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rhythmaningSorting through some of my mother’s stuff – and there really is a lot of stuff to sort through – my brother came across some papers relating to my grandfather.
Before the Second World War – right before – my grandfather stood for election as the Labour candidate for Ashton, Birmingham, and we found some campaign materials from an election: a “newspaper” from the Birmingham and District Co-operative Party called “Co-operative Citizen”. (The Co-operative Party was clearly allied to the Labour Party in May 1939 – and apparently, it still is.) It must have been a by-election, there not being a general election in 1939.
It makes fascinating reading, seeming both relevant and dated at the same time.
I was actually shocked by the use of the candidate’s family – my mother, who was four at the time, and grandmother – as election-fodder. A politician using their family for election purposes? It wouldn’t happen now…
I never saw my grandmother as a feminist icon!
The other issues it covers – pensions, the growing threat of war, profiteering by big business – all seem to resonate as issues today.
The use of photography – almost in montage – looks dated, and almost mid-European. It is pure propaganda – the cartoons also show that.
My grandfather wasn’t elected; he entered the RAF during the war and served as an RAF doctor in the Egyptian desert and Aden (where, incidentally, he was joined by my mother and grandmother). He stood again in the general election of 1945 in Preston, which he won for Labour. As a doctor, he worked on the creation of the NHS. He lost his seat in 1950.
Before the Second World War – right before – my grandfather stood for election as the Labour candidate for Ashton, Birmingham, and we found some campaign materials from an election: a “newspaper” from the Birmingham and District Co-operative Party called “Co-operative Citizen”. (The Co-operative Party was clearly allied to the Labour Party in May 1939 – and apparently, it still is.) It must have been a by-election, there not being a general election in 1939.
It makes fascinating reading, seeming both relevant and dated at the same time.
I was actually shocked by the use of the candidate’s family – my mother, who was four at the time, and grandmother – as election-fodder. A politician using their family for election purposes? It wouldn’t happen now…
I never saw my grandmother as a feminist icon!
The other issues it covers – pensions, the growing threat of war, profiteering by big business – all seem to resonate as issues today.
The use of photography – almost in montage – looks dated, and almost mid-European. It is pure propaganda – the cartoons also show that.
My grandfather wasn’t elected; he entered the RAF during the war and served as an RAF doctor in the Egyptian desert and Aden (where, incidentally, he was joined by my mother and grandmother). He stood again in the general election of 1945 in Preston, which he won for Labour. As a doctor, he worked on the creation of the NHS. He lost his seat in 1950.