South Yorkshire Times, February 2nd, 1934
Old Wombwell – Jump School
Forty Years Ago
A Glance Back at the Placid Age
Village Group
In our Wombwell Notes recently an appeal was made for photographs redolent of Wombwell in the old days. The desire was expressed that readers would submit for reproduction pictures affording glimpses of the town as our grandparents knew it – peeps into our picturesque past.
Well, here is one from Jump. It is not quite the type solicited, but it is a very interesting photograph nevertheless and will please many of our old readers especially those who recognise the people in it. It is a photograph of the staff of Jump Council School some forty years ago, and brings back to mind vivid recollections of Victorian styles in dress. It is a far cry back to leg of mutton sleeves, frizzy fringes, tight little waistbands, and “chokers” that seem to have been designed to prevent mumps – but there are not many who have passed the forty mark who do not remember them. Pretty? Yes. On a photograph. But would the ladies like to go back to those styles again?
What is it that impresses you most as you glance at this photograph for the first time? The dresses? – they are bound to intrigue the ladies. The good looks of the girls? – The male observers are not likely to overlook that. They certainly are a comely lot and not without graces if we are to judge personality by sweetness in a face. Our younger girls will be able to judge for themselves whether their generation is endowed with the charms which their grandmothers possessed.
Those things might attract your attention but there is something else that cannot possible be overlooked and that is the placid Madonna-like expression on every face. No Hollywood grin in this picture – no sophisticated display of painted eyebrows and artificial teeth. Tha was not the age of “talkies,” wireless and sixpenny hops. These girls had time to “stand and stare” and went to bed of nights. The faces are the very expression of intelligent tranquillity.
The picture is supplied by Mr. William Allott, formerly headmaster of Jump Council School and now living in retirement in Scarborough. He is sitting in the centre of the group with arms folded. Mr. Allott has sent a few details of the persons then on his staff. Most of them will be remembered in Wombwell and Jump, though several have now passed away.
In the group are:
Back Row
- Miss Pattie Horsfield, now Mrs. Steer of Hoober.
- Miss Mann
- Miss Nellie Brydon, now Mrs. Perigo. Afterwards at Park Street School, Wombwell. Now living in Sheffield.
- Name not known
- Miss Florrie Firth, of Hoyland, formerly headmistress of Hoyland Nether Council School. Returned to Hoyland after spending some years in Australia.
- Miss Kitty Skelton.
- Miss Clara ……Afterwards at Wombwell Barnsley Road; now a widow living in Carlton, Barnsley.
Seated
- Miss Florrie Baker of Hoyland.
- William Allott.
- Miss Annie Corbett, was headmistress of the Jump Infants School for forty years. Died in retirement at Blackpool about six years ago.
- Miss Elizabeth Wharton, a native of Jump.
- Samuel Shaw, assistant headmaster of an Industrial School at Mirfield. Returned to Hemingfield School for six years. Died four years ago. His widow lives in Hough Lane, Wombwell. Has a son holding an important teaching appointment in London, and a daughter who is matron of a hospital in Cromer.
Front Row
- Miss Annie Crawshaw, now headmistress of a large infants’ school in Bradford. Went there from Park Street, Wombwell.
- Miss Florrie Adamson, now Mrs. Wood, of Chapeltown; a grandmother.
- Miss Maud Pollard.
- Miss Alice Bennett, now Mrs. Harbisher, wife of a retired Rotherham Police Inspector now living at Cavendish, Suffolk.