Part 8

A Memory of Middle Rainton.

Entertainment

The Men: Mostly the pubs provided a good range of entertainment with darts, dominoes and cards being played. Some men kept greyhounds or whippets for racing, but generally gardening took up a lot of their time, as this helped to feed the family, and there were allotments enough for all. This also then led on to hobbies with things such as Leek Shows, Flower Shows and as about 15% of the allotments had pigeon lofts, as pigeon racing was very popular.
Although an illegal activity, Pitch and Toss took place weekly behind the Meadows Pit. And large crowds would congregate there. This was gambling and could involve quite large sums of money. The police would carry out raids occasionally to try to stop this, to no effect at all. We kids were given half a crown, which was a lot of money in those days (12 ½ p today), to keep a lookout and warn of a raid.
Many pitmen kept racing pigeons, these would be trained and raced, and competition was fierce.
Others kept greyhounds, and whippets, again mostly for racing.
Football was also popular, with men supporting either Sunderland or Newcastle; there was always plenty of banter between rival supporters.
Fox terriers were popular; these were generally used for ratting, as there were rats around the pigeons, and at the rubbish tips.
To train the terriers, a rat would be caught in a wire cage, taken into a field and released, the terriers gave chase, and a good dog would kill it with one bite. When the corn was cut, it was first put into stooks to dry, and then into stacks. When thrashing time came around, a large thrashing engine was brought in, and driven by a tractor. They were many rats in the corn stack, so by law, nets were placed all around, about 9 foot high to prevent rats escaping. Men and boys would bring the terriers to catch and kill these rats. You had to tie your trousers at the bottom to prevent them getting up the inside of your trousers!

The Women

Women never seemed to go out much, apart from a bit of shopping or a quiet drink in the snug or saloon, but never in the bar. A treat would be the pictures in Houghton for which you had to queue for ages if you wanted to get in, or a Saturday afternoon in Sunderland by bus. The bomb damage there was quite intensive, and large barrage balloons were to be seen by Binns and the station.
But then the women were always busy, cooking on an open fire (no cooker), making bread, as nearly everyone made their own at home, and ironing (with a cast iron heated on the fire).
The washing was done by heating the water in a cast iron cauldron in the washhouse (if you had one), then into a cut down barrel called a “poss tub” and agitated with a“poss stick” and finally put through a wringer which broke all the buttons. They then had to be sewn back on with the best match you could find. There also seemed a passion for cleaning the front doorstep. This would be done with a rubbing stone which came in various colours. And of course the range had to be polished with black lead. The women did have a hard life.
Another activity was making carpets (no money to buy them). This involved a wooden frame that could be adjusted to size, say from about 3ft x 3ft to about 12ft x 12 ft. On this would be stretched old sacks, cut and sewed together to make a base. Any old clothes would then be cut into small bits, about 1inch x 2inches; these would be separated into different colours. A pattern, generally floral, would be drawn onto the sack base, the bits of cloth would then be pushed through the base, both ends, with a tool, the different colours forming flowers, leaves etc. These were called hooky mats.

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