Mrs. Cherry Horton Grammar School For Girls
I never knew why it should happen to me but when I was five years of age during World War, there was an acute shortage of school classrooms at the time when I was to commence attending school.
On the first day of school I was told that there were too many children for the size of the available classroom at Box Hill State School (No.2838). We had to either go without schooling or else find some private alternative.
I did not understand what that meant until my mother, after much searching, came home pleased to announce that I had been enrolled in Mrs. Cherry’s Horton Grammar School for Girls. Along with one other boy I had been taken into the all girl school until it was anticipated room might be found in two years time at Box Hill State School.
It might be supposed that two young boys in a school full of girls might feel embarrassed and overwhelmed by the ordeal, but my mate Jimmy and I soon found we had a constant audience for whatever we did. Mrs. Cherry had her hands full. I cannot remember her having any other teachers and only a few older girls as monitors to help her. I think she struggled alone with about sixty students.
Our major problem lay with the toilets. Mrs. Cherry’s Horton Grammar School for Girls used to meet in the Box Hill Girl Guides hall. The Girl Guides had no need for male toilets so special arrangements had to be made for the two young men in Grade 1.
Whenever Jimmy or I needed to go to the toilet, a girl monitor had first of all to go out and check if it was occupied. Then, when the “all clear” was given, the two boys would go out together, one to go to the toilet and the other to stand guard.
Then when both boys returned it was the turn for the girls to go. With a little bit of luck, and by carefully spacing our requests, we could manage to keep going in and out avoiding work for the best part of the day.
I do not remember the cause of the trouble that day, but on one occasion I decided not to return to the classroom. Taking advantage of the fresh air and freedom of being in the small school yard with only Jimmy and myself, we climbed the tree that stretched its broad arms over the girls toilets. I climbed along the bough where the rope was tied that was used to make our swing. I found that the further I crawled along the branch the lower it bent down until suddenly I realized I could let go of the branch and sit on top of the ridging of the roof of the girls toilet.
Safely lodged on the roof ridge I discovered that there was no way down. At the same time two girls came out to attend the toilet only to discover me sitting on the roof with my back towards the small stink pole that went up through the roof to a nice peaked cap on top.
As girls would, they ran back into the classroom immediately to report to Mrs. Cherry.
Mrs. Cherry promptly came out of the classroom followed by an excited audience of some of the girls. “Come down from there straight away” she ordered. But she immediately realized that there was no way I could safely come down except by letting go and sliding precariously down the steep pitched roof to a long drop to the ground. She immediately realized the pointlessness of her demand. So she ordered a girl to bring a chair, and then a stool. But they were both too short. The rushing of girls to get the chair and the stool encouraged more girls to come out of the classroom. The situation was a stalemate. Mrs. Cherry was beaten. A number of the girls called out a lot of useless female advice. At that time some of the girls decided that they wanted to go to the toilet and when told that they could not, began to cry. Now Mrs. Cherry was having more problems with her girls than she was with her two boys.
Faced with her crying girls and a disobedient boy she told the girl monitor to go around to the fire station in Whitehorse Road and ask if the fireman would come around and bring a ladder.
Perhaps the monitor was also an excitable girl or else the firemen did not like the idea of carrying the ladder down the street and up into the school. Or perhaps it was just a boring day in the life of a fireman. But the next thing we heard was the sound of a continuously ringing fire bell on the front of the big red fire engine as it pulled out of the brigade headquarters into Whitehorse Road, around the corner and down Linsley Street to Mrs. Cherry’s Horton Grammar School for Girls.
Several big firemen dressed in shining brass helmets, looking for all the world like ancient Roman charioteers, marched up the side of the school carrying a ladder. By this time the entire school was surrounding the girls toilet. The rescue was made and a five year old boy was carried rather triumphantly down the ladder to safety. Punishment was not in question. Mrs. Cherry had a cheering class and a group of firemen who seemed to enjoy the break in what was otherwise a very dull day.
The firemen gave Jimmy and myself a good talking to but that only heightened the joy of the whole experience.
From that moment on Jimmy and I came under a savage new regimen of discipline. When that happened I decided to leave school for good.
The day to day task in Mrs. Cherry’s Horton Grammar School for Girls of cutting out pictures and pasting and hearing of the importance of keeping one’s nails clean did not seem to have much bearing on the real world.
So next morning I walked to the front of Mrs. Cherry’s Horton Grammar School for Girls and straight on past the front gate, down Whitehorse Road to the big engineering works that proudly boasted the name “Daniel Harvey’s Agricultural Implement Foundry”. I went round to the side door where often I had stood and watched the men pouring molten metal, making cast pieces of farm equipment. They made black sand moulds and into it poured the bright red metal to make shares for stump jump ploughs and round cast water tanks for trailers and points for harrows.
The men were always hot and sweaty, black from the moulding sand with their faces as black as the black singlets they wore over their sinewy arms. That was real men’s work.
After standing at the door for a while I walked up to the man making cast mouldings and asked if he would give me a job working in the foundry. He asked me “What about your school. You should be in school young fellow.” I told him I had left school and was wanting to start work. “How much do you get paid for a day?” I asked. And the moulder replied “About two bob a day for a strong young man like you.”
I felt accepted immediately. The conditions were fine and dropping my school bag started to pick up the still warm harrow prongs from the sand. That morning was one of the most intoxicatingly happy memories of my life. I sat with the men at morning tea and ate my play lunch. At lunch time one of them gave me a swig from a bottle of lemonade but kept on suggesting I should have a beer.
The afternoon passed quickly and with each hour I became more covered with black moulding sand. The moulder told me it was time I left and having spent the day handling long tongs to pick up the still warm harrow prongs he was true to his word and gave me two bob for my day’s work. My heart almost burst with pride. Telling the fellows I’d be back tomorrow, I left the foundry from my first day of real work and walked up Whitehorse Road towards home. As I neared the corner Mrs. Cherry turned and walked toward me. Her face was full of disbelief. “What on earth have you been doing?” She looked at the nearest example of an Aboriginal in Box Hill. I explained to her quite logically that I had left school, was now working at Daniel Harvey’s foundry and with a flourish showed her my first day’s wages in the palm of an extremely grimy hand.
Mrs. Cherry did not possess a sense of humour nor did she believe the logic of the events that occurred. Taking me by the ear lobe she marched me up the street into the presence of my mother, giving me a continuous narrative all the way.
I don’t know what happened the next day but when I reported to school that morning being held firmly by my mother’s hand and delivered personally into the care of Mrs. Cherry, she made the announcement that she had been notified that two places had unexpectedly become available in Grade 1 at Box Hill State School and Jimmy and myself would continue our education there.
My career at Mrs. Cherry’s Horton Grammar School for Girls was at an end.
For many months afterwards as I came home from my new school, I thought both of my first school and my first job as I walked up Bank Street along the railway line to the top of the hill, to No.5 Miller Street, Box Hill, a great city that was once a village, where the adults were kind, and the children grew up responsibly.
GORDON MOYES
