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The transcript is an interview with Jack Holden as transcribed by Microsoft Word and summarised by ChatGPT and subject to errors.
Personal Background
- Interviewee: Jack Holden
- Born: 12 December 1927, Ramsbottom (53 Carr Street, above the library).
- Childhood Homes: Moved to 14 St Paul’s Street in 1935.
Childhood & Play
- Street Life:
- Played on Crow Lane, which had little traffic (mainly doctors, solicitors, and a few lorries).
- Games included roller skating, street hockey (using walking sticks and balls), and marbles (played in gutters; special red ones called “blood alleys”).
- Marbles & Pop Bottles:
- Pop bottles contained glass marbles sealed with rubber rings.
- Some children tried to smash bottles to retrieve them, but most marbles were bought cheaply in shops.
- Sports:
- Cricket and football were favourites. Played on a dirt track by the drill hall (kept in good condition by John Wood Foundry’s ashes and sand).
- Once bowled to by Ramsbottom cricketer Billy Whitworth with a tennis ball — a memorable moment.
Shops & Local Businesses
- Richardson’s Shop (No. 19 Crow Lane):
- A well-stocked grocer selling almost everything (bread, flour, tinned goods, pots, pans).
- Cookson’s Bakery (Rope Street corner):
- Sold bread, muffins, pies. Children mischievously tried to knock over bottles of sauce and pickles displayed in pyramids in the window using canes through frame holes.
- Hat Shop:
- Located further down; remembered by others but not by Holden himself.
- Booze’s Shop (bottom of Crow Lane):
- A grocer, though less well-stocked than Richardson’s.
Schooling
- Early Education:
- Attended local school from age 5 (photographed c.1933).
- Teachers: Miss Haspel, Miss Whittaker, Mrs Metcalf, Mrs Cook, Mr Lindley, Mr Price (headmaster).
- About 20–25 pupils per class.
- Daily Routine & Discipline:
- Children lined up for school, underwent cleanliness inspections.
- If dirty, told to wash at school basins.
- Punishments: standing in corners (no harsh corporal punishment at primary level).
- At later schools, caning was common.
- Meals:
- Went home for lunch, as his mother worked in a weaving mill.
- Events:
- Jubilee of 1935: celebrations in Nuttall Park with races and sports.
- Empire Day: uncertain, but recalls processions from school to church.
War Years (1939–1945)
- Evacuees:
- Saw trains bringing evacuees during WWII; remembers their arrival in Claremont.
- Street Life During War:
- Blackout enforced; few streetlights.
- A Bren gun carrier was parked near the drill hall for training.
- Ashtons Mill became stables for the Duke of Lancaster’s Own Yeomanry (used by soldiers from Manchester/Liverpool). Boys gathered manure for gardens.
- Railway Hotel restricted soldiers to 15 pints due to heavy drinking.
- Fairground:
- Travelling fair set up annually (probably at Easter) on space near bottom of Crow Lane.
- Attractions: swings, roundabouts, coconut shies, hoopla, fortune tellers.
- Youth & Mischief:
- During blackout, children tied door handles together and knocked to confuse residents.
Religious Life
- Attended Patmos Methodist Chapel (junction of Brandnew Road and Peel Brow).
- Joined school trips to Anglican church but family worship was Methodist.
Later Activities
- Joined Air Training Corps (ATC) in 1941 (aged 14).
- Trained and drilled in the drill hall, including rifle shooting.
Other Recollections of Crow Lane
- Originally no gardens in front of houses — open flagstone space instead.
- The drill hall: large panelled space with rifle range; later used by ATC.
- Whittaker’s company (local landowners, later Peel Holdings) had stables at bottom of Crow Lane during railway construction in 1840s–50s.
Overall:
The interview gives a vivid picture of working-class childhood in Ramsbottom during the 1930s–40s. It covers street games, local shops, school life, wartime memories (blackouts, evacuees, soldiers), and community institutions (church, ATC). Jack Holden recalls small details — like marbles, fairs, shop tricks, and tying doors — that illustrate everyday resilience, humour, and camaraderie in a close-knit community shaped by war and industry.
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