From candlelight to laser beams.

The Memories of Marian Varley,

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Volume I

Home

Making bread

Washing day

Ironing day

School days

World war I

After the war

Work

Mill work

Prisoners of War in Leigh

School,after the war

May Queens

Games

The sewing machine

My wedding

My parents

Tyldesley Bongs

Volume II

Father's family

Mother's family

Bad times

Comings and goings

Christmas

Family and friends

Tradesmen

Casual traders

Out a nd about

Health and hygiene

Birthdays

Going on errands

Middle teen days

Childbirth

Volume III

Down our street

Toys and trinkets

Christmas

New Year's Eve

Spring cleaning

Sermons Sunday

Walking Days and Carnivals

Holidays

Around and about

Teenage fun

More shops

The Borough of Leigh

Work

A woman's lot

Walking out

Volume IV

Childhood memories

My first visit to the theatre

Visiting Grandma on Sunday

Father's brother, Jack

Emigration: a new life

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Volume I

Home.

A Leigh lass.

Home.

When I was young I lived at 38, Henrietta Street, a Victorian worker's dwelling, two up and two down with a W.C. at the end of the back yard. It was the end of a row of nine houses. Instead of a communal back yard, which was usual, every tenant had his own back yard made by huge stone flags about six feet high, held in place by big iron bosses on each side.

The other houses had an ash pit shared by two families, which was about five feet long and three feet deep, with a wooden back which could be opened from outside to empty when the scavengers came. The front was open and in summer the smell was awful, and the bluebottles flew everywhere. We had a very tall bin with a lid and mother had to use a stepladder to get at it.

The house was occupied by my mother's Grandmother, Mrs Alice Smith, a right old termagant! She was her father's mother and needing care, but fortunately she died soon after, and my parents were able to take over the lease, and most of the furniture too, since no-one wanted it. According to the standard of the times (1910) it was a comfortable place with gas lighting in the living room, which housed a tall fireplace and oven. The mantelpiece above it had a plush edging with tassels tacked around it, and it held two nice opaline glass vases; a green glass little square box, which looked like tongue and groove wood with pointed tops, and a little white cat climbing on one side; a little fairing - a boy and a girl on a seat; matches, spills and other oddments.

The grate was black iron and the oven door had steel bands across, and there was a steel fender as well. Every Friday it was black leaded and polished up, and the steel bits and fender were rubbed bright with emery paper. It was a hot and uncomfortable job in the summer, as there was always a fire for the oven which was controlled by dampers, like flat plates of iron which were pushed to and fro to control the oven heat. How my mother managed to produce the lovely meals, cakes and pies she baked I'll never know. There was also a trivet which fitted on to the front of the fire bars and helped to use pans for boiling vegetables, and the pan for bacon and eggs, etc.

Getting breakfast ready took time. We didn't have hot water , or a gas oven, only a small gas ring to boil water for father's tea. He used to make the fire when he got up, and hoped that it would draw easily. After the fire had reached a nice glow with the help of the dampers on the oven, a shovel in front, balanced on the bars and a sheet of newspaper, porridge and toast were made. (A very sharp eye had to be kept on the newspaper in case it burst into flames.)

If the fire was sulky and hard to get going, it was bread and jam. This happened when the coal was damp. There was no container in our back yard, and it was just dumped into a convenient corner. Most people had a bucket of coal in a corner of the back kitchen so that it was a bit drier, and this usually made all the difference. The floor was covered with linoleum and a coconut matting that had newspaper under, as it was loosely woven, and when it was taken up to be shaken and beaten, the dirt underneath was surprising. This was done on Friday too!

Apart from the gas light in the living room, fuelled by putting pennies in the meter box, oil lamps and candles were used in the kitchen and bedrooms. In the living room was a mahogany chest of drawers, seven tiers high, with a white cover edged in hand crocheted lace. On top was a model glass ship, with sailors on the rigging and dotted about it, covered with a big glass dome. A pair of the usual Staffordshire dogs sat on each side, with painted eyelashes, gilt collars and heart shaped lockets. Behind the ship was a big case of stuffed birds, including a parrot that had belonged to Alice.

On the wall facing the window was an ebony wall clock with a brass pendulum. It was about two feet long. There was also an oil painting of a skating scene, quite a big one, and along the wall stood a horsehair sofa with a scroll arm. It was a most uncomfortable thing when you wore socks, very scratchy. There was a big table and the usual spindle-backed dining chairs, a nice mahogany rocking chair and a big-spindle backed chair which had once been the Chairman's chair at the Druid's Society and it wasn't at all comfortable! So, it had been padded with clean old pieces of woollen cloth and a big slip cover to hide it, made of curtain stuff. That was father's chair.

On the left of the fireplace was a tall cupboard up to the ceiling; the top half was shelves, the bottom half consisted of drawers. On the right was a shelf a bit more than half-way up, with a curtain across to cover the gas meter on the outside wall, and to hide night clothes which were hung on the oven side. When there was a new baby, the old hooded rocking cradle would be brought out from under the stairs.

The front bedroom had a brass ornamental bed and a big iron cot which would easily hold three youngsters if need be. The back bedroom had Grandmother's old four poster bed. The posts had been sawn off above a fancy bulge and didn't look too bad. It was huge.

The kitchen had a tall mangle with a wheel on the top to tighten or ease the rollers. There was a big wheel with a handle on the side to turn the rollers. On the outside wall was a long table, and a copper wash boiler. It had a little grate under it to heat the water. The table was used for scrubbing, and the wood was white-ribbed with use. There were drawers underneath for kitchen utensils and cutlery. By the boiler was the slopstone sink; above it, set into the wall, was the water tap, cold of course. The slopstone was not very useful, except to catch drips from the tap, and to contain any overflow when pans were being drained. The surrounding edge or rim was only about three inches high, so we kept a bowl in it for washing up.

Attached to the kitchen was the pantry, running alongside from the back of the house to the wall of the living room, taking in the space of the stairs between the living room and the kitchen. As in most houses, things that were only occasionally used were stored in the bottom end. There was a small paned window looking into the back yard, and a solid stone slab made a shelf across the width (about three feet) for keeping perishables on: milk, butter (if finances ran to it), lard, etc. Bread was kept in a terra cotta crock with a lid. It would hold about five or six 2lb loaves, as most women baked their own bread then, as my mother did.

Making bread.

I liked to watch her making bread, putting the barm in a mug with a spoonful of sugar and a little water, stirring it all up and putting it in a warm place to work. Whilst she waited for the barm, she put salt in the flour which was in a big yellow earthenware bowl, glazed white inside. She rubbed margarine or butter and lard into the flour, and when it was like fine bread crumbs, she made a hollow in it for the barm which she stirred as she emptied it in. Then she began to work it into the mass, adding more liquid if needed. When that was done, she kneaded it, using both hands, pulling the dough out at the sides, turning it into the middle, time and time again, until it was a big smooth ball. This was put into the washed, warm bowl and covered with a cloth, and set to rise in the hearth. When it had risen enough, it was turned out on a floured surface. It was cut into the number of loaves wanted, and kneaded into shape, put in loaf tins and baked. It smelled lovely while baking! When it was ready to cut, and well buttered, it was really tasty.

Washing day. Washing day, Monday, was a long day. Father got up early to make the fire burn brightly, as it was "banked up" before he went to bed. That is, the day's used tea leaves were spread on it and covered by the ashes from the day's fire, and firmed down with a coal shovel. The dampers were fixed so that it only smouldered during the night.

To make the fire burn enough, part of the fire was moved to one side, the ashes scraped off, and the ashes from the rest as well. Fresh coal was put on the well poked cinders and the ash pan put outside to cool. The dampers were set, and the kettle put on the trivet to boil. When they had had breakfast, father went to work as a porter at the Railway Goods yard. Although he had served an apprenticeship at the Albion Foundry as an iron moulder, he had been laid off. This is what usually happened as a new apprentice was taken on to save paying a journeyman's wage.

When the fire was well lit and the boiler filled with water (cold - no hot water in those days) mother would take a small shovelful from it to put in the boiler grate, together with kindling and coal. While the boiler was heating, the oak wash tubs were pulled out from their place under the mangle. One was for "soaping in", the other was for rinsing. They were made of staves with a slight curve, around a solid oak circular base, and were banded with steel strips to keep them in position. They were jolly heavy to move about too.

The dolly was brought from under the cold slab in the pantry. This was shaped like a three legged stool with the legs splayed out a bit. From the middle was a stout pole, three or four inches square and about eighteen inches long, with a round wooden stick through the top, shaped at one end to stop it from coming out of the pole. The clothes and things were sorted into piles. When the water was hot enough, it was poured into a bucket using a ladling can, rather like an enormous enamel mug, which held two or three quarts.

"Soaping in" began when there was enough hot water in the tub, whites first. Each article was dipped into the water and any grubby collars or cuffs were well rubbed with soap, "Blue Mottled" or "White Windsor". ("Pink Carbolic" was used for washing hands or dirty floors.)

After soaping, things were scrubbed on the washboard, which had thick ribbed glass in a galvanised zinc frame. When the pile had been done, the dolly came into action. It was dumped in the tub and grabbed on both ends of the cross stick handle, and moved vigorously back and forth in a sort of semi-circular motion. When this was done, the washing was fed through the mangle, ready for the boiler which had been topped up to provide a tub full for rinsing whites and coloureds. All the time the boiler fire had to be seen to, so that there was enough hot water when needed. I well remember the clouds of steam when you lifted the clothes out of the hot water with the boiler stick, which was usually the handle of an old dolly. Heaving the clothes and sheets in and out of one tub into another took a lot of effort and time.

The white things were dolly blued to make them look whiter. Pillow cases, petticoats, special occasion table cloths of damask, printed cotton dresses and shirts were all starched. Shirt collars were made separately and were heavily starched to make them stiff. The other things had enough starch to give them "body", i.e. to make them stiff but comfortable enough to wear. The starch used was Colman's, which came in large misshapen lumps, or the Robin brand, which came as a box of fine powder. Both were mixed with cold water to a white milky paste, and then boiling water was poured on to get the amount of stiffening needed.

When it cooled, it was clear, with a film on top which had to be removed. Sometimes, if there were a lot of white things which needed to be starched, the dolly blue was added to it, to save going through blue rinse separately. The dolly blue was made by Reckitt's, as was the Robin starch. The dolly blue was a lump of blue with a wooden peg, about one and a half inches long, sticking out of the top. The peg had a bit of a knob to hold it with as you dipped it in the water and moved it about to get an even colour. The blue lump was covered with a bit of cotton cloth and tied round the peg, to make it firm. There was also a dolly cream for tinting net curtains.After the whites and coloured things had been washed, and the woollens, there was a wash for the dusters and the sacking pinny which mother wore for rough or dirty work.

The whites and towels and sheets and pillowcases were all boiled with Hudson's Patent Washing Powder, meanwhile soaping, dollying and mangling, emptying dirty water from tubs, topping up the boiler, hanging out washed things, attending to the oven fire all had to be done, as well as making a big pan of "lobby" for our dinner. This was the remains of the Sunday beef, with onions, diced potatoes, remains of gravy and Oxo cubes. This was followed by rice pudding.

It was usually well into the afternoon when it was all done. The tubs had to be rinsed and dried and put back, the floor washed, the ashes taken out (But any cinders were carefully left), the copper washed out and dried. The clothes and other things that needed to be ironed were left a bit damp, neatly folded and fed through the mangle to smooth them a bit, and put on the table. Woollens, stockings and socks (all wool) were left to dry as long as possible and then left on the overhead clothes rack in the living room.

Ironing day.

Tuesday was ironing day. Some irons were solid, with a little handle on top. Others, like mother's, were called box irons. They were a pointed oval shape and had a hinged top, with a fastening. They were heated by similar shaped pieces of iron with a hole through the middle, roughly two inches deep. These were put into the heart of the fire and heated until they glowed. Then came the tricky part - hoisting it out on the end of a poker into the iron box, whilst putting another ingot in to heat up. Usually there were three on the go; one in the box, one half heated, and the fresh one. It was horrible work in the summer, when the door would be wedged half open to give much needed air. The iron made a clicking sound when in use, as the ingot was a bit smaller than the case and rattled against the box.

Towels were not ironed, nor woollies, or father's union shirts, made from a mixture of wool and cotton. Underwear - vests, woven knickers, liberty bodices and flannel petticoats - weren't ironed either. The bodices were made of stout cotton with a fluffy inside and came about hip length. They had rubber buttons to fasten up the front and there were two buttons front and back on each side to hang suspenders on if you wore stockings.

The average dress in winter for me was: vest, knickers, flannel petticoat, liberty bodice, lawn petticoat, a medium weight woollen dress with long sleeves, knee length black wool socks, plus a cotton pinny to keep my frock clean, so it didn't need washing every week.

Usually, sheets were mangled again and put to air on the clothes rack. This rack hung from the ceiling and was almost as long as the room. On its four rails, sheets and pillowcases were put on the window end, personal underwear at the other, together with stockings, socks, pinnies, lawn petticoats and blouses and shirts. Fancy covers were arranged over the underwear to conceal it.

Things went along pleasantly, except for one thing: cockroaches. We were overrun with them and no others in our row admitted to having them. Mother complained to the landlord that traps were useless, despite being full each morning. These traps were circular metal containers about twelve inches across and perhaps three inches deep. The tops had a number of flanges that caused the cockies to fall through and they couldn't get out again.

I remember one night when I was about two and a half years old. It was dark, and mother had taken me out visiting. It must have been about 9.15pm, as my father had gone out for half an hour for his gill and a natter with his cronies at Poor Dick's. When we got in, she sat me on the table and lit the gas light, then leapt on the table with me. No wonder! I can still see that horrible dark shining horde running into the corner where the gas meter was. They seemed to come from everywhere and vanished in a very short time. I think that "fascinated horror" would sum up my reaction.

Mother still complained to Mr Caldwell via his daughter Millicent, who collected the rent each Friday night - Friday being pay day at most works. It was worth it, as he finally decided to sort it out. It seems that the cockies went into a gutter drain off the pavement on the road covered by a big grid, through which they came out when it was dark, and through a tiny opening by the gas pipe into the house. The whole wall was cemented inside and out, halfway up, and we never saw any cockies again, thank goodness!

School days.

When I was four I went to the Infants department of the Church of England Parish School which was housed at the Church Institute in Henrietta Street, near to the Avenue. The Head Mistress was Miss Oakes and Mrs Smith was the first class teacher. I loved going to school and I learned to read very quickly. I found "sums" easy and printing my letters too. There were four of us who were that bit further on: Frank Hill (his father had a grocery shop in Bradshawgate), Teddy Crusham (his father had a wet fish shop, in Bradshawgate too), and Frank Howarth, who lived in a garden house at the Avenue end of Henrietta Street. We all sat together at a table for four and got on very well.

We were all ready for Junior School at six, having been moved up early in each class, but then we lost touch as they were single sex schools. I don't know how Frank Hill and Teddy Crusham went on, but Frank Howarth did very well, as he ended up as a Town Clerk somewhere down South.

I can always remember when I was about five, the school had a concert in aid of Serbian Relief. Each class took part, and our class wore sailor hats made out of tissue paper. We sat in upside down forms pretending to row a boat, and sang "Away, away in a golden boat, far away, far away........" You couldn't imagine anything less like a golden boat!

There were also solo items for the more confident ones. I had to recite a poem, "My Dolly". It was about one "that could talk and go to sleep, and of curls it had a heap". I was disgusted to be given a bald-headed baby doll in a long dress. It was nothing like the "heap of curls" charmer.......

World War I.

By this time the 1914 war had started. On August 4th Britain declared war on Austria-Hungary, and on Germany on August 12th as they had invaded Belgium. Japan and Russia also declared war on Germany, and an expeditionary force was sent to France which was occupied by Germany. Many thousands of British and Canadian soldiers were killed, and many sailors too, as the German U-boats were ready to torpedo the ships. All men over 18 were conscripted except for those in certain occupations who had been told to stay at work.

My father was told to report at Bennis' Iron Foundry at Little Hulton near Bolton. This meant an early morning walk through the fields to Bolton as the trams didn't start early enough for him to be at work on time. He took with him sandwiches in a small square wicker basket with a handle on top of the hinged lid, and a big can of tea, sugared and milked, because there wasn't a canteen for meals. He ate outside in nice weather, indoors if not.

Food was getting scarce as we then depended a lot on imports, and the ships carrying them were sunk. So were frigates and battle ships. By December 20th the Zeppelins were over the British coast, although one had been destroyed in Germany. In 1915, countries were declaring war on one another. There were advances and defeats, with great losses on all sides. blockades made food hard to get and more expensive.

April 1916 saw daylight saving time come in, and on June 5th Lord Kitchener was drowned in the "Hampshire" as it struck a mine. From July 1st to November battle raged on the Somme, with 420,000 British soldiers lost. So it continued for another year, the Allies gradually gaining. On March 12th 1917, America declared war on Germany and the first lot arrived in France on June 28th. The battles kept going on with losses and gains on both sides. Various nations made treaties but the Germans were still attacking until the Hindenburg Line was smashed on a ten mile front. The battles kept on.

In July 1918 the last offensive raid on France took place, and on July 15th the British, Canadian and Australian forces attacked Amiens. Other nations made treaties and there was a revolutionary movement in Germany. The Kaiser abdicated and escaped to Holland. An Armistice was signed by the Germans on November 11th and a kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was proclaimed on December 1st. It has been said that the Armistice was signed at the 11th minute of he 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.

When the war ended, the women who had done men's jobs were reluctant to give up their work, even those who had worked on munitions, and whose hands, faces and hair were bright yellow.

After the war.

Times were still hard in the Twenties and by then our family had grown. I had two sisters now. Alice was born on June 16th 1913 and Dorothy was born on August 27th 1917. My first brother, Fred was born in February 1920, Ernest was born in August 1922, Albert was born in August 1926 and my youngest sister Brenda was born on March 31st 1930.

By the time I was eleven, I was in Standard 7 of the Parish Church Girls School. Some of the others were fourteen, ready for leaving, and two others were twelve. There were ten of us, supposed to be the top pupils of the school. By this time I was doing multiple fractions and those sums about trains going at so many miles an hour and when would they pass each other; and taps filling tanks holding x gallons at 8 gallons per minute, and how long would it take? Sums about area, in square inches, feet and yards, or acres and square miles; or sums about distance - rods, poles, perches, chains, furlongs and miles. We also had Scripture, English (with the emphasis on grammar), writing, metal arithmetic, geography, history, drill, singing, and our lot had to learn a piece of poetry every week! We had to recite it perfectly, so we all searched frantically for short poems, of which there were far too few.

During December 1921 I sat for a scholarship to attend Leigh Girls Grammar School which opened that year. It was worth £8.2s.6d. in fees for a year, plus £5 towards the cost of books; £13. 2s.6d. in total if I got one. I passed the exam and had an interview with Miss Caress, who was the Head Mistress at the time, and was awarded a scholarship, to Miss Byron's gratification. I quite liked it, although the homework was a bit of a drag, as there wasn't much quiet at home when it was cold or raining. However, I only went for four years, as the General Strike and the Miners' Strike put paid to it.

I had to get a job.

Work.

I tried to get an assistant's job in a shop, but as I had no-one to recommend me I couldn't get one. I got a job of a sort at Yates' pie shop. The conditions were far from ideal. Two of us worked at a long bench on a landing at the top of a flight of stairs to the cellar, which was dark and pretty big. It had black beetles and was lit by a solitary 40 watt light bulb. Yates was a mutton-chopped, whiskered, unctuous old devil, who was an eminent Baptist and most definitely a Sunday only Christian.

He had a daughter who looked like a little monkey, but was quite nice. She and her mother were very much put upon by the old so-and-so. There was a son, Stanley, who was doted on and sent to Grammar School, but poor Ruth-Annie had to slave for her father. No wonder she got married as soon as she could.

While I worked there, one of my jobs was to scrub down the cellar, which I did as quickly as I could. I washed the pie tins and used bowls, cleaned dried fruit for scones, etc, from 7.45 am to 5.30 p.m. for a few weeks only. I was blamed for spoiling a dinner, although it was not my fault. There were three of us in the working area which was only a quarter the size of the big oven. Mrs Yates was cooking the dinner on a gas stove near a window at the back, and the bench was on one side of it. I was scrubbing it after Janet (the confectioner) had used it and Mrs Yates was doing the cauliflower. She lifted the lid and must have put it down over the soap as I kept asking where it was. I couldn't find it.

After a few minutes I said it smelt like washing day, and Janet agreed. Mrs Yates came in to look at the cauliflower; it was a frothy mess, as the soap was stuck on the lid! Old Eli was furious (mostly for the 2d the cal had cost) and blamed his wife and me for being careless, and said that I should have kept the soap away from the pan. When I got home I told my mother and father. They were mad too, so father marched off to the shop and demanded my card and my week's wages. (This was 7s.6d for five days and Saturdays up to 2pm, and included a midday meal.) Father got it too, and gave the old hypocrite a good telling off as well.

Mill work.

I got a job at Carrington Mills, weighing out cops and booking them in for the winders. I got 17 shillings a week. Holidays and days off like Good Friday, New Year's Day and Christmas Day were at our own expense as they were not paid for, and if orders were few we could find ourselves on short time, working only in the mornings. I worked there until I got married, and I had Anne in 1940. By then I had been a reeler for 12 years.

A reeler wound bobbins of processed cotton into hanks (skeins) of yarn ready for dyeing or bleaching. These were put on a frame which took forty at a time, each of which were fastened with a thicker strand of cotton. They were then tied into groups of five or ten, and slipped off the frame at one end which could be opened. Each hank was about two inches wide and could be made into three patterns. The frame was made to turn a certain length of time, then stopped. this was called a lap. A hank could be made of any number of laps, from one to four, or as many as needed, even ten. The standard pattern was a criss-cross which was fairly close, and usually tied in the normal way.

The ends to start the hanks were looped along the frame by a loose knot in pairs to keep it firm and these were broken out, each laid out over its own hank, the tie cord passed under the loose end and the bobbin end all tied together. The knot was made long enough to enable the hank to be spread wider for dyeing. They were cut by a small sharp knife or a big pen knife, the ends cut off gathered in the right hand to make a small ball and put in a special container on the frame.

The frame was made of long smooth staves of wood, six in all, arranged on a metal frame in a sort of a star pattern, a central pair and each other pair at an angle to left and right. These were about a foot from the end of the staves, under them, so they were kept smooth, and were linked together by strong webbing and special fasteners which could be opened. When opened, the staves were together, three at the top and three at the bottom, and the hanks hung slackly so they were easy to handle. It sounds complicated but it was quite easy really. The only thing that mattered was to keep an eye on the bobbins and ensure that the ends were not broken.

It was hard work if we had coarse "counts". The size of the threads were known as "counts". 10's were very thick compared with 100's which were thin. We would have liked 100's all the time, as they paid well. Coarse didn't. For some orders we had to have "Grant Wheel", which meant that the wheel pattern was altered to a bigger, looser criss-cross, and these were separated into five sections on two fingers of the left hand and the tying cord passed through with the ends tied as normal.

The third pattern was a step pattern. This was not criss-cross, but the yarn was allowed to pile up in a narrow "step" until a certain number of times passed, then moved a "step" for seven times. So, each time when completed, the steps were made of seven separate strips and they had the tying thread passed through the steps like the Grant, only there were seven sections.

This pattern had not been needed for several years, so there was no price on the fixed price list, and when one was made it was so low that we couldn't make a decent day's pay. We who were on the orders were supposed to be the best ten and we refused to do any more and we got the sack. However, it wasn't for very long; the pay was adjusted and it paid very well. (Since the company lost money, no orders for that kind were ever accepted afterwards.) We were all called back within a fortnight as they couldn't manage the orders they had without us.

There was a lot of camaraderie at the mill. It was accepted as a matter of course that if a reeler on the next frame to you needed a little help with coarse work, you did what you could for her. The frames were arranged back to back, so that the person on the front had no-one to help, but somehow she got some!

One girl, Lena Cooke, worked on the first frame for a while. She had umpteen jobs after leaving school and wanted to go on the stage. She lived in Bond Street, on the side backing the Theatre Royal. Their back gate was opposite the stage door so I suppose that influenced her. Although she had lovely black curly hair, her face didn't match. She was sent by the Labour Exchange to train as a reeler because we had a big order and frames not being used. She wore short skirts and when she bent down she displayed a lot of thigh and some underwear - tights were not made then. Old Johnson was escorting the Managing Director on his weekly tour and they both got an eyeful. Johnson was as red as a turkey cock and ranted and raved and sent her home to put on something more suitable. She was not to start work until he approved she was dressed fittingly! I would have been mortified, but not Lena. She came back in her mother's skirt, down to her ankles, but after a day or two she came back with her short skirts lengthened.

Another worker was an old lady whom we called Old Sally, and she had been a reeler for donkey's years. She would never admit to being over 65, but she was really well into her seventies and lived in lodgings. She used old fashioned shears, two blades linked together with a metal band which "gave", and instead of keeping the cuttings in her hand like us, she threw them on her shoulder. We tried to help her as best we could, for although her work was as good as the best, she was slow and didn't make much of a wage. So, if anyone had time, we wrote her tickets (containing the counts, names of yarn, the reel, and her name), tied up the bundles of yarn, and saw that she had enough ties for them, and put bobbins on top of the frame.

The Over-looker had a blind eye to all this, but we kept "nicks" in case the manager was about. He was an irascible man, red-faced and paunchy, and a Liberal, and he was apt to make a sudden appearance at any time. Once a week, he escorted the Managing Director around the works, a long thin man, very old school tie, but back to my younger days after this diversion! Prisoners of War in Leigh.

When the 1914 war was on there was a zeppelin raid on Manchester, but one of them came over Leigh. I was about six, but it woke me up as there was a lot of noise, men shouting "Put that light out!" "Stop in the house!" and over all that, the menacing hum of the airship. At this time, an empty factory building off Etherstone Street was requisitioned. It was intended to be a weaving shed, but in 1915 it was used as a camp for German prisoners of war.

Most of them were captured at Mons. Mother, myself, Alice and Mrs Orrell (our neighbour) saw them, and I can still remember them, mostly boys it seemed to me, and so dirty and weary. Although other lots came to the camp we never went to see them, as Mother's brother Walter was a prisoner somewhere in Germany.

By 1920, machinery was put in and the building reverted to its intended use. It was called the Lilford factory and even now, the tarmac exercise yard is known as the Compound.

After the War.

After the war ended everything seemed to be dull, gradually getting back to normal. I loved school, although the teachers were a mixed bag in Junior School. Little Miss Dolan, very prim and proper; old Miss Griffin, with whiskers on her chin, who played a small organ for prayers and singing, which she taught, although her voice was cracked and not very musical. She lived in Silk Street with a widow and her young daughter. Miss Christie was a very good artist and a very nice person. Not so was Mrs Lolli, more feared than Miss Byron, the Head teacher. She was the teacher from Hell and her cane was always in view and used. Personally, she was tall and thin, dark haired and she always wore dangling earrings. She had a very uncertain temper, so if she was called out to a meeting, one of the bolder girls would watch for her coming back and give us warning. The only time she was pleasant to all was pay day, when the man from the Town hall came to pay their wages. I think she tolerated me because she was always sucking up to girls who were from better off homes, and my friends were Ruth Pascal and Marion Wilde. Ruth's father was the Manager of Mill Lane cotton mill and Marion was the youngest of a pretty well off family, very much petted by her older sisters. She was a bit of a wet and although Ruth and me tried to give her the slip, she always tagged on.

In Junior School we were short of room and except for Standard Seven there were about 50 in each class. We were taught by rote mostly, chanting times tables, four gills one pint (although a Lancashire gill was half a pint!), weights and measures, learning poetry, doing mental arithmetic and horrible parsing - nouns, verbs, etc.

The accommodation at school was very basic, the toilets particularly. They were like long wooden seats with about six holes cut in them, and no covers over them. They were duckets, i.e. when the vessels underneath the cover were full, they automatically tipped over with a splash into the sewers. Once, Lena Cooke (the same one who was sent home for a longer skirt) had on a new pair of patent leather slippers, of which she was very proud. As the floor wasn't very clean, she took them off and put them on the side of her seat. When she got up, she knocked one of them into the hole! There was a great to-do but there was no way she could get it back. We never knew what happened when she got home, but as long as I knew her, she didn't come in new shoes again.

I was very happy in Junior School and was moved up into new classes earlier than the rest, so by the time I was eleven, I was in Standard Seven with girls of thirteen and fourteen. There were only ten of us, so we each had our own programme of lessons and as we tried to work on given tasks on our own we could always ask for help if we couldn't manage.

In 1921, Miss Byron entered me for a County Scholarship to attend the Leigh Girls' Grammar School (£2.14s 2d per term plus £5 towards books). It had been opened in 1921, and was too small for all who wanted to go. The Entrance exam wasn't too hard and those who passed had an interview with the Head Teacher, Miss Caress, to assess their suitability. I got a place and started in Form 2 in September 1922.

The uniform had to be bought at Danby's, one of the posh "Ladies' Outfitters', so it was expensive. The gym slip had to have the saddle in two pieces which buttoned together, the front straps with three button holes on each side and the back ones longer, so when they were fastened the ends had three inches to spare. This was supposed to enable the hem to be let down by moving the buttons. It also had to have four box pleats, not the common three, and it had to be two inches from the floor when kneeling. It was made of navy blue serge and it had a navy braid girdle. We also wore black socks or stockings, black indoor and outdoor shoes, a square necked white blouse with three-quarter length sleeves, a navy gabardine coat and a big brimmed navy straw hat with a navy and reed striped hat band, woven with the school badge at the front - a stag with "Swift and Sure" under it. (We were anything but that!)

The hat wasn't at all practical, for if it rained, the brim sagged and the top rose to a point. We then had to put the hat on a basin, cover it with a cloth, and press it down. We had to press the brim to straighten that too. After one dousing it never looked the same!

About eighteen months later, we were able to buy a navy wool cap with a metal badge for the front. It was a queer design, with a turned up brim at the back and round each side, leaving a band about six inches long on the forehead, which was about an inch wide. The badge was pinned in the middle. Everybody had one, although they were not obligatory. We could stick them in our schoolbags, together with our gloves, and if we fastened the top button on our gabs no-one could tell which school we went to.

The staff of L.G.G.S. were ok but the gym mistress was a bit of an oddity. She was Scotch and she had dark, curly hair, cut short. She was Miss Caress' friend, and rarely seen in anything but her gym slip. She was fairly tall and of sturdy build, with big calves on longish legs, and slim ankles made them look like Indian clubs. On one side of the yoke of her gym slip she wore a big badge with coloured stones set in. We never did find out what it was, but thought it was the badge of the place where she had trained.

We had drill, and games (netball in summer, hockey in winter) which I didn't enjoy because I was a foot smaller than some girls and short-sighted. I should have had glasses. During one hockey game, one of the girls hit me on the mouth. It loosened my front teeth and my lips swelled up an awful lot. After that, I always kept well to the back when teams were picked, as the ones left out could practise throwing the ball into the netball hoop. I didn't really enjoy games. We couldn't wear jumpers or cardigans when it was chilly, only when it was really cold and frosty and your nose was red and your fingers blue with cold.

There was one thing that annoyed all of us who were Church of England. The Catholic girls were excused morning worship and only came in to hear the notices being read out. They were in a classroom next to the Hall, and used to swot up for French and Spelling tests in the twenty-five minutes they were there.

During 1926, the year I left, there was a General Strike from 31st January. Times were very bad. Men discharged from the army were coming home from policing Germany and couldn't get jobs. Those who had been conscripted at 18 hadn't enough training for skilled work so many of them re-enlisted for three more years. My uncle Walter was one, and he was sent to India.

Things had been bad for some years and wages were very low for most folk, but quite a lot of business men had made a good profit owing to the scarcity of food and good quality stuff. My father had been sacked along with some others in a deputation asking for bigger wages. This had been carefully organised by a Sunday Christian, a Methodist called Walter Hilton, who kept in the background and didn't go with them. he kept his job. This was before 1923.

There were so many unemployed men with families who were on Public Relief. They had sold everything they could to pay rent and get a bit of food (mostly bread, margarine, cheap jam and potatoes) so the council decided to build Holden Road. It cost £53,000 as they had to go under the railway and over Penleach Brook. The road is just over a mile long, but the labourers doing the digging were unemployed, each man doing two weeks' work.

My father got his two weeks. After the first day his hands were in a terrible state, raw and blistered and bleeding. My mother washed them with disinfectant and put ointment on a bandage. She did this each day, and they were just about healed when his two weeks ended. The strike by the colliers lasted for six months but they had to give in and compromise. most of the works were at a standstill as there wasn't any coal to provide steam power. It wasn't the best of times to be working class.

May Queens.

Towards the last two weeks of April, the girls of school age - up to thirteen - started to plan the May Queen for the first Saturday in May. When I was about nine or ten, I got involved with the May Queens. We would decide which Saturday we would have it, and chose a Queen. Everybody put their pennies in the kitty to buy gold paper for a crown, and coloured tissue paper and fine wire to make flowers, hoping to get at least 6d back after the party which followed the actual walking round town.

We all went into the back to make the flowers, sitting on our stools as we did so. We also made them in our homes at night. Being good at making roses, or so the others said, I made them for the bouquet. Those who couldn't make decent flowers had to cut green tissue paper into thin strips to wrap round the wire stems, or snip a fold at quarter inch intervals to make "leaves" of paper.

The Queen had to be someone who had a nice white frock and shoes, and could find a nice bit of white net curtain for a veil over her head. The Queen also wore a circlet of gold paper, some sort of train, usually an old window curtain of her mum's, edged with strips of cotton wool daubed with black spots (ermine), and white socks or stockings with her best shoes. She had a train bearer and a page who carried her crown on a cushion - usually someone's little brother was roped in, all unsuspecting!

The crown was of great importance and had to look as real as we could make it. If anybody had been lucky enough to get chocolates at Christmas, any foil was smoothed out and saved for the crown. It was made to fit the Queen's head, out of doubled gold paper strips, carefully glued. The cross-pieces on top were placed with room to stuff in red tissue paper for the lining. If we had any foil, it was crumpled up in a round or oval shape, for jewels on the circlet.

When the day came, we were all dressed up in our best frocks and shoes, and arranged by the older girls to the best advantage. There being quite big families in those days, there were plenty of walkers, so it made quite a parade. All the others dressed up as something or other, and some were given collecting tins (old cocoa tins), mostly boys as they were cheekier than the girls. About 1.0 p.m. we set off walking. Actually, gawping and ambling would be more to the point.

Sometimes we had a boy in front banging a tin lid with a wooden spoon, a few dressed up girls followed, then the Queen with the page boy (in his best clothes), carrying the crown on its cushion, tied in place with white thread, the train bearer, various fairies and baker's boys. They had white tea towels pinned to their shoulders, flour dabs on their cheeks, and carried baking tins with flour sprinkled in. There might also be charladies with pinnies, mops and dusters, or window cleaners, boys carrying buckets and wash leathers. Everybody wore something as fancy dress with their decent clothes (but not their best, unless they were with the royal party), and tried to look like someone else. We walked round the streets into town where most people were, passing other May Queens on the way. One or two were thought better than ours, but we felt that we were superior to most.

While we were walking, our mothers were setting the tables for the party, and everyone had brought a plate, a cup and a spoon. When we got home, our mothers had laid on a spread. Tables were put together and covered with white paper, and sandwiches of beef paste or salmon paste were set out, together with bread and butter, jam, and tinned pineapple cubes (they were the cheapest tinned fruit). We had rock cakes, gingerbread and a big iced sponge if we were lucky. By "big", I mean roasting tin size. It was easier to cut equally.

The houses round about loaned stools and chairs, and big spoons for serving the jellies. They tied different coloured threads round the handles so they got their own ones back. No larking about was allowed, so everyone set to with a will, as parents were watching. Anybody misbehaving would get a box on the ears or be sent away.

Some of the collected money went towards the spread, to repay the mothers' outlay on the bread, jelly, butter, sugar, etc. but I don't think that all the mothers took what was due to them. They knew how much we looked forward to having something more than the usual weekly penny when the rest was divided between each walker. The least I ever had was 4d and the most was 6d. Usually, we got 2d or 3d apiece, and those who had made things got 3d back for the money they had spent on paper, etc. To us it was a fortune!

The Queen was crowned after tea by the oldest person present and allowed to keep the crown which had been carried round, tied on a cushion, by the page. He was the most presentable (i.e. cleanest) young boy. After a few games, we were tired out and went home.

Years later, in 1937, for some reason the grownups decided that we should have a May Queen and that our Brenda should be the Queen. Perhaps it was because she was pretty, but I suspect that it was because my mother was known to be a good sewer, stitchwise I mean, not a drain! She could be trusted to make a good show. Brenda had a long white dress and we made the train out of gold satin; a short remnant, used width wise so that it was long. We edged it with yards of cotton wool "ermine", made with black ink spots. She had a super crown of "gold" with a white satin lining and jewels of sweet papers scrunched up in rounds or ovals to reflect the light. Everyone admired the effect, and no one was jealous because they knew that no one else would have gone to all that effort. I believe that the collection was a good one and the walkers did very well.

It was the last one in our street, as no one had the time or money to spare after Germany declared war in 1939. Besides that, there were more cars on the roads as these, and vans and lorries, replaced the horse-drawn vehicles. I believe that these May Queen dos were a faint reminder of older May customs, such as the dancing round the Maypole on May Day. It was felt that flowers, even if made from paper, were essential, so in our way I think we were keeping up the old customs.