Making Coal Fires In The 40S And 50S

[hellywelly4]

In the 40s and 50s my mother used to make coal fires every day, and made special things using newspaper which she folded in a certain way. I can't remember what she called them, the word 'skewers' come to mind, but I'm sure that's not correct.
Any ideas please?

[tonyav]

My grandad also used to light his pipe with a sill, ferlew. Gawd knows what it was he used to smoke, it used to take ages to light and then kept going out again.

[starone]

Who would have thought this would go on so long, so hope someone will see my small contribution! First of all, only rich people had gas pokers and secondly, we screwed up the newspapers in the manner suggested to save money on wood. With enough paper you didn't need to use so much wood. Newspaper was also carefully cut into squares for use as toilet paper. I tell you, you lot don't know you're alive!

[tonyav]

I hope the newsprint washed of your bum, star !.

[EDDIE51]

Starone We had a gas poker in our council house in the 1950s. We did not use it much , cheaper to light the fire with newspaper.

[oldbillbuck]

We were the same Eddie. Also remember mum used to hold a sheet of newspaper across the front of the fireplace to draw up the fire, used to frighten the life out of me if it caught alight, whence it was screwed up and put on the fire. LOL

[BlackadderV]

As I mentioned earlier, that was called a 'bleezer'. Some fireplaces came equipped with a metal one.

[EDDIE51]

^^ Yes and if I remember correctly some fireplaces had a metal plate that you could lower over the fire grate to keep the fire burning but slowly over night, I think it was called a damper. It had a small air hole in it so that the fire would still be alight but smouldering rather than burning, then in the morning you lifted the damper stoked the fire put more coal on and it was burning again without having to relight it . We also had some poor quality coal that was in small pieces and powder that we called 'slack' . At night to keep the fire 'in' you would put a load of slack on and lower the damper.

[HansUrbancka]

@EDDIE51........Your mentioning Coal Slack and, previously, a Paper Briquette Maker has recalled to my mind that we mixed wet coal dust and slack with cement powder and hand moulded it into balls which were allowed to dry off for the living room fire.

Hans.

[freddiepride]

When we were small we called them 'Paper Guns' ,Not sure if this was a local name or whether it was the shape that Mum twisted them .

[jackson]

My mum made ::spills::