The school was built by John Hall and his sister in 1868 and opened in 1869. The building was enlarged in 1876 and 1884, and attendance rose from 46 in 1876 to 78 by 1889. With more children learning to read and write the parish marriage register started to have signatures, rather than ‘X’.
Len Loates shared these memories:
In the 1920s, there were three teachers. Miss Starling taught the eldest and Miss Chapel the youngest, taking them for nature walks. The formidable Miss Wormald was head teacher and commanded respect in the whole village. Weekend joy could be ruined by the dreaded threat “Oi’ll tell Miss Wormald o’yew on Monday morning”.
Miss Wormald:
Owen Balls has these memories:
I went to the village school in 1931 when I was 5. I can remember Nellie Taylor one of the big girls teaching us to read in the infants room with big ‘oil cloth’ pictures hanging over the blackboard. I remember breaking my pencil in half and dare not tell the teacher, she laughed when she found out, she was nice her name was Miss Wright and she cycled from Steeple Bumpstead each day and back at night.
Owen Balls is the boy on the left:
After 1937, when the seniors went to Linton Village College, numbers fell to 27.
Anthony Loates has these memories:
When I went, it was wartime and Peter Coppen remembered me being good at drawing, though paper was short. Hot meals came from Linton Village College and we had a real treat one day when a jeep pulled into the playground. GIs dished out chewing gum and biscuits wrapped in cellophane. We were more interested in that than the biscuits. All the teachers were women and the best was Mrs Atkins from Ashton…I learnt my first French from her, singing Frere Jacques, I didn’t know what it meant in English. She got me, Brian Addley and Roger Bannister through the scholarship and I went to Cambridge High School for Boys (now Hills Road VI Form).
More about the history of the school:
