OTHER SCHOOL MEMORIES
 
taken from
 
"Clonbonny - A Centre of Learning"
 

edited by Gearóid O'Brien

 

 

Pic of 1930 School Group

1930 Picture. Front row (left to right): Gerry Fox, Edward Brisk Hughes, Johnny Colclough, Frank Hemstead, Kevin Longworth, Joe Scanlon, Frank Longworth, Tommy Hughes, Tommie Colclough, Andy Coffey, Jimmy Hynds, Larry Moylan, Frank Hughes. Second row (left to right): Michael Moylan, Francis Hynes, Biddy Hughes, Teresa Kielty, Mary Scanlon, Nancy Curley, Nell Boland, Kathleen Martin, Mary Fox, Myra Curley, Bill Boland, Eddie Longworth. Third row (left to right): James Coffey, Rose Bannon, Mary Kielty, Mollie Byrne, Eileen Balfe, Fanny Moylan, Teresa Curley, Annie Hughes, Kathleen Balfe, Kieran Devery, Jimmy Doyle. Back row (left to right): J. Joe Coffey, Danny Hynes, Tommy Aspell, Frank Boland, Johnny Byrne, Tommy Moylan.

 

FRANK HEMPSTEAD'S FIRST DAYS AT SCHOOL

I will never forget my first two days at school. My aunt brought me to school across the fields. It was only ten minutes from our house. My aunt was talking to Miss Ghent and whatever distracted me she got away unknown to me and I ran to the door crying melia murder. Now in Clonbonny Old School there was a porch which acted as a cloakroom and a door led from that to the classroom. There was neither a latch, a hoop nor a bolt on the door, yet I spent two days kicking and shoving this door and roaring crying. All I had to do was pull the door back and I was out and would be home in ten minutes. I forget how I settled down afterwards, but I took to school like a duck to water. There was no playground to the school, all we had was a road which passed by the door. There was very little traffic on it and there was only one motor car in Clonbonny - O'Brien's and very seldom we saw that.
 
The games we played were home produced. Motorcars and lorries were getting plentiful in the town, so we boys got old basins with holes in them and imagined they were steering wheels and ran up and down the road imitating an engine revving. We had a garage where we pulled in for petrol and a jail for holding lads who had no tax or insurance. Eddie Longworth was the police officer - he was a born leader. We moved on next to pram wheels with handles!
 
 
   
FRANK HEMPSTEAD RECALLS GOING TO SCHOOL IN HIS BARE FEET
 

I often wonder how children of five years of age walked from Glynwood or Ories across the fields to school. Are we molly-coddling our children too much today? We would be looking forward to the month of May to go in our bare feet. The roads were gravel roads that time and after a few days our feet got as hard as leather and we could race on the roads as good as on the grass. Occasionally we might get a stone bruise on our heel but it would be gone in a few days. On one occasion my grandmother caught a leech and put him on the bruise and he sucked all the bruised blood out of it and it healed in no time. If we got a thorn deep in our foot and we could not remove it with a needle the people got a tiny piece of cobbler's wax and placed it on a small piece of good brown paper and melted it with a hot iron and stuck it over the thorn and the next morning if you bruised the spot or poked it with a needle, the thorn shot out.

 

 

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