Mumbles Schooldays in the 1960s and 70s

by Michael Charles

Part One - Newton School

My schooldays stated in 1962 with a half-day to start off with. I went at 1.30 one Wednesday afternoon and thought that was school over with in one afternoon for life—what a shock I was in for!

My first school was Newton Primary, which my mother had also attended and which in those days was in Nottage Road but is now a private dwelling. In front of the house was a large circular garden with a tree in the middle. Nobody dared to cut across the grass! The wall around the playground is still there. Next to the school was Woolacott’s farm, which is now Woolacott Mews.

Newton Primary School, Nottage Road, Newton

Michael Charles aged about 9 years

The school at one time must have been a house and extra classrooms having been added to the building and a new classroom for the Juniors built in the grounds, which in windy weather could not be used because of the tall trees around it. At such times, lessons were held upstairs in the main building although these rooms were usually used as dining rooms for school dinners. The kitchen of the house had an open fire, which was used to warm the dinners, which had been delivered earlier by FAB Batchelor a well-known removal firm of the time. The meals were lined up in metal containers placed on a bench in front of the grate. On the right hand side of the school-house was the lobby or cloakroom adjoining the house. It consisted of the usual fittings, very small wash-basins on which were soap holders and small bars of green soap, and above were metal containers containing cresco paper towels. Other rooms were the Head teacher’s plus two classrooms and another cloakroom at the other end of the school. The door of the Head’s room was emblazoned with the words HEAD TEACHER in big black bold letters and inside was a fireplace with a bucket of coal and a shovel for the open fire which was always lit during the winter. The desk was of a traditional design and on it was a glass ink holder with inkwells containing red, blue and black inks and pen nibs to dip in.

The two classrooms had a partition, which could be opened into one big room—this usually being done for St. David’s day and at Christmas.

The playground covered a large area and included boys’ and girls’ toilets, a shed for storing coal and sand. The boys’ toilet was in the open and only the sit-down ones were covered. I remember the smell of Jeyes Fluid, the small toilet bowls with wooden seat panels screwed on to the bowl, the large threatening looking toilet brushes and of course, the dreaded sand-paper-like toilet paper, with SWANSEA CORPORATION stamped on each piece.

The school day began at 9am with lunch at 12 noon, followed by afternoon school from 1.30 to 3.30pm for infants and 4pm for juniors. Two days a week scripture lessons were given by Miss Evans, before school started. I remember being told by her that because my name was Michael I had thrown Satan out of Heaven—which made me feel quite important at the age of 4½!

After the 9am start, most mornings we had a few hymns and readings from the Bible followed by normal lessons such as sums, writing and reading. A blackboard with squares was used to draw figures and another one with red and blue lines for letters. Each number or letter drawn on the board was copied into an exercise book with blue squares for numbers or red and blue line and for letters. These were checked after each line of letters or numbers, the teacher also checking that pencils were being correctly held by each child. These books were light blue with SWANSEA EDUCATION COMMITTEE and the Swansea Coat of Arms on the front cover. Before we were good enough to use exercise books, we had to write on slates with chalk.

Exercise book with practice letters

There was no reception class with soft toys, but we did have a clockwork train set, which was brought out on occasions and we had Listen with Mother plus lots of nursery rhymes and songs. Two songs which come to mind are ‘Green grow the rushes, o’ and ‘There was an old Nigger called Uncle Ned’ (Imagine that in this politically correct age!)

In the early days the alphabet was drilled every day and later on, tables as well, plus weights and measures. The reading book for the infants was Dick and Dora, written in larger than usual print to aid in learning to read. The Infants were taught by the Head teacher, Mrs. Gwladys Ferris and later by Mrs. Deanna James. We sat at desks in pairs or on tables put together in groups and I remember having to take old shirt boxes to school in which to keep my exercise books.

At about 10.30, we had school milk in small bottles and straws to drink from. In winter, the bottles would be placed in front of the coke stove, which was used in addition to the electric heating to keep the building warm. Also pads were given to us to eat our biscuits on and no-one dare make a mess! This was followed by play-time in the yard or by reading comics indoors if wet.

Some of the games played included skipping for the girls and touch and British Bulldog for the boys, the latter being later banned as being too rough. We had two breaks, one morning and one afternoon and in summer, this was extended on some days. The end of playtimes was signalled by one ring on a large hand bell, which meant ‘stand still’ and two rings for ‘walking in quietly in twos’. This was practised on occasions and called playground drill and was sometimes combined with physical education.

After play on Mondays, we had a half-hour radio programme called Singing Together and at the end of the series, we were allowed to take the song-books home. Other programmes were Time and Tune and very well remembered was Music Time and Movement, which opened with ‘find a space and pretend you are a tree!’ in the prefect BBC English of the day. I wonder what the children of today would think of these programmes.

Dinner time was from 12 noon to 1.30pm and prayers were sung at the end of morning school and at the start of afternoon school. A lot of people went home to dinner but for those who stayed they were supervised by one dinner lady, Mrs. Mission who had very strict discipline of the whole school during and after dinner. The other dinner ladies Mrs. Pickering, Mrs. Price and Mrs. Jones served the food and cleaned up after the meal.

Other staff connected with the school, were Mrs. Hixon the Caretaker, Mr. Hoppe who did carpentry and Mr. Price the Board man who would pay a visit to homes of pupils in his black hat and uniform to find out why they were not in school.

For the reception Class after play in the afternoon it was heads on desks for a sleep until it was time to go home. At the end of the day, it was chairs on desks, coats on and the prayer ‘Now the day is over’ was sung.

The next class Infants’ 1 and 2 was taught by Mrs. Edna Davies and books such as Wide range readers come to mind and harder sums (addition, multiplication and subtraction). We had different coloured counters to use to help us work out the sums, these being kept in old sweet or tobacco tins. One of the windowsills was used as a nature table and on this was placed some birds’ eggs in a nest and a few stuffed animals, acorns, pine cones and shells.

Juniors 1 and 2 were taught by Miss Mary Thomas (now Colburn) and we were in the new classroom in the school grounds which was very modern compared to the old school building. Again we had a nature table and one memory of this springs to mind—a giant spider crab caught off Caswell took pride of place. Next to this table we had scrap books on periods of history—Norman and Tudor times etc. We learned to do ‘double writing’ and later on to use dictionaries for maths. B&A arithmetic is well remembered as is the dreaded pounds, shillings and pence sums. Friday was usually the day for spelling and dictation and sometimes art and craft work. Singing also played a big part in school life and we sang hymns, national songs, Christmas carols and Welsh songs for St. David’s day concerts.

I was to be the second member of my family to attend Newton as my mother had also gone there and been taught by Mrs. Edna Davies. At that time the school had no telephone, no PTA, but teaching was very good and the teachers dedicated. Discipline was good and we had to sit still and straight with hands on heads. Disruptive and hyperactive children did not seem to exist then.

We had end of term tests and the nine-plus exam. Other events from the days of Newton school are still very much in my mind, such as the man who came to wind the school clock every Thursday afternoon and the twice yearly visit of the piano tuner. More unusual was the air raid siren test, which occurred a few times a year. The testing of these sirens was kept up long after the end of the war and the siren for the Newton area was situated just inside the school grounds by the new classroom for juniors I and 2. Sometimes the test would be just a quick switch on and off, but at other times we would get a warning that the test would be a full blast for five minutes and to put our fingers in our ears, the noise being very loud. If the test occurred during the lunch hour, we had to say how loud we had heard it.

I do not recall school trips, but we did have nature walks down Mary Twill Lane to Caswell valley and other out of school activities were the once-a-year visit to St. Peter’s Church for the Ascension Day service taken by the late Canon Brunsden.

Kerb drill was the other out-of-school event and this took place on the junction of Caswell Road and Nottage Road. We had to stand in line and recite together’ At the kerb, Halt!’ Look Right, look left and cross the road looking both ways.

Junior pupils were even allowed to run errands for the head teacher to buy coffee and biscuits from Mr. Whiston’s shop in Nottage Road. This would never be allowed today.

At Christmas time, we had a Christmas fayre held on an evening before the end of term. I do not remember any Christmas party as such, but I do well remember having to take in ingredients to make a Christmas pudding, which was mixed by the Head teacher. We all had a stir and in the afternoon this was served with custard by the dinner ladies. One classmate picked out all the currants from the pudding because he did not like them.

At the end of term we were allowed to take toys and games and on the last day of the Christmas term every pupil was given a tube of Smarties to take home

More amusing memories are of the whole class being told that if they all talk together and make a lot of noise that the lights would come down and the ceiling fall down on our heads!

School milk always gave a few laughs as some boys would always manage to make a noise by sucking through a straw. This lead to the head teacher standing in front of the whole class and demonstrating how to suck milk from a small bottle through a straw without making rude noises!

For the people who dared to pick their noses, they were told that they would have mouths like letter boxes! Girls who sucked their hair were told that it would grow inside them The best incident of the lot was of course down to the boys, as mentioned earlier the boys toilet did not have a roof and it was the practice of some to see who could wee over the wall and this was achieved on many occasions. Directly underneath was the back door of Miss Maude Woolacott’s cottage and she was caught many times in the shower. A letter of complaint was written and the matter was firmly dealt with. Miss Woolacott’s was a teacher at Dunns Lane school and is remembered by many who went there as a strict disciplinarian.

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