A very happy birthday to this sparky centenarian. And congratulations to anyone who was born in the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s and survived!

 

Their mothers - who brought them up in houses made with asbestos - smoked and drank during pregnancy. These same women took aspirin, ate blue cheese, raw egg products, loads of bacon, processed meat and tuna from a can - oh, and they weren't being tested for diabetes or cervical cancer either.

Having survived gestation, these remarkable people slept in cots brightly painted with lead-based paints.

They lived in a world with no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets. When they rode their bikes they did so without helmets and, sometimes, with no shoes.

Car journeys were made with no seat belts or air bags.

They drank water from the garden hose, not from a bottle.

Take-away food was limited to fish and chips - no pizza parlours, McDonalds , KFC, Subway or Nandos. The shops closed at 6.00pm and were closed on the weekends, yet somehow they managed not to starve.

Friends would often take swigs from the same bottle of Orangeade and no one actually died.

They ate masses of white bread, butter, fry-up breakfasts, and high-sugar cakes and biscuits. They weren't overweight, however, because...

...they were always outside playing!

They built go-carts out of old prams and raced down steep hills - only to discover they'd forgotten the brakes. They built tree houses and dens and played in river beds.

They fell out of trees, cut themselves, broke bones and teeth and nobody got sued.

They ate worms, mud pies and wrestled in the dirt.

Boys were given air guns and catapults for their 10th birthdays.

When they misbehaved their parents clouted them. And when they became rowdy teenagers, if a bobby was called, Mum and Dad always sided with the Law.