Looking Back: Bottle green knickers with a pocket for your hanky!

You always groaned when you saw the shape of the parcel which meant that someone had given little thought to what you might really like. Secured by loads of pins which dropped all over the floor, they were usually floral for girls and plain for boys with a woven initial in one corner.

Hankies, however useful, were simply a present we just did not want to receive.

The handkerchief was actually quite versatile and much more than just something for wiping noses.

Also known as a kerchief or bandanna, the square of hemmed material could be used as a bandage, headgear as protection against the sun when father would knot all four corners of his large hanky to place on his head, usually when you were on a trip to the seaside, to wave around in folk dances, not only English Morris dances but also in Balkan and Middle Eastern countries and at Greek weddings, and for mums to spit on and wash their children’s dirty faces.

You could also use it to give your shoes a quick wipe over or polish.

How many men of a certain age remember Winstons gentlemen’s outfitters on Snig Hill?

When they went to obtain their first suit, often to wear at the dances held in the City Hall ballroom, Mr Winston would ceremoniously present them with a silk hanky to put in the top pocket, although it was actually a piece of silk tacked onto a square of cardboard.

It was like a young man’s rite of passage!

Strangely enough, the word even became a rather dubious part of the English language. Indulging in a bit of ‘hanky panky’ was behaviour of a rather dubious nature. Improper but not too serious!

My gym knickers at school were bottle green and had a pocket for a hanky. My mother waved my sister and myself off each morning saying, ‘Have you remembered your hanky?’ It was something very important!

Today’s young people won’t remember the versatile handkerchief, after they were mostly replaced with paper tissues, an invention of the 20th century.

Tissues are easy to dispose of but not nearly as useful!