Glynis Overson talks about her life

So, what year were you born?Glynis Overson: Unfortunately, 1947.

Okay, what was it like when you were a child?

G.O: Um, it was good. Spalding was different then, we made our own entertainment outside… hopscotch, skipping, rounders, making buggies, bicycle riding, walking, going into town.

What was your school like?

G.O: Spalding County Primary School was a very old school, built in Victorian times. ButI had quite a happy time at the school and cried when I had to leave. Mr. Needs was the headmaster. And it was an era in the 50s, when the cane was still used. Starting off in the infant’s, remembering my first day at school, where I cried because it was the first time I’d left my home and my mother, but soon settled in with all these different friends. And in the infants, we start with, we used to go on, we had little water baths in the classroom and slides and sand-pits, etc., and outside we had climbing frames and various things – Oh, there was Mr. Needs, in the playground, he used to dry these old tobacco leaves. He’d got these ladders, across underneath the roof of the walkway, and he grew these – dried these old tobacco leaves. That’s what it was there for, but we used to swarm on the ladders, going from rung to rung on the ladders and hang upside down on them. And then, of course, the – we had to lookout for when he – we knew he was on the warpath. So everybody got off the ladders, and pretended to be playing, er, chasey or hide and seek.He was a bit like that character in Rupert Bear, with the glasses grey hair.

Oh, yeah.

G.O: Do you know who I mean? I can’t remember his name, but I know who you mean.

G.O: Yeah, yeah – that was in the Infants. And then, er, we had a caretaker… and in those days, he used to shovel this coal into the barrow to put in the, erm, furnace for the heating, heating these big radiators. And the school, it was as it was in Victorian times, and the old fashioned desks with the inkwell in and used to sit in twos, in rows – Yeah.

G.O: – Behind each other, and, and the teacher you know, very very caring very good teachers. In fact that good, I won a scholarship to the High School. Yeah.

And you were telling me that you – you used to walk to school when you were seven?

G.O: Yes. From when – I used to go – originally, my mother used to take us when we first started, but then, from about seven or eight onwards, we used to walk, um, me and my friends and my sister used to walk up Holbeach Road and Commercial Road, and we had to cross the bridge, Chain Bridge, to get across the Welland. To go, um, then we’d cross the road again opposite the Ship Albion. And then we walked along there to the County Primary School, which is on the right hand side, which is now where the police station is. Yeah.G.O: So we made sure that we got there on time. But then at home time, when we were supposed to – right, get straight home, we used to get up to mischief. Going back over the Chain Bridge, we used to jump up and down on it and it used to move, and then we crossed over to where Mr. Godfrey’s shop was, he used to sell ice creams and we walked further along and there used to be some houses, and if they had a doorbell… we used to ring the doorbell and run away. And obviously when we were older, we realised how cruel it was.

Okay, and – what – did you have to pass the barn?

G.O: Oh, yes. When – also, when I was still primary school age, I used to go to – when I had younger brothers and sisters – used to have to go to the, what was the Clinic down Holland Road, to get the baby powder. You know, for the – when babies were fed with bottles. And they sold – the free orange juice and the free, you know, it was National Health you could get it on. And I used to go, walk up there. And I remember, especially in the wintertime going up there and there was, um, Birch’s Mill, but I think it was shut – I think it was closed, then, but then there was Ploughman’s Mill, which was still being used. And also, then walking back, the black, um, old black… warehouse, yeah, it was the opposite side when walking back, and especially when I could bike, I knew as it was getting darker, I used to bike past or run past that quickly, because it was pretty scary and it was reputed to be rat infested. It was, it wasn’t used then, but it was still a bit creepy and, er, then the blacksmith’s were still operating then, on the left hand side, and it was a fish and chip shop that was next door to it. And then Chain Bridge, which was used quite a lot, but yeah, thatsticks in my mind, the black, the black barn.

Yeah. Did you saythat the Chain Bridge had gaps in it?

G.O: Yeah, the, the planks across the floor, there, yes there were some gaps, which you know, you used to step across, ‘cause you thought you’d probably, you know, fall in, but it did used to move. And the boys deliberately used to jump up and down to make it move.Sounds like fun. Can you remember any of the shops and buildings that were there?G.O: Well, opposite the blacksmiths, there was the co op, which was there in the 1930s apparently, according to my Spalding books, and my great uncle Arthur Lane was the manager there for quite a while, but I can’t – Oh, I can remember Godfrey’s shop, but that was on the, the corner, but I think it’s classed as being in Commercial Road as opposed to being in the High Street, it’s just, as you look out of the blacksmith’s on your left, on the corner, and he was a gentleman that used to – he got about in what we called a bath chair, because he’d um, suffered some injuries I think in the war or – I don’t know whether it was the First World War, but he’d only got one arm, but his shop used to sell ice cream and sweets, etc.

Yeah. And you were telling me about Teapot Lane?

G.O: Oh, yes. Yeah. So, where Springfields, one of the car parks is now, as you go down Roman Bank across the bridge, on the right hand side it used to be very tall trees. And as you went around the corner, it was called Teapot Lane, because there was a gentleman called Stan Day, who grew, er, salad crops, vegetables, and flowers, and I used to go there for my mother to get fresh flowers for her to take down the cemetery. And he had this old caravan like a gypsy caravan, which he used to have his cup of tea in and smoke and etc. But I think it was called Teapot Lane because I think he had a teapot painted on the side of this van. But it was nice, it was like a little allotment garden, which is now a great big car park, unfortunately. And then, um, when we first went to live down there, it was all fields, and I used to play in the field opposite my house, which was a wheat field, we used to make dens in it, etc. Then, I think it became a tulip field just in front of Fulney Church.