All change

Still trying to master blogging. Thank you for being patient. At least I have managed a few posts. Even achieved a title today!

Just before we leave Hough Green School/ St Michaels Ditton Church of England School to give it its full name, a couple more memories surface.

I remember sitting on the sandstone windowsill, with my feet up on it, by the door in a sort of porch where the teachers’ toilet was located. I’m sure I would have been in big trouble if any of the teachers had seen me and so I felt very daring!

My other memory was of buying a present for my Mother at a Christmas Fair. It was a brooch in the shape of a crown with a white stone, like a big diamond. I was so pleased with my purchase and my Mother seemed to like it when she unwrapped it at Christmas. I was about six at the time and that was probably the first present I’d ever bought for her.

My brother had transferred to Simms Cross by the time I started at Hough Green School as he was four years older. Simms Cross was in the town of Widnes and had a good reputation for getting pupils through the Eleven Plus exam whereas our little village school did not.

My parents decided to move me to Simms Cross, too, but Mr Upward , the Headmaster, was not very pleased at this. It meant a bus ride for me into Widnes town. When I decided to go home for my lunch it also meant a walk from the Townhall square along the main thoroughfare to Simms Cross.

The local buses were red and ran only as far as Hough Green so then I had to walk down the hill to get home. We paid a fare of one old penny, as did all schoolchildren. The Crosville buses, which were green (117 ) ran to Liverpool and our bus stop outside the house was the first stop you could get off at. i once got on the wrong bus in Widnes and jumped off at the first stop (The Queen’s Hall) and ran crying back to the Town Hall! I never made that mistake again but always went to the front of the bus to check the number before I got on. Amazing to think I did all this when I was only seven.

Simms Cross Primary School had an infants’ department but I went straight into the first year of Primary School which was called Standard One. We girls were all upstairs and the boys were kept totally separate, downstairs with a big wall to divide the playgrounds. The only contact we had with them was when we chucked snowballs over said wall!

My first teacher was Miss Oliver and again we were taught in a classroom which was divided into two by screens. My main memory is of climbing the dark and scary stairs to get there. There was a big glass fronted case in the hall which contained silver cups and medals. The whole school would gather there for assembly every morning. We sang a hymn and said a prayer.

Most of my memories concern school dinners and my not eating them. Some hymns make me nauseous to this day because I associate them with school dinners!

The teaching was obviously good as most of my class in Standard Four passed the Eleven Plus but my memories are few and far between.