Minutes of March 2010 meeting
MINUTES OF THE 27th MEETING OF AYNHO HISTORY SOCIETY HELD IN AYNHO VILLAGE HALL ON WEDNESDAY 31ST MARCH 2010
Present: – Brian Reynolds - Chairman
Peter Cole – Secretary.
Ian Parkes – Treasurer Altogether 38 members and guests attended.
1. Apologies
There were six apologies for absence.
2. Correspondence Peter Cole
The Secretary said that for the third time this year he had received an email, this time from someone in Portugal. She said that her great uncle, William Johnson, had died in Walnut Tree Cottage, Aynho on 29th February 1956, and asked if any information about him could be found.
Peter had contacted Sybil, and she remembered him as a doctor who used to live here. He worked at the Alcan factory in Banbury, and his wife was the sister of another doctor at the same factory, a Dr. Parker.
The very next day after the last meeting he had received a letter from John Fulcher, the old soldier who had contributed so generously towards the new piano. He sent two photographs of himself, taken just before he was posted here. Peter had combined them together, and put the finished picture in a frame he had found, and placed it just above the piano. Brian said that John is hoping to come here in May.
Regarding last month’s meeting, Peter said that he had identified all the Aynho carriers that were included in the censuses. John Dunn had appeared in 1841 and 1851. In 1861 he was a widower aged 60, living in the almshouses. A John Watson is also shown as a carrier that year. No carrier appears in 1871 at all. In 1881 16 year-old Thomas Borton, son of a substantial farmer, is the only one, but he didn’t last long, as his father, Frederick Borton aged 52 is shown as carrier in addition to being a farmer in 1891. Again in 1901 there is no mention of a carrier.
In looking for this information he had conducted a more thorough search of the censuses than he had done previously. He had identified no fewer than 22 family names, which had appeared in every one of the censuses from 1841 to 1901.
Apart from two, they all had between 12 and 48 mentions, the vast majority being agricultural labourers. These findings are produced as an appendix to these minutes.
3. Finance Report Ian Parkes
The Treasurer reported that funds currently stand at £1,268.70.
An invoice for Peter for £17.18 for postage and stationery items, and one from Brian for £96.50 for the conversion of 7 films to DVD, a collection of plays and a village postcard were approved.
4. Chairman’s Report Brian Reynolds
Brian said that the Village Hall Committee has agreed that the refurbished Cartwright pub sign can be mounted on the wall in the Hall near the main doors.
Regarding the Fringford Walk on June 30th, Martin Greenwood is proposing two walks, one longer one starting at 10.30 am to include Juniper Hill (Lark Rise) and Cottesford (Fordlow) in addition to Fringford (Candleford), which will cost £5, and a shorter evening one just of Fringford for £3.
It is likely that the Civil War re-enactment will have to be deferred until next year. This is because the proposed venue has now been licensed to hold civil marriages, so it would be much more difficult to arrange a suitable date, and it would be best to wait and see how this all works out.
On 15th April at 7.30 pm Banbury History Society have asked us to give a ten-minute presentation at the Museum.
An Angela Andrews will be coming to Aynho to research the Borton and Wrighton families.
Bill Land’s son has given Brian several cinefilms of Aynho, which have been converted to DVD, and which he hopes to show at our AGM.
He has also obtained a 1780 book of plays by Shackerley Marmion, plus one by William Cartwright, born in Oxfordshire in 1611, although he was apparently not directly connected with Aynho Cartwrights.
5. Memories of Aynho School David Morgan
David started off by saying that he had been headmaster at the school from 1975 until it closed in 1985. His talk is in three parts, first the early years before he arrived, then his years here, and finally what happened when it closed, and the reasons for that.
In 1812 the National Society for the Education of the Poor in the Church of England was set up. The first record of Aynho School in their archives was in 1815. At that time the teachers would have used the Madras System, whereby the master taught the senior pupils, and they in turn taught the younger ones. The school started of with 50 pupils, and was initially situated in a barn. They had to learn to read, to write and study the four rules of arithmetic. The day began with prayers, and half an hour each day was spent learning the Lord’s Prayer, the Collect and the Catechism.
In 1840 the school received glowing reports, and was stated to be just what a village school should be. The teacher, Catherine Eakins, was awarded a national prize. Education was not compulsory, nor was it free. The National Society paid most of the teacher’s salary, but each child was expected to contribute something. David showed early photos dating from 1913, but mostly taken in the 1930s.
In 1861 The State Education Department paid local schools 12 shillings per head, based on attendance and exam results. This resulted in teachers concentrating on duller pupils to bring them up to scratch, and teaching only the three Rs. State education arrived in 1870, and from then on attendance was compulsory. There were then 112 pupils. Log books were introduced, to record inspections. These were held at Charlton School.
David then produced a number of photographs of the school building and pupils over many years. Originally the younger pupils were in a separate small building, but this was incorporated into the main school in 1895.
One of the most significant things was the arrival in 1930 of Charlotte Govier, later to become Mrs Czeppe, who was head of the school for 40 years until 1970, when she retired. She continued to live in Aynho in Skittle Alley, and became a governor of the school. Up until 1930 all children had attended the Aynho School. After 1930 secondary pupils went to Kings Sutton School.
In 1974 Northamptonshire County Council decided to put money into small schools. They therefore set up a Rural Schools Project. In the south a district was created from Aynho up to Culworth. An advisory teacher was put into this cluster, together with a minibus, and upgraded equipment. David showed photographs he had taken soon after his arrival in 1975, showing the new extension for the infants’ school, and a more recent one for toilets, etc. The numbers in the early 1970s had grown until there were 60 pupils. The main school had two classrooms for older and middle children. A mobile classroom was introduced for the infants.
David said that Mrs Czeppe once assured him that the house now called the Old School Cottage (originally No. 45 Aynho) had in fact never been owned or occupied by the school.
The heating in the school was firstly a coke stove, but this was changed to run on paraffin, which was switched on during the autumn half term, and then left burning continuously day and night until the end of March. It was very effective in keeping the place nice and warm.
When the building was eventually sold, the original idea was to keep the main building almost exactly as it was, but the developers decided that rather than tiny one up and one down flats, they needed to build out two extensions to increase the size of the first four flats.
Round about 1980 class numbers dropped, and only two teachers were needed instead of three. The mobile classroom was therefore taken away.
The garden of 45 Aynho was used as a school garden. Children were encouraged to grow vegetables, with a competition for the best ones, and they had a pond there as well. There was a child with the surname Wilson, who was called Harold, who had a glass eye. David recalled an occasion when a boy rushed in shouting that Harold had lost his eye digging. It was not found for about a year, although it did turn up eventually. They planted trees and bushes on Hill Trees Bank.
David showed a lot of photos of Maytime in the Square, which was started in 1976. The first May Queen was crowned by Lady Juliet Townsend. The following year Morris and sword dancing was introduced.
Chickens were raised in the garden, with the School House used as a henhouse. Egg rolling was an Easter pastime, together with pancake and obstacle races. There were Halloween parties. Trips were made to all sorts of places: Winchester, HMS Victory, London trips to St. Paul’s, HMS Belfast and Number 10 Downing Street, Brecon, the Isle of Wight, Snowdon and a canal trip on the River Nene.
There were sports days, and displays inside the school included taking part in the BBC’s Domesday Programme, when information was collected on Aynho and other nearby villages. We had visiting music teachers, with concerts at the end of the year, including hand bells borrowed from Croughton.
School dinners started in the 1950s, and they were brought in containers from Kings Sutton School.
In 1974 the numbers started to drop off. When David started there were 59 children. Almost half of these were spread between two age groups. This meant that as they worked their way through the school, after a period of two years all of a sudden in 1980 the school halved in size to about 27, and a few years later dropped to 20. A survey carried out in the village indicated that it was likely to go down to single figures in the future. Owing to the spread of ages this meant that a school here would no longer be viable, especially as there was no apparent likelihood of any increase in the foreseeable future.
At a parents’ evening David spoke to every individual family to ascertain their preference, and it soon became apparent that everyone wanted the school to combine with Charlton. David put this to the County Council Education Department. A meeting held with all interested parties confirmed this view, and this agreement enabled the closure to be done much more quickly than usual. So in November 1984 everything was agreed for closure in July 1985.
From then on David’s most important objective was to keep up morale. He did this by ensuring that as many visits as possible were undertaken. They went to Banbury Fire Station, the Milk Distribution Centre in Kidlington, Aynhoe Park House and Coventry.
On the final day there was a church service. Various symbols of continuity such as log books, and an admissions register went to Charlton school, a 1946 watercolour of the school by Lili Cartwright went to Aynho Church, and the school bell and an old timetable were handed over to the Village Hall.
Subsequent to the meeting, David has presented various items, including a watercolour by Lili Cartwright, the 1st log book, a Final Day Order of Service and other papers to AHS for safekeeping.
6. Forthcoming Meetings
April 28th The Cartwrights at Edgcote Sally Strutt
May 26th Those Coaching Days Barry Smith
June 30th Fringford Walk Martin Greenwood
Appendix
TRADITIONAL AYNHO FAMILIES
22 families appear in every one of Dawn’s seven censuses. Most of the entries under every name relate to ordinary agricultural labourers, but some families have produced one or more branches with specialist jobs. These are shown with the approximate number of censuses in which they are featured.
Number of Family
Entries Name Individual Occupations
-------------- ---------- ------------------------------
48 Howes (Shepherd, coal merchant, baker)
43 Watts (Blacksmith (3), shepherd, machine owner)
40 Williams (Iron stone worker)
40 Wrighton (Brick maker (5), railway worker (4), gardener)
38 Borton (Farmer, carrier (2), groom, baker)
30 Turner (Iron stone worker)
28 Tuckey (Gardener (2), farm bailiff, grocer, glazier)
25 Bygraves (Farmer (5), roadman (3), butcher (3), beer retailer)
25 Seccull (Mason (7))
25 Smith (Carpenter (3), lock keeper)
24 Butler (Gardener (5), groom)
24 Tebby (Postman (2), beadle, beer retailer)
21 Dunn (Shepherd (4), carrier (3), farmer)
19 Walton (Carpenter (4), carrier)
18 Page (Shepherd (3))
17 Watson (Carpenter (4))
16 Baughan (Carpenter (4), wheelwright (2))
16 Stayton (Gardener, railway worker)
12 Lambert (Sawyer (3), carpenter)
12 Peckover (Shepherd (4), iron stone miner)
11 Millard (Park keeper (4), grazier)
9 Ford (Road worker (4), gardener)
Garrett just misses out, with 18 mentions, but this name does not appear in the earliest census. Robbins appears 16 times, but not in the last one. Other names that feature quite often are Buckingham (Tax collectors, farmers), Dowty, Evans, Gregory and Mayo (Butchers).
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