Firemen Study School. Lesson

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30157, 14 June 1963, Page 10

Firemen Study School. Lesson

After they had put out a small fire at the St. Martins School yesterday afternoon, some of the firemen were interested by the lesson for the day for primer I pupils, written on the blackboard by the infant mistress. The fire alarm was given at 3.31 p.m. and engines from Sydenham, Woolston and Headquarters Fire Stations answered. The fire was caused when a flue from the automatic coalfired boiler overheated, and set fire to the wall between the boiler room and the primer I room. , Firemen using a hose reel soon had the blaze out, but had to hack holes in the wall

to get at the seat of the Are. which had spread up the wall into the ceiling. A desk and some of the infants’ school equipment were damaged. A poster on the wall, depicting a Are engine, with the words. “Look out, everyone, the Are engine is coming,” and “I am a fireman,” was not damaged. A mistress at the school gave the alarm. Hundreds of pupils returned to school, attracted by the fire engine sirens and the smoke, and watched from the school gates. “The primers’ lesson for the day is the only ironic note,” commented the headmaster (Mr E. O. Arbuckle). “The practical part was after school, fortunately.”