Can you remember how excited you were on your first day of school? Albert tells us, “I got my start at the Hook Common School, Church of the Good Shepherd, Upton on Severn [Parish] Worcestershire, England. “I just can remember...at four years of age...running along between two sisters. The countryside was indeed beautiful there. At certain seasons the fields were yellow with cowslips [and] primroses, and at other times were white with moon daisies; and many other flowers grew wild like hyacinths, ‘Tom Thumbs’ and violets. There were all kinds of fruit growing in our garden and all around us in the fields. Trout and eels in the brook was a good life to me.”
Albert tells about learning to count and tell the letters of the alphabet, then says “I also remember we would kneel on our seats first thing in the morning and in unison repeat the Lord’s prayer, and sometimes the Catechism. The priest occasionally visited us and tested us on our learning of these things.
“Mother made just about all the clothes we wore. I know all of my school clothes were made over from the good parts of my father’s or brothers’ left offs, and I was quite happy and not the least concerned about it.”
Edith had started at the Hook School when she was about three years old. She tells us, “Our parents paid a few pence a month for us until we were old enough for first grade.”
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