How we fought adversity with three channels

The KM Group columnist with his own look at the world

People around my age like to bang on endlessly about how we only had three television channels when we were growing up, as if this was some sort of collective hardship we all endured before the world became a happier place. When we were young, older people would often remind us of the genuine adversity they had lived through several decades previously, i.e. the Second World War.

By comparison, having been a child in the bleak years immediately before the launch of Channel 4 - and trying to make a big thing of it - always seems slightly hollow, as if the first episodes of Countdown and Brookside represented our very own VE Day. Besides, three channels seemed enough at the time, especially as this was before the invention of remote control and we always had a short walk to turn over (again, feel free to get out the violins for the brave kids of the 1970s).

Less frequently cited in the ‘don’t know you’re born’ lecture to

21st century youngsters is the fact that we only had three flavours of crisps - ready salted, salt ‘n’ vinegar or cheese ‘n’ onion (the word ‘and’ being something else we were living without).

The appearance of dangerously exotic prawn cocktail flavour sometime in the late 70s caused tremors in our uncomplicated world, not least because few people knew what a prawn cocktail was meant to taste like, so we just took their word for it.

Some sought solace from this dangerous new world in the back-to-basic charms of Salt’n’shake crisps. These were unflavoured but came with a small packet of salt, so you could apply your own to taste. I’m not sure if that made them cheaper to produce but it made the crisps taste either incredibly bland or saltier than a spoonful of Marmite.

So, next time you’re enjoying some delicious crinkle-cut, flame-grilled, steak flavoured treats, spare a moment to think of the crisp-eating sacrifices made by my generation.

‘Less frequently cited in the ‘don’t know you’re born’ lecture to 21st century youngsters is the fact that we only had three flavours of crisps’