Life without electric

[Highlander]

We often talk about the effects of the National Grid going down to some EMP event, and how terrible that would be for us all,... but would it?

Life in the city would be hell thats goes without saying, but as preppers we wouldnt get caught out like the rest, and life wouldnt be too bad,... and in a way I know

Up untill I was about 12years old I lived in a house that had no Electric, no generator, no running water,..and to top that we didnt have a car either.

My dad used to work on a farm a couple of miles down the road, he used to cycle to work in the morning with an empty 5 gallon jerry can and a 1 gallon milk can,.. on his way home, he walked, and pushed his bike loaded up with the water and the milk,.... that was our water and milk for the next day.

When we first took over the house from my gran, there was an open fire in the kitchen with two ovens either side,..all food was cooked on this `range`,.. later we went up market and got a rayburn,.. but still that was the only cooking area.... there was always a large kettle with hot water at any time of the day

We didnt have a bathroom, the one and only sink in the house was in the kitchen with water fed from a gavity rainwater tank just outside,.. the toilet was up the garden about 70 yards away
Bath night was a tin bath in front of the fire, we used the rainwater heated on the fire/Rayburn and poured in from a large pan,..one bath a week each on different nights [ I have one brother ]

The `kitchen` didnt have any work surfaces, everything was either done on the Rayburn or the kitchen table, the pantry was just off the kitchen and all food was stored in a very large cupboard, on the `very] cold floor, or hung from large hooks in the ceiling,... I dont remember ever seeing food gone `off`,..it wasnt a big room, and only had one very small window with a fly screen

The Rayburn / fire burnt everything, all the coal dust, and any sawdust from other work was kept in a corner in the coal room,..and when we brought in the coal, we also put half a bucket of coal dust and saw dust in bucket with some water,..at night when we made up the fire, the coal dust/sawdust was squeezed into balls and laid on top, this usualy kept the fire in till morning
........There was an open fire in the front room, but it was very rarely lite, as that room was kept for deaths, births and Christmas

We owned four acres of land, and kept sheep [ about 15 ], chickens, and two pigs, we had a large garden and my dad kept two beehives,.. he was a great gardener, he grew almost everything going,..and would store much of it for the winter, carrots kept in boxes of sand, potatoes on boxes of straw, he grew lots of winter greens too.... the honey was put into jars and sold off a table just outside the gate, we often had a que of cars waiting,.. and we always managed to sell as many as we made up,... always keeping enough for ourselves

We also had a large orchard too,.. with apples, plumbs, damsans,..and one pear tree, the Apples my mum would stew and store in large jars, the rest we gave away or sold,... maybe even swaped as I can remember the basket on the bike being full of them, but cant remember where they went to

So if you are able to prepare well, then life without electric isnt realy as bad as it sounds,.. values were a lot different then,... which was spoilt somewhat when electric arrived,... I still remember the thrill of turning on the telly for the very first time, a little 12inch black and white set, that hummed, and seemed to change our complet way of life

[Metroyeti]

That sounds perfect, we are spoiled nowadays a power cut for less than an hour is an emergency. If you could set up your house like the one you had growing up you would do extreamly well when the lights go out

[GrannyMike]

sounds like the good life my granfather rented two up two down had coal fire /cooker devon range outside loo no bath room electic lights and a few plugs just for tv only bbc1 then large garden grew veg hens got logs coal
they were poor but lived good full lives and we could again and better maybe

[Highlander]

Well, I am not sure if it was the good life,.. it was a small house, with just two bedrooms,.. I had to sleep on the landing, and in the winter not only was the inside of the single glazed windows covered in ice, there was often frost on the inside window sill...it was a cold house, with no insulation,.. not even cavity walls, the kitchen slabs were laid on bear earth and we often found ourselves sweeping up the soil that worms had pushed up over night,... I remember my dad put down a concrete floor as soon as he was able to afford it

In the summer food was always on your mind,.. [ well not so much mine ] but for instance, the can of milk was kept in a bucket of water so it didnt go off,.. if it was hot, you either sweated with the fire on, or you had no hot water,...I also remember buckets of water in the pantry to help with the temp,..and food in tin foil to re-direct the heat of the day,...and if there was no fire we didnt have bread, as the nearest shop was four miles away,...dad was often allowed to go on the tractor though,..or we had friends shop for us

[Ranger]

With modern innovations such as double glazing, effective whole house insulation, rocket mass heaters, solar hot water and even something like these http://www.permaculture.co.uk/readers-so...tta-fridge, then life would not be so uncomfortable. Could even be quite nice. That's the thing with a lot of Permaculture design, it's about using modern, intelligent and preferably low tech design and thinking, as well as updating and adapting older technology without chucking loads of unsustainable, energy intensive, solutions at the problem.

[Highlander]

.... but we still have to remember that not everyone will have substainable land to grow on,... and even a preper will run out of food at some point,.... if we dont have trucks to get food into the shops, or we cant walk to the shops, then a big problem still exisits.... mmmm food for thought

[Straight Shooter]

my childhood just about mirrors yours highlander....i was back there when i read this post..
wonderfull post thankyou

[Highlander]

(9 January 2013, 23:12)Straight Shooter Wrote: my childhood just about mirrors yours highlander....i was back there when i read this post..
wonderfull post thankyou

lol,... thats maybe because I was on the south Wales / Shropshire border at the time,.... there was a lot of houses like ours then I assume

[Bracken]

Yes and the place hadnt change a lot by the time I married Highlander,but I did manage to get some secondhand kitchen units installed but still no heating upstairs in the winter we still had ice on the inside and by this time our son slept on the landing , my how things dont change much

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but we did by this time we had a bathroom

[BeardyMan]

I've been searching for a house like that for ages now. Real back to basics type place. Can't find anything anywhere