School

A Memory of Howden-le-Wear.

Vague recollections of my first days, being taken in my little blue coat and cap by the girls next door. I seemed to cling to them for ages. (Was this a sign of things to come?)

Finally graduated to playing with the boys, sliding in the school yard in black boots with 'segs' in. It was all boys because the yard then was divided by a wall and the red brick toilets and you just didn't venture into the girl's half. What is now the school field was still 'Carter's' field, where Alf kept his pigs.

I suppose most of my generation will have roughly the same memories of the school, such as the huge thermometer on the wall, dinners in the W.I., sitting on the pipes in the winter, 'Tommy's Pantry', and maybe the old oak desks with wooden pens and ink-wells. Surely though, the most lasting impression must be of a certain Miss Elizabeth Heslop. 'Lizzie', with her imposing figure, grey moustache, specs stuck on the top of her head and her booming voice, could strike terror into the hearts of your Mam and Dad, while the mere mention of Long Tom or Little Willie was enough to make any seven year old wet himself! This woman would have had most present day teachers for breakfast, while a confrontation between her and Margaret Thatcher would have been no contest.

However I remember her with great warmth and respect, and I am convinced that if every school had one or two 'Lizzie's' we would now be living in a much more civilised society.

A couple of years on and it was nature walks with Gladys Gardiner or 'Polly' as she was known. In common with David Bellamy she lived at Hamsterley, but that was the only similarity. Polly also took us for aerobics, or as she liked to call it, Drill. She had nothing in common with Diana Moran.

On to the top class, and although we must have been given great tuition for so many of us to do well in the eleven-plus, all I can really remember Jimmy Savage teaching us was sport. We called him 'Cromwell' for his apparent sternness and discipline, but on reflection his enthusiasm and commitment to making a football team out of resources so limited that even I was an automatic choice, must have rivalled that of Brian Clough. His efforts were justly rewarded, and I'll never forget how proud he was to present us with our medals for winning the Bishop Auckland District League.

We were not to know that within ten years Mr. Savage would be taken, robbing the school of a fine teacher at a tragically young age.

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