Audrey Ward's Family
I came to Seacroft when I was a small child. The house belonged to my grandparents and I lived with them because my mother died when I was very young so dad and I came and lived here with grandma and grandpa which worked out very well. Of course dad had to go out to work and I always wanted him to get married again, as I was dying for a stepmother, but he wasn’t interested in anybody else.
I went to the village school, Seacroft little church village school, and I’ll show you the thing I’ve written about the school and what we did at the school but during the war it had to close because it was quite unfit to live in so we all used to go to Manston School and then it re-opened so we all came back again. But by that time I went to Roundhay High School, which was a bit unheard of round here so it took a bit of getting used to. People used call me snobbish but I wasn’t really.
To get to Roundhay High School, comparing how children get to school these days, we used to have to walk into Crossgates and then get the bus to Roundhay and I had friends that lived in Scholes and Barwick and they used to come to Seacroft and then we used to walk to Crossgates to get the bus. We never thought anything of it. I was quite happy there. I went there until I was 16 and did school certificate and all the things you had to do. I wasn’t particularly brilliant. I can remember once being Form Captain. In fact I’ve got the report now which I thought was a bit unkind of the teacher: ‘Audrey has been a good Form Captain in some respects but her habit of grimacing has sometimes taken away the dignity of expression expected by one set to be a leader and example to the rest of the form.’ I think that was a bit unkind because she never said anything to me to give me chance to stop grimacing. I wasn’t aware I was pulling faces. I still do it I suppose. I thought it was a bit hard. I thought what’s my father going to say? He just laughed. He was a gentleman.
Then grandma and grandpa died and I started going out with Gordon and dad said that we could live here if I house-kept for him sort of thing. I can’t really say that we bought the house. I sometimes think in retrospect it’s maybe a mistake to live in the same house for so long. I think perhaps you ought to move.
I was here when it was the Coronation and we danced round the maypole on the green. There was one occasion, it must have been the Diamond Jubilee when Queen Mary and King George were going to Harewood House and they came through Seacroft and I’m sure it was an open carriage. We were going to dance round the maypole and of course me being the clumsy thing I am, I fell in the morning and mucked all my dress up so I had to have shorts on and be a boy.
Obviously Darcy Wilson who was the Lord of the Manor, he had the one son who is buried in Seacroft at the crypt in the church. I became very involved in Seacroft Church. I worked at Schofields in 1945. In those days you had to have your School Certificate to get to work at Schofields. I absolutely loved it and I got on quite well actually. Then I left to get married and have children and then I went back part-time in my 40s and stayed there until my 60s when I retired, when it became House of Fraser. I was there when Mr Schofield was there. He was typically Yorkshire. The customer was always right. I hadn’t been there very long and this lady came and she ordered a reel of cotton and said could she have it delivered. I think my bottom jaw was open and she reported me to Mr Schofield because she lived at Headingley which was the place in those days. He came and said, ‘Aye lass don’t worry about it. Just go along with what they say.’ He was a sweetie. It was an exceptional place Schofields. When you go into a shop now they don’t know the first thing about personal contact. It sounds a bit unkind but they’re that busy pressing the buttons that there’s no personal contact. I was on the haberdashery. I used to measure the things. It was lovely. I went to work on the bus and the fare was 2d old money. There were trams but they ran to Crossgates. You know where Chiltern Mills is, that was the Regal Cinema and I went there with my grandma the very first night it opened which was November 16th 1937 and it was a George Formby film. It was a marvellous picture house. That’s where the number 18 tram finished.
I think I could name about six of us in Seacroft that I went to school with. Mr Noble’s a little bit older than me and I can’t remember him when I was younger. He remembers things that I don’t. If you read that little thing that I’ve written. Its more or less about my relationship with St James’s church. Eventually at church I became a Eucharistic Minister. Well, that was the icing on the cake. Then I thought I’d do some voluntary work and I started as a chaplaincy visitor, I trained and I passed and got Seacroft and when they told me what ward I’d got I nearly died. I got the infectious diseases ward. It wasn’t as bad as it seemed. There was a lot of cystic fibrosis. All the patients were in separate rooms and you went in and explained who you were.
It wasn’t just about religion. I learnt about how to do the garden. I remember the very first gentleman I went to see. ‘Now lass what you selling then ? ‘ I got quite friendly with him. He wanted to take a little bit further. He asked to take me out but I said I didn’t think it was a good idea and the chaplain didn’t think it was a good idea. But then it closed well actually moved to St James’s and its so peaceful and restful and then I went there as a voluntary worker until I got a little bit hard of hearing. I really loved working at the Robert Ogden. Now this gentleman, Robert Ogden and his wife had cancer and he set up this centre. He was a millionaire and he set up this centre.
My eldest boy was born in St James’s. it has changed a lot, when grandma and grandpa first came to live here in 1933 they lived down East End park, Kitson street. He wasn’t anything grandpa just worked on the railway and took the challenge and got a mortgage. He was only a foreman on the railway.
I think the village hall was built a bit before 1939, I’m not of my facts there. Then there’s the king George’s garden at the side of it. Its locked up which is a shame. When I was young it was open, in fact the day my second baby was born in the afternoon I took David and he wwent round and round on his tricycle and I thought ‘ it was a lovely garden but its been wasted’ but they have this l;ast few years started doing it on Remembrance Sunday, you know a bit of service. St James’s is not as you think really but I left after all these years- a few years ago. I’m the oldest one there- I don’t mean in years I mean in attendance. So I thought ‘Right I’ll give Methodist a try’. The Methodist church is older than St James’s and evidently John Wesley came to Seacroft. There’s not many of them but they’re so caring and they’ve just accepted me. They’ve even started asking me to do readings on a Sunday. Isn’t that fantastic?
My little boys used to play out and we didn’t used to have to lock the doors. My boys never once crossed that road. It was much busier in those days because there was no ring road and then it was the main road to get to the coast. On a Sunday it was choc-a-bloc, we used to have a job getting the car in and grandpa used to stand at the gate watching the traffic going up and down.When I went back to work at Schofields part-time I got friendly with this lady and we’re still friends. One of her sons was in the police and the first time I asked her to come see me the son said ‘Oh mother youre not associating with someone who live at Seacroft are you?’ His interpretation was a certain part of Seacroft that had become very, very rough and he thought all Seacroft was like that.
I went to the village school, Seacroft little church village school, and I’ll show you the thing I’ve written about the school and what we did at the school but during the war it had to close because it was quite unfit to live in so we all used to go to Manston School and then it re-opened so we all came back again. But by that time I went to Roundhay High School, which was a bit unheard of round here so it took a bit of getting used to. People used call me snobbish but I wasn’t really.
To get to Roundhay High School, comparing how children get to school these days, we used to have to walk into Crossgates and then get the bus to Roundhay and I had friends that lived in Scholes and Barwick and they used to come to Seacroft and then we used to walk to Crossgates to get the bus. We never thought anything of it. I was quite happy there. I went there until I was 16 and did school certificate and all the things you had to do. I wasn’t particularly brilliant. I can remember once being Form Captain. In fact I’ve got the report now which I thought was a bit unkind of the teacher: ‘Audrey has been a good Form Captain in some respects but her habit of grimacing has sometimes taken away the dignity of expression expected by one set to be a leader and example to the rest of the form.’ I think that was a bit unkind because she never said anything to me to give me chance to stop grimacing. I wasn’t aware I was pulling faces. I still do it I suppose. I thought it was a bit hard. I thought what’s my father going to say? He just laughed. He was a gentleman.
Then grandma and grandpa died and I started going out with Gordon and dad said that we could live here if I house-kept for him sort of thing. I can’t really say that we bought the house. I sometimes think in retrospect it’s maybe a mistake to live in the same house for so long. I think perhaps you ought to move.
I was here when it was the Coronation and we danced round the maypole on the green. There was one occasion, it must have been the Diamond Jubilee when Queen Mary and King George were going to Harewood House and they came through Seacroft and I’m sure it was an open carriage. We were going to dance round the maypole and of course me being the clumsy thing I am, I fell in the morning and mucked all my dress up so I had to have shorts on and be a boy.
Obviously Darcy Wilson who was the Lord of the Manor, he had the one son who is buried in Seacroft at the crypt in the church. I became very involved in Seacroft Church. I worked at Schofields in 1945. In those days you had to have your School Certificate to get to work at Schofields. I absolutely loved it and I got on quite well actually. Then I left to get married and have children and then I went back part-time in my 40s and stayed there until my 60s when I retired, when it became House of Fraser. I was there when Mr Schofield was there. He was typically Yorkshire. The customer was always right. I hadn’t been there very long and this lady came and she ordered a reel of cotton and said could she have it delivered. I think my bottom jaw was open and she reported me to Mr Schofield because she lived at Headingley which was the place in those days. He came and said, ‘Aye lass don’t worry about it. Just go along with what they say.’ He was a sweetie. It was an exceptional place Schofields. When you go into a shop now they don’t know the first thing about personal contact. It sounds a bit unkind but they’re that busy pressing the buttons that there’s no personal contact. I was on the haberdashery. I used to measure the things. It was lovely. I went to work on the bus and the fare was 2d old money. There were trams but they ran to Crossgates. You know where Chiltern Mills is, that was the Regal Cinema and I went there with my grandma the very first night it opened which was November 16th 1937 and it was a George Formby film. It was a marvellous picture house. That’s where the number 18 tram finished.
I think I could name about six of us in Seacroft that I went to school with. Mr Noble’s a little bit older than me and I can’t remember him when I was younger. He remembers things that I don’t. If you read that little thing that I’ve written. Its more or less about my relationship with St James’s church. Eventually at church I became a Eucharistic Minister. Well, that was the icing on the cake. Then I thought I’d do some voluntary work and I started as a chaplaincy visitor, I trained and I passed and got Seacroft and when they told me what ward I’d got I nearly died. I got the infectious diseases ward. It wasn’t as bad as it seemed. There was a lot of cystic fibrosis. All the patients were in separate rooms and you went in and explained who you were.
It wasn’t just about religion. I learnt about how to do the garden. I remember the very first gentleman I went to see. ‘Now lass what you selling then ? ‘ I got quite friendly with him. He wanted to take a little bit further. He asked to take me out but I said I didn’t think it was a good idea and the chaplain didn’t think it was a good idea. But then it closed well actually moved to St James’s and its so peaceful and restful and then I went there as a voluntary worker until I got a little bit hard of hearing. I really loved working at the Robert Ogden. Now this gentleman, Robert Ogden and his wife had cancer and he set up this centre. He was a millionaire and he set up this centre.
My eldest boy was born in St James’s. it has changed a lot, when grandma and grandpa first came to live here in 1933 they lived down East End park, Kitson street. He wasn’t anything grandpa just worked on the railway and took the challenge and got a mortgage. He was only a foreman on the railway.
I think the village hall was built a bit before 1939, I’m not of my facts there. Then there’s the king George’s garden at the side of it. Its locked up which is a shame. When I was young it was open, in fact the day my second baby was born in the afternoon I took David and he wwent round and round on his tricycle and I thought ‘ it was a lovely garden but its been wasted’ but they have this l;ast few years started doing it on Remembrance Sunday, you know a bit of service. St James’s is not as you think really but I left after all these years- a few years ago. I’m the oldest one there- I don’t mean in years I mean in attendance. So I thought ‘Right I’ll give Methodist a try’. The Methodist church is older than St James’s and evidently John Wesley came to Seacroft. There’s not many of them but they’re so caring and they’ve just accepted me. They’ve even started asking me to do readings on a Sunday. Isn’t that fantastic?
My little boys used to play out and we didn’t used to have to lock the doors. My boys never once crossed that road. It was much busier in those days because there was no ring road and then it was the main road to get to the coast. On a Sunday it was choc-a-bloc, we used to have a job getting the car in and grandpa used to stand at the gate watching the traffic going up and down.When I went back to work at Schofields part-time I got friendly with this lady and we’re still friends. One of her sons was in the police and the first time I asked her to come see me the son said ‘Oh mother youre not associating with someone who live at Seacroft are you?’ His interpretation was a certain part of Seacroft that had become very, very rough and he thought all Seacroft was like that.