From the Durham County Advertiser 50 years ago (From Durham Times)

From the Durham County Advertiser 50 years ago

12:07pm Friday 26th December 2008

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Everybody’s agreed about it. In Durham, it’s going to be a really old fashioned Christmas – thanks to modern electronics. Sputniks and space rockets may have put people’s heads among the planets, but television will pin their feet firmly and comfortably to the fireside.

Anyone who says that Christmas is not the family occasion it used to be is still living in the restless postwar 40s or the early pre-television 50s. Christmas 1958 promises to be the happiest stay-at-home occasion event, with older people sharing the fun with married sons and daughters and their grandchildren.

Of course, there will still be visits to the pantomime, the circus and parties on Christmas Day – all with the aid of the magic screen in the corner of the drawing room. Not that TV, having kept families together, is likely to dominate things.

There will be lots of homemade jollity in Durham if the demand for crackers and other novelties is any guide.

Mr J C Williamson, president of the local Chamber of Trade, said: “This year, everyone is thinking about the home, talking about the home and buying for the home.

Things were quiet early in December after the little boom caused by the end of financial restrictions but it looks now as if there’s going to be a great last-minute rush.”

● Compiled with the help of Durham County Council’s Clayport library

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