

Before World War One, horses dominated town streets, pulling everything from carriages and taxicabs to delivery carts and buses.

Short branch line train travel times

A local branch line train between Oxenholme and Windermere stopped at three intermediate stations over a 10-mile distance, with the journey taking 25 to 30 minutes.

Lighting in the home was rarely electric

Most late-Victorian and Edwardian families lacked electricity and relied on gas, or in rural areas, oil lamps and homemade rushlights.

Water was often collected from outside taps

Many homes lacked running water, requiring families to collect it from an outside tap shared with neighbours and heat it on the stove for bathing.

Buying Meat for Home Cooking

Because many working-class homes lacked ovens, families often bought 3/4 pound of leg of beef and 1/2 pound of beef suet for meat puddings or rissoles.

Common Drink Adulteration and Reuse

Tea was frequently re-used until all flavour was extracted, and milk was sometimes adulterated with chalk and water.

Rising food costs for families in 1915

A standard family's weekly supply of food, which cost 19s 8d in July 1914, rose to 24s 5½d by March 1915 due to wartime price inflation.

Common Jobs and Uncertain Labour

Common jobs included agricultural labourers, coal miners, domestic servants, and factory workers, as the economy shifted from agriculture to manufacturing and service industries. Many unskilled workers were simply classified as labourers, relying on uncertain daily work at docks or quarries.

Early Morning Child Labour

In the early 1900s, some young boys rose as early as 3:00 a.m. to deliver newspapers or wake up workers before attending school. By 1918, new regulations and compulsory education to age fourteen made such extreme juvenile employment practices virtually impossible.