Canny lass

Can anybody remember : when didthe Coop moved from it's original site next to the pit into the single-story, prefabricated building opposite the Institute at Netherton? when did the coop finally close? when did Esther (Rochester) who had the corner shop at Netherton move into the building?

No, it's me that's Canny

Coughs and colds were treated in our house by placing a dish in the oven containing malt vinegar and 4 or 5 'black bullets'. Anybody remember them? When the sweets had melted the mixture was stirred and used as an inhalation under a thick bath towel. If you had a high temperature at the same time you were tucked up in bed with a shelf, from the coal oven, wrapped in a blanket so that you could 'sweat it out'. The medicine box in a colliery house was very sparsely equipped. Andrews Liver Salts, senna pods and Golden Eye Ointment seemed to be the main stay and these could apparently cure any medical complaint known to man! Splinters, which couldn't be got at using a pair of tweezers, were removed by making a poultice of Fairy Household Soap, warmed and softened then, mixed with sugar. The poultice was left in place a couple of days and drew the splinter out. Perhaps the strangest 'cure' I came across in Netherton was using coal dirt from the pit to strengthen your back. My father never washed his back. He shunned the pit baths when they opened because they had showers, which meant you couldn't avoid getting your back wet. He washed after work in a large enamel bowl on the floor in front of the fire. He often got us children to wash his back but always told us to 'not touch the black bit, just wash around it. This was a patch about a foot square. In the mid 50's my father was found lying on the ground half way between the pit head and home in an unconscious state. He'd collapsed on his way home due to a burst duodenal ulcer and become unconcious due to blood loss. He developed perotinitis as a result and spent several weeks in the RVI after an emergency operation. They saved his life. Was he grateful to these men and women of the medical profession? No - because they had washed his back while he was unconscious. He was not amused and he said his back was never the same again.

I also remember the communal taps in Netherton Colliery. They were set into a white tiled alcove in the walls of the back streets. I can't remember how many there were but I would take a guess at one tap to every 6-8 houses. We were quite lucky and lived only 2 doors down from the nearest so we didn't have far to carry our water. In our house, and in many others, it was the job of the children when they came home from school to fill the 2 enamel water-buckets that stood in the scullery. They were very heavy. I remember going with my brother who was one year older than me. Between us we just about managed to carry a full bucket. If either of us went by ourself we had to make several trips with a smaller enamel 'pot', like a very large tea mug and fill the buckets at home. We also used to fetch water for some of the old folks in Third Street. I particularly remember 'Granny Watson' a widow who lived two doors the other side of 'our' tap. She always gave us something when we collected water for her - couple of Rowntrees fruit gums was the usual but one day she didn't have any sweets at home and she gave me and my brother a brass shovel from her companion set! (was it called a companion set - a stand with fire irons hanging on it, usually a shovel, a poker and a pair of tongs?) Helping the elderly and infirm was an accepted thing which none of us questioned. If one of them called you over when you were playing in the street and told you to go a message for them you just did it. Eventually, I'm not sure exactly when but some time later in the late 50's early 60's, they put cold water into the houses. A couple of families even installed a boiler and a bath at their own expense, the latter under the workbench in the scullery. Others stuck to their zinc bath in front of the fire.

I also remember helping to make proggy mats in the 50's. The mat frame was a permanent feature, leaning against the wall in the livingroom/kitchen and in the evenings or at week-ends it was balanced between the table and 2 chairbacks. The radio was switched on and the children had various jobs in the mat making process while we listened to a play or music on the 'wireless' as it was better known. I don't ever remember my father making mats so it clearly wasn't a mans kind of thing.(They were probably out tending to their leeks)! My job, being the youngest, was sorting the clippings into piles of different colours ready for use. The older children cut 'clippings' and the oldest ones actually got to do a bit of 'progging'. Like Bediesathome I can remember the proggy mat being put on the bed as an extra blanket but not just over the feet. It weighed a ton and a littlun like me couldn't move under the weight. It's no wonder I was flat chested as a teenager! I think it was probably used more for its restraininjg qualities than its heat retaining properties! You had no choice but to stay in bed and lie still. I can remember a few times, when clippings of a certain colour were running out, that there was near panic and we children were sent with a clipping in our hand to go and ask the neighbours if they had anything in a similar colour. My mother's sister lived in Bristol and was obviously a bit of a progger too as odd clippings would come in the post with a request for rags of a similar colour. I don't suppose progging had reached the masses in Bristol at that time so she had nobody to ask. Knitting was also a popular pass time and I remember that wool was bought in 'hanks' or 'skeens.' I don't remember the term 'yarns' but maybe it was a local thing. We children also got the job of winding the wool into balls but we used to turn a dining chair or stool upside down and stretch the skeen over the legs and wind it from there.

Colliery lass myself so I'll look forward to that!

Really good site John. Already added to my list of favourites, right up there with bedlington.co.uk! Looking forward to many happy hours reading.

I think your right. Jimmy it was.

Thank you, thank you, thank you and yes it was a goodun! I'll have to change my profile now as I'm no longer a "pensioner in the making". I'll get round to it when this hangover shifts itself.

Hi Pete, would that be Alan Routledge (Rutt)who went to the YM? He died around the age of 18-20 of leukemia. I rember we had a memorial service for him at the YM.

Ha Ha

If you're not a leek grower yourself then that's a very thorough piece of research you've done there Vic. Thank you very much. I had no idea that the growing of leeks was so complicated. It's a science in itself worthy of a degree course at Newcastle University! I can see it now - "Bachelor of leeks" or better still "Master of leeks." That the leeks are judged as a set explains why there were always 3 to a chair and that there are 3 different types of leek explains why they all looked so different and now I've got a clear picture of what the judges are looking for and I've been able to explain it for hubby. He's fair impressed by the pictures in The Chronicle and understands now why I call Swedish leeks 'scallions'. (Yes folks he does understand a wee bit of Geordie. I've promised him an honorary Geordie 'citizenship' when he can get his tongue around 'by hinny this chebles claggy'). The pictures are now winging their way to various parts of Sweden to friends who haven't believed me either. You never know but this just might catch on with the Swedes? The'yre already experts at the other kind of leek show. Thanks again. You've made my day.

Thanks Brettly!

Hi guys, thanks for the info! Symptoms, If I'd known that as a child I don't think I'd have eaten broth after the leek show. That fertiliser must have been a well kept secret. I had no idea!! Brian, Which kind of leek show was it that you just missed? According to Brettly there are two. Keith, that's not a bad idea! I'll see what i can do but I'll contact you nearer the time for details so that I don't take him to the wrong type of leek show! However, he's still driving me nuts with questions about the competitive side of the thing. How do they judge leeks? What qualities and characteristics are they comparing? I can remember the leek show at the 'tute' in Netherton. I recall that leeks were always displayed in sets of 3, propped up against the backs of the chairs. As far as I remember the size of the leeks in each set was pretty much the same but in some sets the leeks were enormous and in others quite small. However, it wasn't always the biggest that won if my memory serves me right. Could it be that size, in this instance at least, doesn't matter?

Prompted by the new book by Paul Mann I've been trying to explain to my Swedish hubby just what a leek club is - or was, do they still exist? My knowledge falls short when it comes to how the entries were judged. I have a vague recollection of some kind of formula involving the length of the white part and the circumfrence of the leek. At the minute he's having difficulty beleiving that leeks can grow to anywhere near the size of those I have described. Can anybody help me out?

The discovery of radon is often accredited to Freidrich Ernst Dorn around 1900 and It could be Alexander Solzjenitsyn (never could spell his name) who was released from exile in Siberia in the 50's. But i know for certain that the 2nd modern olympics was held in Paris, about the same time that Dorn was supposedly discovering radon.

Oops! Just noticed that Cympil has already posted the photo for you.

The funeral chapel was still standing - just - in 1988 on my last visit to the cemetary, and I attended a funeral there as late as summer 1983. If you look in the fantastic picture gallery on this site, under: -Historic Bedlington -Bedlington & Netherton Old Photos -Page 1 you'll find a b&w photo of the chapel (Last photo on the 2nd row named "Bedlington Church") kindly uploaded by Cympil.

The Bank Top

Merry Christmas to one and all. Any chance of a white Christmas in Bedlington? We just got our first snow of the season today, a month later than usual, here in Sweden. Doubtful if it'll stay though. It's just nudging the minus mark on the thermometer! Normally we'd have a good foot or so by now.

I'll just add my six pennerth, HAPPY BIRTHDAY PETE!!

I think I do Keith! There was a Richard Coulthard in my class. Tall, thin, slicked back hair and "Buddy Holly" type specs. Could that be the same person? I don't recognise the others though. And, while we're strolling down memory lane at Westridge, does anybody remember Mr. Johnson the science teacher? All this talk of punishment made me think of him. As far as I know he never doled out corporal punishment himself - by the look of him, he probably wasn't strong enough. However he had an inimitable system of chastisement built on the premiss that the punishment should fit the crime. The offender had to write 400 words on a given topic dictated by Mr Johnson. The topic was always a single word. On the two occasions when I was on the receiving end of the stick the words were loquacity and verbosity. Now, when you are 12 and a bit such words are not the stuff of everyday conversation round the dinner table. Neither are they heard too often when your playing moont the cuddy (now there's a memory!) or enjoying a leisurely spot of cricket between 2 dustbin lids in the back street - not in Netherton anyhow. So the first part of the punishment was to give up your break, go to the library and try to find out what the word meant. That wasn't always easy because you didn't always know how the spelling was!! When you did finally manage to find out what it was you'd been ordered to write about you inevitably found that you had to write about the "sin" you had committed - in my case talking too much. Even today, 53 years later, I still can't work out just which principles of pedagogy Mr Johnson was applying or if they worked. Today I can't remember a thing about science but I've never forgotten either the meaning or the spelling of loquacity or verbosity.

No, no, no Keith! Holland's far too strenuous. The highest peak, Vaalserberg, is an enormous 1,060 ftä. Try Denmark instead. The highest you'll find there is Moellehoej with a staggering 561 ft.

Symptoms wrote: a Geography teacher (name gone!) used an enormous white sand shoe. Was it Mr. Grainger? Tall, blonde, quite young. He taught PE as well, but only now and then. He fancied himself as a bit of a ladies man.

Beautiful baby! Beautiful name! Congratulations!