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. The following account comes from Margaret Clemow, proudly Welsh born, but a Denton resident for nearly 50 years. It gives an interesting perspective of a changing school environment from a teacher’s point of view.
Andrew, my son, was just over 3 years old in December 1972 when Mr Bert Hollowell, who was Chairman of the Managers, approached me about helping out for one term. However I felt I had to refuse because I didn’t want to ‘farm out’ Andrew. He explained that they wanted someone from the village as, in the winter, staff often didn’t arrive if the ‘buses were delayed for any reason – usually bad weather. Mr Hollowell worked at County Hall and he suggested that if he could arrange for Andrew to come with me would I join the staff? The County agreed, I joined the staff, and so the infants were split between Mrs Stanton and myself. I was originally employed for just one term - in the event that one term extended to 22 years and 2 terms!
During that time I saw many changes. The first was Mr Jones’ retirement in 1975 when Miss Sue MacGowan became Head for 2 years.
Despite the cramped conditions in the old school it was an idyllic environment as every summer the children played cricket on the village green using trees to ‘mark out’ the pitch with very few parked or moving cars to worry about.
Mr Jones (of Welsh stock and known affectionately as ‘Taffy’) was a pipe smoker which of course he couldn’t do in school. So he ‘volunteered’ to do playground duty every day, whilst the staff coffee was served on a tray dead on time at 10.30 by Miss Thomas who was Mr Jones’ housekeeper. In the afternoon we received tea in the same way – all for the princely sum of ten pence per week which we duly left on the tray each Friday.
The mobile library arrived at the green on alternate Wednesdays at 1.30 p.m. All three staff went in turn to change our books. Mr Jones supervised the infants whilst Mrs Stanton and I were in the van - this way he kept a watchful eye on reading progress in our classes. I remember once expressing concern regarding one little girl in my class who seemed somewhat slower than the others, to which he profoundly replied, “Always remember my dear, you can’t put there what God hasn’t, you can only work with what he has”.
From 1976 the children walked up to the village hall in all weathers for school lunches – as they also did for P.E on two afternoons a week.
In 1976 the houses in Bridge Meadow were being built, numbers doubled again and two mobile classrooms were installed in Edwin Cawley’s orchard at the back of the school. The numbers continued to grow and since the centre of the village is a conservation area it wasn’t possible to accommodate these extra children by enlarging the old building. So the new school was built and opened in 1982.
Mr Richard Wilkins who followed Miss MacGowan, was very interested in producing concerts. One Christmas concert I remember well was held in the large classroom – there was no hall – so a stage was created at one end by borrowing empty beer crates from the pub covered with the tops of trestle tables probably borrowed from the church.
As the number of pupils increased so did the staff and in 1980 we were up to 4.4, however during the following years the numbers gradually declined and by 1989 the teaching staff had been reduced to 2.8.
A sad occasion was the sudden death of the youngest member of staff – Mrs Cathy Tomlinson – in 1984. She was only 27 years of age. As a memorial to her a seat was sited in the playground. However this was stolen a few years later.
Mr Wilkins stayed until 1985 and saw us into the new school before he left to become Head of Bozeat. By this time the numbers were growing so quickly it was felt necessary to appoint a permanent Deputy Head - a post I stepped into until the arrival of Alan Harper who succeeded Mr. Wilkins. (Up until this time we always had Supply Heads one of whom I remember used to refer to my mobile classroom in the orchard as my ‘Tree House’!). Alan stayed until 1990.
One of my unforgettable but amusing (or embarrassing) incidents occurred just after Mr Harper arrived – I was playing the piano for assembly one morning when my chair suddenly started collapsing and I gracefully sank to the floor much to the astonishment of everyone!
In 1990 David Croot became Head and when, in 1996 Brafield school closed, the numbers once again swelled with the amalgamation of the two schools.
By 2005 there were well over 100 children. Two mobile classrooms had been added. The original library was converted into another classroom. A new hall had been built and the old hall became a library.
Thirty years ago we had two mobile classrooms in the old school – now, in 2009, there are again mobile classrooms in the new school – things don’t change!
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