Who knocked you up this morning ?

[great big story]

Imagine life without alarm clocks. Workdays would start at noon, breakfast would be brunch, and no one would make it to class before the first bell. From the early 1800s through the 1960s, factory workers didn’t have much of a choice. To get to work on time, they relied on “knocker-uppers,” aka, human alarm clocks. Using long bamboo sticks, or peashooters, Britain’s knocker-uppers would stroll down the streets rapping at windows to help their patrons kick-start their days.

Vocabulary chunks from the video :

• They were called knocker-ups
• We’re travelling back in time
• The early 1800s
• A paid job
• A bamboo pole
• Be up early for their shift
• Industrial cities
• A hook or knob on the end
• Wakey wakey
• Pea shooters
• Why not just shout
• The evidence suggests
• Mystery solved

A tongue-twister :

We had a knocker-up, and our knocker-up had a knocker-up

And our knocker-up’s knocker-up didn’t knock our knocker up

So our knocker-up didn’t knock us up

‘Cos he’s not up.