In Victorian England, most people didn’t have clocks or watches. They had no way of knowing when to get up. This brought into existence the profession called knocking-upping.
A knocker-upper walked down the street and tapped on the windows with a long pole or a broom.
People paid him a penny a month. AI tells me that it’s around 50-75 cents in today’s money.
For some reason, I’m finding the existence of a knocker-upper to be very endearing.
Clarissa's Blog 
I wonder if they stayed up and night and slept during the day in order to get people up at the right time. Or maybe they were just naturally early risers who decided to get paid for getting up early.
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