Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza

Getting around

Train travel times between Utrecht and Groningen

By 1900, traveling from Utrecht to Groningen by train took four hours, a duration that decreased to three hours by 1932.

At the table

Coffee and tea replace traditional drinks

Coffee, tea, and sometimes cocoa with sugar replaced beer, water, and buttermilk as the most common everyday drinks. Previously, buttermilk mixed with well water had been a standard beverage.

What people wore

Moral Standards and Everyday Attire

In the 1930s, some religious schools strictly enforced modesty, with teachers occasionally sending boys home for wearing sandals without socks because it was considered walking around half-naked. Meanwhile, the earlier introduction of flesh-colored stockings around 1920 sparked intense moral debates, though the sheer number of women wearing them eventually rendered the controversy pointless by 1929.

Music

Musicians at Fairs and Rural Festivals

At fairs in the early 1900s, traveling musicians such as violinists, accordionists, and tamborine players were common, sometimes accompanied by street organs. Musicians playing for dances at rural festivities often sat on wooden chests and tapped their violin bows to signal when dancers needed to pay for the music.

Daily life

The transition to electric lighting

Lighting was inconsistent, with candles, kerosene lamps, and gaslight all in use, and electric lighting considered a luxury for the wealthy or public spaces around 1900. By the 1920s, electric light and wired outlets for appliances began appearing in modern homes.