I read about this in the Dismal Swamp weekly newspaper, and am so pleased for them.
One of the many displays that made an impression on me, during a recent visit to this outdoor museum, was the school. The buildings were previously used for exactly that purpose, and had been moved to the museum site, where they were restored and furnished.
We didn’t use slates when I went to school, but these desks had specifically sized slots to hold these articles of long-ago technology. A woman I spoke to was a retired teacher. She said the slates were used into the 1970s. That’s not her in the second photo!
These photos brought back fond memories of the manner in which our little school on the Saskatchewan prairies was furnished. How many of you remember ink wells, and those pens with nibs that splattered all over the place, and ink stains on your fingers (and clothes)? And the Fun with Dick and Jane primers?
You can stop the slide show by hovering with the cursor over a photo, and clicking on the stop icon.
How many of you could pass the tests that had been set for Grade 5 and 6 students? They made me just a wee bit nostalgic for the good old days, when the 3 Rs were deemed to be important.
Ah, dear old school days.
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King’s College Choir is Fantastic! Have you ever heard the “King’s Singers”? MVaden1948, we seem to be about the same vintage … we had desks with inkwell holes, and the threat that if ever you forgot your own fountain pen ( or tried to use a ball-point pen!)you would have to use a dip-pen, which of course had no reservoir to hold any ink, and the dreadful ink decanted into the pot inkwell which was usually at least half-full of pencil sharpenings and screwed-up bits of blotting paper! We both recall the hazards of fountain pens – no new-fangled cartridges here. I recall the hazards of carrying a bottle of “Quink” ink around either in blazer pocket or in depths of leather satchel, and Himself clearly recalls the time his fountain pen chose to leak in his breast pocket!!! Ah, happy days …. will today’s pupils look back on I-pads and their like with such affection?
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I remember the wretched ball-point pens that came out after the war, they were as bad as the dip-pens for blots and splots.
I sure have heard the King’s Singers, and I’m most envious of folks in the capital cities of Australia who can go and see the King’s College Choir.
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It hasn’t been all that long since I tried in vain to get out the blue stains from the ball point pen that dared to leak in my husband’s white pocket….when he forgot to wear his pocket protector! Yes, he was a nerd…the engineer kind.
Mid 1950’s for my fountain penmanship class Andante. In southern California.
And Yvonne, my grandfather worked for the railroad….the Redding Railroad out of Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Amazing all these connections.
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We used the inkwells. The porcelain liners were gathered into a large tray with holes and taken to the stock cupboard to be filled from a very large bottle. We were given blotting paper for the week, much of which ended up as ink soaked pellets to flick around the room! The dark ages, the 1950s.
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Oh, your poor teachers, Andrew! Who had the task of filling the inkwells? It sounds tricky.
The Choir of King’s College is touring Australia just now; I’m listening to them on our classical radio station. They’re not bad! 🙂
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My early days of school in Saskatchewan had the holes in the desks where the ink wells once were but had ceased to be used by the time I got there. That invisible teacher is quite the display!
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Sue, where in Saskatchewan did you grow up? I was from near Kamsack, on the south-east side of the province.
(Small world, this world of blog-dom.)
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I smiled when I read your post. I grew up on a farm near Annaheim which is near Humboldt. The east central part of the province. Definitely a small world.
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Well, Sue, my dad and 2 brothers were with the CNR, and I can remember them having trips to Humboldt! Dad worked in the days of steam engines, I can still hear those whistles echoing through a frosty winter’s night in my mind’s ear!
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Glad to hear your tour was not conducted by the “invisible woman”.
When I was in grade school (1-8) our desks were second hand and all had ink wells….never used because our penmanship classes were all using the modern marvel of the ink cartridge fountain pen….still had a nib but you didn’t dip it in the ink. But of course if you tried to refill the cartridge by using a syringe (in the days when it was legal to possess one of those) you still got dribbles on your paper and stains on your fingers.
Thanks for the walk down memory lane.
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I dreaded those ‘stick’ pens, although the teachers always seemed to handle them with great ease!
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Brought back memories for me of the little country school house I went to from grade one to grade 4.
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When your mom taught at a particular country school (it was where your Aunt Pauline went), I was a guest student for a week or so. Marguerite was such a good teacher, I can still recall some of the neat things we did each day.
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