Mr. Renshaw, the buried bowl and tales of classroom cruelty ………

I am back on the trail of James Renshaw, who was a Chorlton schoolteacher and not someone who would easily survive in the profession today.

But back in the early 19th century things were a tad different.

He remains a shadowy figure and apart from appearing in the census returns for 1841 and 51, along with references in the trade directories, all we know about him comes from anecdotal comments recorded by our local historian in 1885, a full half century after he died.

From these we can gather Mr. Renshaw was not to be trifled with in the classroom, because his discipline ran from “strict to severity, especially with scholars not in his favour” * 

They remembered how he who would strike the boys on the head with his cane and then apply cobwebs to stop the bleeding, and in the case of William Rhodes nearly cut off one of the lad’s fingers.  This had been done with an open pen knife which he threw at the young Rhodes who had put his hand on the desk while standing during a lesson.  

Despite this, Renshaw was much respected amongst the villagers and was known simply as ‘The Village Schoolmaster’ being consulted on many subjects ranging from the law and medicine to science.  

The school master held an interesting position in the rural hierarchy in that he would be respected for his learning which set him apart from most in the village but was less grand than the vicar or curate and certainly more accessible than those who styled themselves ‘gentry’.

Not that Renshaw by all accounts could always play the dignified pillar of village society.   

Despite his formidable personality which was much helped by his only having one leg he could still be bested by his students.  In a story still told thirty or so years after his death James Renshaw was the butt of more than one schoolboy prank.  

There was the story of the lost porridge bowl or I suppose more accurately the tale that started as a conspiracy and ended in a student revolt.  Each morning one of the schoolboys had the task of collecting Renshaw’s breakfast from his home and bringing it to the school.  

His home was a little further up the Row and on this morning the conspirators had elected Charles Brundrett to bury the spoon and throw the bowl into the pond opposite the school.  This stretch of water was known as Blomley’s Fish Pond and extended along the opposite side of the Row up to Sutton’s Cottages and across the centre of this water was a bridge leading into the fields.  **  

While young Charles Brundrett was engaged on this enterprise, one of the class ‘split’ to Renshaw who rushed out to prevent the deed happening.  Not only did he fail but on returning was refused admittance without the promise of a holiday, a tactic repeated by the boys on other occasions and supplemented by hiding his pipe and tobacco.  

Charles Brundrett suffered no long term effects from his prank and grew up to run Oak Farm.  Not that anything as dramatic might have occurred in that other private school run by Mary Taylor at Clough Farm at Martledge.  ***

James Renshaw was a Methodist, and is attributed to being the first in the village **** and so his school attracting children from Methodist backgrounds continued after the establishment of the first National or Church school on the green.  

In 1834 he was listed in a local directory as running a school in Chorlton and in 1841described himself as school master. But by 1851 aged 79 he had retired and by 1852 was buried in the grounds of the Wesleyan chapel.  *****  

Sadly no records of the school fees of Renshaw’s establishment have survived, but over in Stretford in the early decades of the 19th century, Mr Johnson charged “3d to 8d per week with 1d [ 1½p to 3p and ½p] extra for fire money in the winter.   

The scholars were allowed one quill a week and had to pay ½d each for any more.” ****** Johnson like our own Renshaw was “a perfect Squeers, inventing all kinds of queer punishments, and in one case made a lad eat a bad exercise he had written.”*******   Given the harshness of the times many parents may not have deemed such behaviour as excessive especially if the means delivered an educated child.  And Johnson’s fees were not cheap.  They were beyond the means of farm labourers and the services provided by James Renshaw and Mr Johnson was limited to the children of farmers and tradesmen.

There was also the Sunday school.  The first was set up by the Methodists in the August of 1805 and was held in the chapel later it moved to a building across the road which had been built from subscriptions raised by the Methodists.  When this building was lost the Sunday school returned to the chapel.********

Alas no pictures of the man have come down to us, and there is little more, other than that he was born in Chorlton-cum Hardy, never married, and was a member of the Renshaw family who had farmed in the township since the 1760s.

Location; Chorlton-cum-Hardy, 

Pictures; Sutton’s Cottage circa 1892, photograph from the Wesleyan Souvenir Handbook of 1895, and Pigot's Directory Lancashire  1828-29, Stretford Chorlton Page 282, Chorlton Row now Beech Road in 1845

* Ellwood, Thomas, A History of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, Chapter 24, Shops, schools, April 24th 1886, South Manchester Gazette

** The water ran from where Acres Road joins Beech Road up to just before Wilton Road.  Ellwood Chapter 24. Elizabeth Blomley, gentlewoman was living in Chorlton in the mid to late 1820s

*** Pigot’s Directory Page 68, Historicacl Directories Page

*****  Pigott 1834 Page 68 Historical Directories Page 337, 8141 census, Enu 8 Page 5, 1851 census Enu 1 Page 11

***** Ellwood Chapter 18, March 6 1886.  He died on June 22 1852 and was buried in the Wesleyan chapel on the Row.Owen MSS Vol 42, Edge Geoffrey a claim Ellwood also made for James Baguley

****** Leech, Sir Bosdin, Old Stretford, 1910, Manchester City News Co Ltd Manchester page 38

******* Ibid Leech, page 38

******** The loss of the building is unclear.  The Methodist historian Ellwood writing in 1886 wrote that the Wesleyans had failed to convey it to trustees and that the building was sold to Thomas Taylor who charged them rent until 1827, when they were given notice to leave and the building converted into cottages.  The land was retained by the Lloyd estate 

Harold William Urquhart another story from Tony Goulding

 I have written previously of Chorlton-cum-Hardy's schools which were situated along High Lane. 

The old National School on Chorlton Green – March 1959

This was, obviously, not an exhaustive list of all the local educational institutions. 

Disregarding the current collection of Local Authority and private schools, there were historically, others. 

There was The National School established on Chorlton Green in 1817. 

The present building, now converted to flats dates from 1878 and was the subject of a substantial piece on this Blog on 1st March 2024.

Less well-known is the short-lived grammar school of William Harold Urquhart, literally around the corner on Beech Road. 

The Methodist Chapel, Beech Road – November 1958

Opened on 1st October 1884, in what was supposed to be a temporary arrangement, in the former Methodist Chapel. 

The school is recorded, still there, in the township’s rate book of April 1890, however by the following year’s census Howard William had moved to Liverpool, where he was recorded as a schoolmaster lodging at 30, Gloucester Road, West Derby. 

His host family was Arthur Roper, a dock porter and his wife, Hannah; a 10-years-old son, Arthur and Arthur’s widowed mother-in-law, Ann Perkins.

The relatively short existence of Mr. Urquhart’s school may be explained by two factors, firstly that he had no formal qualifications and secondly, he was unable to obtain more suitable accommodation for his premises. Indeed, the closure of his Grammar School and his move to Liverpool may have been occasioned by the provisions of Elementary Education Act of 1891 which became operational on 1st September 1891. 

There is some very revealing correspondence which sheds some light on both these factors in the pages of the local press during August and September 1887. 

Some quite vitriolic letters criticising Mr. Urquhart’s “Grammar Schools” were published (1) signed anonymously by “A Parent”; these were subsequently answered eruditely and at length by Mr. Urquhart.

Harold William Urquhart was born during the March quarter of 1864 in Barton-on-Irwell, Lancashire. His parents were James Urquhart, a government gas meter inspector, and his wife Elizabeth Ann (née Cornford). 

He was one of six children with 3 brothers and 2 sisters. In the 1871 census the family were recorded at 9, Canal Bank, Barton-on-Irwell. At the following census of 1881 the family were at 13, Pembroke Avenue, Barton-on-Irwell. James Urquhart was by then a widower (2) and his unmarried sister, Ann, had joined the household to help with the 6 children. Harold William was recorded as a “pupil teacher” whilst his older sister, Lizzie, was a dressmaker and older brother Ridley James was an engineer’s apprentice. His three younger siblings were all recorded as “scholars” which as they were all over the age of compulsory education seems to indicate the family were comfortable financially.

“Mona Villas” in January 2025

Early in the 1880s the Urquharts arrived in Chorlton-cum-Hardy as the rate books from April 1883 show James Urquhart at 3, Mona Villas, Church Road. (3) 

The family remained in the township until the end of the decade, latterly at 57, Keppel Road. The 1891 census shows James Urquhart and three of his children (Ridley James, a patent agent, Nelly “a housekeeper”, and Herbert Sydney who was a clerk) living at Sedgley View, Bury New Road, Prestwich, Lancashire. The family were sufficiently well-off to be able to hire a domestic servant. 

 

Map of Chorlton-cum-Hardy from the 1930s showing Church Road

James Urquhart died on 12th April 1893. Harold William had already by then moved to Liverpool and following the death of the patriarch he was joined in that city by his brother Ridley James (4) and sister Nelly.  

The former married Louisa Cecilia Barton in St James’s Church, West Derby on 7th October 1897. In the same church during the December quarter of the following year Nelly married John Wolstenholme, an engineer, latterly of textile machinery for Brooks and Doxey Ltd. of West Gorton, Manchester. 

Nelly and John settled in Monton, Eccles, Lancashire and raised 3 daughters; their address at both the 1911 and 1921 censuses was 4A, Algernon Street, Monton.

Harold William also returned to Manchester as is shown in the 1901 census which records him lodging with John Glover, a brewer’s drayman, and family at 20, Dryden Street, Chorlton-on-Medlock, Manchester. The return also reveals that Harold William was no longer pursuing his career in education but was working in an iron works as a clerk and a draughtsman. 

Harold William later returned to reside in Liverpool as when he died in September 1908 he was living at 15, Lavan Street, West Derby Road, Liverpool. He was buried on 12th September 1908; as recorded in the burials register of St. Anne’s Church, Stanley, Liverpool.

Pictures: - Methodist Mission Chapel, Beech Road, and former National School on Chorlton Green both by R.M. Stanley m 71948 and m 17712 respectively courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information, and Archives, Manchester City Council. http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass1930s Map and “Mona Villas” from the collection of Tony Goulding

Notes: -

1) This correspondence appeared variously in The Stockport Advertiser and Guardian and The Alderley and Wilmslow Advertiser and possibly other publications.

2) Harold William’s mother died during the March quarter of 1873 when he was still only 9 years old.

3) This “Mona Villas” address also appears on Harold William's advertisement in the Alderley and Wilmslow Advertiser on the opening of his school. It is also given as his brother Ridley James’s address in several newspapers reporting on his various patents.

As can be seen from the map above Church Road was the former name of Chequers Road

4) Ridley James became a successful consulting engineer (electrical) with offices in Clayton Square, Liverpool and Barton Arcade, Manchester.

One building ……. five views ......... and the story of a school

The time when this building was a school will all but have faded from living memory.

But I know a few who remember it as an overflow dining room for the new school on St Clements Road, and a few more who might just have been at the VE Day celebrations in the May of 1945.

More recently it was a workshop, design centre and an office, and back in the 1980s four of us considered it could be the venue for a restaurant.  

It was a two-pint ideas and if we had had the capitol we might just have prompted the Beech Road café revolution by almost a decade. *

But we didn’t and around 2012 a developer bought the place and converted it into residential accommodation.

I remember going round the building during the final fit out in the company of Emily Fisher who worked in the Horse and Jockey and knew the builder.  Emily was impressed by the conversion while my thoughts lingered on its time as a school.

It had opened in 1878 and was the third school on the site. The first had opened its doors in 1817 and was replaced by a second in 1847.

These were church schools and provided elementary education for the children of the poor. They were the product of the National Society which had begun in 1811 and aimed to establish a national school in every parish delivering a curriculum based on the teaching of the church.

The new school had been built with grants from the National Society and the Committee of Council on Education   on land given by George Lloyd in 1843 “for the purpose of a school for the education of poor children inhabiting the said township of Chorlton cum Hardy......and for the residence of the master of the said school for the time being, such schoolmaster to be a member of the Established Church, and the school to be conducted upon principles consistent with the doctrines of the Established Church” **

The 1847 school was a fine brick building which could hold three hundred children which was just as well because we had 186 children between the ages of 4 and 15.  Most were at school, a few were educated at home, and fifteen were already at work. 

The youngest at just ten was Catherine Kirby who was born in Ireland and worked as a house servant, the rest did a mix of jobs ranging from errand boys to farm worker and domestic service.  There were slightly more boys than girls and most were born here.

There may even have been more for when William Chesshyre interviewed their parents in the March of 1851 some children were described as farmer’s sons and daughters. 

They may have been at school or they may have already begun to work alongside their parents on the farm.    And as we shall see just because parents described their children as scholars was no guarantee they attended school or even if they did that they were there full time.

The national picture was one of children even younger than 10 being employed.  A labourer’s child could earn between 1s.6d and 2s. [7½p-10p] a week which was an important addition to an agricultural family’s income and in the words of one government report was “so great a relief to the parents as to render it almost hopeless that they can withstand the inducement and retain the child at school”***    

But in some cases this child labour would have been seasonal.   In one Devon school up to a third of boys over the age of seven were absent helping with the harvest, while in another school during the spring upwards of thirty were assisting their parents sow the potato crop and then dig it up in the summer.  

It was just part of the rural cycle and which one contributor to the Poor Law Commissioners on the employment of women and children in agriculture in 1843 said would at least teach children “the habit of industry,”   which fitted in with the belief much held in the countryside that “the business of a farm labourer cannot be thoroughly acquired if work be not commenced before eleven or twelve.” *** 

There is every possibility that with so many market gardens in the township some of our children would have been called into help when needed.

By the 1870s Chorlton was already on the cusp of change and beginning its rapid transformation from rural community to suburb of Manchester, which was accompanied by a steep rise in the population.

This in turn pre-empted a discussion on expanding the school and plans were drawn up to add another floor but this was shelved in favour of a brand new school on St Clements Road.

I have written extensively about the first two school both on the blog** and in The Story of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, so I shall leave it at that, other than to say contained in those will be heaps of pictures.***

Location; Chorlton Green

Pictures; the former school on the green, 2024, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Measuring the quality of ideas by pints may seem daft, but sitting in the pub we could always be confident that and an idea that arose during one or two pints would work, while a three-pint idea might if the wind was in the right direction.  After that the workability of an idea deteriorated.

**Ellwood, Thomas, Chapter 13, National School, History of Chorlton-cum- Hardy, South Manchester Gazette, January 23rd 1886

***Evidence of Mr Austin on Wiltshire schools , Reports of the Special Assistant Poor Law Commissioners on the employment of women & children in agriculture 1843 

 **** Ibid, the 1851 Census of Great Britain on Education 

***** In our village school on the green in the spring of 1847, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2020/03/in-our-village-school-on-green-in.html

******Simpson, Andrew, The Story of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, 2012,  https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/A%20new%20book%20for%20Chorlton

Back on Chorlton Green with a painting and a debate

Down on the Green, 2012

Now here is one of those simple lessons about our recent past.

This is the old village school on the green which along with the schoolmaster’s house was built by public subscription in 1878.

And when Peter showed me his painting it set up a discussion because Peter remembers painting it before it was converted into residential accommodation.

And yet I am not so sure.

Back in the December of 2011 I wrote about the planned change of use and even had a tour around the building with Emily from the Horse and Jockey just before it was completed.*

But the exact date of that visit is lost to me which is a lesson in always recording things and I think it is the same with our picture which must date from after the conversion because the windows in the roof and the brick wall and iron railings in front of the entrance were added during the change of use.

Miss Florence Elizabeth Renshaw, 1877

Now of course the first people who moved into the newly renovated building will know for sure, so perhaps I will just pop down and ask.

That said I am on firmer ground with the present building which replaced an earlier school opened in the 1840s.

There are a few pictures of the interior from the 1940s, and a handful of memories of the place both before and after it closed.

These include a VE day party and the regular meeting once a week of the Penny Savings Bank.

That said I do have a picture of one of those needlework samplers undertaken by a young Florence Elizabeth Renshaw, aged 10 and completed in 1877.

Now the Renshaw’s are an old Chorlton family and can be traced back to the mid if not early 18th century.

I have a copy of the legal agreement between James Renshaw and the Egerton’s from 1767 setting out the tenancy agreement for the farm on Beech Road and the family continued to be part of our history pretty much up to today.

Saving your pennies in 1934

And what is exciting about our sampler is that it will have been one of the last undertaken in the older school.

But and here is the second lesson for the day I have misfiled the name of the person who so kindly provided the image.

It is somewhere but as yet it eludes me.

However as a bonus and added since the story was first posted, here is an advert for that Penny Savings Bank which Sandra sent me after reading the post.

It dates from 1934.

Picture; sampler of Florence Elizabeth Renshaw, 1877 and the advert for the Chorlton-cum-Hardy Penny Savings Bank, 1934 from the collection of Sandra Hapgood 

Painting; The school on Chorlton Green, © 2012 Peter Topping
Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk

Facebook: Paintings from Pictures https://www.facebook.com/paintingsfrompictures

*Changing uses ................ the village school on the green, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/changing-uses-village-school-on-green.html

Beware what you go looking for......... stories behind the book nu 22, the pitfalls of research

An occasional series on the stories behind the new book on Manchester and the Great War*

Students at St Clement's school. Chorlton-cum-Hardy, date unknown

Now one of the concerns exercising many people here in the city in 1916 was the issue of the “half timers.”

These were the children whose schools had been taken over as hospitals to tend the sick and wounded returning from the war zones.

It had resulted in a degree of ad hoc provision for some at least. In the February of 1916 the Manchester Museum reported that it was providing effective instruction “for 900 to a 1,000 children per week drawn at present from the higher standards of the elementary schools”*

The school population, 1910

A similar scheme was underway at the “City Art Gallery, the Whitworth Institute, and kindred institutes in the city,”

A national conference held in the city a few months later argued that the system of half timers had to be abolished.

There were 72,000 in the country of which 61,000 were in Lancashire and Yorkshire and rather than allow the practice to continue Parliament should raise the “school leaving age, allow local authorities to have educational oversight of children to the age of 18 and a proper supply of well trained teachers.”**

Central School for Boys and Girls, 1906

The first school taken over was the Central High School for Boys and Girls on Whitworth Street which had a thousand students and from August 1914 became the headquarters of the 2nd General Western Hospital.***

Then in 1915 the authorities took over another seven schools.

These were Alfred Street in Harpurhey, Alma Park in Levenshulme, Grange Street in Bradford, Lilly Lane in Moston, Ducie Avenue, and Moseley Road and Heald Place.

Finding the student numbers of these seven led me back to the street directory for 1911, which conviently lists every Manchester school including both those maintained by the local authority and the faith schools.

Grange Street, Bradford, 1906

Not only is there an address and a date for the opening of each establishment but also the capacity and the average attendance for the previous year.

And the rest as they say was a painstaking afternoon with a blank spread sheet recording each school and its average attendance for 1910.

There were gaps with some schools offering no information added to which the data is five years out of date, but I reasoned it would at least offer some comparisons.

Along the way it would also tempt me to look at school attendance for the year and compare different areas of the city from inner city Hulme to semi rural Chorlton-cum-Hardy and well healed Didsbury.

The "seven" taken over in 1915 and their average attendance in 1910

But an hour stretched into two and expanded into a third, and along the way the sheer tedium of in putting the data sat beside the very real prospect that this was just a nerdy enterprise.

Still the first bit has been done.

I now know that in 1910 the average attendance of all 193 schools came up with the figure of 101,353 young people.

And of our seven schools one offered no data, a third had been built but not yet taken in a student, leaving the remaining five with 4668.

A school photograph, St Clement's, date unknown

So that would suggest that something like 5688 young people may have been our half timers in 1915.

In time the names of some them and even their stories may come to light.

For now there is a small bit of me that wonders what else I could have done on a very wet and dismal Saturday.

Location; Manchester 1916

Pictures; Manchester Municipal Secondary School later Central High School, Whitworth Street,  1907, City Engineers, m65853, Grange Street School, Bradford, 1906, City Engineers, m77534,  courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and students at St Clement’s school Chorlton-cum-Hardy, circa 1900, from the Lloyd Collection

*A new book on Manchester and the Great War http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/A%20new%20book%20on%20Manchester%20and%20the%20Great%20War

** War Service in the Museums, Teaching the Half Timers, Manchester Guardian, February 21, 1916

***2nd Western General Hospital, Manchester, 1914-1919, Margaret Elwin Sparshot, courtesy of David Harrop

Another of our lost roads, a music school and that car park

The two remaining houses, 2014

There will be few in Chorlton who will remember that once Manchester Road crossed Wilbraham Road and continued down through what is the car park and on past the Undertakers and the Library and off towards Upper Chorlton Road.

Today two solitary houses are all that are left of what were once a set of eight grand properties with large gardens to the front and even larger ones at the rear.

They stretched from the junction of Wilbraham Road down to what is now Nicholas Road and were home to some of the more comfortably off families of Chorlton including businessmen a retired tradesmen and those on private means.

The eight houses in 1894

And like other large establishments at the beginning of the last century, number 23 was also a private school run by Adelaide and Eva Breweton.  Adelaide  described herself as a music teacher while two of her sisters listed themselves as school mistresses.

Theirs was one of the fourteen private schools operating in Chorlton in 1911 which ranged from small businesses run from one room of a private residence to large establishments like that of Mr Dadley’s Grammar School stretching across two properties on High Lane which specialized in training for “Law, Medical Accounts, Prelims, University, Civil Services Exams” and much more.

I am not sure exactly when the Surbiton School at 23 Manchester Road opened, but it was receiving students by 1903 and was still there eight years later.

On the corner of Manchester Road looking down Nicolas Road in 1958

And as these things happen there are people who remembered a private school on Manchester Road later in the last century but whether it was the Surbiton has yet to be established.

Either way the houses went when the car park and precinct were built and today only the two remain.

As ever I am indebted to Andy Robertson who ventured out on one of those sunny March days and recorded the last of the eight.

I just wish he had been on hand to record the other six, but that said he is doing a grand job of recording the bits of Chorlton which seem close to disappearing.

Back in 1959 Mr Downes came close to recording them but moved on along Barlow Moor Road.

Pictures; from the collection of Andy Robertson and detail of Manchester Road from the OS for South Lancashire 1894, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ and West side, corner of , Manchester Road, Nicolas Road, Barlow Moor Road A H Downes, 1958, m18046, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass
Manchester-Road

Magic vanished days ……. boiled cabbage … and the teacher we all remember

Well, we just had to include Lost Chorlton Schools in the series nothing to do in chorlton.

Chorlton Cof E, 1951

The books are predicated on that simple idea, that there is plenty going on in Chorlton and we will bring the stories to you, while you do nothing more than sit back, enjoy a mix of daring, historical and the odd silly tales.*

This you can do from the comfort of an armchair or better still by walking the stories.

So far, we have explored the area around the village green, zipped over to the vanished Four Banks Corner and are presently completing an adventure along Beech Road.

Chorlton Grammar School, circa 1931

Others in the series will include the Pubs of Chorlton, the Lost Pubs of Chorlton and trips to Wilbraham Road, Barlow Moor Road and into Didsbury and Whalley Range.

And given that for some “the best years were my school years”, we have fastened on resurrecting those Chorlton schools which are no more.  They are the ones that many will have gone to either as eager and carefree seekers of knowledge or unwilling hostages.

We will include the schools, the memories and the pictures from those that attended, all of which may challenge that dismissive comment from one student that “It could be made of marble, but it would still be bloody school”.**

St Clement's class group, date unknown

Of course what would be fascinating are contributions from you.

They can be about the fun you had , or the misery you endured, mixed with tales of overcooked cabbage and semolina pudding, Sidney the strap, and the bested teacher you met.

So that is it.

You can find Peter Topping and I on social media, stop us at our next book launch, or join me for the next two history walks on September 18th and September 25th.

In the meantime our latest book in the series …… Martledge, Lost and Found by Andrew Simpson & Peter Topping, costs £5, and is available from Chorlton Bookshop or from us at  www.pubbooks.co.uk

Location; Chorlton Good Neighbours

Pictures; The class of 1951, Chorlton C of E, 1951, from the collection of Ann Love, Chorlton Grammar School, circa 1930s, and class group of St Clemet’s School, date unknown from the Lloyd Collection

****A new book on nothing to do in chorlton, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/A%20new%20book%20on%20doing%20nothing%20in%20Chorlton

*Half Our Future, Newsom Report, 1963, Chapter 1 page 2, http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/newsom/newsom1963.html 

Another slightly familar picture, Chorlton High School for Boys circa 1930

It is a scene that will be familiar to many of us.

It’s the old Chorlton High School on Sandy Lane but with a slight difference.

The picture was taken around 1930 when it was Chorlton High School for Boys.

Picture; from the Lloyd Collection

50 years of that school on Brookburn Road .......... what do you remember

Now, whatever our own school days were like, the chances are we remember with fondness those of our kids.

In my case that was Brookburn School, where three of our four attended from the late 1980s through to the beginning of this century.

These were the years Mr. Clegg was head, and our family played their part on the governing body, helping at the school fair and at Saturday football, making the drinks and distributing the biscuits.

So, I was pleased to receive this poster, which I instantly decided, had to become a blog story, along with the trailer of the event in November.

And somewhere we may even have one last remnant of uniform, be it the red jumper, or the white polo shirt, along with the plastic reading bag and some reports.

These may or may not be of use, but I bet the memories of our Ben, Josh and Saul will be, as will be their friends and many others who passed through during that half century.

50 years of Brookburn Primary School ………………… what do you remember?

Now, whatever our own school days were like, the chances are we remember with fondness those of our kids.

In my case that was Brookburn School, where three of our four attended from the late 1980s through to the beginning of this century.

These were the years Mr. Clegg was head, and our family played their part on the governing body, helping at the school fair and at Saturday football, making the drinks and distributing the biscuits.

So, I was pleased to receive this poster, which I instantly decided, had to become a blog story, along with the trailer of the event in November.

And somewhere we may even have one last remnant of uniform, be it the red jumper, or the white polo shirt, along with the plastic reading bag and some reports.

These may or may not be of use, but I bet the memories of our Ben, Josh and Saul will be, as will be their friends and many others who passed through during that half century.

Chorlton by night nu 1 ............. Oswald Road School

Now this is one of those pictures which needs me to add very little.

We are looking across at Oswald Road School pretty much as it has looked for a century.

Andy Robertson took the image on an early evening at the end of November.

Just over to our left and out of shot is the library opened in 1914 and the snooker hall.



Picture; Oswald Road School, November 2014, from the collection of Andy Robertson

Looking in at the class of 1951 in Chorlton C of E

We are in Chorlton C of E Primary School sometime in the early 1950s.

In many ways it is one of those timeless images of school life which with a bit of judicious alteration could be any school anywhere in the country at almost any time.

The students stare back at the camera caught in the middle of a lesson with their books out on the desk while their teacher stands to one side making sure the young people are the focus of attention.

And as ever in any classroom the work of the children is there on the walls for all to see.

But what makes it unique is that it is the only post war picture of a Chorlton classroom in the collection.

Long ago I added a fine series of photographs from the late 19th and early 20 centuries, some of which were taken at the old school on the green.

None of them however were of the inside of the school and so this one is special.

Looking at the picture is to go back sixty years.

There were still ink wells in the desks and Ann who provided the picture was the ink monitor.

In the corner is an open fire which would have been lit everyday from late October and maintained during the day.

Many of the boys and even some of the girls are wearing ties and there are those zip up jackets which were called windcheaters.

I can still remember mine.  It was made of brown canvass with a chequered woollen inside and had a distinctive smell which I have never forgotten.

So much so that when I come across the smell it still has the power to transport me back 55 years to carefree days and countless adventures.

School uniforms had yet to become standard in junior schools but a sort of uniform is there.  I doubt that I ever wore exactly the same clothes to school as I did for going out to play and judging by what you see in the picture the same was true then.

And there will be many who remember those all in one desk and chair units which came in single or doubles with a lift up lid which gave access to the interior where books and that old fashioned pencil case made of cardboard could be left all day, all term and pretty much all year.

Now there is a very real danger that I shall any minute slide into a comfortable and rosy bout of nostalgia, so I will end by saying that open fires were fine if you sat three rows back.  Those at the front could be toasted while those at the back felt the icy bite of draughts from the gaps in the door leading to the corridor.

Lessons were still chalk and talk, and the cutting edge of classroom technology came in the form of the schools radio broadcast.

That said some of these were magic.

I have never forgotten the excitement of the history ones where the two children were transported back to a time before now encountering anything from dinosaurs to the wrath of Nero and it didn’t matter that they were not tied to a scheme of work which took the student from one period to another carefully worked out against a set of learning objectives and required skills.

The fun and the learning came with the story.

And that is where I shall leave our cohort of 1951, some of whom I know.

At the back is a young Ann Stevens who in the fullness of time went on to become an art teacher, somewhere also near the back is John Ager who still lives and works in Chorlton and in the middle of the front row is Mary Yeadon who went on to marry an explorer who "went up the Amazon.".

Picture; from the collection of Ann Love

Modern buildings in Chorlton ............. nu 1 Oswald Road School

Now back in 2014 Andy Robertson took a series of pictures recording the new build for Oswald Road School.

At the time it generated some discussion about the style of the building set against the obvious need for more space and an extension which was fit for the new century.

Yesterday Andy was back with this image, and that in turn made me think of just how many new buildings have gone up around Chorlton in the last year.

All of which is I think the start of a new series.

Location; Chorlton

Picture; Oswald Road School, 2016, from the collection of Andy Robertson

The Schools of High Lane ......... another from Tony Goulding

For over 140 years some of the young people of Chorlton-cum-Hardy (and beyond) have been educated at a wide variety of educational establishments along the length of High Lane. 

The New Art School

When walking, along High Lane, from the Edge Lane end towards Barlow Moor Road; the first such building observable was in what is now the Buddhist centre and “World Peace Café”, which also used to be the headquarters of a Road Transport Union.

It was in this building that the accomplished Manchester artist Thomas E. Mostyn (1) opened an art school in 1896.   (The glass roof of the studio is still clearly visible evidence of the building’s former use) This institution only had a fairly brief life before being taken over in  August, 1904 by Manchester Education Committee; immediately following the incorporation of Chorlton-cum-Hardy into the City of Manchester.

For 5 years it served as the area’s mixed municipal school, with places for 220 pupils. It closed in April, 1909, being replaced by the newly opened, purpose-built, Oswald Road School.

Chorlton Grammar School

Walking further down High Lane the next “educational establishment” reached was housed in Denbigh Villas at nos. 57&59. This was the site of Chorlton Grammar School which was operated by Charles Carey Dadley M.A. (2) from, 1896.

Initially only using no.59 as the school whilst living nearby at 2, Napier Road, he later expanded into no.57 which also became his residence. This school remained in use until 1930 with the retirement of Mr Dadley, and then aged 62. This may have been prompted by competition for pupils following the opening of the Education Committee’s Chorlton High School on Sandy Lane in, 1924. (This latter became a Grammar School in, 1952.)

Manchester Islamic High School for Girls

Neighbouring Mr. Dadley’s school was the convent school at 55, High Lane which was opened around the middle of the first decade of the 20th century and housed a congregation of Roman Catholic nuns belonging to the order of “The Sisters of the Christian Retreat”.

Besides operating a convent high school for girls these nuns also provided a head mistress and a number of teachers for the parish primary school a little way along High Lane.

After almost a century the nuns left in August, 1991; the building then taking on its present use as The Manchester Islamic High School for Girls.
Chorlton High School:

St Augustine's'St John's R.C School

The penultimate location on this walk through the history of education on this road is a building which merits inclusion on two fronts.

The buildings on the corner of Chequers (formerly Church) Road and High Lane functioned as a school of some sort for close on 100 years. Originally, from 1872 it housed Chorlton-cum-Hardy Commercial School renamed Chorlton High School two years later.

It was founded by Mr. Robert Davies (3) who appears to have made a success of being a school proprietor, as when he sold the building to the Roman Catholic diocese of Salford in 1897, he was able to retire comfortably to Southport.

From this date, for over 70 years this was the location of the parish primary school first known as St. Augustine’s.

High Lane Primitive Methodist Church briefly an annexe to St John's School

The final stop of this historical journey may well prove to be a surprise to many.

Further down High Lane still is this building now a centre for Buddhist Meditation which some will recall as the hall of the High Lane Primitive Methodist’s Church (Macpherson’s Memorial).

However for a very short interval, between the closure of the Methodist Church and the opening of St. John’s new school buildings on Chepstow Road, this building functioned as an annexe  of that school - in the words of a Max Boyce  song “I know ‘cos’ I was there”
.
Notes:

1)Thomas Edwin Mostyn (1864-1930) was born in Liverpool but raised in Salford, and Harpurhey, Manchester.  He was educated at Manchester Grammar School and later studied Fine Art at a college in Manchester. His parents were Edwin and Elizabeth (née Jones). Thomas’s father was a lithographic artist and for a time Thomas worked in partnership with him at a premises on Granby Row. Mr T. E. Mostyn, a one-time president of the Manchester Academy, had a successful career as a painter with over 80 works still available in print. He left the Manchester area after 1904, and in the 1911 census he is settled in St. Marylebone, London. The record of Thomas’s death, on 22nd August, 1930 and other sources show that the family later moved to the Totnes / Torquay area of South Devon.
Whilst he was living in Chorlton-cum Hardy, Thomas and his wife, Florence (née Shaw) had their youngest child, Edna May, christened at St. Clements’s on 29th May, 1895. Also, in 1911 the census reveals that his father, brother, and half-sisters were residing in Chorlton-cum-Hardy; at 234, Oswald Road. Interestingly it indicates too, that following his first wife’s death in 1885 his father had re- married in 1888 the mother of Thomas Edwin’s new bride.

Playground of St John's

2) Claude Carey Dadley was born in Nottingham in 1868, where his father, Elijah, was a “chemist and druggist”. In 1898 Claude married in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire Elizabeth Greaves, a schoolmistress 12 years his senior. The couple had no offspring and following Elizabeth’s death in January, 1922 Claude re-married Lily Marguerite Sestier in Manchester Cathedral during September quarter of 1924. This lady’s death in May, 1930 perhaps further influenced Mr. Dadley’s decision to close his school.
Charles Dadley together with both his wives is buried in Southern Cemetery (Grave 0 377). Unfortunately although still discernible the memorial stone is in a somewhat dilapidated state.

3) Robert Davies was born in, 1843. His father, John, a tin-plate worker had married his mother, Amelia (née Fitzpatrick) at St. Mary’s Church, Parsonage Green, Manchester on 24th October, 1841. The family home in 1861 was in Copton Street, Hulme. Robert married Emily Sturges (of Harlaston, Staffordshire) at St. John’s, Manchester in the September quarter of 1868.Three successive census records show only one child of Robert and Emily, a son Samuel born in 1870.
Mr. Davies’s prosperity in his    retirement is indicated on the 1901 census return on which his widow (Robert died in June quarter of 1899) and journalist son, Samuel are able to employ three servants at their house; 5, Alexandra Road, Southport.

© Tony Goulding, 2016

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; courtesy of Tony Goulding

Down at Oswald Road School on a July day, capturing another changing moment

Now the skill of recording events which will mark a moment in history can be just good luck.

For many photographers it will be that they were there with a camera just as the event unfurled.

A few minutes earlier or later and that event would have been lost.

Now in the case of Andy Robertson who took these pictures of Oswald Road School the images come from a keen knowledge of what is going on in Chorlton and a determination to record the changes as they happen.

And in doing that he is following a small group of local photographers who diligently took pictures across the township in the 1950s and 1960s.

These are now in the city’s image collection, and are a powerful record of what Chorlton was like.*

And I hope Andy will in the fullness of time pass his onto the local studies library.

In the case of the school he has recorded the building of the new extension and now the demolition of the old one.

Like all good pictures that capture a point in time, it is sometimes the one most people miss that says it all.

So here amongst the bulldozer, and broken bits of building is that pile of classroom furniture and other things which for me sums up just what as going on.

Now that for me is what a camera should be for.

Pictures; Oswald Road School, July 2014

*Manchester Local Image Collection, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

That stables on Stockton Road, soon to be no more

The lock up on Stockton Road which was a garage has been sold.

Now I know this because Andy Robertson has sent me a series of pictures of the place and as you do I have been drawn into its history.

It is a building I have often wondered about but until now have not bothered to look up.

But I guess now that the sold sign has gone up its days are numbered and like other buildings Andy has recorded over the last few months this one will soon be gone.

It looks to have once been a stable, with the hay stored at the top and the horse and carriage below. It is just possible to make out on the south elevation what would have been the entrance in the first floor for loading the hay into the building, and inside there would have once been a hatch to drop the hay down to ground level.

To the left the old entrance to the coaching area is still visible as is the half bricked up door giving access to the stables.

For as long as I can remember the building has been a motor repairs business, but despite being curious I never knocked on to get a look inside.

And that is another timely reminder that when in doubt investigate.

Now I didn’t so all I am left to do now is to search for its past.

I can’t be sure when it was built but it was there by 1894 and could already been there by the 1840s.

In 1841 it may have been the stables for what I think was the home of a Mary Dunster which stood directly behind it.

But the house has long gone, and to the north of our stables by 1891 were numbers 59 and 57 High Lane.

These were private residences until the beginning of the 20th century when they became a private school with number 59 being converted by 1903 and incorporating its neighbour soon after.

All of which is a tad intriguing because the owner of the school was Miss Annie Booth who lived with her family on Manchester Road.

Her father was Aaron Booth who took some of the early photographs of that end of Chorlton in 1882.  They lived in Sedge Lynn which was demolished for the cinema in 1919.

Now Annie Booth described herself as a school teacher in 1891 and her father was well off enough to help fund the "school for girls" on High Lane and a decade later and she is down on the 1901 census as an employer.

But Mr Booth had died in 1912 Miss Booth was no longer the owner of the school which was now owned by Charles Dadly MA and specialised in training for "Law, Medical Accounts prelims, University, Civil Services Exams" and more.

All of which is a powerful reminder of the large number of private schools in Chorlton.

As for Annie I rather think she continued to live in Chorlton long enough to donate her father’s photographs to John Lloyd the local historian.

All of which is a long way I know from Andy’s picture.

Pictures; Stockton Road March 2014 from the collection of Andy Robertson, detail of High Lane from the OS map of 1841, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/ and extract from Slater's Manchester, Salford and Suburban Directory 1903