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High Street

Take me here now

Learning and earning

Two women describe how their parents' decision dictated their careers.

First interview

"I was made to go and work in a factory much against my will but in those days you just had to do what you were told by your parents – by my mother. I just got on with things because what I really wanted to do, I wanted to go on the stage."

Second interview
"I would have liked to have been a child's nurse but my mother wouldn't let me because I had to go away from home to do it. There was a lot of training in it and she said, 'You won't like it, you'll go, we'll rig you out in all the clothes you gotta have, then you won't like it.' 

And my mum used to have a book and it was called 'The Nursery World' and in it it had all the jobs that you could apply for and I really, really wanted to do it and it was really lovely but she - they wouldn't entertain it.

Because at that time you did what your parents said, didn't you.

Exactly yes. And my money meant a lot to them, well, my mother at any rate.

It helped contribute to the house.

Exactly, yes."

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