Yes, aged 8 went to boarding school. There was no phone for the kids. They did have phones for staff, obviously. In our case they’d call a parent if you broke something. But, communication was a weekly letter. We had letter writing every Sunday morning.
My parents seldom wrote back. My mother would send the occasional post-card, at which point the whole school would comment on how bad her english was.
I got a letter from my father and it was signed off:
“Love Dad
Actually, this is his secretary, but he told me to write love dad on it”
After a while there was a campaign to put phones in boarding schools, so a phone was installed. A single phone for 250 boys. There was always a queue and time was limited. On the plus side, I memorized a lot of phone numbers that I’d never know today.
Event with the phone new joiners to the school were banned from using it for the first 3 weeks on the basis they’d adapt quicker to just break the tie to parents than spend all their time moping on the phone.
My parents seldom wrote back. My mother would send the occasional post-card, at which point the whole school would comment on how bad her english was.
I got a letter from my father and it was signed off:
“Love Dad
Actually, this is his secretary, but he told me to write love dad on it”
After a while there was a campaign to put phones in boarding schools, so a phone was installed. A single phone for 250 boys. There was always a queue and time was limited. On the plus side, I memorized a lot of phone numbers that I’d never know today.
Event with the phone new joiners to the school were banned from using it for the first 3 weeks on the basis they’d adapt quicker to just break the tie to parents than spend all their time moping on the phone.