Memories: They stole the schoolmaster’s cane

A schoolmaster named Issac Firth Pickles was undeterred when his schoolboys stole his cane. He simply sent off to the local newspaper shop for another – G.C. recalls life in Burnley, Lancashire, at the end of the 1900s in the Burnley Express, 29 July 1950.

I WONDER how many old people of Burnley spent their boyhood days in the town. My earliest recollection was of 1878, when my father, a stonemason, was engaged on the building of St. Stephen’s Church.

Fulledge day school under the headmastership of Mr E. Jones, was one of the best elementary schools in the town. There were about 1,000 scholars on the roll and the sight of three large classes in one big room would horrify the educationalists of today.

The scholars were packed tight on long desks with hardly room to use their slates and pencils which were the only writing material supplied for the week school pence. No wonder there was some bad writing or which some of the teachers thought the cane was the only corrective. I took advantage of the opportunity.

I had to cause many of those canes to disappear mysteriously. Issac Firth Pickles, who kept a newspaper shop at the corner of Oxford Road, kept a good stock of canes so when I destroyed one the teacher simply sent a scholar to him for another. But despite of “discipline” there was generally plenty of noise in the schoolroom.

Picture credit: Boy’s Own Paper, 9 October 1897

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