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Domesday Book now online

TV Cream's latest email bulletin alerted me to this: the entire content of the 1986 Domesday Book has been placed online. Wonderful - I checked the info on my hometown of Egham and Englefield Green, and to read about life 20 years ago, reminds me of how much some things have changed, but others have remained the same.

Under the Egham listing, I found some text entitled 'Fashion in 1985'. Remember that the content here was put together by schoolchildren:

Pastel colours are in fashion this year.You can see that miniskirts are also Fashionable.Boys wear mostly Kikku jeans which are not wide at the bottom.Adidas sweatshirts can have long sleeves and short sleeves.Lyle and Scott and Pringle jumpers are made of wool with either a plain or patterned design which are very expensive, the brand name being the fashion. A Bob haircut is shaped at the back cut so that it curls under.The fringe is flicked slightly at the side.To
'flick',the hair is brushed back,but is not held by anything. Perms are a treatment for your hair,the affects can make it either curly or just wavy. Layering is a style of cutting hair, making it 'flicked'.You can highlight your hair making your hair have Blonde streaks.Or Dye it Blonde, Brown,Ginger or even Purple!


I can't recall these fashions - I must have had a sheltered life.

Here's an extract from an article concerning what was at the time, my local supermarket (now a house extension):

...Their most expensive item is a bottle of Gin the lowest price is a box of matches at 6p.They get their stock every day but on Wednesday they get a big stock.10 people sometimes try and get in at closing time at about 7.00 and on Fridays they close at 9.00.They send their Mattersons and pork pies and things like that back when the dates are out and changes them for fresh.The stale bread they give to the boy over the road or they throw it away.


I wonder what became of the boy who received the stale bread? You wonder whether the boy collected the bread for birds, or whether his family were poor, or something.

It's sad there are not many pictures from that time. I'll include references to this project at a later time.

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