[Steerforth]

Originally Posted by Bob Dobson

I am left wondering why you changed from St John's to Peel Park. Are you confusing it with Hyndburn Park?. I bet Harry Place (aka Fluke)the St John's headmaster wasn't pleased, nor Mrs Thurman who taught at St John's and lived up Moss Hall Rd way.Another St John's teacher, Miss Riley, has just died. Peel Park is celebrating its centenary this year. You are an example of the old saying 'You can take a lad out of Accrington but you can't take Accrington out of a lad'

I'm not certain. I remember Mrs. Thurman fairly well, and I must have only been three or four. I guess it was nursery school, eh? I left England when I was seven.

Mrs. Thurman had (has) a lovely daughter, Freda, who was in the Mother's Union with my mother (Irene Bolton Procter). I had a boyhood crush on Freda, too. There is a photo of her in a chorus line with my mother somewhere in our family memorabelia.

I took the bus to St. John's and got into serious trouble one day for imitating the conductor who would get off the bus before it stopped.

There was also a teacher at St. John's called "Evelyn Bury". She and my mother became fairly close friends -even after we emigrated to the States. They carried on correspondence for many years, and we never knew what happened to her (of course, she died). Mrs. Bury marched with Bertrand Russell in the Ban the Bomb protests in the early 1950s.

Thanks for your warm reply!