St Mary's School Class Photo's

Two more class pictures from St Mary's school with stood on the corner of Talbot Road and Bradley Green Road. I like to think Colin Critchlow for his continued support and for sharing his family pictures.

St Marys School, Newton 1925

St Marys, Newton class of 1946/7

St Mary's 1957

St Mary's primary school class photo which was taken in 1957.

Back row2 L-R Frank Wright, Steven Moores, Peter Rowlands, David Sowter, Trevor Nixon, Ian Bradbury, Ronnie Royston, Barry Lewis.

4th Row L-R Mrs Clegg, (head Mistress) Eric Whittaker, David Bridgehouse, John Heywood, Stephen Fisk, Geoff Capstick, Derek Booth, Colin Mottram, Stan Mills, David Gibson, Mr Jones (Teacher).

3rd Row L-R. Valerie Linney, Erica Seddon, Barbara Mullen, Eileen Connolly, Joan Saville, Josie Lee, Anne Howcroft, Sandra Tatton, Eileen Birchall, Kathleen Worral.

2nd row L-R. Janice Worthington, Carol Holt, Judith Willox, Anne Smith, Janis Smith, Rita Shuttleworth, Joyce Hewitt, ? , Christine Adshead.

Front L-R. Graham Dootson, Alfred Parker, Maurice Barlow, Kevin Pentney, Brian Blenkinsop.

Thank you to Barry Lewis for this post

Barry Lewis From OZ.

Today's post is made possible by Barry Lewis who was born on Victoria Street, Newton in 1946 and attended St Mary's primary School and Flowery Field Secondary, His Grandad had a Chippy on Talbot Road across from St Mary's School. Barry joined the RAF after working at T.Walls, Godley and served 5 years before migrating to Oz in 1969. Over to Barry now for the rest of the post.

No.15 setting off to Newton...

My Dad, Bill Lewis was a conductor then a driver on the No. 15 for years. He also drove the 210 from Hyde to Piccadilly, Manchester.

This is he on the right (the skinny one) with his driver Alan Stelfox in the late 1940s.


I have also attached a recent photo of myself and my first Primary School teacher Mrs Betty Sparkes.  Please allow me a little story here to tie in with the bus story.  Mrs Sparkes was my teacher at St Mary's primary school on Talbot Rd in the early 1950s,  I lived with my Mum and dad in the Chippy directly across the road from the school.  Every day my dad would be driving the Bus and he would stop the bus (passengers and all) outside the chippy to collect his flask of tea and sandwiches, but also to wait for Mrs Sparkes to get out of school and catch the bus.  She lived at Glossop and if she missed dads bus she would miss her connection at Hyde and have to wait over an hour for the Glossop bus.  On a few occasions Mrs Sparkes would be a little late out of school but Dad and the passengers would wait until she stepped on the bus.  Would that happen these days ? I doubt it.

The above photo of myself and Mrs Sparkes was taken in August 2010 and it was our first meeting in almost 60 years and we had a great time together. Unfortunately she passed away October 2011.

St Mary School

The above shows St Mary's on the left corner, then a smaller building and then the Methodist building.

In this photo you can see the front of the shops on Talbot Road (where my Grandad had his Chippy in the old days) and just up the road is the Conservative club jutting out,  known locally as 'The Time Tunnel.

Opposite the Time Tunnel you will see a fence then a load of trees, within those trees is the little house above and alongside that was the Methodist building seen in the Whit Walk picture above.  There was then a large wide dirt driveway and then the houses that you see in the shops pictures.

No 177 Talbot Rd which was owned by the Taylor family, was in the 1830s a public house known as The Buck Inn. It recently underwent restoration and now houses apartments/flats.  

I think this is a theatre group standing in the yard of St Mary’s school, over the top of the ‘Brides’ head you will see my old bedroom window above Jess Lewis Chip shop and next to that was Mayalls bakery. I hope someone can name the folks in the photo.