At School


The Board School

The Board School was built on High Street South in 1880. Around the time of this Peatman photograph, a Miss Cunnington was Headmistress, ably assisted my Miss Holmes, who later became Mrs Grover Wilson, thus relinquishing her post as assistant teacher, as married women were not permitted to teach in those days. Miss Holmes taught the younger children in the small room on the front of the school, whist Miss Cunnington taught the six to eight year olds in the main body of the building. I have very few memories of my time here, except being taught by Miss Aram in the little room, and by the then Headmistress, Miss Eva Newton, in the older class. I do remember being fortunate enough to be collected by my mother each lunch time, to be taken home for a hot dinner and being returned again for afternoon classes. My transport for this journey was on the back of mother’s bike, seated comfortably, on a cushion in a little metal seat. Occasionally, I recall crying because I didn’t want to return to school after lunch, but mum always held firm and insisted I had to go!

The National School

At the ripe old age of eight years, I was transferred to the National school, then referred to as the Junior School, on the other side of the beck, at the other end of High Street. It was built in 1867 at a cost of £1000. The Headmaster then was Mr James Adlard, and whist he was in command, until 1892, the cost of education had to be paid for by parents. Earliest records show a school had once been sited in Station Road, but in my lifetime this building was the Post Office and is now a private residence. In my day, pupils remained here until they were fifteen years of age. I vividly remember being in Miss Winifred Cock’s class in the small room off the main building. I was very at ease with Miss Cock as she and her parents were neighbours to my paternal Grandparents, Arthur and Emma Harding, at 29 Station Road. I often went into the Cock household when visiting my Grandpa, (Grandma had died by then) so was pretty confident that Win Cock would treat me kindly. This she did, although, on reflection, she treated all the children kindly!! We had great fun in the playground, boys being allowed only to cross the front or girls playground to access their own playground at the rear of the school. However, the rear playground was used by all for drill and in the event of snow, a more frequent occurrence in my younger days, for sliding! The boys would make very slippery slides across the full width of the playground, some thirty feet long by around two feet wide and Mr John Hanwell, the Headmaster of that period would announce to the girls that they would be allowed to join the boys for sliding!