Chapter 6: Ossie, Cecil and the ‘University of East Belfast’

It wasn’t called that, of course, but for generations of working-class children of Castlereagh and Woodstock, Euston Street Public Elementary School was the beginning and end of education before being ejected into the unfriendly arms of the labour market.

Uncaught it could mean years on the ‘brew’ (the bureau of unemployment) or night school at the ‘tech’ to gain the necessary certificates that would give them entry into the print, textile and other trades and the first step on the ladder to a commercial livelihood.

The school had in its vicinity a cooperage, a major printer company, the East End’s largest laundry and the Belfast rope works plus, of course, the easily accessed shipyard. Each in its turn would soak up the energy, enthusiasms and aspirations of many of the post-education young of the area.

The Bells – sons and daughters of William, the grocer, and Minnie, his second wife – were key players in the life of the area, particularly in the church (McQuiston Memorial Presbyterian Church, whose huge bulk shared the high ground of the Castlereagh Road with the Castle Cinema) and in education. Ossie and Cecil were key players in the latter.

Although the Bell children attended the nearby Mountpottinger Public Elementary School, all but the youngest of the Duffield’s were inducted into learning process through the ‘baby’ or ‘wee’ school of Euston Street or its main body which was opened in 1926 and whose design was a tribute to the planning talents of the time.

At nearby Cregagh was a physically loftier Harding Memorial Public Elementary School readily accessed across Daddy Winker’s Lane from Ormonde Gardens where Andy Duffield, much to the disapproval of his father-in-law, had bought a £300 ‘subsidy’ home to remove his offsprings from the claustrophobic surrounds of Cherryville Street adjacent to Bell’s grocery shop.

Like many others remembering their childhood, Gordon has poignant recall of being ‘deserted’ by his mother when she left him at the door of the ‘baby’ school to be treated to a Christ on the Cross and his crown of thorns tirade by an enthusiastic teacher eager to instill the basic precepts of Christian living into her captive young minds.

Shortly after his ‘transfer’ to the main school he was entered as a pupil to Harding Memorial.
Whether this was due to the ‘upwardly mobile’ aspirations of the family or the proximity of Daddy Winker’s Lane he does not know.

More likely it was because of the proclivity of the mistress of the third form, Mrs J Corken, to hurl heavy wooden-backed blackboard ‘dusters at unruly pupils in a frantic effort to control her flock. Her lethal projectiles could strike the body, if not the head, of the unfortunate target with the impact of a direct hit by one of Hitler’s bombs on the flimsily built ‘shelters’ of the day.
Perhaps Andy and Sadie felt that the brains of one of their younger sons deserved better protection.

A more likely reason for change is that Cecil Bell, the first of his cousins to achieve academic success, after gaining a Queen’s University degree, had become deputy head of Harding Memorial, winning the respect of pupils and staff for his exceptional talent (he was later to author a book on mathematics) and the fairness of his authority.

He was to teach Gordon when his younger cousin attained the higher reaches of the school and although no family favours were given, undoubtedly contributed to his winning a scholarship to the Royal Belfast Academical Institution (Inst) which Cecil Bell had attended before proceeding to third level education.

More importantly, in the first year of peace after the Second World War, Cecil Bell was appointed headmaster of Euston Street School, a post which he held until 1969 and which allowed him for almost a quarter to a century to direct the ethos of one of East Belfast’s significant educational institutions.

He was helped by the appointment of his brother, Oswald (Ossie), member of a successful printing firm active in educational publishing, as a governor of the school. Gordon visited the school in March 2006 and was so impressed he wrote to the principal:

‘Visiting your school was a mind-bending experience!

‘In a world of supposed black-board jungle education I expected to find a rowdy, ill-disciplined bunch of children training (at least secretly) to become flick-knife members of society.

‘Instead I found a centre of idyllic calm in the middle of East Belfast populated by the most delightful youngsters whose manners, attentiveness to the teachers and courtesy to visitors was both exemplary and extraordinary!’

Ossie and Cecil enabled Euston Street to travel light years in a period of unrivalled change and social conflict.