Wigan Album
St Mary's, Ince
4 Comments
Photo: Norman Hickson
Item #: 381
Back row L-R:
Dave Bytheway, Jack Richardson, Jim Cooper, Norman Harter, Alan Hilton, Jimmy Lacey
Next to back row:
Roy Harrison, ?, ?, Margret Bleakley, Irene Sargent, Joyce Birchall, Barbara Price, ?
Next to front row:
John Fitsimmons, Cliff Harrison, Ann Duddle, Minnie Preston, Joyce Johnson, Barbara Gerrard, ?, Kathleen Hilton, ?, June Rowley
Front row:
Geoff Sharples, Derek Rudd, Fred Bootle, Stan Waring, Raymond Nash, Fred Hewitt, John Brockley, Tommy Hunt, Norman Hickson
Can any one fill in the blank spaces, sorry but it was 55 years since.
Second from right, behind front row and between Kathleen Hilton & June Rowley - Myra Clayton.
This was my first school which I started in January 1947 aged 5. I'm struggling to work out where the school actually is in relation to this photo. An abiding memory is of a certain playtime when an older boy scaled what seemed a very high wall presumably from another playground to enter ours. I assume the age groups were kept apart.
The other memory is of "Pedro the Fisherman" blasting out from a loudspeaker (top of the hit parade probably in 1947) kept high up on the wall inside the main room, where in winter an open coal fire kept the place warm. I also remember dropping shiny ball bearings, with a loud clatter, onto the wooden flooring several times during a lesson, much to the annoyance of the teacher, and only later discovering that there was a hole in my pocket.
I also remember a teacher covering a noisy child's mouth with sticky tape to shut him up! Finally my antagonist in the playground trying to get his "friend" to fight me and receiving a straight right hand punch on his nose from a bewildered me for his troubles, a confused and less likely fighter than myself it would have been difficult to find, but I followed the maxim if anyone picks a fight get the first punch in. I dealt with the middleman, never saw his "friend" but I've often wondered who he might have been. It was difficult to work out whether it was the tears or the blood that flowed more freely, my "punishment" was a teacher marching out with a very large cane warning what happens to people who fight in their school. I might be wrong but I think it may have been my very first day, after 40 years as a teacher I've had time to reflect on my indelible memories of St Marys.
A former schoolmate from this class gave me these names: Second Row From Top: Roy Harrison, Joyce Monks, Margaret Jolly,Irene Fisher, Gwen Farnsworth, Joyce Birchall, Barbara Price, Alice Haselden. Third Row From Top: ....Barbara Gerrard, Catherine Phillips,Joyce Atherton, Kathleen Hilton, June Rowley.
Ashley. This was known as the bottom yard. the wall at the back of the photograph is the wall on the cemetary side,the wall on the other side was below the top playground, there was also a bridge that lead from the top playground and crossed over the bottom yard to two classrooms, at the back of the main school.