Well, I never took Latin and I never took French. Just arithmetic and English and geography: oh yes, geography. Geography and history. That would be it, wouldn’t it? And every Friday afternoon we had either a spelling match or memorizing poetry. Did you ever have that in school? That was Friday. We always looked forward to Friday afternoon to come for the spelling match.

We had slates: slates and pencils. And then you had a cloth to clean your slate and your fingers. Ink wells on the desk and slop, slop, slop. Oh boys!

Take our lunch to school. There was a brook, a nice little brook running out of the rock. It’s not where the new school is now. It’s where the old school was.1 It’s right at the other end, now, of the bridge... . The water’d be flowing down clear as crystal. We always took our milk in a little flask with a string tied at the neck. Then we’d tie that flask to the root of a tree or something. And that was to eat with our lunch.

I remember one game they used to play [at recess]. There was a nice little grove there: I suppose it was spruce trees. And they [would] pretend it was a railroad through the woods. They would run around. There’d be stations. That was one game we played.

[After school] in those days, we usually had the chores to do... [Some] days you’d have to take in the wood. There was always hens; you’d probably have to look afterthe hens; take in the eggs or something like that. And then it’d be dark. You’d only have a dim, dim lamplight to study with. You’re not going to understand that.

St. John’s Presbyterian Church

Many’s the time I went to church out in the tent. The English was in the tent, you know, and the Gaelic was in the church. The tent was all torn down years ago. It was back over there on that nice green grass back of the [church] parking lot. Right inside the fence. There was a big tent there.

I don’t know what shape it would be. I suppose it was like a tent. It was a wooden structure. I don’t know whether there was a floor in it or not, to tell you the truth. It wasn’t really seats, just planks they’d sit on, set up on logs, I think. We had to go there for the church service.

[After the tent era] we used to sit in church up where the piano is now. Had a [pew] number, yes, always sat there. The MacGillivray Smith sat in

l. The old school referred to here is the former one-room school at Newtown. The new school was a more recent one—room school which was sold in 1968 and converted into

a family residence.

Kate MacTavish 201