The Saga of Knightwick School

 

A brick building high on the hill,
Yes it’s Knightwick school and it’s standing there still.
Yet it was quite a climb for a four and a half year old
Dragging her feet in the winter cold,
Up the pathway,
Day by day,
With long plaits flying
Which every way.
Into the ‘little’ room first with Mr Partridge and a warm cosy fire
And an alphabet poster hanging on a wire
Full of large letters to say and letter to write,
Giving any small pupil quite a fright.
Otherwise there were fights over dolls and such like
Or frightening trips to the loo or other small hikes
And having to sit still
Most often against one’s own will.

The time came to move from one’s safe cocoon
And travel through that huge wooden door into the ‘big’ room.
The portals stands open wide
And there’s no chance to hide.
There stands Miss Selwyn looking elegant and beautiful
Handing out empty pages that were soon quite full
Of drawings of elegant ladies with summer hats tied in bows,
Surrounded by gardens full of cockle shells and pretty maids in rows,
Bringing nursery rhymes to life in pictures
With coloured crayons of various mixtures.

The nature corner behind our backs
Housed creepy crawleys, but no rats.
Cages were filled with grass snakes and tadpoles producing legs,
And mice, and butterflies and sometimes birds’ eggs.
These we were expected to closely observe
Although sometimes it seemed rather absurd,
As they were things we already knew about,
And growing plants was just an excuse to get out
Although it became clear that here we had competitions
Making lots of accurate or inaccurate decisions,
About size and height
Of each green particle as it struggled towards the light,
As we made precise or imprecise mathematical calculations
And secretly developing our personal educations.

Yes, there was safety in that section of the ‘big’ room,
Which we knew that we would be leaving, all too soon.
It was warmly decorated with our work productions
Showing that learning was not just deductions
Of unknown quantities,
But also expanding our individual qualities
As we learnt basic facts,
Yet it is, even so, hard to remember that.
At least we did not need to wonder what was behind a door
As we had had to do before
As now we could secretly peep round the screens
Dividing the two different scenes.
We listened in
And there was very little din.
We all knew that one day we would be sitting there,
Struggling to answer and trying not to turn a hair
When Miss Heath shot questions directly at a chosen few,
As if by some divine telepathy she knew
That those were the ones that did not know the answer,
To those questions coming faster and faster.
You trembled in the timetable lines
Clenching your fingers from time to time
Watching the ruler hovering ready to strike
Ii your answer by chance, was not completely right.

The ‘big’ room with Miss Heath was a serious place
Now it was your turn to prepare for a race
Taking you on to further education
Preparing you to become a part of a future nation.
It all seemed so vague and distanced and unsafe
All we wanted to do was stay in the same place,
But no that was not to be our lot
We were expected to fill some slot
Unknown to us just there and then.
Flashes of light
Bring into sight
Cold, clinking milk bottles reluctantly being dragged
By pupils who had been nagged
To place them before the coal fires
Leaving one with few desires
Of wanting to drink the lukewarm milk
That no longer tasted like smooth silk.

Another flash
Without being too rash
Is of the nurse’s visits
Looking for nits
Was a welcome relief
As Nurse O’Brian frantically searched
through your hair like a thief
Making those clinging insects scared
And wiping out any that dared
To find a hiding place there
Right in your hair.
Even vaccinations were a break
From serious studies, which was our usual fate.

What an honour it was to ring the bell
Hanging on high in a well-placed cell.
And cleaning the blackboard was fun too
As clouds of white dust blew
Round the heads of innocent pupils
Concentrating on their educational skills.
Once, I remember we had a school play
And parents attended without any delay
To watch proudly their offspring up on the stage
No longer having the support of a page
But struggling to remember their lines
And surprisingly everything went fine.

Knightwick school
Yes, Knightwick school.
It’s walls still stand,
But no more are childrens’ voices at hand.
Memories flow
But the years no longer go slow
As they did in those childhood years
When we had few fears
About what our future would bring
When there was no longer a bell to ring
But on days such as these
When previous pupils the school building sees
Then the past becomes spiritually alive
As we each pluck out what made us thrive
And what we can cherish

With positive relish
A heritage not to be forgotten
That is what lies at the bottom
Gather round and find out
What you want to think about.
From the days spent at Knightwick school.


Josephine Stenersen (Holland) June 2005


A poem of Knightwick School by Josephine (Holland) Stenersen

In June 2005 Geraldine Cooper organised a reunion of old Knightwick School pupils at the Knightwick village hall. Marquees were erected in the Bridge Meadow at the back of the church with expectations of a large gathering. Numbers were few to begin with and then suddenly the meadow was overwhelmed with all the people who turned out for this wonderful event. Many of the old photographs of past School Pupils had been posted in the village hall and were ever possible names of those known had been put along side each photo, along side other memento's of times gone by. My sister Josephine Stenersen and her husband Gunvald had come over from where they live in Norway and Josephine who had also been a pupil at the school gave a reading of the above poem that she had written for the occasion.

On the left Josephine is seen reading the above poem to all those who came to the reunion.

 

 

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