Dorothy C Maguire recalls a time when games were very different

DURING my own school and college days the games of netball and football were played with heavy balls with thick laces.

And it really was quite a task to blow the balls up with a hand pump and then put the laces in.

But what I remember is the weight of the balls. They were nothing noting like the ones they use today.

I played netball for both the Kendal High School and Liverpool College teams, and when playing for the latter, in 1950, I had a blow on the head from the ball and suffered a detached retina.

That is the sort of injury which is usually only suffered by boxers!

In summer months at Underbarrow School, where I was headteacher in the 1950s and 1960s, the children enjoyed rounders.

I was usually the bowler, and we played with a tennis ball.

A boy called Richard slammed the ball and it floored me.

There was dead silence from the children, but I soon recovered.

It’s a good thing we weren’t playing with the hard, match rounders ball.

But I asked the children the question – what they would have done if I had been unconscious?

I had some very interesting answers from them.

To reach our playing field we had to cross a bridge which over the beck.

Some of the children had a habit of walking on the parapet, but one day, Richard, again, fell off and into a bed of nettles.

Because of wearing shorts he was nettled all over!

His mother had to come and take him home and put him in a bath of cold water.

No-one walked on that parapet again for a long time!

As country children they enjoyed playing together and we had many happy sessions.