My Grandmother

I mentioned my grandmother in the previous post. One of the things that I did this weekend was to scan all my mother's old family pictures and I plan to post a few from time to time in case anyone out there is interested!

My grandmother was born in Camden Town, London. I can't remember the exact date but she was christened Dorothy Turner. There are quite a lot of old family photos and although they were not a rich family I would guess that they were probably what we would call upper working class at the time. This was her, I assume around 5 years old, in a wonderful posed picture! She was quite a character. She was quite short (not much more that 5 foot tall) and I remember her as being rather round in her younger days. However, whereas nowadays people may think of diets and toned bodies she thought of herself as a 'mere slip of a thing' and quite voluptuous! Here is a great picture of her in her bathing costume! She described the young Dorothy as being very popular with the boys! (Although in those days this had the much more innocent meaning of 'flirty'.)

She met and married Thomas Welch when she was about 19. He was a childhood friend and they had know each other pretty much all their lives.  He played the piano and piano accordion and she sang soprano. They loved music and seem to remember them saying that for a while they performed together in music hall. One of her regrets in life was that she was never able to train as a singer as her mother wouldn't let her. She was devoted to Tom, as she called him, for the following 60 years, although she also deeply resented the role that had been placed on her as a woman of her day. I think she was actually rather envious of her grandchildren for the opportunities that we had and in another life she would have loved to have been an independent woman.  

Thomas and Dorothy Welch on their wedding day (They got married on Boxing day, a common day to get married on as people would not need to take time off of work.