Sir - 56 years ago this month my daughter was born. My wife and I lived with her mother in a cottage with a large garden overlooking Pershore cricket ground.Before I moved in, the outside loo had been replaced by an inside toilet; the pump by mains water, and gas lights by electric.We still washed at the kitchen sink and used a zinc bath in front of the fire, but we had no TV and the radio depended on an accumalator. However we lived in bliss!

I had to walk to the doctor’s house for him to phone the local taxi to take us to Avonside Maternity Hospital and then because it was unheard of for the father to attend a birth,I returned in the taxi,had some lunch and rode my Vespa to Pinvin to play football. From a phone call in a coin box I gleaned that my offspring was expected within the next two hours so my recollection of the match was very hazy except that I turned up with a black eye to find mum and daughter doing fine.

Admitted the cost of living was a lot cheaper in those days but we lived at first on less than £10 a week, as the family allowance only came for our second child. Even so we enjoyed life to the full and with no regrets we hope to celebrate our diamond wedding anniversary next year.

Phil Pegler

Worcester