THIS TAPE HAS BEEN RECORDED ON THE 2ND JULY 1979 AT 16 COWGILL STREET, EARBY. THE INFORMANT IS HORACE THORNTON, TAPER AND THE INTERVIEWER IS STANLEY GRAHAM.
[One unexpected problem that I hit when doing the interviews was that due to time pressures it wasn’t possible to complete all of them before the mill finished. Ideally, the section on taping should have been done with Joe Nutter, he was the remaining taper after Norman Grey finished early. This problem was made worse by the fact that due to the structure of weaving out, the tapers were the first to finish. The impact of closure, understandably, made some people very bitter and Joe refused to talk about his job or comment on the pictures.
Fred Inman, one of my tacklers, suggested I talk to Horace Thornton and I think you might agree with me that things could have been worse. He was a wonderful informant and the number of tapes in this series bears testimony to the way he gave me full access to his experience. I don’t see how we could have done any better.]
Right Horace, we'll start at the beginning. When were you born?
R - Nineteen Ought Six, 13th April.
Thirteenth of April, 1906.
R- Nineteen ought six. I'm seventy-three.
So that makes you, that's it, seventy-three year old. Oh, nobbut a young un. And where were you born Horace?
R- At Carleton. near Skipton.
What were the street, do you know?
R- South View. It's just as you're going into Carleton from Skipton end, on the right hand side. There’s a street on t’left hand side, a few houses and then when you get a bit further up on t’right hand side there is three houses together and I were born in the middle house.
How many years did you live in that house?
(50)
R- Well, there was six children in our family, and me father were a mule spinner at Carleton Mill, and he died in 1916, and that left me mother with six children. We lived there for about two years after me father died. I had a sister, an older sister, she died of TB, when she were twenty-one, that were in 1917, that left five of us.
She'd die when you were at Carleton then.
R- Yes, when they were in that house.
Yes, so you were in that house till you were about twelve year old. Yes.
R- Yes, and then we moved to Chapel Street. Now an aunt of mine owned…
Chapel Street…?
R- At Carleton.
At Carleton.
R- Aunt of mine owned some houses in that street. She'd ...well my father were a Whiteoak, my grandfather wore a Whiteoak, and .. joiner and undertakers
and when he died he left, they'd been builders as well, he left that row of
houses. But they had to be sold and distributed amongst the family. There were
five girls and three lads, and this aunt of mine, aunt Annie, bought two of the
houses. Another uncle bought one of them, and a cousin across the street
bought another, they were all living in them you see. And a cousin further
down bought another house you see. All these houses sort of remained in the Whiteoak family. Well, it come empty and me aunt, me mother’s sister,
let me mother have that house rent free because she had no income only
washing and cleaning and looking after the church. I mean, all my young life,
all I can remember, wakening up early, is the mangle going. Five and six
o’clock at the morning, mangle going, and she used to he washing and drying
(100)
them and ironing and then we were sent out with a basket full of clothes, half a crown, washed and ironed.
All that'll come in Horace. I shall be asking you a lot of questions about the houses when you were young. We'll do that on the house on South View, see, because you were there for your first twelve years. Now where do you, where was your father born?
R- In Carleton and his father were a mule spinner you see. My grandfather were a mule spinner.
Now when you say a mule spinner, at Carleton who owned….
R- Slingsby, W and J Slingsby.
Was there a connection between Slingsby’s and Bracewell? Do you know?
R- None at all that I remember. That I know of, no connection whatever.
Aye. I have an idea, something rings a bell in my mind that Bracewell had a daughter that married, you know, William Bracewell from Barlick, old Billycock, had a daughter that married somebody that owned Carleton Mill. I might be wrong. Now, your father was born in Carleton. Where was your grandfather born?
R - On me mother's side or me father's side?
Your father’s father.
R – Well, he were born in Carleton I suppose. I don’t know, no.
Aye .. that’s right, if you don't know. And how many brothers and sisters did you have altogether?
R - I had three brothers and a sister, two sisters, one died, the oldest died, yes.
(5 min)
Yes. Well now, start with the eldest, start with the eldest and work your way through the children, and see if you can give me the names and the ages. The years they were born. Can you manage that?
R – Well, somewhere about it. Maude was twenty-one in 1917 when she died so she's been dead ...
Yes, so that were 1896.
R - Yes. Now then, the next one, Percy, he died last year aged seventy-six so he were born in 1903.
Last year did he die?
R - Last year.
Yes well, that’s 1902 then.
R – Yes, and I were born in 1906. And then I've a brother next, Cyril. He's three years younger than me.
Nineteen hundred and nine.
R – Aye, and there's a sister comes next, she is three years younger again.
Yes, that's 1912.
R – Yes. And I have a brother, the youngest, he's two years younger so that's 1914, yes.
Aye, that's 1914, yes.
R- Yes and me father died in 1916. Me mother’s, like me youngest brother, he were only like a baby in arms when he died.
Aye. And you came, you were what? I've listened to that, you were third, you were the third eldest in the family. That’s it.
R – Yes.
And now, which one was it that died, as a baby?
R – Maude, she died at 1917, she were twenty one, she died in 1917 and me father died in 1916.
Yes, but did you say that one of your brothers died when he was young?
R - Last year. Last year.
Oh aye, last year, that's it aye.
R - He died last year.
That's right aye. You say TB, what do you think caused that?
(200)
R – Well, what did cause T.B? I mean when, in my younger days they were dying all round you, left right and centre, and it wasn't malnutrition, because there were a farmer in Carleton, he farmed half of Carleton, and he’d three girls and a boy. Now two of the girls died of T.B.1 and… Well, I’ll tell you what it were, it were bad .. milk, because they milked anything did farmers then until, until there were T.B. tested
Cattle. It were rife in England were T.B. It were nothing but t'milk.
Yes. Aye. That's it yes.
R - That's all it were.
Yes, we tend to forget that you know?
R – Yes, it were milk and nothing else. And it were very infectious. They're, very infectionate. If that's the word.
Yes, infectious, yes.
R - Infectious yes, very infectious. Because I know when my sister got it, there were a field back door to us, and she slept in a hut in that field. The County Council provided a hut with windows that could open at each side, provided a bed, she hadn't to sleep in the same house with us because it were infectious.
Aye. I've never heard of that before.
R - Oh yes. Have you never been to a sanatorium?
Yes but I've never heard of them providing the hut you know?
R- Well they did, they provided the hut. And it were a brand new hut out in this field. I suppose they provided them where there was accommodation to put one. And mates of mine died of it. Oh yes, everywhere, folk were dying with TB. And in the country, all the fresh air you wanted, and it were nothing but the milk.
Aye, I think you’re probably right there Horace, aye.
R - It were.
When you were a child, can you remember any relations living with you?
(250)
R – No, no relations lived with us, no.
No. And so did you ever have any lodgers?
R - No. No lodgers.
Aye. And you say your father was a mule spinner when you were born?
R - A mule spinner, yes.
At Slingsby’s? Do you know whether he had any jobs before he was a mule spinner, or was he a mule spinner all his life?
R – Well, I know he used to be a reporter on the Bradford Daily Telegraph before he were married.
And born in Carleton!
R - Born In Carleton.
So, did he go to Bradford to work? He must have done.
R - He must have done. Oh I say, I wonder. How long he had it after he were married I don’t know, but he used to be a reporter.
(10 min)
That’d be unusual then wouldn't it?
R- Yes, well….
It would.
R- But they are rather a brainy family. I don’t say I particularly were, but me father and his grandfather, he were t’Parish Clerk and a beautiful writer. Clerk to t’Parish Council, and verger at the church. And you see, they had to be somebody that could read and write in those days.
Of course they did, aye.
R- Because it’d be in the eighteen hundreds, and he were a beautiful writer were William Thornton, that were my grandfather.
And .. I never asked you your father's name.
R – Edwin.
Edwin?
R - And me youngest brother's called Edwin.
Aye. Did, what was your mother's job before she got married?
R - She worked, well, do you know anything about Skipton? She were a milliner, worked at Amblers.
Amblers aye. Are they still going?
R – No.
No, they've finished, I've heard that name before.
R - National Mill Store at the bottom of Otley Street, that were Amblers.
That’s it. Now when you say she was a milliner, was she actually making hats or was she working in the shop selling them?
R - Well she worked for Amblers, and it were a drapers and milliners.
Yes that’s it, yes. And did she work outside, did she do any work after she was married?
R – No, she wouldn't do. No.
(300)
No? And so of course she'd be looking after the children all the time. And how old was she when she died?
R – Seventy seven.
And when was that?
R - Well, I were forty-eight so that's twenty-five years since isn’t it?
Twenty-five, now, wait a minute, forty-eight, you are seventy-three now so that’s right, twenty five years since.
R - Twenty-five years since.
So that's 1954. The year after the Coronation.
R – Yes, aye.
Aye. And did any of your family leave Carleton? Say before 1930? You know, leave Carleton to go and live elsewhere?
R- I had a uncle who did. He went down to Australia. He were a mill engineer at Slingsby’s Mill and he served his time with Henry Browns. That’d be Barnoldswick. [Earby I should think] Served his time with them and got married and had one boy and he emigrated to Australia about 1912 and he went as an engineer in a gold mine.
Aye?
R – Aye. And it was at Sons of Gwalia. Sons of Gwalia I think were the mine at Wonthagie in Australia.
Sons Of?
R- Gwalia, the name of the mine.
[Sons of Gwalia is a famous gold mine in Western Australia. The mine was sunk in 1896 and the first manager was Herbert Hoover (1897 to 1908) who later became President of the United States. It reached a depth of 5,316 feet, became the second largest gold mine in Australia and closed in 1963. It re-opened in 1981 as an open pit working but is now once more a deep mine. In 1912 they imported the largest winding engine in Australia from Fraser and Chalmers of Erith and Chicago US who were makers of mining machinery. I smell a connection between the uncle and the engine… The town is about 150 miles north of Kalgoorlie]
Yes, that's it, aye. That’d be G w a 1 i a or something.
R – Aye. Sons of Gwalia, it's worked out now, such a long time since. But he were doing all right, they'd had another child, a baby girl. And then when the flu epidemic started in 1918 it killed him and his wife and the girl and left one boy. And he left it in his will that he'd to come back to Carleton. There were an aunt and uncle of his, his father's brother and sister, and my father's brother and sister, that hadn't been married, they lived in the family home at Carleton. And it were his wish that he came back to Carleton to be brought up with them. And he
(350)
did do, and he started courting a girl from Silsden. Her father had a farm and he had a horse and cart and worked on the road same as farmers did. They lent their horse and cart to work on t’road. And Geoffrey married their daughter and he could drive a motor car and they went into the haulage business right? Jacksons of Silsden. And the funeral, weddings and funerals and th’haulage business. You'll look in any paper, Jacksons of Silsden. And I’ll tell you, they do all the taxi work for them funerals. They're funeral directors at Barlick.
Windles?
R – Windles, that's it, they do it for Windles and if there's any funerals they have a hearse do you see and funeral cars or weddings. And that were how they got in the business, he married the daughter, and he had a horse and cart, and they got a wagon and started carrying and then in the car hire business.
Now, out of the houses you lived in as a child, you'll remember the first one best, South View, won’t you?
R - Yes.
Well, so we’ll talk about South View, and then afterwards we'll just have a quiet look at Chapel Street ...
R - Chapel Street, yes.
To see what the job were there. Now, just simple questions Horace but it gives us a picture of what the house was like, because what houses were like tells you how people lived of course. That's the idea of it. How many bedrooms did it have?
R - Two.
And what other rooms were there?
R - There were a living room and a kitchen, [This is a bit confusing but I think Horace means that there was a kitchen which they also called the living room and a front room they called the house because he talks later about his mother washing in both the kitchen and the living room] we called it the house, and the living room. We always called the front room the house, we didn't live in it, we were in at night and we were in at week ends and it were a fair big room and the staircase, it went up out of the front room, and it were open staircase.
(400)
Yes that's it.
R - A newel post at the bottom and all twisted ...
Banisters, yes.
R - Bannister up there and I don't know whether it's like it now or not.
Aye. Oh no it's nearly sure to have been changed Horace nearly sure. And can you remember any of the furniture? In the bedrooms for a start off, what were the furniture in the bedrooms?
R – Well, we'd a wash hand stand, very old fashioned and it'd be whitewood. It were painted and there’d be a dressing table. And in the front bedroom, where the main of us slept, we all slept there, me mother and father in the back; that's what I remember of sleeping there. And I can, I can remember to this day when me mother were coming to bed she always, if I happened to be awake, she always used to come in with a candle and look round us all. And I can picture that as if it were yesterday.
And how about the furniture in the kitchen?
R – Well, there were a square table. And in the house we had a square table, but a bit fancier in the house, with, and a dresser, they called them dressers then, the white sideboards and there were a low fireplace in the house, and an ordinary fireplace and boiler and oven in the back kitchen.
Yes, in the kitchen aye. So really, the house, you would just use that at week ends and for sitting in at night. So where did you have your meals?
R- In the kitchen. Always in the kitchen because the cooking range were there.
Yes that's it. And where did your mother do, well your mother did the cooking in there, on that range?
R - Yes, did the washing and, and stone floors.
Yes. Now, she did the washing in the kitchen as well?
R- Yes.
And have no bathroom?
R – No, no bathroom.
So, if you were going to have a bath where did you have it?
R - We washed in front of the fire in a tin bowl.
Now I always ask this question Horace and I know what the answer is before I ask it. Did you have a special bath night?
R – No.
Oh! Thank God for that!
R- Oh no we didn't. But I know t’younger end, they were bathed every night, baby and next one or two, that’d be Edwin and me sister.
(450)
R – They’d be bathed every night but we bathed when we were in you see? When everybody…
Yes. Well, that's very refreshing Horace because…
R- When everybody went to bed like we, we had ours in.
Well, that's very refreshing, because nearly everybody I ask says Friday night.
R- No.
Now, lavatory .. outside?
R – Yes, we went to the end and there were three together.
Now, were they water closets or buckets?
R - They were water closets then. Now then, them houses, they hadn’t a road round t’back. You went in through a door at the end of the three houses and up and round the back. The first house, you came to their back door first, then our house the second one and the third house hadn't a back door, they had to go round their own end you see? Oh yes, they had a back door. Yes they had a back door but they didn’t
(20 min)
come past our house, it finished, there were a wall up at our house, and the third house had their entrance round the other end.
Yes. So, and you said there were no road round the back?
R- No.
So when they were dry toilets they must have emptied their own.
R - They must have.
Yes. And can you, when you say they were water closets, were they tipplers or flush?
R - They'd be tipplers, tipplers, oh aye.
Aye that's it.
R - Aye they were tipplers.
And had the house got piped water?
R- Yes, and gas.
Yes, now when we say piped water, that means just cold water of course. Aye.
R- Yes, that's it. Because we used to fill the side boiler, yes.
Side boiler, that’s it Horace.
R - And if you wanted a wash you'd dive into it wi’t lading tin.
That's it, lading tin, aye. Did they, did you have a stair carpet?
R – Yes, oh aye.
How was it held down?
R- Well I don't know. Eh, brass rods. Brass rods, because I can always remember they were always slipping out. You see, they were always slipping out.
Who polished them?
R - Oh, me mother did all t’work.
Now, did the neighbours have stair carpets?
R - Well I don’t know, the woman next to us, she were, it were a Miss Thompson, and her parents had Carleton Post Office, Post Office and grocer shop and she were an old woman. I don't know how old she’d be then, and she didn't work, they'd retired from the shop and she were living, she lived there in the first house. And it were rather a better house than ours you know, different windows, same as if there'd been our two houses and then this one built on.
(500)
It nearly sounds like a landlord and two houses to rent doesn't it? Aye.
R – Yes. And we paid one and six a week.
One and six a week. That’s one of the questions later on, you're too good Horace.
R- One and six a week. Aye. Aye ... but it comes back to you you see. One and six a week.
Oh it does, yes it does.
R- But we did better after that, when we went into me aunt's house and paid nothing.
Aye, rent free. What sort of floor coverings did you have on the rest of the floors? Bedrooms for a start of.
R - Well, lino ...
Yes, oil cloth and …
R- And prick rugs.
Aye .. Now you call them prick rugs, peg rugs, that's it aye.
R - Peg rug, aye peg rugs.
And downstairs in the parlour, you know, in the house?
R - Carpet, it’d be carpet in the middle.
Yes. That was a square?
R - Carpet square, and there'd be lino all round. That way it would cover t’flags up. you ace?
Yes. That's it. Did that carpet stop down all the time?
R - Oh yes, all the time. Aye.
And in the living room, carpets in the living room?
R- No, it’d be, it'd be coco matting as there. Because you see me mother had to wash there, she had something that she rolled up.
That's it yes.
R - Put out of t’way, but with any amount of peg rugs.
Can you ever remember sand on t’floor in the house?
R – Never, but I do know lots of people had sand on t’floor. Because as lads, when we were wanting some money, like a gang of us, we’d go and break some sand. And we used to go round hawking it, we knew the houses that had sand in t’kitchen.
Now then, that's interesting, you say break some sand?
R – Well, ordinary river sand won't do, they wouldn't have that. You couldn't go down to the river and get up a bucket full. You had to get soft sand stone, and hammer it, that makes sharp sand.
Aye.
R- We had to do that, we used to take ‘em in those stone jam jars. I’d say that’d be a penny. But we had to break it, they wouldn't have sand, soft sand, it were no good. It had to be sharp, it crunched under your clogs, and clean the floors. And soft sand doesn't do it, it just…
That's it. Sluthers about yes. Aye.
R - Stuck, all went into lumps.
Aye there you are.
(550)
R- Now where the daughter lives, it's all soft sand. And you dig the garden and then first time it rains there is a crust on top, you have to break it up. You see, go round hoeing it, it forms a crust anywhere.
Aye. What kind of curtains or blinds did you have?
R- Well, they were paper blinds, these where you had a cord on them. And there'd be lace curtains and happen thicker curtains in winter.
Aye. And what kind did your neighbours have?
R- Well I don't know, you didn't go into neighbours houses when you were younger.
Now that's an interesting thing. There in no question in here about that, but you've just said something there. Obviously I've interviewed a lot of people, and I’m beginning to get a sort of an idea about what things were like, and it strikes me that people kept, in many ways they kept more private in their houses in those days.
(25 min)
R – Yes, probably they did, but me mother'd go into the other houses, but kids weren't allowed to go in you see?
That’s it, yes.
R- But when, I’m happen advancing a bit, but when we went into Chapel Street, we were nearly all related and everybody went into everybody’s house. You see, I'd an aunt and uncle next door and a cousin next, and a cousin across the street, and another cousin further down. You see, because they'd been Whiteoak's houses, you see?
I can see it, aye. Another thing, I don't know, of course I was brought up this way, if you went round to somebody's house and they were having a meal, you kept out of the way didn't you.
R- Well. You didn't go but you just, you just went into your relations as you wanted you see?
Yes, that's it, aye. Did, can you remember anybody in the street not having curtains?
R - Oh no, not everybody. I mean, you were in a village like, and everybody's respectable in a village. Though there were houses in what they called New Street. Now at that time there were tramp weavers and tram spinners, and New Street, they were very old houses. One man had four or five houses there, rented them and took them tramps in, tramp weavers. They hadn't curtains but I suppose they had bunks, and it wore like …
Did the women round about donkey stone the door steps?
R- Yes, my wife does.
Still? Aye ...
R- Yes. Now I tell you why. She always used to put a white chalk mark on, when she'd done her steps, on the end of the step and on to the edge of that, and out at the back. Now you couldn't get donkey stones could you?
No
R - They, they were a thing of the past. Well, a woman next door she has some relations, do you know where Garsdale Head is, Garsdale Station, up above Hawes
Yes.
R- Well, as you go up to the station, on the right hand side there is a shop, a shop and a warehouse. It used to be a very busy shop before the motorcar days, because it were, it were the man who supplied all the Dales wi’ proven and all the groceries. Well, it’s sort of gone down, but this woman, oh she is there now and she were up at Easter and the son in law and my daughter were here. And so we went up to Hawes. And my wife had never been, never been up to Garsdale Head .. she's heard plenty about it from Betty, this is her next door neighbour and John says “Is there anywhere you'd like to go?” So she says “Yes, I'd like to go see Betty" she were there then, and they went and Edna, that's her cousin that lives there and has this shop, she were showing us round, we went into a big warehouse at the end where there were coal and all sorts stacked and there were a pile of white stones, like bricks they were. “By gum” - I says – “I haven't seen them for a lot of years.” And she said “Aye, do you want one?” I says yes and so she get me two. And we brought them back and she [H’s wife] does, when it's decent she whitens the edge of the flag.
Funny you should say that, I bought some only the other week. I went into an ironmonger’s shop for something in Manchester and he were clearing out and he had a boxful on t’floor and he were going to throw them away.
R- Were they bigguns? These were as big as bricks.
No, these weren't that big.
R - I know, they are little square uns. But these are as big as a brick.
Aye. With a donkey on ‘em. These had the donkey on 'em I think.
[24 years later, I have just gone to the cupboard to have a look because I still have them. They have a stamp on which is a representation of a lion and the words “LION ENGLAND’]
R - These have a name on of who made them.
Aye that's it, aye.
R - As big as bricks. And there were a reight pile. She says nobody wants them now, I don't suppose that they knew anybody had them.
Aye, aye. How was the house lit?
R - Gas.
Gas. Were they, what were they, fan tails or incandescent?
R - An incandescent mantle. And they're uprights
Yes, with a fork in.
R- Because, aye, there used to be a fork, and I’ve seen them hooking them on, and then the bottom’d break off, and they were blowing about.
(650)
How did you go on in summer wi’ t’door open and t’bombers coming in, moths? You know did they use to do them in?
R- Well, we weren't really, it were right on t’roadside, and we had the front door and a vestibule, glass vestibule. And many a time, not once, we’d gone to bed in summer and the front door’d been left open, wide open all night. Vestibule door shut, but we never noticed that the front door were open.
When can you first remember electric light, which house did you first have electric light in?
R- Chapel Street.
(30 min)
Chapel Street?
R- Yes.
Can you remember, or did you ever know how it was charged for?
R – Well, I’ll tell you how it came to Carleton, how we got electricity before such a lot of other people. A man called Percy Hudson lived at Carleton Grange, and he was a director of the Yorkshire Power Company, and he had electricity brought to Carleton before they had it in any other village. They brought it down the valley, and brought it over to Carleton and he lit his own house and he put it in the church. Of course that were propaganda, you see. People would go into church and see electric light and wanted it in their own houses, and that were when electricity came to Carleton.
Where were it generated, do you know?
R - Down at Leeds. It were Yorkshire Power Company, a private company. And they brought the power line right down the valley; and it didn’t go into Skipton. Skipton wouldn't allow it, they must have had a supply of their own somewhere. And it just branched, it come over into Carleton.
What year were that, do you know?
R – Well, immediately after the.. oh, I don't know, I really couldn’t say.
You're right.
R - But I were living at Carleton and it’d be fifty years since.
How did you get rid of the household rubbish.
R- You put it in the ashpit, you had an ashpit.
Now in your case where was th’ashpit, because there wasn't a road at the back, was there?
R - No. It were at the other end of the houses, there were ashpits at the other end, and they used to come round when they were full, a man came with a horse and cart, you see. He’d have the job of emptying the ashpits. But everybody hadn’t an ash, hadn't flush toilets, there were lots of places where they had a tin box or some houses it just vent into the ashpit, it went into the ashes you see. It were raked out and went with the night soil. Yes, it were the ashes.
(700)
Is that right? I didn't know that.
R - Yes.
Yes, that’s like the old midden idea.
R – Yes, the old midden yes. Because I know an uncle of mine that had a farm and he lived in Carleton, uncle on me mother's side, it all went into the ashpit and I can remember they used to clean it out and take it on to his farmland. His farmland were in a different place to where he lived, you see? The farm buildings were outside Carleton you see, and he lived, he lived in Carleton and he brought the milk home to his house twice a day and people went and collected it.
People went and collected the milk off him?
R- Yes, he didn't go round with it.
He didn't hawk it.
R – No.
Aye, it sounds interesting and all. How did your mother do the washing?
R- Well, mangle and, we hadn’t a set pan, but after a while she got a gas boiler you see, and boiled the clothes in this gas washer and scrubbed them and boiled them and had an old mangle.
How about the dolly tub?
R- Dolly tub, yes but wooden. . Chaps used to come round mending dolly tubs, putting fresh garths on. And you remember…?
Now, when you say ‘fresh garths’ that's the hoop.
R- Yes. Do you remember the old brass and iron beds? They used to have laths across, metal laths, you interlaced them. Do you remember those beds?
Yes, spring steel.
R- Yes, and if any of these dolly tub men come round they were always asking had you any garths off the old iron bedstead, they’d give anything to get hold of those things, you know, spring steel to mend your tub with. Yes.
So it were a wooden dolly tub.
R- Wooden dolly tub, yes.
And how often did she do the washing?
R - Mondays every week. Mondays.
How long did it take her?
R- Well, she were washing when we got up, and she were bothering with them, at getting them dry, at Monday night if it hadn't been a good day. And she were ironing, it seemed to be all Tuesday.
How did she iron it?
R - Old iron on the fire. She used to be trotting backward and forwards putting them on the fire.
Which sort, were they irons that you put in t’fire, and then used on a slipper?
R- No, put in the fire.
Yes but…
R- Not a slipper, she used to rub them on the hearth rug, she took them off the fire.
That's it.
R - They had a article at front of the bars and then they stood them there. Put them right up to the bars, not into the dirty fire. Stood them up to the bars and then she used to run them on the hearth rug and then spit on them.
(750)
(35 min)
That’s it, because there were so many different sorts weren't there, there were block irons, and charcoal ...
R- And there were charcoal irons.
And then there were gas irons, and some with slippers, and some without.
R - But these were the old fashioned iron, and when they got pitted we used to take them up to Slingsby's Mill, and the chap in the mechanic shop, he'd buff them up for you. He had a, there were a belt about so wide, they said it were whale skin, they always said it were whale skin, and he’d put your iron on and it polished them up. They did that for polishing any of their stuff. But they always said it were whale skin, that’s what I know about it.
Yes, I could see how it could have been shark skin but not whale skin, yes.
R – Well, it could have been.
I've never come across it before, but no, you say it was whale skin…
R – No, you see I were only allowed [in]when we used to take these irons up to the mill, and the engine driver, a fellow called Geldard, Jack Geldard, he used to …
Aye. Can you remember the engines at Slingsby’s?
R- Oh aye. There were three engines, two at one side and one at the other.
Beams?
R- No. There were just one a beam engine that ran the shed but there were just ordinary engines at both the old spinning mill, that ran the spinning mill and what they ran the new mill. They were big engines, run with steel belts. They used to be rope drive, and, and just an ordinary flywheel, they used to be rope drive and then they ground the grooves off because the ropes were having, they were having a lot of trouble with the ropes and their were steel belts after that. And there were always trouble after with them. In frosty weather, there used to be a cork, you'll know about it, a cork covering on the wheel and they used to slip. They'd get started at Monday morning and it’d stop. The cork slipped and that wore, word went 'round that the cork had slipped and they'd be out about happen an hour or two till they glued some fresh cork on.
What can you remember most clearly about washing day?
R - Well making up and hearing the mangle going, and coming home at Monday, on a wet day and clothes round the fire. And mother used to say “I don't know how it is but if ever I have clothes at t’front of the fire you want to be round the fire yourselves!” You know we were pushing in and we were cold and she'd right big ones, [maiden/clothes horse] we have a little un about a yard high but…
Yes, you mean a maiden, clothes horse aye.
R - Aye, them six foot high, take a whole sheet.
(800)
What did you call them, did you call them a maiden or a clothes horse?
R - Aye. Clothes horse.
Aye. And like it’d be catch as catch can for tea that day would it?
R - Oh no, we never, even though we were poor we never went short, there were always meals ready.
How did your mother clean the house?
R - Well, she got down on the floor I suppose and scrubbed the floor. Thursday night or were that Friday, there were, everything were polished up and put down. Fire irons and fender were put down for t’week end and taken up [on Sunday].
That's it, that's it. Yes.
R - Because there were the flag for the hearth and she used to have it whitened, white stoned, and then eventually it come to an enamelled plate with flowers on. We advanced so far. And we used to have the old lino on the table from Lancaster.
Aye, oilcloth, American cloth.
R - Yes oilcloth. Well I said lino aye.
They used to call it American cloth and all, didn't they?
R – Yes, and how we used to get them, Carleton had a fair lot of railway men, living in Carleton, and they used to be working at Lancaster and if ever any of ‘em were working at Lancaster we used to go and ask them to bring you a tablecloth. That were how you got your tablecloth from Lancaster.
(40 min)
Was there anything, when she was cleaning up was there anything that she paid particular attention to? You know, was there anything that was really her pride and joy?
R – No. The steel fender, steel fender, that had to be polished. And then eventually they packed up to the black leading and did it with blacking on, lamp black paint you see, that were another step forward, with black enamel.
Aye. Did you and your brothers and sister do any jobs in the house?
R - No. But I know what I did. When the doctor came round Carleton he’d examine the person and then he'd may “I’ll make them a bottle up. Send somebody on for it.” And I’ve done dozens of times, walked to Skipton and collected, gone round the surgery and collected the medicine and carried it back to Carleton. And you got a penny.
Yes. Of course, ‘cause there again in those days they used to dispense their own medicines did the doctors.
R - Yes they did and he’d say to whoever were ill “I'll make a bottle up and you can send somebody in for it.” And if it were after dinner, you see, it were too late for the carrier. We had a village carrier, and he collected them if they were ready before dinner. But if the doctor visited after dinner he made the medicine up and it had to be collected [some other way]
Apart from going for the prescriptions, did you do any more jobs outside the house, do you know, like running errands, or gardening, or owt?
(850)
R - Well when me father worked for Slingsby’s, as well as being a mule spinner he was the verger at Carleton Church. He’d taken the job up when his father died. It were in the Thornton family for about hundred years. And when me father died me mother kept the cleaning of the church on, because she had to exist of something, and me eldest brother, he did the verger's work, did the Sunday work. And one of my jobs when I came out of school were to go see to the boiler and such.
Coke?
R – Coke. And it wasn’t these horseshoe boilers in this ...
Aye, Robin Hood aye. [Robin Hood was a type of coke boiler very commonly used for space heating in schools and churches.]
R - It wasn't the horseshoe boiler, it wore a square brick affair. And a small fire door at the bottom for raking the muck out, but you had to throw the coke on to the top and lift a lid up and it went down a hole. The article were like that now ….
Pear shaped inside. Aye.
R – Yes, opened out and all the pipe ends were all round except for where the, the fire door where you put your poker into. And that were at ten year old.
Did you ever help with the younger ones, you know, dressing them or eating or anything like that?
R - I used to have to rock the cradle. I were the only one who could get the youngest one to sleep, I can remember that. It's funny is that.
What sort of a cradle were that Horace?
R - Well, a wood one and it, it rocked.
On the floor? Yes.
R – Yes, rocked this way. You put your foot on to it, and rocked it like that.
Yes. And did your father do any work in the house, you know, mending, decorating, anything at all, looking after the children?
R - Well you see I were ten [when he died] Before that you don't have much recollection, but he used to do a lot of fishing in the canal. You know, he used to walk, you know where Niffany is? He used to walk across the fields from Carleton, across the river bridge and fish round there at Niffany. I can remember him taking me across those fields fishing, and I had a little rod ...
The only trouble with canal fishing is you can’t eat what you catch can you, unless you get a big pike or sommat like that ...
R- No.
And they rented the house didn't they?
R – Yes.
And one and six a week you said. Who was the landlord?
R - Miss Thompson, Miss Thompson owned the first one and drew rents off the other two.
Yes. Was she a good landlord?
R - Well I suppose so, I suppose so.
Did your mother ... now, obviously she did after your father’d died but we'll do this question in two parts. Like, before your father died, did your mother do any work in the house to earn a bit of money, you know, like child minding, taking in washing or baking or cooking ?
R- No. Well you see a mule spinner were like one of the better class cotton operatives a mule spinner were like the elite of the mill.
So, now, after your father died, that was a different story wasn't it?
R - Yes.
Tell me about that Horace.
(900)
(45 min]
R - Well, we were always short of money but never of food. That sounds a funny thing, but I had two uncles that had farms.
SCG/31 January 2003
7,530 words