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Malin Bridge Primary School


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I went to Malin Bridge Primary school about 1984-1990, worked there in about 1995 for a couple of years and got to see loads of rooms/places that I couldn't see as a pupil. Spent a bit of time up in the infamous bell tower in the junior building, it has a huge water tank up there and a small opening in a dividing wall (After walking on a thin beam over the water tank!) that takes you further into the loft space. It's a surprisingly light space with the bell tower itself letting in quite a bit and various holes and small windows letting in a bit more. Very scary place to be if I'm honest and that's forgetting all the grey lady stories!

Also went down into the basement of the junior and infant buildings where the boilers are kept, can't remember much about them except they looked like they hadn't changed hardly in the 90+ years since being built. On one occasion the caretaker took me onto the roof of the infants building, through a small window you could see the original roof inside which is a fantastic piece of architecture - Looked very ornate with windows dotted around the sides, shame to cover it up really, just wish I had taken a photograph!!

I've searched high and low for old photo's and history of the place but haven't found much... Does anyone have any photo's or info? I think deejayone should know something as if I am right he went there at the same time as me and was even in the same class... (Mr Grafton)?

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Guest wheresspot

I know this thread was started years ago, but I went to Malin Bridge at exactly the same time (84 - 90). I seem to remember they used to let pupils go up to see the bell tower on their last day at the school, but for some reason I never made it up there - something I really regret. I'd love to go and have another look round the place - I often have dreams about being back inside the junior school - my house used to overlook the building so it's always prominent in my memories.

Teachers I remember were Mrs Davies & Mrs Thornton in the infant school. I also remember my Reception class teacher, I think her name was Miss Pouny (not sure how it would be spelt, but that's how I remember it sounding). She got married and changed her name to Mrs Mc-something. I remember her bringing her wedding dress into school for everyone to see and she wore it - I seem to remember the caretaker (Mr Mick?) walking her into the hall like a recreation of her wedding!

At the junior school I remember Mr Knowles, Mr Porter, Mr Grafton and Mr Pemberton (who sadly passed away not long after he retired - I believe he spent his entire career at Malin Bridge).

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I too went to Malin Bridge Infants and Junior School but I started there a bit earlier, about 1952.

A few years ago, (June 1987), a history of the school was published by the wife of the then caretaker and I purchased a copy from the school.

Things have changed a bit since those days. I was given three strokes of the cane from the then infants headmistress, for talking to my pal Chris while we were sat cross legged on the hall wooden floor, reciting our times table. I was 6 years old at the time. The headmistess was called Miss Catherall and when she dropped dead of a heart attack a year or so later I had mixed feelings about her demise.

The book is called Sheffield School Life, Malin Bridge, School diaries and pupil's memories from 1879, and written by Slyvia Langan.

It covers various periods in the history of the two schools.

In it there's a class picture featuring my mother in the 1920's and another of one of my double cousins some years later.

HD

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I too went to Malin Bridge Infants and Junior School but I started there a bit earlier, about 1952.

A few years ago, (June 1987), a history of the school was published by the wife of the then caretaker and I purchased a copy from the school.

Things have changed a bit since those days. I was given three strokes of the cane from the then infants headmistress, for talking to my pal Chris while we were sat cross legged on the hall wooden floor, reciting our times table. I was 6 years old at the time. The headmistess was called Miss Catherall and when she dropped dead of a heart attack a year or so later I had mixed feelings about her demise.

The book is called Sheffield School Life, Malin Bridge, School diaries and pupil's memories from 1879, and written by Slyvia Langan.

It covers various periods in the history of the two schools.

In it there's a class picture featuring my mother in the 1930's and another of one of my double cousins some years later.

HD

The book is available as second hand from Amazon, see this link

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Guest wheresspot

My parents bought the book at the time of it's release, because me and my sister were both at the school then. They still have it - I saw it for the first time in years about a month or so ago. My little boy pulled it off their bookcase - thankfully I managed to grab it before he either ripped it up or tried to eat it (he has a thing about eating paper!) and it's in pretty good nick. There's a picture on the back cover of all the kids in the school when the book was published. I am on the picture somewhere (you can't really tell who is who) - I remember the photo being taken though.

My parents also bought a print of the Joe Scarborough painting 'Malin Bridge School Days' - I believe one of the infant school teachers commissioned him to paint it when she retired - I can't remember her name though.

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Like hilldweller I was at Malin Bridge in the 1950s (Infants 1953-55, Juniors 1955-1959). The infants teachers I remember were Miss Birch, Miss Bolsover, Mrs Senior and Miss Garrison. Edith Garrison was an excellent teacher and a lovely person; she lived next door to my aunt and uncle on Thompson Road near the Botanical Gardens. I managed to avoid being caned by Miss (Evelyn) Catherall. By the way she didn't die of a heart attack - she was helping to supervise the children going for lunch at the church hall opposite and a boy was misbehaving. She chased after him, fell and hit her head on a paving stone and died of head injuries. This was in May 1954 - she was aged 56. Miss Pass succeeded her as headteacher. While I was there, Miss Garrison planted a tree to commemorate her 25 years' service as a teacher at the school - I think it's still there on the bottom lawn.

In the Junior School I was taught by Mrs Potter and Mr Hawley. Lewis Hawley became headteacher and I kept in touch with him until he died aged 84 in 1999. He succeeded Frank Courage as headteacher - other teachers I remember in the Junior School are Mrs Preece (her daughter Margaret was in my class), Mr Brooham, Mr Binney, Miss Winkworth and Miss Birtles (who became Mrs Rennick).

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I was a year ahead of Wadsleyite having started after new year 1952. I left the infants for the juniors in 1954 and left in 1958.

We were told by our teacher that Miss Catherall had collapsed on the steps from the St. Marks Church Hall dining room up to Hibberd Place, whilst carrying a very heavy typewriter. If she had been chasing a lad while carrying one of those great things, then no wonder she came to grief.

In the book it simply mentions that she died suddenly outside the canteen.

In the juniors my teachers in the third and forth years were Mr. Brooham, who used to arrive on a motor cycle combination clad in black oilskins and a hemispherical helmet. He parked it under the girl's playground shed.

Mr. Hawley was very encouraging as was Mr. Courage. Some of the male teachers used to park their cars under the shed. A wise move, if they had left them in the boy's shed goodness knows what might have happened.

On Monday mornings we used to take our sixpence and Yorkshire Penny Bank book to him to have the money entered up. I was always mesmorised by the rather hi-tech wireless receiver and amplifier for the schools broadcast service in the classrooms which was located in his study.

Happy Days ! :)

HD

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Hi hilldweller - it's interesting to read your further recollections. Over the years a number of people have asked me about Miss Catherall's death, and so I decided to apply for a copy of the death certificate. This arrived today, and it states that her death on 24 June 1954 was due to "Left ventricular failure ... post mortem without inquest". So although it is clear that she collapsed on the steps of the church hall and might have hit her head, her death was evidently due to heart failure rather than head injuiries as I had been told. My mother was quite sure that she had been chasing a misbehaving boy, as apparently it was my cousin Alan. On the certificate, the place of death is given as "Malin Bridge Infants School, Dykes Lane" and she lived at 38 Gisborne Road, Banner Cross.

 

I was never taught by Frank Brooham but my older sister tells me that he was a very good teacher; he lived at Stannington and died aged 90 in 2005. When supervising children going to Hillsborough Baths he would evidently be on his motorbike and sidecar, keeping alongside them as they walked down the hill. I well remember the wireless programmes that were relayed from Mr Courage's study, especially the weekly history program that featured short radio dramas - I can still remember some of the programmes even now, such as the "Life in ancient China" one about the man whose jade was holy but nobody believed him. Memories....

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I went to Malin Bridge for a couple of years in the early 80s when we lived on Findon Street. I remember Mrs Ryalls, Miss Haddon,

Mr Porter, Mr Pemberton.

Remember going upstairs for assembly and that kind of bay window that overlooked our room when I was in Miss Haddon's class,

the sandpit in the playground and playing football with a big stone when we hadn't a ball.

I'd previously been at Rivelin Infants on Morley Street.

.

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I was never taught by Frank Brooham but my older sister tells me that he was an very good teacher; he lived at Stannington and died aged 90 in 2005. When supervising children going to Hillsborough Baths he would evidently be on his motorbike and sidecar, keeping alongside them as they walked down the hill.

I remember the trips to the baths with a long column of lads stumbling down the hill trying to keep up with Mr. Brooham who in turn was trying to keep his speed down.

Crossing Holme Lane was conducted like a military exercise, as was crossing the narrow Hill Bridge at the bottom of Walkley Lane.

We went in via the back entrance by the boiler house, quickly changed in the communal changing room and then a quick paddle in the foot-bath and in to the swimming pool.

Beginners had to stand in the shallow end while Mr. Sivoir (sp), the instructor, poured water over our heads from a large copper ladle on the end of a long wooden pole.

Afterwards the trek back up the hill with soaking wet hair, it was no fun at all in winter.

HD

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Have been meaning to post to this page since discovering it a few years ago. The Corona Virus Lockdown has given me time.  Not all bad then!

Anyway, I started in the infants back in about 1949.  I left in the summer of 1955, so you work it out.  I remember my first teacher was a Miss Lowey who taught the first year in the Canteen across the road. This was a good place, big and with a bit of garden outside, plus a stage.  She was nice.but the second year we were taught by Mrs Mainwairing whom I recall as a bit of a tartare.  Presumably it was shock at the shift to real school from the relaxed first stages.  She always forced me to eat the disgusting dinners until I was sick outside one day.  She never refused my request to leave it again. A lot of the puddings were secreted in my pocket and chucked in a corner of the yard when I got out.  Those dinners were so different from those from a Mum who was a good cook.

Enough of that.  The matter I want to report is about Mrs Preece, who Mr Courage, the then head, put in charge of our class for two years running, as an experiment I understand.  Normally the teachers were changed yearly. This was an inspired move as Mrs Preece must have been determined to follow the same practices as the few private preparatory schools in getting pupils ready for the 11+.  Malin Bridge had never had any notable success in getting kids to the grammars in the city, but few folk had any expectations in those days.  She got the agreement of those interested and supportive parents to purchase crib or preparation books from Andrews, Educational Booksellers just behind the City Hall. We had to work through them at home and she marked them separately from our school work.  They were quite different to school work, including IQ tasks and problems.  I think I quite enjoyed them.  She was nice but no nonsense.  She taught us to write long hand neatly and with style, and to hold a pen the correct way.

Whether I am remembering all this quite correctly, I am not sure, but I do know that there was a significant difference in her approach and that I went with Mum to Andrews to get these books etc.  When it came to the 11+ we had some experience of the style of papers we faced. The upshot was that she achieved fantastic results from that little school.  I remember one girl got through to the Girls High and six (yes 6!) boys passed for King Edwards, supposedly the best boys' grammar in the city in those days. Others went to High Storrs, City Grammar etc.  Unheard of in the annals of the school.

I remember going back to visit Malin Bridge at the end of my time at KES with a friend who like me had been one of the 6. It all seemed so small!  Mr Courage was still there, He talked politics to us, trying to get us two lads to take life seriously.  It took a few years before that kicked in.  I don't recall Mrs Preece so perhaps she had moved on to a headship herself.  She certainly deserved it. She played the unfair system to the benefit of the underperforming kids in, let's face it, a lower income neighbourhood with lower levels of ambitions for the children.  

KES was OKish, an exams factory, which gave you the paper qualifications needed later, but not the life experience you really needed - there were no girls for a start.

I'd be interested to read if there are any real oldies like me with memories of those days. 

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Thinking about Malin Bridge, I also remember going swimming. My teacher was Mr Sivior, he was really funny and made us laugh. 

In the junior school I had Mrs Potter, really bossy lady then Mr Hawley for 2 years. We had handwriting competitions every week and the winner had to go to the front  assembly to collect a shield that you kept for a week. 

Mr Courage was Headmaster, he was brilliant. I remember the day he retired, tears streaming down his face. He was followed by Mr Hawley, who was also brilliant. I remember the dinner ladies being really bossy. After lunch we played relay races in the playground. 

In Y4 Mr Hawley class we listened to the radio every Monday ( I think) when music was played. We had a Maths test every Friday morning. 

Good times

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