THIS TAPE HAS BEEN RECORDED ON THE 28th of JULY 1978 AT MRS CLARK’S HOME ON MANCHESTER ROAD. THE INFORMANT IS EMMA JANE CLARK AND THE INTERVIEWER IS STANLEY GRAHAM.
Can you ever remember your mother getting any sorts of a woman's magazine?
P -. No. The Sunday Companion. That’s all.
And did anybody in the family belong to the library?
R - Not when we were young. Happen there wouldn't be a library here then when we were young.
How about the Mechanics Institute?
R - Oh well, I used to go down there from the night school, we. had cookery lessons down there.
Where was night school?
R - In Gisburn Road School. Evening classes, I tried that school, I went three years to the evening classes, and we had our cookery lessons down there.
The Mechanics Institute?
R – Yes, by the Gas Works, down by the Gas Works it was.
Ah now, that's a different one, this is a different one then.
R- Ah, well, we had to go down there.
Yes? Because the one that I was talking about is where what's now the Town Hall on Jepp Hill.
R - Oh no, well we used to go down to, at this end of the Gas Works, the Gas Works building it is, it was, and we used to go down there for cookery lessons.
(50)
Yes, What other things were there, what other things could you do at evening classes?
R – Oh, English, Household Management, which is like Domestic Science now, Household Management, which included cookery and Needlework. English, Needlework, Household Management. Not Arithmetic.
That's it. Would you say that there were, were there all sorts of people went or were there more women than men that went to them?
R - No there were part, I think they had classes for men ‘cause I mean, we hadn’t any men in our class, they were all girls.
That’s it. Can you remember if there’d be any books in the house?
R - Oh yes, we were all good readers. Her Bennie, you know that was a, can you remember, have you heard of that?
I've seen it.
(100)
R – Oh, it was a very sad story was that. I’ve ready it many a time and cried every time I read it. It was about a little, a little, do you know they were waifs on the streets of Liverpool and it was a brother and sister and the little girl died. And he turned out to be quite all right. He got a job with, as a little boy clerk with a solicitor I think. And one day there was a cheque missing and he couldn’t think of anything but what this boy had stolen it and he were heart broken and he ran away and he got work on a farm and they thought the world of him because he was a right honest little boy. And one day there was, a gentleman came to this farm, he were a friend of theirs, and he started telling about this little boy did this gentleman, he was in quite a big way you know. And he started telling about this little boy. He says ‘and a year or two after he’d run away, this little boy, he found this cheque in a book and he said you know he had been very unhappy about it. And when he was leaving this little boy said, ‘Well I am Bennie who used to work for you.’ Well I used to sob my heart out about this Bennie you know, he’d lost his little sister and then he was accused. Anyway, he married his daughter so it was all right at the end. But I’ve never forgot that story.
(150)
Can you remember any of the other books?
R - Yes, I can but I can’t remember the titles and we always used to be reading.
That's it. It doesn’t matter, it doesn't matter. I’ll tell you one that my mother used to have…
R - East Lynne, East Lynne.
That’s it, Mrs Maryatt [Mrs Henry (Ellen) Wood actually]
R - And Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
(5 min)
Aye, how about Christie’s Old Organ?
R – Yes, Christie’s Old Organ.
There was one. I can never remember the title of it, but there was one and it was a very, very popular book at the time I know, and that was a real tear jerker about this man who lived in a cottage on top of a hill and these two lasses used to go and try and befriend him. Now did they call it something like Winter’s Folly?
R - Oh yes? No I have never read it, I have heard of it. No, no, I haven’t heard that.
Winters Folly, that was it. Yes, aye. And were there anything like, you know, an encyclopaedia or…
R- Yes, Wide World Magazine, I think there was Wide World Magazine and do you know, that was a thick magazine you know? It was a good one. I remember that.
And so every body In your family would be able to read and. write.
R - Oh yes.
(200)
Did you know anybody that couldn't read or write?
R - No. No.
And how about toys?
R- Toys? Oh well we didn't have a lot of toys, we always had one or two you know, we’d always get a toy at Christmas, a doll or something like that, an apple and orange and nuts and things like that. Oh yes we were, we never went short of anything, never went short.
Can you ever remember having anything like a toy or a doll that you thought a lot about?
R – Oh, I can remember having dolls, yes I always wanted a doll.
Aye that's it, aye. And if your mother had any spare time at home, what did she used to do?
R – Knit. She was for ever knitting. When we were young she used to knit all our socks and stockings and she was always knitting?
Did she knit on long needles or did she use short steel needles?
R - Steel needles for knitting stockings and socks.
Can you ever remember her using a knitting stick?
R - No, no.
Do you know what I mean, don*t you? Knitting sticks aye.
R – No, I don't know what you mean.
Oh it’s like a, it looks like, do you know these scimitars, these swords, you know, scimitars with a curved blade, it looks like a small one of them about a foot long made out of wood and it has a hole in the end for a steel needle and they used to put it under their arm. You know how some people knit with one needle under their arm don't they?
(250)
R - And use the thumb. Yes.
Yes, my mother knits like that with one needle. I think she puts it, I think she puts it under her left arm and she holds one needle, some people knit with two needles like that don’t they?
R - Yes I always, I always, but I used to cast on with me thumb. You know, I used to cast on with me thumb, but always knit with two needles, but she used to do a lot of crocheting and she 'd crochet beautiful shawls. Oh, and put a lovely fringe on. I
always remember Shirley when she was about, she was only about four and auntie Grace, she was, she was eight years older than me. Well, in the first war, in the last war, yes in the last war, well her husband had to go, had to join up and he was about 40 and her daughter was married and she used to, she said “Can Shirley come and sleep with me?” You know she was nervous, and I said “Yes” She said “And then she can go to school.” She lived in the Avenues, and she said “I'll get her ready and
she can go to school” you know and then she can come home for her dinner and her tea and then” No, no “She can come home for her dinner and then go there for her tea and stay all night.” And so one night she says to her ''Now then Shirley, it’s getting ready for bed time, it’s getting bed time.” She says “Oh, I don't want to go to bed yet
Auntie Grace.” and she says "Well, you know you have to get up to go to school in the morning.” And she says “Well I'll go if I can have your red shawl on and a candle.” A candle. You see when we used to go to Dale Park they had candles upstairs you know, they had no gas, no electricity, they have lamps downstairs and she thought it was marvellous to have a candle to go to bed with. And she said “Auntie Grace, well I’ll go if I can have your red shawl on that grandma knitted and a candle. And that was only forty years since. Yes. She was, she is 45 now
(300)
she'd be about four then, she’d just started going to school. And we always laughed about her wanting a candle to go to bed, and of course they had electricity!
Yes. That’s it, aye. If your father had any spare time, what would he do? In the house?
R - Oh he never did any work in the house. He says, now what was his saying? I'm not going to keep dogs and bark myself.
(10 min)
I don't blame him with all those children! It’s, it's just about right. And what time did you get up in the morning?
R - To go to school? Oh, about eight o'clock.
And what time would you go to bed at night?
R - About nine. When we got …
That's it, yes.
R- Yes. When we got about ten or so you know, something like that.
And had you any pets?
R - Me brother always had a dog.
I remember you saying about that.
R- And he always had rabbits you know. We had like an out building at the back and he always kept rabbits. But I was never interested in rabbits. But he always had a little dog.
And, did anybody in the family smoke?
(350)
R - Me father smoked a pipe ‘cause I always remember going in the kitchen once and taking it and smoking it and oh, and I was sick. I wouldn’t be so old, I thought I'm going, he’d gone to sleep in the chair and I thought “I'm going to have a smoke at that pipe.” And oh and I was sick.
That’d cure you!
R - And when I came back they said “What’s the matter with you, you look sick.” I said “Yes, I feel a bit sick.” But I never told her what l’d been doing.
And did anyone, did anyone in the family gamble?
R- I don’t think so. No, no.
No. Now can you. remember when you had your first wireless set? Which was the first wireless set you saw, can you remember?
R - The first wireless set I saw… You know Watson's Garage? [The red brick building at the end of Skipton Road facing what used to be the Co-op] Well, Eddie Bradley had that. My brother in law’s brother in law. Billy’s brother's wife’s brother. They were manufacturers at Bankfield where Rolls Royce is now, they had a thousand looms.
Who was that?
R- Bradley’s, and he used to live at Highfield House where Mr Farmer lives now, the specialist. Rolling in money. Billy and I used to go up there tennis playing, tennis court with everything. Money was no object. I don't know whether I should be telling you this or not, it's personal you know. Would you like to stop it? Or does it matter? Would anybody hear it?
No, you are right, No, no, it’s right. No, I mean if you don’t, no if you don't want to tell me. Don't bother you know, it’s right. I mean it's just the radio you know, the wireless sets you know.
(400)
R- Yes, well now, well it’s common property is this. They were manufacturers and they were the biggest manufacturers in Barlick were Nutters and Bradleys. They went into Bankfield Shed when it was built.[1905]
That’s it.
R - And they had a thousand looms each, within one or two of a thousand. ‘Cause they had so much to pay more if they… [Emma never finished this sentence but I have a suspicion she was referring to membership fees of the Manufacturer’s Association or something similar.]
That's its aye.
R- And Billy's brother married Mr Bradley's daughter and, and they had a son, they had a son. Well, when Billy came back from the war, I mean he joined up about six weeks after I met him, and of course he wanted me to write to him and that was how it started. And I didn’t want to settle down really, I never thought of being serious when I went with him. But I always thought he was very nice you knows but, ‘cause we used to have such a good time, you know…
Aye, that's how these things happen.
R - We used to go out with a lot of boys and girls. We went out with a crowd of boys, there was about six of them and four girls there was and we went everywhere together. And they were right nice lads, in fact one was Sidney Brooks’ brother, Harry Brooks. Well he was, he died in the war. You know Robinson Brooks, and they were a right nice lot of lads and if we, if there were any dancing on they wouldn't go out if we weren’t going, and we wouldn't go if they weren't going. We used to go out with them every Sunday, every Sunday afternoon we used to go down to Stock Beck. We didn't go with them, but we met, all met there then we’d meet them down Gisburn Road on Sunday night. We never went with any of them and lots of people used to say “Which is your boy Emma?” I said “There isn’t any of them my boy, we only go mates with them” which we did.
(450)
And what was I going to tell you? Oh well, after Billy came home from the war well we used to spend all our Summer evenings up there playing tennis in the tennis court, they had money for anything. Well, Eddie had to go [to the war], that was George’s wife’s brother, he had to join up. There were three brothers with Bradley Brothers [I think they were Christopher Edwin, Arthur and Watson.], it's called Bradley Brothers [the weaving firm at Bankfield] and they each had a son. Well, Ella’s [Ella{?} was George Clark’s wife] brother had to go because he was the eldest and his father fell out with the other two brothers because his son had to go. And isn’t it silly? Anyway he got paid out, he fell out with them and he says “You'd pay me out.” and he got paid out which, he was better off than any of them you know because they went bank did Bradleys and they’d nothing. He [Arthur Bradley]never put anything in his wife's name, he’d just nothing. [Emma is talking about the practice of putting certain assets in the wife’s name to preserve them from being taken as assets of the business in bankruptcy of a non-limited company, a common practice. Bradley Brothers wasn’t a limited company] And his warehouse was packed to the top with cloth and he was told times without number “Get your cloth sold!” and he’d say “Oh, I’m not selling my cloth, I’m waiting till prices go up.” But they went down, they kept going down and the bank closed on them, they had nothing. Well, Eddie, this is George's brother in law, he {the father]was out of the mill then you see and he built that garage for Eddie, he built that garage for Eddie and it is a good garage that was, after the 1914 war. And he put him a thousand pounds in the bank which was a lot of money then and a thousand pounds worth of stock. And it, that was just when the wireless was coming in. Well Eddie had an office upstairs, all he did was spend his time up there fiddling with wirelesses. And he got married, they got married him and Elsie and well they invited us.
(500)
They lived, they never had a home of their own, him and his wife they lived with the. parents down Gisburn Road so they invited us down one evening for supper, me and Billy. Well, the dining room table was full of batteries, but full of batteries. That was the beginning of wireless and all we got was a few squeaks. All we got was a few squeaks and he was twiddling this and twiddling that, and then, and then there were like a bit of a ‘twerp’. He said “That's like a bloody canary!” Now that was my introduction to wireless.
Eh, goodness gracious me.
R- And I said, I used to think “Well, Elsie will have a lady's life.” His wife, and she’s had to work all her life. She is still living, he died, he’s been dead about seven or eight years has Eddie, but you see he was a spoilt boy.
Yes, that’s it.
R- He’d too much money, you see they had too much money and they thought it’d go on for ever but it doesn’t you know.
No. It doesn’t. That’s one of the things that started me off doing this you know. In the days we are talking about when cotton was, well cotton was king. That’s all there was to it.
R- It was the main industry in the country was cotton.
They never thought it would finish, they couldn’t see the day when It’d finish. Well now you see, Rolls Royce, Silentnight, they’re the kings now but they’ll finish as well
R- Oh yes, sometime. Oh yes it’s like everything, it's an old Lancashire saying you know 'In three generations, clogs to clogs.’ Have you never heard it?
(550)
That’s it. Yes. Clogs to clogs in three generations. And another one, ‘Up like a rocket and down like the stick.’ Anyway, apart from the first radio, which evidently wasn’t a great success, can you remember when you heard the first radio that was working?
(550)
R- Well, now when would that be? Now Eddie was married before we were, and that’s the wedding present, that silver cake basket that they gave us. And we were married in 1920 and so they were married before, so it would be about 1920 when we heard them [The ‘twerp’ I think] And then I think it would be about twelve months after that before I heard the first radio. I should think so. Well we were married in 1920, November, it would perhaps be 1922 when I heard me first radio.
That’s it aye. When did you first buy one yourself? Can you remember that?
R- Well it was when we lived in the top house in Ash Grove, and we, now we lived in Ash Grove, we married in 1920 and Dorothy was born in l926, so I should say, oh no, I don’t know about wireless, I’m talking about a gramophone now.
It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter.
R - I can’t remember.
Not it’ll, it’s funny, do you know I’ll tell you something. We’ll be talking about something else happen next week or a week or two later and we'll get around to it and you’ll remember, you'll know then. It'll come back to you.
R - I can't remember,
No, don't bother about it, no, that's all right. And, well you have already said about riding your bicycle to St Annes. Which must have been a fair outing in those days.
R - Well my sister and my sister in law took our luggage, they went on the train.
Oh, well that was a big…
R- We’d gone for a week.
That's it, yes. How about going for walks?
R - Oh well, it was the only thing we did in our young days was go for walks. We had to walk over Brown Hill and Gisburn Old Lane down to, you know, to Brogden and back down Brogden Lane. And when Billy used to come home on leave, his parents, his mother, his father lived at Barrowford and his mother died when he was 18 and he went to live with a friend of his mother's, a Mrs Broughton.
(600)
And his father got married again and lived at Barrowford. And when he used to come home on leave, well he took me home for the first time, when he came home from leave the first time because I'd never met his parents. And we used to walk to Barrowford and back in a day. Yes, we used to go in the morning when he was on leave and have dinner and tea there and walk back at night. I used to be dead nearly when we got back home!
Aye, But it hasn't done you any harm has it?
R- No evidently not.
There you are. Can you remember anybody in the family going fishing?
R- No, no. No fishermen in our family.
No fishing, Not your father?
R - No.
If he had any spare time did he go for a walk?
R- Yes, he used to go for a walk and then he’d go out for a pint at night sometimes. Down to the Syke. And then he used to be the choir master at the Chapel.
Ah, so he’d be fairly busy.
R- Yes
That’s it. What sort of people would you say, you went to the Wesleyan didn't you?
R- No, Baptist.
Baptist, sorry, Baptist. What sort of people would you say went to the Baptists. When I say what sort, you know, well what sort of people were there?
R- Well, there were a lot of money people went to the Baptists, there was the Robinson Brooks family, the Slater family that had the mill at Salterforth, Whiteoaks, they had the mill next to Robinson Brooks at Westfield, they were Baptist. Stephen Pickles,
(25 min)
you know what they are. Stephen Pickles, they had plenty of money you know? It was Stephen and Harry Pickles then, it was, you know, the old [this must have been Stephen1856], well they’d be a hundred now and Fred Pickles died, it’d be four or five years since and he’d be in his middle seventies. So yes, there were a lot of money people, and then there were just ordinary working people you know.
That’s it, yes.
R- Shopkeepers and I should say they were quite a nice class of people yes.
(650)
R- And we had to go to Sunday School you know. Morning and afternoon and. Chapel at night. Sometimes I used to go to the New Ship Chapel with my friends, they all went to the New Ship, Independent Methodists and I used to go with them sometimes. Now I used to ask my mother. She says “Yes of course you can.” She says “You can’t expect three of them to come to the Baptists.” And I used to like it, They were a more homely lot at the New Ship, not a lot went to the New Ship.
That’s it, they were, that's it. Can you ever remember any of your family being connected with the Temperance Movement?
R- No.
Did you ever sign the pledge?
R- No.
'Cause there were a lot of people, young people who signed the pledge.
R- Yes, yes. No, I never needed to do, because I wasn’t, I never …
Well no but, you know, I mean, a lot of people signed ...
R- Yes, yes.
Did anybody ever say anything to you about the evils of drink?
R- I don’t think so.
No. Can you ever remember seeing women going into pubs?
R- Not when I was young, no. I remember being at Douglas once when I was about eighteen or nineteen you know. We met some boys, and we were staying in a boarding house just by the Castle Mona Hotel on the front. We met these boys and they were nice boys from Keighley. And they said “Would you like to go in, in the Castle Mona bar for a drink?” I said “I've never been in a public house in my life!” They said “Well, you can go and have a lemonade.” You know, they were just going to have a beer. They’d be about 20 you know? Two years older than us. I'd be nineteen. I think it was the last time I went to Douglas before the war. So we went in, my friend and myself, and I were frightened to death of any Barlickers who was coming in seeing me in a bar.
(700)
But were there any other ladies in there?
R- Well it was afternoon. I can’t remember but 1 were, I just thought I hope to goodness no Barlicker is coming here and finds me in a pub. Me mother would, I don't know what she’d have done.
Can you ever remember, do you know of anybody whose lives have been spoiled by drink? You know ...
R - Well, I'm going to tell you a personal thing now, Billy's father was a big drinker, he went through a lot of money and yet he, I liked him. But you see, when he got married again, he was a very clever business man, they were manufacturers in Barrowford. But when trade came bad he couldn’t face it, and he used to go in to drink then. He hadn’t the willpower to put up with it. And he used to go into drink for a few weeks at once. You know? And I know it's a personal thing is this, and yet he was the most entertaining man, I’d always liked him. And when he got married again she was a right strict, you know, right bossy and she kept him off drink and I admired her for it. Although she was a masterful woman and she was a big smart woman and he was a big smart man. They were a very smart couple. But she kept
him off the drink.
Isn’t that a marvellous thing, that she could.
{I’ve omitted some personal details here as they don’t really concern us, sorry, but Emma would have agreed]
R- And those two, Billy's step brother thought the world of him. They thought the world of him. And the youngest boy, Mr Clark used to take him up into Scotland on his holydays and he were only about eighteen was Arthur the youngest. Eh, and they had a motorbike and sidecar then and they did enjoy it and Arthur thought the world of him. And they, both boys did, he was a really grand fellow. It was just his drink you know? When he got into drink
Of course there were quite a few of them. I've heard people talk a lot about Aaron Nutter.
R- Oh yes. Ephraim.
Oh now. That's it. Well, I might have got the name wrong.
R- Aaron. Yes there was Aaron, but he wasn't one of the sons you know? He was a relative. Aaron wasn’t one of Nutter Brothers.
That's it, yes. But Aaron used to, he used to like his drink.
R- Yes I think, yes I think he would and he was a right grand fellow, too. Yes.
(800)
Do you say so? Somebody told me, it was Billy Brooks, he told me a story about Aaron Nutter and a man that Billy calls Tom O’Teds. This Tom O’Teds was a friend of Billy Brook's father. They used to work together when they were weavers. And he tells about Aaron Nutter and Tom O’Teds getting drunk one night. And they came out of the pub and they were in the main street and he said Aaron Nutter stood there in the street and started singing “I care for nobody, no not I, and nobody cares for me.” And Tom O’Teds says to him, he says ''Well I wish you and your nobody'd keep quiet, you are making too much noise!” And he said it finished up - he says - it got to fighting. And he said they were friends. It’s a good job the police didn't call.
R- Eh, I remember him yes, and very well. Yes, he had two daughters.
Aye. So what relation would he be to…
R- He was some relation, I don't know what …
To the Nutter family?
R - Perhaps he’d be cousin to the father, to Jim Nutter, old Jim Nutter. He may have been. He were related to them but he wasn't one of the Nutters, James Nutters sons.
That's it. You see one of the, it isn't the only reason that I wanted to do some recording with you, but one of the reasons why I wanted to do some recordings with you is because you know a lot about the relationships of the Nutters to each other. And you see my main stay there was poor old Sidney, You know, Sidney Nutter.
R – Yes.
And you see Sidney died you know?
R – Yes, now which, who was his father? Was it Tom? Tom Nutter?
Now I'm not really certain but Sidney always said that he wasn’t one of the Nutter millions. He always used to say that, it was a little private joke of his. He always used to say “I'm a Nutter, but I'm not one of the Nutter millions!” And evidently his father was never, you know, they weren’t part of the main stream of the Nutter family like the Jim Nutter and Wilfred and… I have an idea that Eughtred Nutter is either his brother or his cousin. I’m am not sure which.
(35 min)
R - Well if it’s his brother he is one of the Nutters. You see Tom and Ted Nutter who lived at Grimestopes..
That's where Sidney used to live, at Grimestopes.
R – Well his father was one of the Nutters, but you see they were both drinkers were the fathers.
That’s it. He's always said, he’s told me that, and his father was a terrible drinker.
R – Yes, they both were.
Yes, and he says that's the reason why he wasn't further into the firm.
R - Yes, that's right and he died fairly young. Now, I remember when he were dying and I was away on holiday with my friend and we were at Hemsworth and her uncle was the station master there. And Tom Nutter died while I was there and I was twenty. So that’s 63 years since, this July, since his father died. [1915]
Aye, that's it,
R - Now how old, how old will he be now?
(850)
Well, Sidney were, his father must have died just about when Sidney was born then, because Sidney was 62 his last birthday so…
R - Well he is Tommy Nutter’s son. Yes, and they lived next door to one another. 'Cause Ted Nutter, I knew their boys ‘cause there was Harry, Fred and Arthur. So he was Tommy Nutter’s son. You know Norah Nutter? Do you know, have you ever heard him talk about Norah Nutter? That was his sister and he was born, you know, quite a few years after the others.
Yes, that's it, yes,
R - He was born on the same day and the same time as Norman Clark, and that was Billy’s brother’s son, and he died when he was 39 did Norman(?) did George Clark’s son and they were about the same time.
Yes, well, we'll get further into that later because I'm very interested in the relationships of some of these families because, you know, it was a very close-knit, the manufacturers themselves were a very close-knit body of men you know. I mean, there was, a lot of them were in different firms with each other, they were all …
R – Yes, yes. Well we were, Billy and I were very friendly with Rupert who lived at the Homelands. We used to play every Saturday night, bridge with each other. And Billy and Rupert went to Burnley football match, they had a ticket in the stand, for the stand, and they went every Saturday afternoon to Burnley football match and then either his wife’d come down here or I'd go up there and then sometimes we’d go out for a meal instead of having tea.
That’s it.
R – We’d go out to Stirk House or Thornton Manor and then come back and play bridge for the evening and we always played till twelve o'clock dead on, finish. And about nine o'clock Rupert’d say “Who'd like a cup of tea?” Always went to make a cup of tea at nine o’clock. And then we’d have our supper, about ten. Yes.
Aye, Football widows, Football widows.
R - Yes, Well, Saturday afternoon that was and we had a few weekends away with them. And we went to Bournemouth with them for a week once, with Rupert and his wife.
Now, to get back to Barlick, can you ever remember street entertainers? People going round singing or…
(900)
R - Only at Christmas, choirs going round you know, choirs going round singing at Christmas. No, I don't think I can, No, I remember them Barrel Organs. Can't you?
Oh yes I’ve seen a barrel organ, yes.
R - Oh yes. They used to come round and oh we thought it were marvellous. Barrel organs and collecting you know? Sometimes they’d have a monkey.
Yes. Were those the ones on wheels or the ones on a stick?
R – Yes. No, on a wheel, on wheels. Yes you know, they used to wheel them all round the town.
That's it, yes. Knife grinders?
R - Pardon?
Knife grinding?
R - Oh yes. They used to come into the mills. Yes. You know, if you wanted your scissors sharpening, yes.
That's it, aye. Yes, Ernie tells a nice little story about a knife grinder in Barlick and they used to call him Flagger. And he was too poor to afford a grinding stone so what he used to do, he used to take the knives and go round the corner and sharpen them on kerb stones.
(40 min)
R - Oh well these were proper ones you know, they had the machines. And they used to come round to the mills and you always got your own scissors back. It's amazing how he could remember them.
Yes. Now, because I mean, every weaver would haves at least one pair of scissors.
R- Oh yes. You couldn’t do without scissors and a reed hook.
That’s it, yes. Andy what did you think about Barlick in those days? You know, Barnoldswick, what did you think about it as a place to live?
R - Oh we thought it were grand. I never thought about anything, anywhere else. Only we lived from one year to another for a holiday. We used to have to save up a year for a holiday.
That’s it yes. Just coming back to something there you see, saving up for a year for a holiday. I've talked to people who said that there were a lot of people in those days who used to save up for a year to go on t’rant, to get drunk.
R - Oh well, I've never heard of that.
Oh yes, there is more than one told me that you know. I mean, you know, this was when things were really bad, you know. Because they always used to say, there used to be a saying in Salford you know, that the quickest way out of Salford was four pints of ale.
R - I've never heard that before.
Now you can understand it you know. People were living in miserable conditions you know? And they’d save up for a year just so that they could go out and get drunk and stay drunk for three or four days.
R - Oh goodness!
And that was the same as a holiday for them.
R – Well! Never heard of that before.
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Andy can you remember going to any weddings when you were young? Say, before you started work?
R – No.
Or funerals?
R – No I can’t remember going to a funeral because our grandparents and all our relatives lived away.
That’s it. Of course they did, yes. Aye. Where did you enjoy going most when you were a child? If somebody came to you one morning - I'm not talking about annual holidays now - if somebody came to you one morning and said “Emma Jane, you can have a treat today, where would you like to go?” What do you think you'd have said?
R - To the seaside I should think, Yes.
Aye. Aye that’s it. Go to the seaside for a day. Because of course they used to run trips by rail out of Barlick each week didn’t they?
R - Oh yes, they did at the holidays. You know, your weekly tickets you know, to go Saturday and come back Saturday.
How about day excursions at weekend?
R - Yes I think they used to do that when I was in me teens. I can’t remember when I was little. They used to be able to go to Blackpool you know? To Blackpool, and it was so much and you could go into the Winter Gardens and come back, it was only sixpence to go into the Winter Gardens and dance all evening and come back on the train. I've never been but I know, I know we’d been to Douglas, well I hadn't been that year, I wasn't old enough to go, my mother wouldn’t let me go because my four, three friends were going, well there were four friends then and the parents were going and three of them. Two of them, their parents weren't going but two of them the parents were going, but I hadn't to go. My mother wouldn't let me go although the two parents were going. So I had to go to Llandudno with me sister Grace and her husband which I did. And what was I going to tell you? Oh, and these, two of these girls they got on with two boys from Lancaster and they wanted them to go to Morecambe you see, these two girls, and they said “Oh well, we have, there's four of us you know, we have two friends we never go anywhere without” “Well bring them as well.” So we went to Morecambe for half a day. I think it was a half a crown, something like that. Saturday afternoon, got back on Skipton Station at night about a quarter past eleven you know, to catch the Barlick train, to change at Skipton. No train, it had gone twenty minutes before. There we were stranded at Skipton, half past eleven at night. Well, we didn't know what to do and there was a young man, he was on the train and he came from Colne. So well, there’s nothing else we can do, we shall have
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to set off and walk. So we walked from Skipton, it was four o'clock in the morning when we got home. And we went to my friend’s house and we all sat up you know, we daren’t, none of us dared go home by ourselves, we were terrified being out at that time. Never been out at that time, ever. And we sat there till breakfast time. And you know we were half asleep and of course as we had breakfast down we went home and my mother were frantic you know, she couldn't tell what’d
(45 min)
happened. There were no telephone, no one of us had telephone in those days. And she says “Where ever have you been?” I says “Well the train had gone when we got to Skipton.” And of course she believed me and of course she couldn’t do anything else only believe us. She said “Well, where have you been?” I said “We have been at Maggie's, we have been at Maggie’s. The fire hadn’t gone out when we got home, you know it was just a bit of fire, parents probably stopped up perhaps till twelve or so waiting for her coming home, 'cause she was an only girl. And anyway we got over it, we got over it. It was all right as long as they knew. But they were very worried when we hadn’t got home you know?
Aye, that's it. That’s one of the advantages of having a telephone as you are saying isn’t it. I mean you can let people know.
R – Yes, yes. And the young man walked with us, he walked with us. And I says “I daren’t go past that churchyard at Thornton” I says “We’ll walk on to Earby and come back over the fields.” Which we did. I daren’t come past that churchyard you know how you are when you are about sixteen, they used to talk about ghosts walking about in church. “Oh.” I says, “I daren't go past that churchyard at Thornton.”
SCG/20 January 2003
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