During the nineteenth-century towns and villages throughout Britain clubbed together to create Reading Rooms - lending libraries - for the benefit of the community. Yetholm was no different. In nearby Donaldson's Lodge a small building was purpose built to house the community library. It is still standing, with a neat fireplace in one wall, but abandoned and strewn with rubbish. Yetholm, although a much bigger village, does not seem to have been as ambitious and its 'Reading Rooms' seem to have been peripatetic. At one point the books were housed in the house called Montana, next to Gibson's Garage. In it's latter years it seems to have been housed in the school, where it was managed by the redoubtable Tibbie Herbert. When it closed, and what happened to the books, is a mystery. The poster shown above dates from 1910 and seems to mark an attempt to inject new life into the project. An account of the 'Conversazione' is given below (from the Southern Reporter, 27th October 1910). Dr Rodgers, who presides, gives some useful background information about the history of the Reading Room, although even he seems a little unsure about its origins. It is interesting that gentlemen were charged a shilling to attend the ball, which followed the conversazione - while ladies got in free (and no children)! Dr Rodgers lived in Romany House, which was built for him as a wedding present. Miss Downs, the pianist, was the schoolmistress at Mowhaugh. 'Miss Rebecca Downs' is listed as schoolmistress there in the 1903 Slater's Directory. She lived with her widowed mother. In 1917, in her mid-40s, she married William Tait, a farmer at Middleton Hall, near Wooler. At that time it was expected a married woman would not continue in work. When she duly left Mowhaugh she was presented with a 'handsome silver tea service' by members of the library based in the schoolhouse there. From the report of the event (Jedburgh Gazette 20th April 1917) we can see that she had for many years been secretary and treasurer of that remote Reading Room. In many ways we are better informed about efforts at self-improvement at Mowhaugh than we are at Yetholm. In the 1870s, for example, the teacher (and poet) there, Mr Henry Telfer, established a 'Mutual Improvement Association'. Below are a couple of newspaper reports about his efforts. The first (Kelso Chronicle, 11th August 1871) gives us some idea of the kind of books which the Mowhaugh library contained, presumably similar to those on offer in Yetholm, while the second (Kelso Chronicle, 10th November 1871) suggests that, as with Yetholm, efforts to improve the intellects of locals did not always meet with total enthusiasm (especially when 'members had a long way to come' - by foot, over rough moorland!). Hopefully the 'Conversazione' of 1910 was a convivial and successful event. All who have attended the ball have long since passed away, though we do - probably - have a picture of Mary Anne Rebecca Downs (1873-1950). Several photographs of the Mowhaugh School, with pupils and teacher, have survived, from the early decades of the twentieth century. The female teacher is nearly always shown with a pet pony, as in the image below, sometimes with a pupil perched on its back. It looks like Miss Downs, as well as encouraging reading and writing among the children of the Bowmont valley, liked to give her charges some fun as well.
1 Comment
Margaret Rustad
15/11/2022 02:16:55 pm
When we moved to Yetholm in 1980 the Public Library was housed in one room of Yetholm Primary School (before the renovations took place, after which a mobile library served the village). It was open in the early evenings and was still presided over by Tibbie Herbert. It consisted of a wall of bookshelves. We never availed ourselves of it, as it seemed rather a small collection, so we joined Kelso Library - in the heady days when both rooms of that library were chock-full of books. The WRI also met in this room in the evenings, and you took your own cup for the refreshment afterwards.
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