Oral history - interview extract one

Study Title: Family Life and Work Experience before 1918, 1870-1973

Information about interviewee
Date of birth: 1895
Gender: Male
Marital status: Married
Occupation: Final occupation Coop manager/administrator
Geographic region: Bolton
Interviewee's name: Frank Benson
Interview ID: int054

Int.: Your name please?

FB: Frank Benson.

Int.: Your present address?

FB: 29 Malvern Avenue, Smithills, Bolton.

Int.: Marital status?

FB: Married.

Int.: Year of marriage?

FB: 1922.

Int.: Year of birth?

FB: 1895.

Int.: Where were you born?

FB: Bolton. Crumpsall Street.

Int.: How many years did you live in the particular house where you were born?

FB: 9.

Int.: And where did you move to then?

FB: To a new house on a new housing estate. A new house in Astley Bridge. Well I was born in Crumpsall St. which is actually on this side of Astley Bridge. Then we moved over the bridge. What we called the bridge to Bloomfield Street. Bolton.

Int.: Can you remember why it was you moved?

FB: Because of the growing family.

Int.: How long did you stay at that address?

FB: 'Til I was married. 1904-1922 apart from the war years.

Int.: How many brothers and sisters did you have?

FB: Four sisters, one brother.

Int.: Could you give me the order in which they came?

FB: One elder sister, 3 years older than I am I was second; next a brother 3 years younger; a sister another 3 years younger; another sister 3 years younger again; another sister 5 years younger. That was the spacing between them.

Int.: How old was your father when you were born?

FB: Twenty six.

Int.: Where did he come from?

FB: I think it was Pabold.

Int.: What was his job?

FB: Moulder in a foundry - iron moulder in a textile firm. For making textile machinery.

Int.: Did he have any other job before that or after that?

FB: No. He did that all his life. He came to Bolton to be an apprentice, as a moulder. It was a craft trade. He served five years.

Int.: Did he have any casual or part-time jobs of any sort?

FB: Not paid jobs. Plenty of voluntary. I can't think that any of them were paid unless it was an honorarium for trade union work. He'd probably get a small fee for being on the co-operative educational committee.

Int.: Do you remember him every being out of work?

FB: Yes. Yes many occasions - well not many. There was such things as short time and slack time and I think I can remember one long period of a strike about ten weeks. Oh yes, various periods of unemployment because of shortage of orders I suppose. I remember as a child that my mother would be put to it to find enough money to feed us when he was out of a job. When there was no work and no unemployment pay or anything like that.

Int.: How old was your mother when you were born?

FB: Twenty five.

Int.: Where did she come from?

FB: Astley Bridge.

Int.: Had she any jobs before she was married?

FB: No. Unless you call looking after the family shop. They had a small mixed business. I think it was one of those small corner shops, something like that, her step father, and she used to help in it. She stayed at home and the rest of the family went out to work.

Int.: Did she work after she was married or not?

FB: No.

Int.: Not even part-time jobs?

FB: No.

Int.: I should like to ask you about life at home when you were a child; the time up to when you left school.

Int.: As a child the house you lived in longest would be in Crumpsall Street, wouldn't it?

FB: As a child, yes.

Int.: Can you tell me how many rooms there were in the house in Crumpsall Street?

FB: Just two up and two down. Well there'd be a scullery at the back, which was used as a wash house, and then a kitchen and I think there was a small sitting room, and two bedrooms. Which mean's we had to get out as we got bigger - that was the reason for moving. We had three children when we left there.

Int.: Did anyone else besides you and your parents and brothers and sisters live in the house?

FB: No.

Int.: Did your mother have anyone to help her in the house?

FB: No.

Int.: Was the washing done at home?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did your mother or father make or mend the family's clothes?

FB: Oh mother did. Mother was clothes mender and baker. She used to bake her own bread.

Int.: You would I suppose buy some clothes?

FB: Oh yes.

Int.: And these would be bought new or second-hand?

FB: All new.

Int.: Where were they bought?

FB: At the Co-op.

Int.: How often would you say that you had new clothes?

FB: We had a new suit every sermons. Every Sunday School sermons.

Int.: And what about shoes?

FB: We'd have a new pair of shoes. We used to be fit out every May when it was Sunday School sermons. We'd have new clothes and shoes and those would go on for twelve months and then you would take them for school, for everyday wear.

Int.: Did your father ever mend your shoes?

FB: Yes. On occasions yes. By the way, we wore clogs not shoes. We had a pair of shoes for Sunday, not for everyday of the week.

Int.: Did your father help your mother at all with any of the jobs in the house?

FB: Yes. He would help with the washing up at night. He'd mend.... He'd do his own repairs in the house. I wouldn't say he did anything else apart from washing up, helping to wash up.

Int.: Did he make the fires?

FB: Oh yes, on occasions, yes. He would be up early in the morning and have the fire going for us to get up to.

Int.: Did he do any decorating?

FB: Apart from white-washing and lime-washing, no. Well yes, he would do some ordinary plain painting in the house. He'd keep the place going in decent order.

Int.: Did he ever do any cleaning or cooking?

FB: Yes when mother was confined and in bed with the children. He had to.

Int.: Did he do anything for you as children? Like dressing, undressing or feeding you or anything like that?

FB: In emergencies, yes. But not normally, no.

Int.: Would he read to you or tell you stories?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Would he take you out without your mother?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Would he look after you while she went out?

FB: Yes.

Int.: As children did you have any tasks that you had to carry out regularly at home?

FB: Yes. Saturday mornings you had certain jobs to do. I had to clean the knives and forks, spoons and cutlery. My sisters had their regular jobs on Saturday mornings helping Mum to clean the house. The house had to be gone through, cleaned right through. And we all had to do certain jobs that were allocated to us, and we didn't get our pocket money, which was a 1/2d until we'd done them.

Int.: Was this confined to Saturdays or did you have to do things throughout the week as well?

FB: As far as I can remember it was confined to Saturdays. Or possibly maybe Friday night; if there was something important on like a Sunday School outing or something like that we'd do them Friday night.

Int.: How long did you go on doing this? After you left school?

FB: Yes. We always had to do something in the house. I started to earn money when I was. In fact my first recollection of earning money was when I got 2d. a week for carrying breakfasts up into the spinning mill. In those days the spinners started to work at 6 o'clock. They used to break for breakfast at 8 o'clock till half past. And if they wanted a cooked breakfast it had to be carried into them. If they wanted a cooked breakfast, eggs and bacon or bacon and tomatoes. My first job was carrying breakfasts up to 2 spinners in the cotton mill which earned me a penny each from each of them. Then of course when I was going to school I took up papers. Helped the family income earning 2/- a week taking on papers every day. Yes my sister went as a half timer. There was a need as the family grew up for more income. Everything was geared to earning more money, in order to get more clothes, to live better. When we were very young father's age wasn't an adequate one for 3 children or four children or five or six as it was in later years. By the time the last 2, the 2 younger, I was earning 2 shillings a week on a paper round and my elder sisters would be earning 2 or 3 shillings a week as a half timer in the weaving shed.

Int.: Did the older children help the younger children with things they found difficult? Helping to feed or dress them and so on?

FB: Yes. Yes.

Int.: Did the younger children do anything to help the older ones in any way?

FB: Can't ever remember, no.

Int.: Were you expected to go to bed at a particular time?

FB: Yes. When we were very young we were put to bed at seven o'clock, as we grew up eight o'clock and later nine o'clock. And of course the light nights in the summer we didn't go to bed until it was dark.

Int.: At what age did you start to put yourself to bed?

FB: About eight.

Int.: And was it your mother who put you to bed before then or did your father do it?

FB: One or the other. If we'd been naughty father would put us to bed with a slap, if we'd been good mother would put us to bed.

Int.: Did you share the bedroom with anybody?

FB: Yes until we moved we had to. The three children had to sleep in one room. Two boys and a girl. By the time I was eight of course we had moved into a bigger house and the girls shared one bedroom and the two boys shared another.

Int.: What room did you bath in?

FB: We used to bath in the old tin bath in front of the fire.

Int.: How often did you bath?

FB: On Friday nights and the three children had their baths one after the other.

Int.: How often did you have clean clothes to put on?

FB: Every week on a Friday night.

Int.: Where did the family have their meals?

FB: In the kitchen.

Int.: Was there any occasions when you would eat in another room?

FB: No.

Int.: Where did your mother do the cooking?

FB: In the kitchen.

Int.: That would be on a fire range would it?

FB: Yes.

Int.: What time would you have breakfast?

FB: Eight o'clock.

Int.: And would you all have breakfast then?

FB: Yes.

Int.: What about your father?

FB: Oh he would go off to work at six o'clock and take his breakfast with him. He'd take sandwiches with him to the foundry.

Int.: Would he have anything at all before he went?

FB: Oh I expect so. He would probably cook himself some bacon. Yes I think he used to get a breakfast. Or probably I should say he would have some porridge, oatmeal porridge, and milk to go off with and may be a cup of tea. And take some bacon sandwiches with him. For the breakfast half hour - eight o'clock till half pad.

Int.: What did the rest of you have for breakfast?

FB: It varied. Bread and butter and maybe when eggs were cheap we'd have an egg between the two of us. Or porridge - we'd just have porridge and nothing else. And Oatmeal porridge Easter day was the one day in the year we had a whole egg.

Int.: Did you ever have anything special on Sundays?

FB: We had a joint when times were good enough, permitted, father was in full work. We'd have a big Sunday dinner with beef and Yorkshire pudding, tomato.

Int.: But you wouldn't have anything special at breakfast time?

FB: No.

Int.: What did you have to drink?

FB: Tea and cocoa. Generally cocoa at breakfast in winter time. That was our winter beverage, both for breakfast and supper.

Int.: Now you said you had a big joint on Sundays for dinner time, what about the other days in the week?

FB: We'd have the cold meat on Monday. We'd have stew on Tuesday, or fish, or if there was enough meat left over Mother would make it into cottage pie, or she would stew up the meat and serve it with boiled potatoes. Wednesday was baking day and we had Lancashire potato pie that was the standard thing. We might have anything on Thursday. Perhaps if the wages permitted it we might have chops - chops were a luxury. But I can remember the time when I've gone out, mother used to send me to the butchers when we were really hard up and father was out of work, I'd go out with 2d and buy herbs and we'd just have soup made out of perhaps some bone and what we called pot herbs. Quite a lot, you'd get an onion and a carrot and a bit of cabbage for about 2d, two-penny worth of pot herbs and a bone from the butchers, which he might give to you if you were a regular customer. And mum would make soup up and put some peas or lentils in it and we might have that one day a week.

Int.: Did you have a pudding or anything like that?

FB: Yes, if the oven was heated, we'd have a rice pudding. Possibly three times a week. Wednesday, possibly Friday and Sunday we'd have a rice pudding. Occasionally mother would make what's called a syrup dumpling (flour dumpling with treacle). May be just a banana chopped up in milk. But we had a second course most dinners, unless times were bad. I've known bad times when mother was put to it to give us a proper meal. I remember one period, a ten week strike when I was a child and we just had to scratch what we could get. For 2d or 3d mother would make us a soup dinner and that would be it.

Int.: Were you able to get meat at all during that period when they were really tight?

FB: Maybe some scraps, you know, what we call pie meat or something like that to make a stew of perhaps once a week. But on the whole our life was fairly good standard for working class in Bolton. There must have been hundreds of families for worse off than me. We were called the respectable working class. And we were taught to make the best use of them halfpenny penny that came into the house. We had it {ILLEGIBLE} in us 10 sticks with you too.

Int.: Did your father come home at dinner time?

FB: Yes. He used to run up Kay Street. There were two big foundries in Kay Street. I can remember all these chaps coming out with their black faces rushing up to catch special trams which were waiting for them at the top of Kay Street to bring them up to Astley Bridge and they would practically run in the house, sit down to a hot meal, just have a pull at the pipe for five minutes and then off back. They were brought back of course. They had an hour's break. But there were no canteen or feeding arrangements inside the foundry not until the war came. I think there were some canteen meals during the first world war which was the start of canteen meals.

Int.: So you'd all have your dinner together?

FB: Yes.

Int.: About what time would it be?

FB: Half past twelve to half past one. Father would be in the house at a quarter to one prompt. It would take him a quarter of an hour to get home. And he would be out of the house at ten minutes past one. We always sat down at quarter-to-one prompt. At quarter to one dinner was on the table had to be.

Int.: And tea time?

FB: Tea would be at quarter-to-six.

Int.: What sort of a meal did you have then?

FB: That used to vary. Bread and butter and jam mainly. Tea. And for an occasional treat, very rarely, I can remember potted meat that you buy from the butchers; or some lettuce in season, tomatoes in season. But mostly bread and jam or bread and margarine when things were bad.

Int.: What about on Sundays?

FB: We had high tea on Sundays. That may be some boiled ham or a little bit of the cold meat and salad, and jelly and maybe a tin of fruit, or a tin of salmon, which was quite a luxury.

Int.: Then I suppose you'd have something at bedtime, a drink would you?

FB: Not when we were children, no. Not until we started to work, then we were allowed a cup of cocoa and maybe a biscuit.

Int.: Now you say your mother baked her own bread?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Was this on the three days when the oven was heated?

FB: The two days it was heated.

Int.: Did she make cakes and things like that?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did she make her own jam or bottle fruit?

FB: Yes. She wouldn't bottle fruit. She'd make marmalade and jam.

Int.: Would she preserve vegetables?

FB: No.

Int.: Would she make pickles?

FB: Yes on one or two occasions she pickled some onions.

Int.: Did she ever make wine or brew beer?

FB: Yes. Herb beer.

Int.: Did she used to make up any medicines for you?

FB: Yes. Camomile tea and brimstone and treacle, castor oil of course was always a good standby, and malt extract, cod liver oil, she used to mix up. She used to have various concoctions. Camomile tea Senna and linseed. She used to boil linseed and stick Spanish in it for coughs and colds in winter. Spanish {ILLEGIBLE} liquorice

Int.: Did you have a garden? Were you able to grow your own vegetables or fruit?

FB: My father took an allotment during the First World War and grew vegetables, before that they were all bought. This was the first time we grew any vegetables for the house.

Int.: Would they buy fresh vegetables?

FB: Sometimes.

Int.: Or would they be tinned or dried?

FB: Mostly fresh vegetables. Not far out of Astley Bridge you could go to what they called salad gardens and buy lettuces from people that grew them, on the outskirts of the village, Astley Bridge. You're soon in the country there. People used to grow things where they had a back garden and you used to go and buy them from the growers. Or in the winter you'd go to the greengrocer on the main road, and buy carrots and cabbages and cauliflowers and things.

Int.: When you did get your own allotment were you able to cope with all the needs of the family for fruit and vegetables?

FB: Oh no. You'd buy in winter.

Int.: Did your parents keep any livestock for the family; hens, pigs, goats, etc.?

FB: In later years, yes, we had a few hens on the allotment. A little piece which was cut off with wire netting. I remember my father building a little hen cote and we'd probably have half a dozen hens there.

Int.: Who looked after the hens?

FB: My father and mother and the two boys; of course we were growing up then, in our teens, I was at any rate. I used to go and help feed the hens and clean the mess up. You know.

Int.: Did you ever get some extra meat such as rabbit from poaching?

FB: No.

Int.: Do you remember seeing your mother having less food to eat so that the family could have more?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did your father have more?

FB: Yes. He was a heavy worker. Heavy industry. He had to. It was a necessary that he should be fed he was the breadwinner and had a very heavy rough job.

Int.: At the meal time were you allowed to talk during the meal?

FB: No. It was a case of speak when you're spoken to. We weren't encouraged to talk. If we were asked questions we were supposed to give honest answers to them. I can't remember being invited to talk as a child except perhaps at parties when you were invited to give a recitation - something you learn.

Int.: Could you choose what you wanted to eat from what was cooked or did you have to eat a bit of everything?

FB: Oh we had to have what was put on the table.

Int.: What was your parents' attitude if you every left anything uneaten?

FB: Oh you got a lecture about it, you had to eat it, you weren't allowed to leave it. Waste not want not. These ideas were enforced. Nothing more 'till we'd eaten that. Oh yes we had to have what another gave us - or nothing or do without.

Int.: If there was something on the table that you wanted. If you wanted the salt for instance, could you ask for it or did you have to wait for it to be passed round?

FB: You would wait for it to be passed round. But if it was near you'd reach for it. Everybody helped themselves to what was on the table, in the way of...

Int.: Could you ask for a second helping of anything?

FB: Yes but you didn't always get it. If you wanted a second helping you had to say well "There's a bit of pudding left hands up who wants some more", and you shared it.

Int.: Were you expected to hold your knife and fork in a particular way and sit in a particular way at the table?

FB: No.

Int.: Were you ever allowed to bring a book or bring toys up to the table?

FB: No.

Int.: When could you leave the table?

FB: When father got up. Mostly. Unless you had somewhere to to like. Errands to do or jobs to do and Mother would say well get up and do what I told you to do. Generally when father got up out of his chair, his easy chair, and got his pipe we got up from the table.

Int.: Did you have to ask if you could leave the table?

FB: Yes. Except when the meal was over and father got up. But if you wanted to leave before father got up you'd say 'May I leave the table?'.

Int.: I suppose that all the family would sit at the table for the meal?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did you always all have the same places?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Was it your mother who served the meal?

FB: Yes.

Int.: How would she serve it?

FB: She would give us all our portions served on the plates.

Int.: What order would she serve you in?

FB: Father first of course, and down from the eldest to the youngest, and herself last.

Int.: When you had younger brothers and sisters where did they sit before they could feed themselves?

FB: In a high chair.

Int.: Who fed them?

FB: Mother and then the eldest sister. The teenage sister would help if she was there of course.

Int.: What age would the younger ones graduate to the stage of coming up to the table?

FB: About four.

Int.: Well now, can you tell me something about your mother, about the sort of woman she was.

FB: Very religious, both father and mother, attended church regularly. Father was a local preacher in a way. He used to go about to various men's groups on Sunday afternoons - men's classes. Give them a talk.

Int.: Did you feel you could talk easily to your mother about things. Could you confide in her?

FB: No, we never volunteered it. Mother usually got into our minds by questions. If she wanted to know what we were thinking we'd get questions. I can't think that we were encouraged to converse. We were taught to listen rather than talk. We would never volunteer to join in a conversation.

Int.: If you had any special worry?

FB: We used to keep it to ourselves.

Int.: You didn't confide either in your mother or your father?

FB: I don't think so. No. I can't remember opening my heart to anybody because we always felt, we always had a guilty conscience about things we used to do.

Int.: Did you confide in one another as children then?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did you feel close to your parents?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did they show affection in any way?

FB: Yes. My mother did, yes. I had a very good mother. But we were never spoiled. We were disciplined. There was very rigid discipline in the house. Mother would give us a religious talk in hour own fashion. This was bad - this was wrong and that was right and God wouldn't like us if we did this. Got this sort of religious atmosphere in the home.

Int.: How did your parents expect you to behave towards them?

FB: Certainly with respect.

Int.: What above behaviour amongst the children? Were you brought up to behave towards your brothers and sisters in a certain way?

FB: Oh yes. But I can't say it always came off, you know. We used to quarrel. Have our little tiffs and quarrels and arguments over various possessions. We used to guard our rights as children. You don't play with my toys unless I know about it.

Int.: Did your parents ever tell you you should hit back if another child hit you?

FB: This was something we hadn't to do. It didn't always work.

Int.: What sort of people do you think your parents hoped you would be when you grew up?

FB: God fearing, respectable, law abiding citizens. Respect for the law and respect for your parents. We were taught the ten commandments and they were pretty well drilled into us.

Int.: And these were the main things that they considered to be important in life?

FB: Oh yes.

Int.: What did they think about swearing?

FB: Oh Blasphemy. Absolutely taboo. We would be thrashed. Any wrong doing was reported to father when he came home and if we did anything really wrong we would get thrashed for it.

Int.: What sort of offences did you get punished for?

FB: Potty pilfering Swearing (but I don't think we'd ever dream of swearing). Potty pilfering in the houses I remember I got one of my thrashings for pinching my mother's pearl buttons. We used to play odd games with them in the street. We used to play one game with buttons - we used to set up a stone and put a pearl button on it and they'd throw a marble at it. And of course to get pearl buttons we used to have to take them out of the house. Then mother found half a dozen of her pearl buttons were missing and we got accused of it, we had to own up and that was a thrashing. Taking cake or biscuits without her knowledge, that was petty pilfering, and that was punishable as well.

Int.: Can you remember if there were minor offences that might be punished less severely than that?

FB: No. I think that there were threats of a punishment or of being deprived of things. My parents would threaten that if that happens again we shan't take you to Southport or something like that. They would threaten to deprive us of treats and threaten would be enough. Usually the threat would be quite sufficient to deter us from repeating minor offences.

Int.: The thrashing was your father's job wasn't it?

FB: Yes. What we call a deliberate punishment would be father. Mother would punish on impulse, you know, smacks.

Int.: Would you say that you received the ideas you had about now to behave from both your parents or...?

FB: From both.

Int.: One didn't play a more important part than the other?

FB: Well of course my mother saw most of us, father was away at work all day, and he was also in his own particular way a worker at the church and Sunday school and he was active in his trade union and temperance movement and the co-operative movement and we didn't quite see so much of him as we would see of my mother. I dare say my father would be out, he'd come home from work, had his tea and get warmed and probably three nights a week, he'd {ILLEGIBLE} somewhere to some sort of meeting which he considered important.

Int.: When you had a birthday would that be any different from any other day?

FB: Not really, no. Maybe it would be remembered by just wishing 'Happy returns of the day', occasionally there might be a birthday cake. If it happened to be baking day she'd probably put a cake in the oven and say this was a birthday cake. Perhaps put a bit of icing on top and a cherry and that would be a birthday cake. But I wouldn't say that happened all the time. My particular birthday was near Christmas and was generally forgotten. If I said 'Where is my birthday cake, to my mother, she would say oh we're having your birthday cake on Christmas day. We're celebrating your birthday on Christmas Day. And that would have to suffice you see.

Int.: Was the same true of presents?

FB: Well presents were very, very rare indeed. I don't remember receiving any birthday presents of any consequence until I was twenty-one. When I was given a silver watch, and that was my first birthday present, that I remember.

Int.: Did you have guests in to celebrate?

FB: No.

Int.: How would you spend Christmas Day?

FB: Oh it was quite an exciting day, especially in the morning. We hung our stockings up as children, until about the age of ten, or eleven, possibly twelve, and we expected some sort of present. I think my twelfth birthday was celebrated by a very important present which was a 5/- Ingersoll watch, which was quite a gift in those days. That was my twelfth birthday and I was earning 2/- week as a paper roundsman and that was some sort of reward for this as I was contributing to the family income I got a present in the shape of at 5/- watch. This was something really good. Previous to that Christmas presents would comprise of simple toys or games like Ludo or Dominoes, cheap toys which we treasured very much. The girls would probably get a doll and we would get a game and some sweets, and maybe one or two bars of chocolate and some nuts, and an apple. That was Christmas morning, which we thought was quite good. We always had a good Christmas dinner. A joint of pork or a fowl. In the afternoon Aunties and Uncles would come in for high tea and we'd have a party after tea and games and everybody would generally let their hair down, and have a jolly evening.

Int.: Did you go to Church on Christmas Day?

FB: I can't say we were compelled to go. I think my sisters would go out of a sense of duty and loyalty to Church, but I don't remember ever being compelled to go to Church. When we were in our younger teens we would be expected to go round carol singing 'til about one o'clock in the morning with the Sunday School, on Christmas Eve, and collect. And then we were allowed to lie in if we wanted to, but this generally didn't happen we were too excited, even in our teens. Christmas Day was... you know.

Int.: Did you have any musical instruments in the home?

FB: Yes, we had a violin - a very old violin which was the gift of someone who had played in the Halle Orchestra at one time. It was a family heirloom. I was given charge of it and I used to have lessons at school, out of school hours, which cost me 6d. a lesson. I remember having possibly twelve lessons and I got tired of it and just packed it in. Did anybody else try to play it? Yes my younger brother had a similar experience. I think he preserved a little bit more than I did but he fell by the wayside as regards music. Probably the violin was too difficult an instrument for youngsters to play. But we were certainly encouraged to be musical and as the family income grew, as we grew up, we ran to a piano and my younger sisters were encouraged to take lessons, two of them. But they never accomplished anything much, except to play hymn tunes and the popular ballads of the day to which we used to sing, round the piano, but this was later on when we were in our late teens. We would buy the popular songs of the day. I don't mean the old-fashioned "Drink to me only with thine eyes" business and these popular song books that we had you know. My particular favourite was "The Mountains of Morne", I used to sing that as a solo and party piece. And my brother and I would sing "Watchman what of the night" that was a particular favourite, as a duet.

Int.: Did any of your aunts and uncles come in to make music with you or was it just your parents and your brothers and sisters?

FB: Well at Christmas we each had our party piece, which was the same each Christmas. They all had their pieces to recite, you see, and were all expected to do their party piece on Christmas night and we used to enjoy it.

Int.: Did your parents ever play games with you?

FB: Oh yes. Indoor games in winter. Draughts, dominoes, ludo, snakes and ladders, can't remember any others. Oh my father would play games with us, yes. As regards outdoor sport, no. We used to make our own outdoor sport. When the cricket season started we'd go round all the neighbours and collect pennies to buy cricket bat and ball and we'd form a local cricket team with neighbourhood boys of our own age, from about the age of about ten onwards, and we used to have a cricket team which played on the spare ground. We'd collect enough pennies from fathers and mothers and neighbours for a cricket {ILLEGIBLE}. We used to build our wickets of bricks and stones, but the team was the important thing. We used to have a cricket team which played various local other gangs of boys. And when the football season started we would do the same. We'd generally go round and collect pennies and raise enough pennies to buy what we'd call a case ball, which was a proper football. And we used to have our own football team our local football team. And any time we could get out, which wasn't often enough, because I remember my mother insisting on I had to help with the washing-up and do things before going out to play. I'd come home from school and I had to do jobs around the house - perhaps one or two errands before tea at half past five. After tea my sister and I would probably have to wash up and then we were allowed to go out to play. And we were fortunate to own a piece of spare ground in front of the house which we played cricket and football on.

Int.: Did you have books about in the house?

FB: Yes. Certain kinds. These were censored pretty well. I was forbidden cheap magazines like the 'Magnet' and the 'Gem' these were considered to be no good at all, but they were very precious to us. And there was another popular one called 'The Boys Friend' and another about Sexton Blake, which were cheap weeklies. I think the 'Magnet' and the 'Gem' cost 1/2d but I was never allowed to buy these things. I got them second-hand, and I liked to smuggle them into the house and read them in the privacy of my own bedroom. And even then I would get a lecture, this was not suitable, this was wrong. It was trash, my mother's favourite work. But we were encouraged to read books in the house, and we had Sunday School prizes, books, and certain religious books. And the thing that came into the house every week was 'The Christian Herald' and that had a weekly serial by Silas Hocking or Joseph Hocking and we were encouraged to read that.

Int.: I think it was put as much trash as the boy's friend when I look back on it, but nevertheless it had a {ILLEGIBLE} basis, and it was accepted into the house.

Int.: What about newspapers?

FB: Just the local Bolton News, that came into the house.

Int.: You didn't have a morning paper?

FB: No.

Int.: Do you remember your mother or father reading?

FB: Yes I think my father read a bit. I wouldn't call him a well read man. He used to read his Bible. Both of them were Bible readers. And he used to read the Bible. I think after we'd gone to bed, they used to have a session with the Bible nearly every night, but I'm guessing here because once or twice I had to come downstairs with tummy ache or something like that, and I would overhear them reading from the Bible or religious literature of some sort.

Int.: Did they ever read aloud to you, to the children?

FB: No. I don't think so. I don't remember.

Int.: Do you remember there ever being a funeral in the family?

FB: Yes. The funeral was very important. I remember my grandmother's funeral. She died when she was 65. Grandmother Benson. I was taken into see her as she lay dead - when she'd been laid out in bed and made to look nice and decent - we were taken in as children to look at her for the last time. And I remember the funeral was rather an important occasion. My grandmother had a big family; there was three brothers and four sisters and all these came to the funeral with their own families of children, which amounted to perhaps four or five coach loads of relatives. And it was very important that she should be given a good funeral and a good headstone put on the grave. It stands out very clearly - I would have been nine years when grandmother died.

Int.: What about mourning clothes?

FB: Yes we all had to wear black. We had to have a new suit. We had to have black suits all of us. There were my sister and brother and I to fit out. My sister would have a black dress and my brother and I would have black suits for grandmother's funeral.

Int.: Is there anything in the way the funeral was conducted that was different from the way they are done today?

FB: There was a great deal more ceremony. Today they seem to be formal affairs. I think my grandma's funeral was important because she was important in the family. An important person. We had to take her to church and there was an impressive service in church and another impressive service at the graveside, and everybody shed tears and it was quite an impressive afternoon, as far as we were concerned as children. We finished up with high tea in our house - we had a fairly big kitchen in Bloomfield Street, Astley Bridge, and a good front sitting room and everybody came in. The people who came any distance went off without tea. Some of my aunties and uncles lived as far away as Horwich which was quite a distance in those days, and Leigh. That was another 6 miles but we used to think it was a long way to go. They would go off probably but I can remember some aunties and uncles coming to our house for tea after the funeral.

Int.: Were you taken out to visit your aunts and uncles, neighbours and friends when you were a child?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Who would it be that would take you?

FB: Father and mother together. Mostly on holidays - during the holiday period. We used to think it was quite an adventure to have a tram ride to Horwich to our cousins. Leigh was another place where we had cousins and we'd visit them during holidays some times and stay for a few days.

Int.: What exactly do you mean by holiday periods?

FB: Well there was Easter. We got so few holidays at the seaside as children. I remember one or two probably seaside holidays. Bolton holidays when the works was closed we mostly spent in trips. My father would take us to Southport for the day or probably to Leigh for half a day, or Horwich. Or he would take us over Belmont and walk from Belmont to Rivington and come back by tram. That was the sort of way we'd spend our holidays.

Int.: Would this apply to Bank Holidays and odd days during the holiday week?

FB: That's right. Yes. Good Friday father would probably go to church, but we weren't compelled to go church on Good Friday, that was the day when mother would pack up sandwiches and as children we would go off on our own and spend the day on Rivington Pike or Belmont Moors or Alton Towers.

Int.: When you did get the chance to go away to the seaside for a holiday would this be all the family who would go together?

FB: I can't remember all our family ever going on a holiday together. I can remember as a young child when there were only three of us in the family, the three children, having a seaside holiday at a place called Knott End where I think lodgings were fairly cheap and some fresh air and a change and the great joy there was to have a wagonette drive. I've a feeling we probably went there two years in succession. I think we had two seaside holidays there and those were the only two seaside holidays I really remember. Although my mothers says she and my father took my sister and myself, when I was about three or four and she would be seven, to the Isle of Man. And we were all sick on the boat. But I don't know how long it was for.

Int.: When you went to Knott End how long would that before?

FB: That would be probably for a week.

Int.: When were Bolton holidays at this time?

FB: I think it was August.

Int.: How would you spend your Saturdays when you were a child?

FB: We were left to our own devices on Saturdays. Saturday mornings we had to do the errands and help with the housework, clean the house. Saturday afternoons we were free and we were left to our own devices. My earliest recollections was to go and watch cricket. The local cricket team. From a very early age I used to go and watch the local Sunday School cricket team. It was all sorts. I hadn't any money so I couldn't afford to go to a cricket match and pay to go in. Not even a penny. Bolton and district cricket league we could go in for a penny but we just didn't have a penny to go in. So I used to go and watch the Sunday School Cricket Team. I can remember on one occasion walking to Old Trafford and this was a school holiday. The High School holiday in August and a friend of mine and I we told our mother we would go out for the day and she would pack us jam sandwiches. We didn't tell her we were going to Old Trafford cricket ground. Might have been 11 then. And we would sit on a bridge and watch the boats come up the ship canal. Watch for boats to come up and that was a thrill to watch a big steamer come up the canal. And we would have our jam sandwiches on the canal bank. Then we would walk from there to Old Trafford cricket ground, wait for the gates to open to let the crowd came up after tea and the boys would then swarm in without paying - see the last hours cricket which was a reward in itself especially Johnny! Who was the famous Lancashire batsman of the day and the fast bowler who was a chap called Briersly. We would see these two operate and of course that made the day. Walking was one of the things we did. We prided ourselves on the distance we could walk... and then there was the walk home and if we'd two pence in our pockets we might have had a penny or twopence which we'd saved up for the occasion. Bound to do this probably two or three weeks before and the last penny would be spent on a halfpennyworth of chips and a bottle of pop on the way home somewhere - Clifton or Farnsworth - one of the little shops coming from Manchester along the main road to Bolton. This was quite a day.

Int.: What about your Sundays?

FB: Oh Sundays were very religiously observed. As children we went to Sunday School at half past nine in the morning and from the age of about ten or eleven we came out of Sunday School and went into church, and the younger ones would be allowed home at half past ten. The older ones would file into Church at twenty past ten for the Morning Service. Then there was Sunday School in the afternoon from half past two 'till half past three. And then as children we were expected to go again at six o'clock for a Children's service in the evening, the Evening Service.

Int.: Did you have different clothes on for Sundays?

FB: Yes. Very important we had our Sunday best clothes on.

Int.: Did your parents allow you to play games at all on a Sunday?

FB: No.

Int.: I suppose they would both go to church, would they, your mother and father?

FB: Mother would be busy cooking in the mornings. Mother and father would go to church in the evenings. Sunday afternoons father would go about various churches talking to men's Bible classes - various places in the town district. And he would walk as far as Horwich to take a mens' class and nobody would persuade him to spend 2d. to go on the tram. He wouldn't. That was a crime to go on a tram on a Sunday. And he would walk both ways to take a mens' class say at Horwich from Astley Bridge.

Int.: Did your Sunday School organise outings?

FB: Yes. To local places. We had one annual outing a year. This was what we called the Sunday School class picnic, which meant the Sunday School would take anything from ten to twenty scholars in the class and go to some country place like Rivington Park or to Worsley, Heaton Park was another favourite for Sunday School picnics. Easy to get to by 1d. or 2d. tram rides, you'd get to them with a little walk.

Int.: What other social activities were organized by the church?

FB: Concerts mostly. Sunday School concerts and various branches of Sunday School activities like temperance society would organize their special gen in the form of a play - pointing out the use of strong drink and moral laws. I can remember the favourite play of the temperance society was one called 'The Prodigal Son'. They used to publish short one act plays which had a moral and religious purpose behind them - I can't remember the publisher now, but these plays were quite frequently done in Sunday School. The cricket club would have their concert, and the football club would organize a concert for the benefit of their own particular activity. The Church Lads' Brigade had a concert. The temperance society.

Int.: Did you belong to any of these?

FB: No. I used to want to join the Church Lads' Brigade but my mother used to think they were rather rough for me - the rougher end of the parish used to get in the Church Lads' Brigade. Out time then did. She didn't forbid it entirely but she used to discourage the idea. These lads came from the 'slummier' end of the parish, they were all very good lads most of 'em were killed in the 14-18 war, bless 'em but I wasn't encouraged to join.

Int.: Did you belong to the choir?

FB: No.

Int.: What denomination was the Church?

FB: Church of England. All Souls.

Int.: Was grace said at home at meal time?

FB: Yes. Always.

Int.: And who was it that said it?

FB: Father.

Int.: Obviously you would be taught to say prayers at night?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did you have family prayers?

FB: No.

Int.: Did your father take an interest at all in politics?

FB: No. Not an active interest. He was active in his trade union, which was I think the foundry men's trade union, at this time. No I wouldn't say he was an active party member at all.

Int.: But he had his own views?

FB: He had his own particular views which was in those days called Lib-Lab, which was a sort of right wing Labour man if you like, but he would vote Liberal. In those days Bolton was represented by one liberal and one labour and they used to run together against the Conservatives, you see, and they called them Lib-Labs. They would be frowned upon by the extreme left of the labour movement and the socialist movement would think these were traitors, but my father had no room for the extreme socialist type of person. I think the association with atheists and atheism and so forth.

Int.: What about your mother?

FB: Mother had no active interests outside her home.

Int.: Did she hold any particular political views?

FB: No I think what particular views she had she would get through the co-operative women's guild. I think she used to go there one night a week, when we were older and able to look after the younger children. My sister and I could stay and look after the younger children while she went to the guild on Thursday night. That was her only outdoor activity apart from the Church.

Int.: Would you say that she tended towards the labour?

FB: Oh yes. I think she got political ideas through the women's guild. Not that the women's guild had any party loyalties, I don't think, in those days it hadn't. There was no party loyalty. But there were various speakers who used to come to the guild I think and imparted what we termed as progressive ideas about politics.

Int.: Can you remember your mother and father voting in a General Election up to 1919?

FB: Yes. By 1918 they would both be voting labour. My father would certainly vote labour because the labour man prior to 1914 was a prominent local trade unionist and he would come on the loyalty of most active trade unionists in the town. He would be elected on a trade union vote, rather than on a party political vote I should think, before 1914. The 1918 election, well I was in the army in France and I don't remember much about it.

Int.: In some places at that time people used to think they may lose their job or their home if they didn't vote according to the wishes of their employer, or somebody else. Would this apply at all?

FB: I don't think it affected out family. I've no recollections of any influences. I know it happened - you'd vote as your employer wished you to do. But in the textile industry and in the engineering industries in the town there was quite an independent attitude from work people. They were large enough to stand on their own and the trade union dominated their thinking.

Int.: Neither your father or mother were active members of a political party so it's unlikely they would do anything to help the party at election time?

FB: No. They wouldn't do that. They would be sympathetic to the Labour Party but that was about the end of it.

Int.: Well, now, you've told me a little bit about your parents other interests. Your mother only went out to her co-operative women's guild, did she? Did she ever go out to enjoy herself, apart from that?

FB: As we grew up, and were teenagers, yes, she would leave us in charge of the younger ones and go to a Sunday School meeting or Sunday School concert in the evening, something like that. She would think that was a pleasant night out and a relief from domestic chores.

Int.: Who would she go with?

FB: She'd go by herself. She'd meet other people there. See her friends.

Int.: Did your father ever go out just for the purpose of enjoying himself? Rather than taking an active part in the union.

FB: No. All his activities were connected with some purpose. He was active in the temperance movement, in the trade union movement, and in the co-operative. I should say that the co-operative commanded quite a lot of his time. And I think as we grew older the co-operative society took over from the church in his part-time priorities. He was elected as a member of the education committee and I think this made demands on his time - he would have a committee meeting once a week, as a result of that he would have one or two, possibly three nights, taking children's classes in industrial history or what he called co-operation the history and principles of the co-operative movement. They were mostly school children from 10, 11, 12. There were children's groups and they used to attend these classes once a week in various parts of the town and my father and various other members of the committee would go and talk to them about the co-operative movement and how it was formed and the background to it. The story of Robert Owen and the Chartist movement and they had to make it part of their business to know about these people. To read about them. And my father would probably spend two or three hours in preparation to take these classes reading up his industrial history. About the {ILLEGIBLE} pioneers and {ILLEGIBLE} the Christian Socialists and Kingsley and he had to get an interest about these people and had to tell children what these people wanted to do, what they were trying to do.

Int.: Did he do anything of the same sort with adult groups?

FB: Yes. He would talk to an adult group on co-operative affairs. He was in demand as a speaker at various co-operative guilds. Men's guilds and Women's Guilds. There was a men's Guild which was formed much later during the 14-18 war. He helped to form what was called a Men's Guild which grew into quite an important body. I think it is defant now.

Int.: Would that be just groups in Bolton?

FB: No he would go about to places like Horwich and Leigh and Westhoughton talking to branch groups of men.

Int.: Obviously your father being a temperance man would not go to pubs at all, would he? Or did he go to try to reform the ...?

FB: Yes. I think he may have to go to one or two pubs in regard to trade union work because pubs were a favourite meeting ground for the committee - the trade union committee. He may have to go to places that was very much against his grain and he was always agitating that trade union meetings shouldn't go to public houses. I remember him having a thing about this.

Int.: Did he belong to any club at all?

FB: No. The only club, and he wasn't a very active member, was a Aconites Club was the sick club. They paid sick benefits. He wasn't active in it but he was a member, so that if he did fall on evil times there would be a few shillings coming in from the sick club.

Int.: Did your father or mother belong to any other type of savings club?

FB: No I don't think so. They paid their 1d. a week insurance clubs, you know.

Int.: Did your father take part in any sport?

FB: No.

Int.: And he wouldn't go as a watcher to anything?

FB: No. Only in what I would call the course of duty. If the men's guild had a bowling tournament he would go and show his interests there.

Int.: But would he do anything like going to the races?

FB: No. Oh dear me, no. That was the devils work!

Int.: Now we're back to you and your brothers and sisters. How did you get on together?

FB: On the whole very well I think. I think we used to have little bits of jealousies and quarrels, most families do, but they don't stand out as being anything. I think I sometimes used to resent having to take care, when I wanted to do things on my own I would resent having to take care of my younger brothers and sisters: take them out - take them with me where I happened to be going or do a spot of pram pushing when there were babies to be taken out. I used to be put on.

Int.: Was there any brother or sister that you felt particularly close to?

FB: No.

Int.: You used to play together? Would you?

FB: Up to a certain age.

Int.: Did you play with neighbour's children?

FB: Change sometimes. I used to resent that and probably. Oh yes, very much so. I mean you got to the age of six, seven, eight, you found your own friends, amongst the neighbours' children.

Int.: And you would play with them rather than with your own family?

FB: Yes. There were different age groups in your own family so you would find someone of your own age to play with.

Int.: Now you said you had a piece of ground in front of the house where you could play?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did you play anywhere else besides there, either in the house or yard?

FB: Oh in the parks. We would go and play in the parks on occasions. Swings in the park. Astley Bridge Park wasn't far away and as boys we would go there and swing on the parallel bars and play on the swings and sometimes play cricket on the grass there. Sometimes when four or five of us would make a small cricket team up and go in the park and challenge four or five other boys, and play a game of cricket. That was quite frequent in the school holidays. But this was mainly during the four weeks school holidays we had in August. This was an activity - every afternoon we would think of a different park to go to. We'd go down to the Bolton Park sometimes. Perhaps a group of four or five boys and take a bat and ball and look for another small group of boys to challenge to a game of cricket.

Int.: Did you ever go into children's homes to play? And did other children come into yours?

FB: Not very often. No. Occasionally we might bring a friend but we didn't look upon the home as a place to play in at all except when father could spare a few minutes to play a game of draughts or teach us something like that. No I don't remember going to neighbours' houses to play. Except as you got older as you got your own particular friend you might have one particular friend and you'd go in his house and he'd come in yours. 11 or 12.

Int.: That would be when you were getting a little bit older wouldn't it?

FB: Yes. You would get attached to one particular boy and you would take him home sometimes to tea and his mother would perhaps invite you to tea sometimes.

Int.: You told me about when you were younger playing you're your mother's pearl buttons and marbles and so on. What other sorts of games would you have played at that age?

FB: There was all sorts of boys games. Rough games. One was know as duck stone. You built a little pyramid of stones and then put on stone on the top and you used to have to pick stones, sizeable stones which you could get in your fist, and try and knock the top stone off. And if you did that ... I've forgotten how we used to play this. There used to be come running in it, the boy who was out who was sort of victim. You used to try and knock the column of stones down and while the boy who was the victim was rebuilding it you'd used to have to run from corner to corner while he was rebuilding. It was like a game of rounders in a way. Yes. It had associations with rounders. Rounders was a popular game; we had another name for it though, rounders. Yes rounders, duck stone and certain jumping games - we had one we used to call ride a kench, this was played in teams of three or four boys and the boys would go down and hold each other behind, form a sort of chain, and you used to have to jump on their backs. If there were three boys you would aim at going in one jump on to the top boy's back, you see, over these two (you'd used these two as levers) to get on to the third boy. So that your team of three or four, playing say three a side, the three of you would have to jump on the three boys backs and if they collapsed they'd lost the game, you see. And there were penalties to pay, forfeits probably a kick in the pants or something like that. Another game we used to chase each other in teams and we used to do this to deliberately annoy some group of boys, to get chased and this would mean a real hare and hounds all round the streets and sometimes out into the country.

Int.: Were you allowed to get dirty when you played when you were little?

FB: Oh yes. We'd get punished for tearing clothes. We sometimes got a tear and mother would administer a slap over the head, or something like that, and 'get off to bed'. She'd show her disgust, you see, if we tore our clothes. But so long as we came in and cleaned ourselves up and didn't leave any dirt in the house. There was always a back way into the house, which if we had any mud on our clothes it was a good thing to get it cleaned off before you went into the house.

Int.: Were you free to play with anybody you pleased.

FB: More or less, yes.

Int.: Was there any type of child that you were ever discouraged from playing with?

FB: Not really. We would sometimes be advised to keep away from a certain clique or the 'lamb brow' lot. One hotel on the corner of Seymour Road is called. The Lamb Hotel and the road that runs up there is called Old Road. But we in our boyhood days it was known as the lamb brow for some reason or other, and it was a rather slummy area with a rough lot of lads. Big catholic families very roughly brought up, some of them hadn't any footwear. We used to challenge them to our patch to play football or cricket and this would generally {ILLEGIBLE} end with stone throwing going on and this was terribly discouraged. Possibly for two reasons. First of all these lads didn't hesitate to use bad language which we were never permitted. And second because the stone throwing usually ended in somebody's window being broken and this would mean we forfeited pocket money until the window was paid for, so that there was discouragement to associate with this group of boys. But it never prevented us because there was something of a challenge here, you see, if it came to a fight we were as good as they were. This would involve sometimes interference by parents these sort of stone-throwing fights, and sometimes fisticuffs or wrestling would be broken up by parents.

Int.: You say you would have liked to have belonged to the Church Lads' Brigade. Did you belong to any youth organisations at all?

FB: No. Only Band of Hope which was a sort of Monday night meeting.

Int.: Can you tell me something about how you spent your free time when you were at school?

Int.: Did you have any hobbies?

FB: Yes. We had rabbits. My brother was very fond of keeping pets. I wasn't particularly keen but I remember we shared a common interest in rabbits for a short period. I got tired of rabbits; my brother kept them and he followed on with guinea pigs and hens and he always had an interest in livestock. But not me. I was very fond of reading and at an early age I joined a local library in Astley Bridge which was then one of the new Carnegie libraries and this was a real treasure to me as a boy to go in there and to be able to get a book, at the age of ten or eleven, and reading was mostly adventure stories and school stories by popular authors of the day. Henty stories, adventure stories, school stories of the time. I was allowed to read these in the house, these were all right, because they were out of the public library. These were on a higher plain then the penny dreadfuls and the 1/2d. Magnets and Gems, you see. I can remember spending quite a lot of my time reading.

Int.: Did you collect anything?

FB: No. I don't think so. No. I was never a collector.

Int.: You wouldn't have a garden then would you?

FB: Just a small handkerchief garden in front of the house.

Int.: Did you do any gardening?

FB: No. Not really. My father used to keep it tidy. And put a few pansies in and lobelia and probably bedding out plants just in the front garden and they used to keep the privet... each garden was surrounded by a privet hedge which had to be clipped and I don't remember as a boy ever doing any gardening.

Int.: You liked outdoor activities like walking?

FB: Oh yes, very much.

Int.: What about fishing?

FB: No. Except with a jam jar and a little net. One of the favourite haunts was Barrow Bridge, over here, and there used to be a boating pond there and there was small fish in there we could sometimes catch with a net and in the stream there was little minnows and gudgeons, but you couldn't call it fishing.

Int.: Did you go any boating?

FB: No you couldn't afford to. Except when we were about ten or eleven we'd save our pennies we got from aunties and uncles and share a boat on Barrow Bridge lake, as a treat.

Int.: You took part in cricket and football did you?

FB: As a boy, oh yes.

Int.: Any other sport?

FB: No.

Int.: Did you go to any theatres?

FB: No theatres were taboo. Another place for the devil.

Int.: Obviously the same would be true of music halls?

FB: Yes music halls were dens of inequity.

Int.: Concerts? You went to the Sunday School concerts?

FB: Yes. That's about all.

Int.: You didn't go to any others?

FB: Not as children. No.

Int.: What about the cinema?

FB: From 1904 when the first cinema projectors were used in the fair grounds on the town hall square in Bolton. The cinema used to come with a 1d. show. And we used to have a cinema at what was then the temperance hall in Bolton, which only came on Saturday afternoons. I don't say we were discouraged from going but we never had any money to go. But if we could raise 1d. as children we might go to the temperance hall on Saturday afternoon and see these very early films. 'Charles Peace' was one of them and 'The Great Train Robbery' I think, was another one, and some 'mock up' of the Boer War was another.

Int.: What about the fair? Did your parents allow you to go the fair?

FB: Reluctantly, yes. We were allowed to go.

Int.: What about a circus.

FB: No, we were discouraged. I can't recall them. Only a sort of Wild Beast Shows we used to call them round the fair in New Year, in Bolton. There was a wild beast show and a show where you could go and watch as we called them, Living Pictures. This would cost at 1d. It was a question of pocket money this.

Int.: Your pocket money was a weekly 1/2d. after you'd done your Saturday chores?

FB: Yes. Up to the age of twelve.

Int.: Was there anything else you spent the money on other than the things you've been telling me?

FB: No, only sweets. Any extra amusements came from pennies that were given you by aunties and uncles. Or maybe for doing errands for some of the neighbours. If someone wanted somebody to run errands perhaps on Saturday morning you would get a 1/2d. or a 1d., and these we used to guard very preciously and save them 'till we got perhaps 3d. which was quite a lot of money and then we blew this on a fair or something, or walking to Old Trafford with 2d. in your pocket.

Int.: Did you ever save money to buy anything special with?

FB: The first I remember trying to save money was trying to buy a bicycle and this was a second hand one, and I was in my early teens, then thirteen.

Int.: This was the one that you shared with your brother?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did anyone outside the home help your mother to look after the house or family?

FB: Oh yes. When mother was confined. I can remember the three younger children being born. And when one of these were born auntie used to come in. She hadn't any children, she was an elderly aunt with no family of her own, and was the standby of the family when things were a bit tight and mother was poorly or confined. All the children were born in the house and auntie used to come along and act as home help.

Int.: Was your routine disrupted in any other way when one of the children was born?

FB: Not really. No.

Int.: Would anybody come in at any other time or only when your mother was ill?

FB: Yes. The next door neighbour might pop in sometimes to see if there was anything if my mother was ill or just off colour. We were trained to do what we could from an early age and to be independent and to cook our own breakfasts. If mother was poorly we could go downstairs and make our own porridge, and make some toast and tea and get off to school ourselves.

Int.: Apart from your aunt living nearby, did you have other relatives living close?

FB: Oh yes, all my mother's brothers and sisters were - their relationships was very close. But their own particular lives, their own particular activities didn't permit of attendance on each other at times of sickness. No. They all had their own families to look after. The only aunty who was a regular helper in the house was one who hadn't any children of her own.

Int.: Did you see your relatives frequently?

FB: Very frequently. Yes. Sunday nights was an occasion when they used to visit. A visiting night. People would come in after church and stay until perhaps ten o'clock or half past. We would be packed off to bed of course at nine o'clock. But visiting on Sunday evening or sometimes a Saturday evening was quite a common practice, between relatives.

Int.: What about friends?

FB: And friends. Yes. Friends of the family used to come and visit us in the evenings - Saturday and Sunday evenings.

Int.: Did your parents share their friends or did your mother have her own particular friends?

FB: I think they were shared friends. One's friends were both's friends. I don't think there was any discrimination between friends. They were all welcome. They were mostly visiting couples.

Int.: And would your parents go and visit them?

FB: Yes.

Int.: People that were invited into the house, would they be invited for a meal?

FB: Sometimes on Sundays, yes. They may be invited to tea on Sundays. But mostly it was a case of a cup of tea and sandwiches or biscuits in the evening or something like that in the evening. On occasions they'd be invited to tea, especially if they came over from Horwich or Leigh, they would come to tea on Sunday. We'd invite them to tea.

Int.: What about people calling in casually?

FB: The door was always open for casual visitors.

Int.: Would people who called in casually be offered something?

FB: Mother would say 'Have a cup of tea'.

Int.: Did people call in casually without an invitation quite often?

FB: Mostly friends of mother's in the afternoon might come over for an afternoon cup of tea.

Int.: Would neighbours drop in?

FB: Yes the next door neighbour. But mostly the neighbourliness was done over the back yard wall. Just a small brick or wooden partition between the two houses and mother would have a gossip over the yard wall.

Int.: There wasn't any dropping into each others houses and having a cup of tea?

FB: On occasions yes. Neighbours used to drop in just like that and pass the time of the day. And with mother not being well they'd come in "How's your mother" "Oh come in, She's all right. She'd like to talk to you - for a little gossip"

Int.: It's often said that at that time people used to make their own amusements, and I think from what you've said this seems to be pretty well true. Did your parents do anything in particular when they go together with their friends and relatives, in the way of say making music or playing games, or anything like this?

FB: Only at Christmas. Except when we were in our late teens (16, 17 and 18) we were allowed to bring friends in and we would get round the piano and sing and that was encouraged - as long as we sang the right stuff, you see. We started with hymns. This happened mostly on Sundays, after church, and one had to be very careful with your repertoire that you sang the right song with a good moral tone, you see.

Int.: Many people divide society into different social classes. In the time up to 1918 did you think of some people as belonging to one class and some to another?

FB: Oh yes. Well there was the wealthy class, the Chorley New Road people and the people that lived up Seymour Road, which was a residential area. There were certain residential areas, and Seymour Road in those days was one of them, where the professional classes lived, and they were a class on their own. The school master from Astley Bridge school lived up there; and the local mill owner Colonel Hesketh who was one of the important Bolton citizens, he lived in a big house there. There were some other mill owners, Mallinsons, who had mills and beach works, and there were the aristocrats of Astley Bridge in those days. Particularly Colonel Hesketh. And the Ashworths, they were also cotton mill owners. These were the upper class as far as we knew, we didn't know any nobility, they weren't titled people. The Colonels and the Captains were mostly the territorial or result of volunteer service, that they had these titles; mostly mill owners, industrialists, with their big houses and stables and the back - these were the aristocrats the really top class as we knew in those days. Then there was of course the distinct professional classes - the doctors and the solicitors and the school masters, who we thought were a class on their own - the professional classes. We, I suppose, thought ourselves as the respectable working class; we were a little bit above the labouring class who lived in the poorer districts of the town.

Int.: Were you taught to treat people of a particular class differently from people of another? Thinking say of the wealthy or top class people? Like Colonel Hesketh.

FB: Yes.

Int.: You'd have to raise your cap, or something like this, would you, if you saw him?

FB: Yes, you would do as a mark of respect.

Int.: Were there any other people that you would have to show a mark of respect to?

FB: No, I don't think so, except the Minister, the Parson and the school master.

Int.: Was there anybody that you had to call 'sir' or 'madam'?

FB: You would do. But I don't say you had to. But you would call them 'sir' or 'madam' out of respect. You'd always say 'sir' to the headmaster. Our contact with these people would be very limited, it would be limited to special occasions like when they might come along to present Sunday School prizes and then you would say "Thank you 'sir'". The girls would give a little bow to show how grateful they were for all the small gifts they used to get. I can remember Lord Leverhulme distributing gifts. This was when he had Lever Park. And I was spending Christmas there. My father was poorly then - my father was in hospital one Christmas. And my sister and I were sent off to Horwich to stay with cousins. And Lady Lever - I don't know if she was Lady Lever then - the wife of Sir William Lever. I think he might be Sir William in those days but we knew him as Billy Lever, he was making his thousands then. And she was a very famous type and she would come into the houses of the Horwich people who lived in Rivington Park then. And I remember we got gifts on this occasion, very simple Christmas gifts, from Lady Lever. Simply because my uncle and aunt and cousins used to go to the same church as Lady Lever did. I don't think she was Lady Lever. She was Mrs. Lever then. They were important people.

Int.: In your particular district you would consider people like Colonel Hesketh the most important people?

FB: Colonel Hesketh yes. He was the most important person in Astley Bridge. Very worthy citizen of the town, of course. He was the Mayor of the town and stood for Parliament on one occasion.

Int.: So he was important for these sort of reasons not just because he was wealthy?

FB: Oh yes he was wealth and also a big employer of labour. He had these big mills in Astley Bridge then - and one or two other mills. I think, smaller mills. But he was the main employer of labour in Astley Bridge in the cotton spinning industry. And also a pillar of the church, Astley Bridge church.

Int.: What sort of people, apart from teachers, doctors, etc., that you considered to be the professional classes - are there any others that you would put in that particular group?

FB: No I don't think so.

Int.: Would you call them strictly professional classes?

FB: Oh I should say that those were the people who we thought were middle class, above our particular ... We considered these important people. They did a job in their own particular way, they would attend church and show their interest in church activities. We didn't go to the village church in Astley Bridge, we went to All Saints. I went to Astley Bridge school. They always seemed to take an interest in the affairs of Astley Bridge, and I suppose in local civic affairs. They always seemed to have some sort of interest these people. They fulfilled a purpose in life.

Int.: What sort of people would they associate with? Would they associate with anybody about?

FB: Oh no no. They would have their own social circle. On Sundays they would come down to perhaps our level with regards going to church, and probably act as superintendent in Sunday School sometimes. They would be prominent on Sunday School anniversaries and donating subscriptions in the form of guineas and pennies. It was partly wealth and partly the better education; they were looked upon as better educated people.

Int.: What sort of people for instance would the clergy associate with?

FB: Their flock included all classes, didn't it? I suppose in Astley Bridge society the vicar would quite often be in Colonel Hesketh's house and vice versa. Colonel Hesketh being a big churchman and the vicar of Astley Bridge was considered an important person and in the same type of class as Colonel Hesketh and the other people. But on the other hand I suppose he visited the parishioners on occasions, especially during sick periods. But we used to look upon the vicar and the curate as somebody very important.

Int.: What about the teachers - the headmaster and the teachers at the school?

FB: I suppose they would have their own particular friends and social acquaintances. The more wealthy church patrons. The headmaster of a place like Astley Bridge he was expected to take his place in church activities and of course he would in the course of duty come in contact with people like the vicar, and Colonel Hesketh and the wealthier sections of the congregation.

Int.: Were there any farmers about?

FB: No I don't think so. I don't think you would find any farmers active in social activities at all, the farmers were very much a class unto themselves. There were farmers about on the fringe of the village, of course. We used to rely on milk production, deliver milk, take the milk round to the houses in Astley Bridge and maybe all round the town. They used to come down with a horse and milk load. But their social life was very much confined to themselves. They were a very exclusive class to themselves.

Int.: Would you say there was much mixing between the different professional groups within the same class?

FB: I wouldn't know. I couldn't tell you. There would be a certain amount of mixing politically because there was certain political activities they had in common and I should think that any social activities those days would be centred round the Conservative political party in those days and the Liberal party. Two distinct groups and the groups would contain elements of various classes of people. And there would be a common meeting ground here with common political party interests.

Int.: Going on to your class that you described as the respectable working class, what sort of people would belong to your group?

FB: Mostly artisan and craftsmen; cotton spinners would be included. The man in the cotton mill who was a sort of an employer in his own right. He was a spinner of what was known as a wheel gate and he employed two assistants - a side piece and a little piercer - and he used to pay these from his own earnings, so he was a sort of employer you see. He was employed by the mill owner and over him would be a mill manager. Possibly what was termed an overlooker. I think he was an overlooker overlooking the section of the mill in which the cotton spinning was done. Now then, there would be the cotton spinners who were a very important social group of their own, and they would be in the earnings of 50/- to £3 a week, the wealthy section of the working class people in those days. Then there would be the fitters and the engineers. Father was in the foundry - he was a craftsman, a moulder. In the foundry there were different skilled crafts:- moulders, pattern makers, fitters and one or two others, who had served their time at a particular trade. These were a class on their own, and would consider themselves somewhat distinct from the labouring classes. The people who used to do the fetching and carrying, and the assistants.

Int.: You speak of the cotton spinners being a class on their own, and people like engineers and fitters being a class on their own; would they in fact meet together on level grounds socially?

FB: Oh yes.

Int.: They weren't exclusive in that sense?

FB: No. They would all mix socially. Yes.

Int.: What about the labouring class?

FB: These were respectable labourers who would mix in various church activities I suppose, who would be considered religious in the religious life of the church, who took part in the religious life of the church. You would mix with them, you wouldn't look down on them in any shape or form. The only people you'd look down on was the people who used to drink and neglect their family life - their wives and children. These were the people you'd look down on. But the average labourer who was probably earning 18/- to £1 a week, and was trying to do the best he could for his family, there was no snobbish ideas about this at all. Oh no. The only people we used to think were a bit low were the people who used to go into pubs, who used to drink on Saturday nights and spend their money on gambling, on horses.

Int.: The people who would go to Astley Bridge Church, they would be a mixed congregation of all the different classes?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Your church, All Souls, would that be the same?

FB: The congregation socially, there wouldn't be the same element of aristocracy at All Souls. It was more in the working class part of the town, round what I call the working class perimeter of Bolton. Astley Bridge was more in the residential part you see. You got in the working class perimeter of Bolton which was centered within about 3/4 mile to a mile from the Town Hall. These were mostly what I would call typical slum dwellings where there were working class terraced houses, inhabited mostly by the lower income groups who would be earning 25/- to 30/- a week doing various jobs. Not altogether unskilled jobs, things like bus conductors, milk roundsmen, shop assistants and labourers too, that were very careful and wanted a decent life for their families. And these would be the people. We had a few business people at All Souls, shop keeping type of people, but I don't think we had any of the wealthy. I don't remember any doctors, lawyers, or solicitors, any of that type of people coming. It was a typical working class parish.

Int.: What sort of people would the shop keepers associate with? Who were their friends?

FB: I think a lot of them that went to church would confine their social activities to the church. They probably wouldn't admit it but I suppose business interest had a lot to do here, if you went to church and you had a shop in the parish, it was important. You used to patronise the shop because you know Mr. So and So, who happened to be a Sunday School teacher or superintendent. I suppose some of them had their own particular club life - the conservative club or liberal club - those were the social centres of the day. But quite a large proportion of them would belong to some church, either the non - conformist or the Church of England.

Int.: Do you know much about the non conformist and catholic communities?

FB: Not a great deal.

Int.: What sort of people would go to chapel?

FB: A fairly good cross section of working class people and one or two of the trades people type. I don't think they commanded many of what we called the better class people, what we might term the middle class or higher middle class, or the manufacturing classes of Bolton. I don't suppose many of them were non-conformists, one or two might be. Lever was of course - Lever himself built two or three congregational churches out of his money. But the non conformists were mostly very sincere working class people or trades people, with maybe one or two interested people from the other, But I don't think they dominated. I think they were, dominated by the respectable working class people, nonconformists, who couldn't accept the prayer book, {ILLEGIBLE} about the prayer book. Who found the non conformist service more attractive than the Church of England.

Int.: Was there a strong catholic community in that part of the town?

FB: Yes. In Bolton yes, Bolton's very shory In Astley Bridge there was a catholic community. Mostly the poorer element of Astley Bridge were Catholics. I think we used to despise them a little bit. I don't know why. In fact one of my early girl friends was a catholic and this was very much frowned upon both by her parents and mine.

Int.: Where you lived in Astley Bridge, would you say that all the people in the lower class, the labouring class, would have the same standard of living, or would you say they were different?

FB: Oh no. They were on much lower standard of living.

Int.: Within the class, would different categories have different standards of living would you say?

FB: Well I should think there was an Christian standard of thing and a labouring class standard of living broadly speaking. Well the working class generally depended on their children leaving school and supplementing the family income, before what we called a 'good standard of living' was reached. Most families had a minimum of three children and it could go up to eight, nine or ten in the family. And these were the people who really had a struggle. They'd buy second hand clothes and go to the rummage sales. I don't think it depended so much on income as the size of the family and the needs of the family and what parents were prepared to do for their families and what they were prepared to sacrifice for families. Now I wouldn't say that this sort of attitude, concern for the family welfare, was confined to the artisan classes; because the labourers, many of them, were anxious that their families should have a chance. There was no ideas of birth control or anything like that and the mother of a labouring class with four, five, or six children really had a tough time.

Int.: Is there any family of that kind that you can remember that you can describe?

FB: Oh yes. Several. Many families who needed help and were often helped by my own parents. My father, one of the places he used to visit, he did a fair amount of mission work in the slum areas of Brunel Ford. The mission was known as the Brunel Street Mission, and my father would help a lot of people there who came to the mission in need of material help. He would help them wherever he could and my mother would. They used to think this was part of their Christian obligation to help people, and they would do so. My father would help to organize subscriptions for his own particular workmates who were down on their own particular work. They'd have a whip round and help people who really needed it.

Int.: Would you say that your mother was class conscious at all?

FB: No. Or my father. I wouldn't say he was class conscious at all. No. We weren't class conscious, we recognized these people for what they were. They had.

Int.: Would you say it was possible in those days to move from one social class into another?

FB: Very difficult. It did happen occasionally. There was a certain gentleman who became to be known as Sir John Horden, a mill owner. He came out of a very poor family and he certainly rose socially to the top because he was the type. He was the Billy Lever type who could organize, take risks. Sir John Horden was a distant relative of mine through marriage. His own brothers and sisters lived typical working class lives, but he rose. He became a mill manager, then a mill owner. I think he emigrated from Astley Bridge to Leigh and founded a cotton mill there and became a very important person in Lancashire life. Money and they were respected because they took an interest, a sort of benevolent interest in the affairs of people in their own. The usual thing was that his sons didn't follow suit and they dissipated their father's fortune. But it was very unusual and very difficult. Those were exceptional cases, for a boy to pull himself by his own boot straps, we used to say, from clogs to clogs in three generations. But they were very rare cases these. Bill Lever was one of them of course Sir John Horden was another when I knew personally. There were one or two other people who rose to the top through their own efforts; their own commercial and industrial efforts. They must have had some sort of brain and dedication to money making.

Int.: Can you remember anybody who moved in the opposite direction, who started off higher up the scale?

FB: Oh yes. Mostly through drink. Colonel Hesketh had three sons, who were more or less fond of horses and dogs. And one of his sons was Colonel of the territorials, I think he fell addicted to drink. He was Colonel of the local territorials in the 1914-18 war and had to be brought home as a nervous wreck I think. There was a feeling that, well as the man who had made his own way felt that his own family mustn't go through what he'd done; he used to pamper them and this was bad for their own moral fibre.

Int.: Can you remember anybody that you would describe as a 'real gentleman' or a 'real lady'?

FB: Colonel Hesketh. We used to lock upon him as a gentleman in every sense of the word. And the school master, too, I suppose; a gentleman in his own particular way. A discipline I went to Astley Bridge school and he was the authority in the school in his time.

Int.: Do you remember seeing a policeman around where you lived?

FB: Yes.

Int.: What did you think of him?

FB: We used to fear him. As boys we would occasionally get into minor trouble. We used to make fun of the night watchman and that sort of thing and I remember once getting into real trouble with a policeman, was when we thought it great fun to turn his hut over, and he brought the local bobby on to the job and this involved calling at certain boys' houses. One of them was mine and the policeman knocked at the door, I had gone to bed, and I was brought downstairs and questioned by the policeman was I in this gang that turned over the watchman's hut. And this was a terrible thing in our family. A policeman should knock at our door. And the local police sergeant was a man we feared very much indeed, because we used to sometimes climb over walls to get into a football match or a cricket match or in to the local village show. Try to get the through hedges and that sort of thing. And the policeman would pounce then and he'd administer his own punishment on the spot.

Int.: Did your mother ever say 'I'll call a policeman', when you were children?

FB: She'd say, "Well if you do that sort of thing you'll get into the hands of the police." She would say what sort of things were a crime and point out certain things must not be done, or the policeman would be after you.

Int.: How do you think the policeman treated people?

FB: Very well on the whole, I think. I think his job was mainly looking after drunks Saturday nights and Friday nights. There wasn't a lot of crime not as we know it today.

Int.: Do you think he treated people fairly or was he a bit harsh?

FB: Well if the local policeman caught you doing something you shouldn't do he'd administer, I've been turned over a policeman's knee and thrashed for trying to climb over a wall, where you know, there used to be a big stone wall around there and we used to play football over it. And because I didn't have a penny I'd climb on this wall and watch it you see. Oh yes, I remember being pulled down from this wall on Moss Bank Way. And over there, I can remember being pulled down off that wall and thrashed by a policeman; probably for my own good because it was a fairly high wall. I don't know whether it still is, to watch football. We would trespass sometimes and the policeman would be on his beat and he'd catch us and he'd administer punishment on the spot, and that was the end of it.

Int.: The home that you lived in, was it rented?

FB: Our second home was bought through the co-op housing, like hundreds of other homes in Bolton.

Int.: What about your earlier one?

FB: That was rented?

Int.: Did you ever see anything of the landlord?

FB: He used to call for his rent on Saturday mornings, regularly.

Int.: In person - he was a local man was he?

FB: I think so, as far as I know. I wouldn't know. I was only very young when we left that house.

Int.: You probably wouldn't remember how he was as a landlord, whether he was a good one or a bad one?

FB: I think he was good in his own particular way. He used to collect the rent, and would do the outside repairs, see the house was kept in good condition. I don't know about interior repairs whether we had to pay for them or not, I should imagine we did. Paper hanging would come once every six or seven years I should imagine and do what we called the decorating but who paid for that I wouldn't know. In general you would feel that he fulfilled his obligations. Yes. I should say he did. I think he performed quite a useful function because he would let him house for four or five shillings a week and for his own interest he would see that it was kept in good repair outside.

Int.: It sounds as if your parents did have a struggle to make ends meet?

FB: In the early days when we were young, yes.

Int.: What did you think about that?

FB: We had no particular views. We accepted it as the ordinary life of our particular family.

Int.: You took it upon yourselves to try to supplement things by taking on these jobs like paper round and such like?

FB: Yes. This was an important contribution to the family. The two-shillings a week I earned as a paper boy.

Int.: In the early days were you ever badly off enough to need help?

FB: Yes. But my mother would never ask for it. My recollections were that we had to be content with soup when father was out of work, or on strike. We'd known then. Mother would say, "Well that's all you can have." It was probably a bowl of soup made of bone and vegetables, and this we knew was because father was out of work. And we just accepted it.

Int.: Were you given lessons by one of your parents, a tutor or governess?

FB: No.

Int.: How old were you when you first went to school?

FB: Four.

Int.: Was that all day - morning and afternoon?

FB: Yes.

Int.: About what times did you start and finish?

FB: Nine o'clock 'til twelve and two 'til four.

Int.: What kind of a school was it?

FB: My first school was Chalfont Street School, a council school. Then we moved over the bridge, as we used to call it, which was a move up in social life, to our own house. Then we went to Astley Bridge school, which was a Church of England school.

Int.: And both these would be mixed schools?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Which of these were you at the longest?

FB: Astley Bridge.

Int.: How long did it take you to get to school?

FB: Two or three minutes.

Int.: Were you ever escorted?

FB: Don't remember. We used to go on our own.

Int.: What did you think about school?

FB: We looked upon it as a duty to learn our lessons and become proficient in the three Rs. And the great idea was to get a Scholarship to, what we called, the higher grade school. The Bolton Secondary School. I remember sitting for scholarship to the free higher educational school, which was known as the Municipal Secondary School in Great Moore Street. I won the scholarship to go there, but that involved keeping me there for four years, or three years at the least, you undertook to keep the child there 'till fifteen or sixteen. And this was a question of domestic economy again, and in my case my mother couldn't afford to let me take up the scholarship. She was very distressed about it. I accepted it seeing the distress which she showed about this and I said 'Don't worry I'll go and get myself and job.'

Int.: You yourself had no particular regrets about it?

FB: Afterwards, yes. It was one of the jealousies that I had with my younger brothers and sisters. At least two of them won scholarships and went to the secondary school. And afterwards I felt rather envious and felt that life wasn't really - this was very much later of course. But no I just accepted that I'd got to go out to work as soon as my school days were over, which was then at the age of thirteen. My eldest sister accepted the fact that she must go and work half-time in the weaving shed, as a half-timer, which she did.

Int.: Did you like school?

FB: Not particularly. I liked some of it. I was interested in History and Geography and I liked these things. I used to think Arithmetic was a bit of a bore but I used to do tolerably well at it. I did very well at school.

Int.: You didn't dislike school?

FB: No. I just accepted it as part of life.

Int.: How did you feel about the teachers?

FB: Some we liked and some we didn't. Some we respected and some we didn't. A lot depended on the teacher's personality. Whether the teacher was a friendly type and an encouraging type or whether he or she looked upon the cane as the sole means of controlling you. Some of them did, of course.

Int.: What would you regard as a friendly teacher in those days?

FB: One who would give you a smile now and again, especially if it was a lady teacher. And come and encourage you and say 'That's very nice.", "That's a good drawing you've done." Or "That's a good essay you've written". This sort of encouragement we used to value very much. This was the sort of teacher we liked. The sort of teacher we didn't like was "No, that's terrible, come over and take the cane, you've not tried your best." You used to be punished and this was the sort of thing was used to hate. They were a mixed crew, the teachers in those days.

Int.: Did they used to emphasise particular things as being important in life?

FB: Yes. Getting on and getting a scholarship was very important. This was a real honour to the school. And the one or two bright boys who reached Bolton Grammar School these were the cream of the society. These were the important people. When you're about the age of 11 and you begin to show signs of intelligence you were picked out and joined a scholarship class. This meant extra tuition after school hours. The headmaster used to take an interest here I suppose for the honour of the school. You'd be encouraged to study and do a little bit of homework. Then you were sent in to enter for the very limited number of scholarships that were going you see. There was the Church Institute which was a higher educational establishment run by the church and then there was the Bolton School, grammar school, which was the boys school and the Higher Grade School which was mixed and to get a scholarship was a real aim of life.

Int.: Did they emphasise such things as manners and tidiness and punctuality?

FB: Oh yes.

Int.: As much as scholastic achievement?

FB: Yes. Hygiene and cleanliness - we used to form into ranks in the school yard and the teacher would go round and look at your clogs to see whether they had been cleaned. And whether your hands were clean. And punishment if you went with dirty hands or clogs. This was the cane again. Your hands and clogs would be inspected before you went into school, the teacher would walk round the ranks and look to see whether you'd polished your clogs that morning.

Int.: What about manners?

FB: Yes. Manners were taught. Good behaviour yes. We had Religious Instruction every morning which included behaviour - 'Honour thy father and thy mother'. Very important. The 10 Commandments were important. Prayer book was important, catechism was important.

Int.: Did they pay any attention to the way children spoke?

FB: Not particularly. No. Except of course we were taught to sound our Hs in English lessons. That was important.

Int.: If you did something that was disapproved of you would have some form of punishment?

FB: Yes. The cane.

Int.: You would be caned for bad work and dirty clogs?

FB: Yes.

Int.: What other sorts of things would merit the cane?

FB: Talking in class. Or to laugh or interrupt a teacher. Or if the teacher left the room and came back to find everyone chattering she'd pounce on somebody and set an example.

Int.: Was there any kind of punishment besides the cane?

FB: No. I don't think so.

Int.: Did you just get told off for certain things?

FB: No. Just the cane.

Int.: Did this apply to girls and boys alike?

FB: Mostly the boys, the girls were pretty well behaved. It was the boys that used to create all the trouble. They used to tease the girls in class and the girls would perhaps weep and tell the teacher who'd done it.

Int.: Did your parents show an interest in your school work?

FB: I don't think so. Not particularly. Very proud of you id you'd one something. Just now and again there'd be a competition in school for the best essay and this might be shown at a sort of exhibition where the parents might come round and look at it, and you might be patted on the back for something that you'd done that was exceptional.

Int.: Your parents did come into school sometimes then?

FB: Very rarely. Didn't interfere much. Probably once a year when there'd be an exhibition of school work. And if you'd done something to merit being posted on the exhibition in the way of an essay or a drawing or a painting, the parents would be very pleased about it.

Int.: Did your parents meet your teachers?

FB: No. There was no consultation at all between parents and teachers.

Int.: Did the other children at Astley Bridge school come from similar types of home to your own?

FB: They were a very mixed crowd, of course. You'd have some ragamuffin types, with parents who didn't care or who couldn't afford decent clothes, obviously bought their clothes at rummage sales or second hand shops or pawn shops, and came to school untidy, especially round the necks. Some of the boys would wear a scarf and a nice clean celluloid collar which could be washed every day. If you wore a collar then you came from a good home - that was a real distinguishing mark.

Int.: The school would be a cross section of the locality?

FB: Yes.

Int.: The teachers used to single out the bright children for special scholarship tuition?

FB: The headmaster would when you got into the higher standard. Standard 6 was the top standard, so if there were any bright boys in standard 5, as I was, I was promoted to standard 6 before my time in order to join the scholarship class.

Int.: Did they single out any other groups for different treatment?

FB: No.

Int.: Were there any favouritism or anything like that?

FB: No. If you were a favourite you were a well behaved one, you see, and pointed out as an example to the rest who weren't so well behaved.

Int.: Were there any gangs among the children?

FB: Not school gangs. The gangs were neighbourhood gangs, your own playmates in the immediate neighbourhood. We used to gang up against the Wesleyans you see and when snow came the thing was you'd go and snowball the Wesleyans. We used to have running fights with the neighbouring school which was in Seymour Road, there was a Wesleyan school there and no boys used to gang up and fight the Wesleyans with snowballs. There were no gangs in the school. In later school life you'd have your own particular friends in school.

Int.: Did any of the children seem to be left out of things? In the school playtimes?

FB: Yes, the nervous types. You could pick them out. Perhaps the ones that were badly treated at home. You could see they responded in two ways - you either became aggressive or you sunk into an inferiority complex and just didn't take part in school activities. You stood by the school wall in play times and couldn't join in - these were the nervous types. And then on the other hand there were the aggressive types who came from poor homes. I suppose the psychological effect there was to become aggressive and fight and show that - well - they were somebody.

Int.: Would you say that the children made any attempt to encourage the nervous ones to join in?

FB: No. They just went there own way. They would have a poor time the nervous ones.

Int.: Would you have stayed on longer at school if you could have done?

FB: No. I think the ambition there was to leave school and get a job.

Int.: You did attend part-time classes after you left school?

FB: Oh yes.

Int.: Would you like to tell me about some of the things you did?

FB: Well my first job on leaving school was an errand boy to an Ironmonger firm in the town. And for 5/- a week I used to work from 8 o'clock in the morning 'till 8 o'clock at night, delivering orders from this firm. A very important firm with a shop in Deansgate and they used to supply the wealthier classes, the Chorley New Road classes, the west end types, with domestic requirements; and also they were builders' merchants. And my job as an errand boy was to either take parcels out up Chorley New Road and deliver them or deliver ironmongery and builders' requirements to building sites with a hand truck. A builder would ring up and say he wanted so many drain pipers or down spouts, nails or screws, nuts or bolts, and I would deliver these on a hand cart, probably within any distance up to two miles from the town centre, with a hand cart.

Int.: How did you get this job?

FB: I just went down and applied for it. A friend of mine in my Sunday School class had already got himself a job as an errand boy with this firm. I told him I was leaving school at Christmas and looking for a job and he knew I was looking for a job and he had already got a job as errand boy with this firm said "We want another errand boy, come down. If you come down you'll probably get the job." So I went down and I got this job.

Int.: What hours did you work there?

FB: From eight in the morning 'till eight at night. And 'till one o'clock on a Saturday.

Int.: What about meal breaks?

FB: One hour for dinner and half an hour for tea. And we used to finish at eight o'clock, then I was expected to go to night school, which wasn't really right because night school used to run from seven 'til nine so I only got an hour instead of two hours' tuition. And I was so tired it was no good to me because I used to fall asleep, in the heated class room, trying to learn commercial arithmetic, and shorthand and book keeping. I went in for a commercial course, being in business then as a boy, and hoping to rise to something a bit more in the profession. I was encouraged to go to night school but I'm afraid for the first three years of my night school life I was much too tired to have any benefit of night school work.

Int.: Did you sit any exams there?

FB: Yes. Well later on. I had this errand boy's job for a matter of ten months and then my father thought this was not quite the thing and he encouraged me to sit an exam for a job at the Co-op.

Int.: Was that when your association with the Co-op began then?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Well this errand boy job with the ironmonger, this was your first full time job wasn't it?

FB: Yes.

Int.: You were there for ten months - did you have any holidays during that period?

FB: No. I don't remember any.

Int.: Can you remember what you were paid?

FB: 5/-.

Int.: For what you were doing, and considering what wages were, did you feel that this was a fair wage?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did you give any of the money to your mother?

FB: Yes. All of it.

Int.: What was it spent on?

FB: It went into the family pool.

Int.: Did she give any of it back to you?

FB: 2d.

Int.: Were you carrying on with your paper round at this time?

FB: Oh no. I gave that up when I left school. It was only an after school job.

Int.: How did you get on with the other people at work at the ironmongers?

FB: Very well.

Int.: You knew the other boy that had been at school with you.

FB: Yes we were the two errand boys, doing the same job.

Int.: What about the other people who worked there?

FB: They were seniors. We got on with them all right. They used to treat us fairly well. It was a shop that employed probably fourteen or fifteen people in and about the shop. And there were section heads you see and the great boss himself, George Grayson, who was a man to be feared. He used to come down to work at nine o'clock in the morning, after things had got going and he was the man who'd call us into the office if we'd done anything reported by the section head. We'd go into the office and get ticked off.

Int.: How did you feel he treated you?

FB: I suppose fair enough but sometimes we thought he was a bit unfair you know.

Int.: A bit harsh you mean?

FB: Yes. They were disciplinarians. "You don't do this my boy." Sometimes you'd got windows to clean and these were inspected by the boss and if they weren't clean enough to suit him you would be ticked off.

Int.: How did you feel about the work itself? Did you like it or not?

FB: Not particularly. We thought it was a bit rough to have to pull a truck about town. Some of it we liked. We liked to deliver parcels up Chorley New Road because this meant a free tram ride. We'd have half a dozen parcels and load them on to a tram and deliver them as we went along. And we had a pass to go on the tram in the form of an arm badge, this was what we liked.

Int.: And did the tram wait for you?

FB: No. We would get off at the first call. We'd probably have half a dozen parcels to deliver to the better class houses. Deliver them to the madeismen's entrance. We'd deliver them and then wait for the next tram to take you further on. Because you had a badge contract and when you were on this particular duty you would be given an arm badge. The work was shared between the two errand boys because this was quite nice work. Free tram riding. Then the other days you would be put on the merchant sort of end. And this meant a hand {ILLEGIBLE} which was pretty tough.

Int.: You then went on to the co-op. When would that be?

FB: Just before my fourteenth birthday.

Int.: What did you have to do?

FB: Deliver milk.

Int.: That was the first stage?

FB: Yes. That was the first stage of co-operative employment. To deliver milk on a milk round. And for that you used to report at a quarter past seven in the morning and deliver milk 'til about one o'clock. Then you'd come in and clean up all the cans. It was loose milk delivered in milk cans with a horse and milk float. There was a man in charge of the round and you was his boy and helped him to deliver milk. And about half past one or quarter to two you'd go home for a meal and you'd come back again at four o'clock. It was a sort of split duty because there was an evening round as well.

Int.: How long did you do this?

FB: Two years.

Int.: What time did you work on 'til when you came back at four?

FB: 'Til about seven o'clock by the time you'd cleaned up after you'd delivered the milk; you used to have to wash all your cans and the kits you know.

Int.: Who saw to the horse?

FB: The driver. The man in charge of the round. He had to go and feed the horse and bed it down.

Int.: You were on that particular type of work for two years. What were you paid for doing that?

FB: 5/-. Then you got 1/- rise on your first birthday. At fourteen 5/- and at fifteen 6/-.

Int.: Did you have any holidays with pay?

FB: Yes. One week's holiday with pay.

Int.: Did you go on giving all the money to your mother?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Were you still getting the same back?

FB: Still 2d. Yes.

Int.: How did you find the people you worked with at the Co-op?

FB: Oh all right. There was a lot of boys. There was about then forty to fifty milk rounds, so there was 40-50 boys, so a lot of rough play about, especially when you was washing up when you came in. But this was again under strict supervision. You had bosses who looked after you and inspected your work. They used to look at your kits and cans to see whether they were properly cleaned and you weren't allowed to go home 'til they were properly cleaned.

Int.: Did you like this work or not?

FB: On the whole, yes. But I thought it was a bit unfair having to work Sunday mornings, because it was every morning; Sundays, Christmas Days, Bank Holidays, This was the time when we used to feel it a bit unjust. That we couldn't have the same holidays that other boys had. We had to turn out the whole year round, except for the week's holiday. And again I was too tired to get the full benefit out of night school. I was taught the elements of book keeping, and probably my arithmetic improved, but apart from that I didn't get the full benefit because I was too tired. And I can remember falling asleep on occasions because of being out of doors all day and going straight from work into a heated class room. I used to find I couldn't concentrate.

Int.: How did you find the Co-op as an employer?

FB: They were model employers. It was a great thing to get on the Co-op. It was considered quite a good safe respectable job once you got on the Co-op.

Int.: You went on after your two years of delivering milk into some other aspect of Co-op?

FB: Yes. Then you were drafted into the shop life from the milk department. The biggest employer of junior labour was of course the grocery department. But before I went into the grocery department I served a term as errand boy in the gent's outfitters, mostly specialising in hats, caps, collars and ties, and umbrellas. The manager of this shop wanted a boy so he reported this to the secretary of the Co-op, and he would inform the dairy manager that a senior boy, (in turn, the senior boy of the milk department would go into the department that required a boy) and this happened to be in my case the gents outfitting department. And I went there as sort of errand boy and window cleaner.

Int.: Did your hours of duty change?

FB: Yes. Slightly better. From 8.30 in the morning, instead of eight o'clock, but there were late nights on Fridays and Saturdays. Nine o'clock on Friday and eight on Saturdays.

Int.: And normal shop hours the other days?

FB: Eight o'clock mostly. I had one what I think we called an early night. I think it was Mondays and Tuesdays, 7.30, Wednesdays early closing at one o'clock, Thursdays eight, Fridays nine, and Saturdays eight o'clock.

Int.: Did those hours apply to the other departments too?

FB: Yes. General hours.

Int.: So that those would be the hours you would be working from then up 'til the end of the war?

FB: Yes. Until I joined the army.

Int.: Did you have any other job with them before you joined up?

FB: I was transferred from this job as errand boy to the grocery department, which was supposed in those days to be a sort of apprenticeship - apprenticed grocer. You went into the grocery department and there you learnt the trade of being a grocer. Then of course night school became some benefit, because then I joined what we called institute classes and became a qualified grocer. I went two years, first year and second year grocery classes with examinations here. Then of course the war came along in 1914 and this was the end of night school and a different life altogether.

Int.: In these other departments in the Co-op, did you like the work there?

FB: Not particularly, but it was better than going in the mill or the foundry.

Int.: Did pay increase on transfer from one department to another?

FB: No. Pay increased according to age.

Int.: And then you went into the forces because of the war?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Could we just go back for a moment to those part-time activities that you did? When you were still at school there was a period when you took the spinner's breakfast and then you had your paper round; was there anything else that you did as a means of earning an odd little bit?

FB: No. Apart from odd pennies I got from neighbours for doing jobs - errands mostly.

Int.: How did you get the paper round?

FB: Just went to the newsagent and asked to be considered for the next vacancy. They were always changing as these boys went into full time employment. There was always a demand for a paper boy and as long as you were clean and presented a good appearance you for the job.

Int.: What exactly did you have to do?

FB: You kept a book and delivered the papers and collected the money on Saturday mornings. You kept a record in the book of the papers you delivered and was occupied all Saturday morning collecting the money from the people you had delivered the papers to.

Int.: What time did you have to begin?

FB: Half-past four in the evening we started, and finished at half-past six.

Int.: Was this on Saturdays and Sundays too?

FB: No. Not Sundays. Saturdays mornings, and this was up to you, if you wanted to earn extra pennies you'd go round selling football papers Saturday nights.

Int.: You would go round selling them in the streets?

FB: Yes. We used to short and people used to come and buy a football paper, if they were interested in football results. You'd run along the streets shouting "football final" and people would come up to their doors and whistle for you and you'd sell them a paper, and we used to get 2d for every dozen we sold. This was extra to the 2/- a week.

Int.: How long were you doing that?

FB: Twelve months.

Int.: Did you have any holiday at all from that?

FB: No.

Int.: And again you would give the money to your mother?

FB: Yes. But she would perhaps give me an extra, allow me to put some in my money box. If I'd earned an extra 8d or 10d, or if it had been an important cup final or something like that it might amount to 1/- earned extra on Saturday night, and my mother would probably give me 2d or 3d to go in my savings.

Int.: How did you feel about the job? Did you like doing it?

FB: Well it was earning money, this was the point. There was an economic motive.

Int.: How did the newsagent treat you?

FB: Fair enough. All right. It was up to him to treat you properly or else you'd pack in the job.

Int.: Would he employ other boys on the rounds as well?

FB: Yes. There was two or three of us from the same shop.

Int.: How did you get on with them?

FB: All right.

Int.: Did having a job like this alter your attitude towards school?

FB: No I don't think it made any difference to school life.

Int.: It didn't make you want to leave any sooner?

FB: I think it gave you a sense of feeling that you were doing something to help your parents help the family. There was a little bit of satisfaction there which gave you a sort of communal feeling that you were doing something to repay your parents and help the family along.

Int.: Well going on then to the war. Would you like to tell me how you came to be called up and what branch you were in?

FB: This was the thing to do. This was an adventure in life. All school life had this patriotic bias - the history we were taught, the heroes of history were the soldiers and sailors. So of course to join the army was a great adventure. This was daring. The first might war broke out off we went down to the local artillery barracks and asked to join the local artillery, which was the thing. I remember the gang of us eighteen year olds who went down to join the artillery the night war broke out and fortunately or unfortunately were told they'd got their full complement the sergeant told us and to come back in two or three weeks' time. And I happened to go home on the Saturday night and mother asked the usual question, "Where have you been tonight?" And I told her that I had been down with so and so to join the army and this was a real shock to my mother and father, and my mother wept about this, and forbid me to do anything of the kind. And as the weeks progressed I was always at my mother, there was all the boys and my play mates in the same age group, they'd had the same experience with their parents, we all sort of compared notes on the following Sunday and they'd been discouraged from joining the army by their parents, they were too young (we were too young actually because the age of recruitment was nineteen). Eventually under continued pressure I got permission to join the army, this would be late October, and the war had been going then for two months. Eventually my mother gave way. Of course the air was full of bands and recruitment posters and it was all the young men's duty to join the army. The pressures were very great, and of course the call to join the army was very strong. I was eventually allowed to go down to the recruiting office and join the army. This was in late October and by the first week in November I was on my was to Portsmouth. I remember going down with half a dozen of my friends to join the army. And we all said we wanted to join the same regiment. We weren't particular which one so long as we could keep together. Because I was five foot nine, fairly tall for may age I was put in the artillery, and when we came out of the recruiting office that night we all found ourselves in different regiments, according to our particular physical abilities. And I was sent off the following day to join the artillery in Portsmouth, at least in Gosport, Hampshire. There was no time to think I just had to go home and tell mother I was off the following day, and I had to go and report to my shop manager that I couldn't start work that day as I'd joined the army. I was in a shop then that employed ten men and I was first in the shop to join, the youngest boy in the shop, and they all responded with "Bravo" and they made a collection for me and sent me off in good style. And this was the opening of a new life to me. I'd never been out of Bolton scarcely. To go through London, on a train to London, was a real adventure.

Int.: Did you enjoy this aspect of it then?

FB: Yes. Very much. This was a new life.

Int.: What was your response to this unaccustomed freedom?

FB: Fortunately here I began to value my home religious beliefs, because I found myself among a very rough crowd. Most of them I slept with the first night in a big barrack room - we were given a blanket and laid on the concrete floor of an army gymnasium in an army barracks - and the language I heard and the people who were in the army in my particular group there were terrible, I'd never experienced anything like it before. There was all sorts of filthy language going about. I found myself amongst people I never dreamt I should be associated with. They were a very mixed crowd of course. There were a few decent lads. Some had come out of goal and joined the army. But here again I think religious training counted for something. I think my home background.

Int.: Your attitude to life didn't alter as a result of your army career?

FB: No. My mother gave me a lecture on wine and women and all this sort of thing and it stuck fast did this, I think it did really. So army life did appeal because of the drill and the adventure of the thing - this appealed very much. I enjoyed army life.

Int.: Where did you get sent to?

FB: They had so many recruits, everybody was joining the army so they had more than they could cope with. It was six weeks or so we were sleeping rough in all sorts of places where they could find to put us in. I know one was an old brewery which had been commandeered. Eventually we got posted to training units and I was very fortunate I got posted to Weymouth and found myself in billets. Billeted on some very nice people in Weymouth, I was fortunate here, it was a religious home a good influence with people who really did care and made us very comfortable. There were only two of us in the billet. There was an overdraft went down to Weymouth and we were billeted down the street. I think maybe a hundred in the charge of a sergeant, two in this house and two in that, right down the whole street. For two months, I was billeted with these very nice people and then we went into tents under canvas and I began to really enjoy being in the army. I got some training as an army signaller which I very much enjoyed and which appealed to me.

Int.: Were you in the signals?

FB: Yes. All the time.

Int.: Did you get posted out of Britain?

FB: Yes. Over to France.

Int.: Almost immediately would this be?

FB: Oh no. We had a long period of training in Weymouth, from January 'til the end of August before I passed out as a qualified signaller. Then I was posted to a battery and went through a course of training of firing on ranges, that sort of thing, and then we went out to France.

Int.: Were you in the same place in France most of the time?

FB: Right through the Somme yes. We were posted to the Somme district in April and spent three months preparing for the Somme battle, laying cables all over the place. Operation posts and battery positions. Trying to destroy the enemy trenches and fortifications, for three months in preparation for the Somme battle. Oh before that we were in training with our units in the battle line, up in the Rennes Louis district then after two or three months there we were sent down on the Somme to prepare for the Somme battle. And we were down there right through the Somme battle right up 'til Christmas 1916. Then we were moved about the whole front, Ypres, Arras. I was one of the fortunate ones who came home without any disability. We'd have long periods in the firing line and then we'd come out for three or four weeks rest, during which you played football and had a certain amount of recreation, behind the lines. No my only experience of army hospital was when I played football after the armistice and I got knee trouble and spent a few weeks in hospital with this knee. But apart from being gassed - I had a small does of gas once - yes... But otherwise I was very fortunate. More fortunate that the poor boys who got in the infantry. I think out of my Sunday School class - most of us jointed from the Sunday School teenagers - 17, 18, 19 year olds - very few of them came back so when I came back I considered myself indeed very very fortunate.

Int.: How long after the armistice was it before you came out of the army?

FB: Oh it wasn't very long, because I came home on leave in February 1919 and I didn't go back. Everybody then was clamouring for demobilization so I applied for mine while I was home on leave and I got it.

Int.: And then you resumed your career with the Co-op?

FB: Going back to the co-op before 1914.

Int.: Did you belong to a union or association?

FB: Yes. I was elected on to the branch committee. We had roughly about a thousand members which included the outlying districts - West Houghton, Horwich. I got pretty active in trade union work and became a branch secretary.

Int.: When would that be?

FB: In the 1920's.

Int.: But you joined when you first went into the Co-op?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did you belong when you were with the iron mongers?

FB: No. It was - I don't know that it was an actual condition of employment. When you joined the co-op all your work mates insisted that you should be a member of the union. It was the thing to join the union, you were more or less roped in. There was pressure on you to join. It wasn't actually a condition of employment then, but the pressure was there. It was the thing to join the union.

Int.: Some people say that there was in those days division between trained craftsmen and other workers. You would agree with that would you?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Would you say that full time work changed your attitude to life at all?

FB: Yes. Because one joined educational classes run by the Co-op. You went to night school, if you were inclined that way, and I was encouraged to join classes and first of all take a saleman's course and then a managerial course, and eventually became a branch manager and from branch manager I became a managing secretary of a co-op of a small society. I had to leave Bolton of course to get a branch managers job. Applied for a job in other societies.

Int.: You feel that your career in the co-op, it influenced you because it had this method of promotion and education and so on?

FB: Yes. And idealistic purpose in the co-op which through attending classes organized by the co-operative union, book keeping and managerial courses, to become a co-op manager. If you got certificates in economics and commercial law, arithmetic and history and principles of co-operation and eventually you became qualified on paper for a managerial capacity, and this helped you to secure a job when you applied to other societies. You answered advertisements I left Bolton to become a branch manager in Southport. From Southport I applied and got a managing secretary of a small society in the Cotswolds, in the Midlands, in a little place called Fenny Compton, with a small village society where you were a very important person.

Int.: When you first left school and went back to work you continued living at home?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did going to work change your relationship at all with your parents?

FB: I think slightly, yes. You were allowed a little bit more latitude and freedom, although the home influence was still fairly strong until later on. Mother kept an eye on your girl friend and saw that you came in at decent time on Saturday nights.

Int.: Did you have a specific time for coming in?

FB: Yes I was expected to be home by eleven o'clock, even after I came home from the war. Eleven o'clock was still rather late to come home on Saturday nights. And dances was taboo actually, until dancing was allowed in Sunday School and I was permitted to go to a dance in Sunday School.

Int.: Did you still spend your Sundays the same way going to Sunday School and to Church?

FB: Well yes I did. But one came home for the army with ideas about whether you had been taught the truth about things and you begin to question your religious...

Int.: I meant when you first started working?

FB: Oh yes.

Int.: It was only when you came out of the army that things began to change?

FB: Yes. New ideas. And you used to question things.

Int.: Did you develop an interest in politics?

FB: Yes. Very much so.

Int.: What were your views?

FB: My views were against war for a start. I got myself involved with the Labour party. The socialist movement.

Int.: This was before the war?

FB: No after the war. I don't think I had any strong political views before the war.

Int.: Before the war you weren't specially interested in politics?

FB: No, except at election time, when we used to look upon them as a bit of a sport.

Int.: Did you carry on spending your spare time in the same way, after you left school when you first went to work, or did you do different things?

FB: No I was interested mostly in sport. And my bitter regret about shop life, working in shops before the war, my teenage regret was that I had to work Saturday afternoons and couldn't join the Sunday School cricket club, or football club. And this was one thing I regretted about shop life it did deprive me of sporting activities.

Int.: Apart from going to the evening classes, did you go out in the evenings?

FB: No I don't think so. I had three nights a week at night school and the other nights I had a bit of homework to do and for the other spare hour I used to go into the reading room at the local Library. And read about the things that interest me.

Int.: Did you make any new friends were you started going out to work?

FB: No I kept to my old school friends - they boys I made friends with at school. You sorted your own particular group of friends out, and that was mainly on Sundays, and we'd chum up and go for walks. And take an interest in girl friends, which was frowned on at home, even when you were sixteen or seventeen. Girl friends were taboo, sex life was very taboo.

Int.: Did you have any special friends at this time? And take them home sometimes?

FB: No. Not a great deal. The few of us would meet outside Sunday School and we'd walk the parade you know which was at Astley Bridge. Yes. I had two or three very close friends which I made at day school.

Int.: And you would continue on your Sunday evening walks with them?

FB: Yes. No. I don't think so. Well, one of my closest friends, very closest friend, was killed in the war and that unsettled me after the war. When I came back after the war I was very unsettled with my job. I went to join the police force but was rejected, I came out of the army with this injured knee and that prevented me joining the police force. I also applied for another job in the post office. I'd had some training in signalling, telephone work and I remember applying for a job at Rochdale as a post office engineer. They were applying for ex-signal service men for Rochdale post office. And I remember going there and there was a queue there of about 20 ex-servicemen and I was at the end of the queue and by the time my time came they'd got all they wanted. And so I just settled down to the job of being a grocer.

Int.: Previous to that would you have preferred any other occupation?

FB: Yes, I would but I hadn't the qualifications. I wanted to be a journalist. There were two things I wanted to be - a professional footballer and a professional cricketer, or a journalist. When I left school I would have liked to have gone and been a reporter on the local paper but I hadn't a secondary school education and that barred me and when my brothers finished his secondary school career he went and got the job I always hankered after and he became a cub reporter on the Bolton Evening News and I used to envy him. I was really jealous about this. Because he used to go to football matches with the senior reporter and learn his job at football and cricket matches and the local council and things like that. And I used to be very jealous and very envious. And this was when I really missed my secondary school education. If I could have chosen my career that's what it would have been. I think I would have made a very good reporter because I was interested in things.

Int.: Would your parents expect to know where you were and who you were with?

FB: Yes.

Int.: Did your parents meet your friends?

FB: Oh yes. I could take them home if I wanted to, but our particular later interests were outdoors. Always outdoors never inside.