Canny lass

I watched a TV documentary about Cohen a couple of years ago. He lived as a monk for 5 years but left the order as during his time there he dicovered that he wasn't religious!

... because it's a drinking fountain, perhaps?

Lovely! If this is going to be a regular display i wouldn't mind knitting/crocheting/sewing a few poppies.

Spot on! Alan Stappard it was, but i can't recall him ever being called Harry. Lovely film, damian. Brought back many memories to a 'Third streeter'.

A man and a woman are sitting in a pub discussing their forthcoming marriage. They have been ‘saving themselves’ for each other and have never seen each other naked. The woman doesn’t want any unpleasant surprises – for either of them – on the wedding night so she says to her intended, “I’m as flat as a pancake up top”. “That’s OK”, he replies, “I’m equipped like a new born baby down below”. The wedding night arrives and both undress, somewhat nervously. The woman removes her bra and says, “See, I’m as flat as a pancake”. The man removes his underpants and the woman faints. After a couple of minutes she rallies round and says, “You swine! You told me you were equipped like a new born baby”. “Exactly”, says the man, “47 centimetres long, 3.865 gram”.

You must remember his maps. HPW! They were massive! Roman Empire behind his desk, to the left of the blackboard. WW2's Europe on the back wall together with one other - long since forgotten (may have been Viking Britain). They were real works of art. Did he insist that you wrote everything in italics? We had to.

HPW, now I'm confused. Are we talking about the same picture? I'm referring to the photo 11 posts before this one and labelled "WESTRIDGE - UPPER REMOVE - SUMMER 1960". That date, I think, is correct. It fits in perfectly with my time at Westridge and Robert Cross as head boy.

I just had a lovely mental picture of Mr. Abrahart doing just that! I wonder what he would have painted on his classroom wall? Can you remeber those lovely maps he had hand-painted around his classroom?

Could this be a group photo of the prefects together with the head boy and the head girl? That would account for the different ages. As for 'remove classes' I vaguely remember Mr. Hemming visiting Junior Remove, within the first few days of my starting at Westridge, and explaining to us that it was a class which - if they worked hard - would be allowed an extra year of study in which to obtain GCE O-levels. At that time, the standard, compulsory secondary education lead to the Northern Counties Certificate of Secondary Education. Like the public schools he wanted "good achievers" to have a second chance and be able to obtain - by way of an extra year's work - the same level of examination success (O-levels) as pupils in the Grammar school. I don't know if it was his idea or if it was something happening in all secondary schools at that time.

I thought nr 16 might be the head girl. I remember the head girl as always having a 'sash' like the one she's wearing. She's also wearing the school tie which makes me think she's a pupil rather than a teacher. Just a thought. Number 11 reminds me of George Mitcheson. Would that name ring a bell, HPW?

Thanks HPW. You don't get this in history books!

We are very lucky to have access to HPW and his knowledge. A veritable 'mine' of information.

Now where have i heard something like that before? ....... Ah, yes ... i think it was the leek show at Netherton Colliery.

A million thanks HPW! A very vivid and easy to understand description of what it must have been like for my relative in 1913. Knowing what miners endured makes me very proud to come from a family of miners who, when you think back on it, were at the very heart of the industrial revolution in Britain. Without them where would we be today. Hats off to each and everyone of them! PS your decription of the pit 'netties' left me gasping for breath!

Happy thanksgiving to you too, Vic! Have you got snow? We had our first in September but it didn't stay long. Lake temp. down to 13 degrees now. That's my limit for swimming this year.

It's all this new-fangled technology, Eggy! It was much better with photo albums and sticky tape.

Two working class lads were invited by an upper class gent to swim in his private pool. While they were changing into their swimming gear one said to the other: “Did you notice how small the private parts of the rich are?” “”Yes!, said the other, “ but it’s probably because they had toys to play with when they were kids.”

That's my knuckles well and truly rapped! You know it was appreciated.

I'm amazed that Foxy hasn't got this going already! Never leave anything to a man! Happy birthday 4G!

Doesn't sound very promising for me then!

Thanks Eggy! This is the site I'm using but so far I'm not having any luck with finding the full report.

Thanks Jim 1.

Thanks HPW! I didn't think about that kind of jack! If you are asking about which area in the pit the accident occurred then I'm afraid I can't help. I haven't seen the full report as I'm still trying to get my hands on it. However, I do know that it happened at Bebside colliery on May 3rd 1913 and that the lad was a putter. Here's a bit more info: "Deceased was going along the coal face between two gateways, when a filler in one gate shouted to deceased not to go along there as stone was heavy. Just then a huge fall occurred, killing deceased instantly. the stone fell from a jack and canted the timber out".

Help needed again from our resident mining experts! "The stone fell from a jack and canted the timber out". (1913) This is written in a mining report related to an accident in which a young boy was killed. I understand he died instantly under the stone. Can anybody explain what a 'jack' is and what a 'canted out timber' is? Trying to get an idea of how this accident happened.