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              Ramsbottom Reminiscences

Volume 1 is now out of print but a limited number of Volume 2 is still available. An example of a recollection of Volume 1 is printed below

Volume one contains 13 reminiscences mainly from Ramsbottom in the early 1900s through to the 1940's.

A sample recollection from Doris A. Hibbert of 'Early School Days 1933-1941' is printed below.

I was born in Crow Lane, Ramsbottom on a-July evening in 1930, so I presume it was taken for granted that I would attend the school across the road, St Paul’s.. Incidentally, four generations of my family were pupils there, my mother, myself, my children and now my grandson. In 1933, I went into the ‘Baby Class’ and I have a lovely memento to prove I attended regularly-a picture with biblical text-signed on the back by the head teacher of the infant department Miss Sarah Whittaker. “Well done Doris” it said. You couldn't play truant living so near to the school, and sometimes in the snowy weather my father would carry me there! Miss Hassall was my first teacher she always wore a long sleeve floral overall, as did all the infant teachers and if we were good, she used to pinch us gently under the chin, a sign of her affection. Her classroom was a wooden shed at the back of the infant department there was a wooden sandpit which always had a peculiar smell about it, a lovely old rocking-horse and toys and books. I can remember being scolded for pushing in front of a group of children waiting to speak to her - she admonished me with “wait your turn”. Miss Hassall was the ideal example of a reception class teacher kind but firm. In the main infant department the hall was divided into two classrooms by a moveable partition with windows in the top half. Miss Whittaker had the one next to the Baby Class and Miss Shaw the other. Miss Shaw wore her hair in a bun.. Her brother Charlie had a grocer's shop at number 60 Bridge Street when you went in they was a delicious aroma of coffee something I’m sure I never tasted as a child. Miss Whittaker, the head of the infant department was a stalwart St Pauler and had the interest of both the Church and school at heart. Her classroom had the only fireplace in that department, with a big brass-edged fireguard. She stayed at school for her dinner and had on it a small table near the fireplace. In the spring we grew bulbs and watched their progress with interest especially if ours grew the biggest and best for the bulb show. We had shows where we dressed as  flowers - I recall being a daffodil in one. At our Church sermons (Anniversary services on the third Sunday in June) she had all the girls dressed in white, with white net cap with trumpet-like sides - we were all so proud to take part in this important event in our Church school calendar. Miss Whittaker used to arrange a party for us afterwards we had to take our food and the school provided cups of tea. I remember once taking a hard boiled leg, and when I put the shell off, the egg slipped into my cup of tea!. At our school Harvest Festival, we took fruit and flowers – I have a photograph, sitting at tables with the gifts in front - if we were the one with the bottle of milk in front of us, we hadn't to drink the milk a bit difficult if you had a straw in your mouth. Christmas of course was a special time with a large Christmas tree at the far end of Miss Shaw’s room, but the partitions were drawn back then. When you were ready to go up into the junior school across the corridor all-girls got a fairy doll - always the same style with a crepe paper dress, so as you grow older, your eyes feasted on these beautiful dolls, and you longed for the day when you would get one. The school was redecorated during my time there and in the infant department, we had some lovely paintings of flowers on the walls, maybe they were transfers, but to me they looked like paintings, hollyhocks and lupins in lovely shades on a cream background. Craft work consisted of woolen bobbles made using cardboard tops of milk bottles as a template. I never got the hang of opening milk bottles, often I used to push the whole top in  instead of the little round centre pieces. We also made raffia mats that was funny stuff sometimes you have a thick piece sometimes a thin one, and sometimes one with both thick and thin. I can just see the card-board we used with string stitched in it, around which we used to weave. In those days the toilets were across the yard the infants and girls used one half of the yard and the boys the other - there was an iron railing between. There was also an iron railing in one corner with steps down to the boiler house - what an exciting place that was with its smoky smell ( we weren’t supposed to go there but how else  could you retrieve your tennis ball?) Moving up to junior school – our Assembly took place each morning and we had a different hymn for each weekday. Fridays was “There is a green hill faraway”. Mrs Lucy Metcalfe was my first teacher in the juniors. I remember she once lost her voice and asked one of the older girls to speak for her I was so envious and wished I'd have been chosen. Teaching us real writing, we all tried to copy her immaculate style. In the early war years we had evacuees in Ramsbottom and their teacher Miss Murray joined the staff at St Paul’s and used the classroom on the stage. This had a wooden partition with windows at the top so that we wouldn’t fall over into the hall! She was a good teacher and wore her auburn hair short, a bit like an Eton crop. Mr Henry Price was our headmaster, a spotlessly clean fresh-faced, white haired gentleman whom we all regarded with awe. His desk was at the front of the stage and if you misbehaved in class you were sent to stand on the line an imaginary one in the wall near Mr Price and you had to explain to him why you were there. Mr Linley the deputy head was a more approachable figure, he travelled every day from the other side of Manchester along with Mrs Cook another teacher who was a widow. She had a classroom above the stage the only one in the school with a fireplace. She had monitors to do everything even one to clean her shoes during the dinner break. She tried to teach me sewing, without success. She was the shortest-tempered of any teacher I ever encountered. Whilst in her class I took a scholarship examination and came home with my fingers covered in ink - inkwells and pen nibs didn't agree with me - I was always in too much of a hurry. Needless to me say I didn’t pass the scholarship, but was able to take the entrance exam for Haslingden Grammar School which I did pass, probably with clean fingers and where I attended until 1947. But  that's another story.