The free school milk program? More like cottage cheese giveaway

I have before me, courtesy of the National Library’s Trove website, a page from The Uralla Times, dated August 1, 1935.

The student officials for fifth class at the Uralla Rural School have just been announced. Doris Swilks and Zoe Bullock have been installed as flower monitors for the month, while the book monitors have been confirmed as Wilga Crapp and Merle Hopley.

People had better names in the 1930s. Or maybe it’s just people from primary school that always have the best names.

Anyway, back in Uralla, the ink monitors were a couple of boys called Douglas – Duncombe and Cooper – while the paper monitors were Gordon Trickett and Doug Cooper’s brother, Reg.

Such lists are common in country newspapers, particularly if you search the middle decades of the last century. Depending on the period, each classroom had an ink monitor, a milk monitor, a paper monitor, and – more occasionally – a manual work monitor.

There was some attempt at gender equity, although the flower monitors were always girls, and the manual work monitors – who I assume put away the woodwork tools – were always boys.

I was inspired to search out a little of this history after reading a memoir by the British screenwriter Georgia Pritchett. Called My Mess is a Bit of a Life, it’s a strange and wonderful book that crabwalks its way to profundity.

In one scene, Pritchett is anxious about spending time with the other children and so volunteers to be the school’s “lab monitor”. This involves looking after the laboratory animals – gerbils, tadpoles and locusts – who are later to be subjected to experiments. The job is horrific and makes her realise that she is not equipped for responsibility. This, I have since discovered, is true of all these jobs.

Everyone I ask about their life as a “class official” has vivid memories. First, they recall the pride upon being selected. Then the bitter disappointment. The worst position, probably, was that of washroom monitor. The outside wall of the toilet block featured a raised concrete trough, at which students could either wash their hands or make use of the bubblers.