New & Good Things: Alfred Hopkinson, 1930

Alfred Hopkinson (1851-1939)

When Alfred Hopkinson, barrister, academic, MP and keen alpinist, wrote his memoirs in 1930, he ended one chapter with three lists.  He was 80 years old and looking back over the changes he had seen since he was a boy.  Here are his lists – perhaps readers will be inspired to make their own.

New & Good Things

Electric Lighting
New Universities
Short Skirts
Third Class on Express Trains
Telephones
Typewriting
Bathrooms with Hot & Cold Water
Underground Electric Tubes
Trained Nurses
Merciful Administration of Criminal Law
Mixed Bathing
Improved Sanitation
Woollies for Children
Boy Scouts
Girl Guides
Taxi-cabs
Afternoon Tea
Spring Wire Mattresses
The Salvation Army
Improved Anaesthetics
Antiseptic Surgery
Lawn Tennis
Sunday Opening of Libraries and Museums
Grape Fruit
Co-operative Holidays
Push Bikes
Lavatory Carriages
Flannel Shorts for Men
Charity Organization
Better Architecture
More Platonic Friendships
Wireless Telegraphy
Lighter Meals
Less Drunkenness
Workers' Educational Association
Wider Knowledge on Sex Matters
Garden Cities
Sun-bathing
Cushions in Third-class Carriages
More Daffodils
Pneumatic Tyres
The National Trust

New & Bad Things

Four Shillings Income Tax
Cocktail Parties
Cubists
Boëcracy (Government by shouting and big headlines)
Psycho-analysis
Vanity Bags
Oxford Bags
Road Hogs
Educational Theories
Post Impressionists
Bigger Gambling Sweeps
Ugly New Roads
Ugly Sculpture
Plus Fours
More Litter
Vers Libre
Want of Discipline
Newspaper Stunts
Too much Talk on Sex
Submarines

Bad Things Which Have Disappeared

Bed Curtains
Tight Lacing
Fundamentalism
Materialistic Dogmatism
Black-plumed Hearses
Funeral Crape Bands
Black Kid Gloves for Men
Compulsory Drinking
Chignons
Peg-top Trousers
Long Services in Churches
Crinolines
Sandbags for Windows and Doors
Mrs Gamp
Pomatum
Internal Drains
Waste Pipes without Traps
Elastic-sided Boots
Heavy Neck Stocks
Concealment on Sex Questions
Long Bathing Gowns

Alfred Hopkinson (1851-1939), my great-great-grandfather, was the son of John Hopkinson, engineer and Mayor of Manchester, and Alice Dewhurst, daughter of John Dewhurst, cotton spinner of Skipton. 

(See 'The Engineering Hopkinsons')

Penultima by Sir Alfred Hopkinson (1851-1939), pub. Martin Hopkinson (1930)