These days people pay good money to stay in an ice hotel in Sweden and spend an evening shivering in sub-zero temperatures.
When I was a boy a cold Winter would have been quite an ordeal I’m certain because like most people in 1962 we lived in a house without central heating and this was in the days long before double glazing and thermal insulation.
I don’t think we even had a fitted carpet! We didn’t have a fitted carpet for at least another five years or so. The house had an open coal fire in the lounge and a coke boiler in the kitchen to heat the water and that was it. Sitting around the fire was quite cosy of course but when it came to bed time tearing yourself away from it was a real ordeal – rather like Scott’s preparation for walking to the South Pole!
Have Bag, Will Travel 
And do you remember the ice on the inside of the bedroom windows in winter? We only had heating in the bedrooms (a coal fire) when we were ill with something serious like measles.
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I remember the ice. My children laugh at me when I tell the story! Thanks for the comment.
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Thank you so much for the very interesting article and how you linked with what was happening elsewhere and to your own childhood. My husband tells about how they got electricity in their village only in the seventies, and it was oil lamps and lanterns till then. We cannot imagine life without electricity now:))
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So much progress has been made during our life times! Thank you for the comment.
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