Hilda Pattie
Miss Pattie 2003
Apart from first year when I was in her History class, I didn't have a lot of contact with Miss Pattie. Years later I discovered that she detested teaching History as much as I disliked learning the subject. I knew from conversations with girls who were in her form that she was a martinet who ruled with a metaphorical rod of steel; a woman who could teach Archie Campbell, Ollie Overton and Big Bill Ramsey a thing or two when it came to disciplining a class.
When Marlene and I visited her last year, Marlene was still quaking with fear even though it was well over forty years since she'd left school. I knew the feeling as I felt the same when I paid her, Miss Pattie, the first of several visits. (See, 'Oh Her! The Last Gentlewoman, at the end of this article.).
In retrospect, and with the advantage of time, I can see that, far from being a power mad despot straining to unleash her weapons of mass destruction, she was the complete professional.
That she also had a compassionate side can be seen from some of the articles that follow: -
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Remembering Miss Pattie by Susan Schofield (nee Chester)
I HATED maths. I remember one day we had a double lesson of the dreaded subject and, as usual, I hadn't done my homework. Whilst waiting for Hilda to march in and then march me out and, as punishment, make me spend two hours standing outside the classroom door (my usual spot), I sat and prayed. I prayed for some divine force to descend and stop Hilda from taking the double lesson. Whilst I was praying and telling God that I really did believe in him, Hilda entered the classroom. She was followed at a great pace by Mr Hopwood, who was shouting "Hilda, Hilda, your sister has just had a fall in the playground and broken her hip" (Her sister taught in the Grange School next door.) Needless to say the lesson was cancelled and she rushed off to attend to her sister.
So, having just discovered that, either there was a God after all, or else I had some previously untapped magical powers, the rest of the day went really well. I continued with my "Faith" but sadly lost it when Hilda returned to work at the end of the week.
Susan Schofield (nee Chester). 1964-1969
May 2007
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Memories of Miss Pattie from Elizabeth Tindle (nee Baker)
About 7 or 8 years ago I was in Jarrow and I called in to see Miss Pattie. She made me very welcome even though I must have been one of the naughtiest students she'd ever had. On one occasion when Miss Pattie was taking us for Physical Education in the schoolyard, I was behind her, imitating her demonstrations of jumping. It was just my luck that she turned around and caught me. I think Jean McIntosh was been doing it as well. She knew that we lived for our sport and PE lessons so she banned us from PE and we had to do Maths with the first years instead. It didn't quite work out as planned because the young Maths students couldn't concentrate on the lesson as we were showing off again. We must have been terrible attention seekers.
When I was in first year a few of us stayed back after school and were in the
classroom fooling around. I was chalking on the board and, again, I was
imitating Miss Pattie teaching us about the invasion of England by the Angles,
Saxons, and Jutes. I had the map of England looking like a spaghetti dinner with
the lines of invasions coming into the country. Just as I was getting into full
swing who should be standing at the classroom door watching me do my teacher
act? You've guessed it -
Miss Pattie!
She would frequently send me out to the cloakrooms to comb my hair and tidy myself up after playing a mad game of lunchtime bundlies when we all went mad. My long plaits would be out and I would have hair all over the place. The only snag was that I never carried a comb and took little pride in my appearance in those early teenage years. Netball was much more important to my friends and myself and we ran around like wild things.
It is hardly surprising that I am still coaching and playing basketball - we
play in the grand final next Tuesday. I taught Physical Education and
Sport for about 16 years in South Australia and so did Jean McIntosh (now
retired in Adelaide) We had a reputation as the terrible twins.
Elizabeth Tindle (nee Baker). July 2004
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My Memories of
Miss Pattie
By
Maureen Stanger.
Not such a formidable lady after all.
Miss Pattie, thought to be a formidable lady by most and who am I to dispute it, was quite a favourite of mine. She was a good friend to me so I saw the kinder side of her. I always did well in her class so perhaps that helped.
I remember two occasions when I expected to get into trouble but didn’t. The first was when my mum permed my hair one evening for the forthcoming Christmas Party and, with perms not being as sophisticated as they are now, I had to wear curlers during the night. The next morning my hair was still very wet so I took the day off school. When I went in the following day with an explanatory note from mum, she smiled, flicked my hair, and said it looked lovely, but to remember to have it permed at the weekend next time.
The second occasion was when I was asked to serve tea to Miss Pattie and some guests. Taking a laden tray up the stairs, I managed to drop it from the top to the bottom breaking everything except one saucer. I definitely thought my end had come but not so, she helped me pick up the mess and take it back to the kitchen where she helped me set out a fresh tray. Somehow though I don’t ever remember being asked to do it again.
She was a great teacher, a wonderful person and I am so pleased someone has made contact with her after all these years.
Maureen Davison (nee
Stanger).
June 2004
Pauline Ducker
Remembers Miss Pattie
I have many memories of Miss Pattie - I was terrified of her and seemed to spend most of my maths lessons standing outside the door for failing to answer one of the famous "If, Then, And" problems! I have hated maths ever since.
However, when I was 14 I was rushed in to hospital for an emergency operation and Miss Pattie very kindly sent my mother a letter asking after me together with a half crown postal order to get a bottle of Lucozade for me. She was the only member of staff who made contact and was not even my form teacher. This redeemed her in my eyes but I was still useless at maths!
Pauline Ducker June 2004
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Muriel Bowman's Favourite Teacher
My favourite teacher had to be Miss Pattie but I didn't discover it until the day I left school.
She taught Maths so well that when it came to choosing the subjects to take for GCE I wanted to do maths. However only the top two girls in the class were allowed to do it, along with all the boys, and I had come third. The rest of the girls were told to take Needlework!!! So my Dad came to see Big Bill Ramsay and I got my way to do maths.
When I said goodbye to the teachers on the last day I was as happy as a sandboy but to my horror, promptly burst into tears when I said goodbye to Miss Pattie.
Yes Miss Pattie was strict but she was good and twice I
saw a very tender side of her dealing with troubled children.
I thank you Miss Pattie.
Muriel Tiller (nee Bowman) July 2004
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‘Oh Her!
The Last Gentlewoman
Although it had been over fifty years since we’d last met I recognised her. Hilda Pattie had been one of my schoolteachers. Apart from the dark, wiry, hair, which was now softer and totally grey, she didn’t look much different than she did all those years ago. Then I was an eleven-year-old schoolboy embarking on the perilous path of secondary modern school education as it was in the 1950’s.
In those days, at Jarrow Central School, she’d been a tyrant feared and yet respected by the very students she terrorised!
As I walked up the path of the semi-detached terraced house where she’d lived all of her life, I automatically straightened my tie, thankful that I’d remembered to wash behind my ears. I wondered if she would expect me, even at 65-year-old, to be wearing the school tie!
The lady in question, then ninety-two-years-old, greeted me enthusiastically saying that, although she remembered me, she wouldn’t have recognised me. Not surprising as in the intervening years my voice had broken and I’d begun shaving.
I didn’t have any problem recognising Miss Pattie. She still had the same distinctive features. In particular the strong jaw-line that is so often indicative of an assertive personality.
The house was large, well kept, and scrupulously clean.
I complimented her on the splendour of her surroundings.
She sighed and said; “These days it’s not a home – just a house – particularly after my sister died.”
Her sister had also been one of my teachers at the adjoining Junior School.
Hilda freely admitted that she’d been a strict disciplinarian but hoped she’d been a fair one.
I think she was. If there were more teachers like her today the system would be none the worse for it.
In those days teachers taught whatever subject came along. Her main forte was maths but, occasionally, she taught history.
With admirable frankness she admitted that she hated teaching history because, she said, it was a subject she knew nothing about!
Despite her years she remains as alert and articulate as anyone I’ve ever met.
She showed genuine regret that Marlene, my wife, hadn’t been able to accompany me on this visit as she too had been one of her pupils.
The time flew by and we talked about many of the things that had happened to us over the years. She spoke with affection about other pupils and teaching staff at the school but refused to be drawn into any criticism although hinting, with a mischievous glint in her eyes, that there were many stories she could tell.
I knew she wouldn’t as it wasn’t in a gentlewoman’s code and she is, perhaps, the last true gentlewoman.
Post script.
I re-visited her some months later to present the above manuscript for her approval.
I sat with bated breath awaiting her verdict wondering if she would scrawl upon it 5/10 or ‘Could do better.’
Thankfully she was pleased with my effort although she did suggest I titled it –‘Oh her!’
It would appear, so she tells me, that when her name comes up in conversation people invariably say, ‘Oh her!’
At the time of writing I was organising a school reunion.
One ex pupil said to me, ‘Oh her – she’s been dead for years.’
I was pleased to inform him that ‘Oh her!’ was very much alive.
Lance Liddle. Sept 2003
(The above article, 'Oh Her', appeared in the Arts Advance
publication 'Bric a Brac' and appears by kind permission of that organisation.)
There are more Miss Pattie stories to follow.