A COUPLE of weeks ago we printed a wonderful old photograph, dated 1922, showing the pupils and staff of Haughton School in St Saviourgate, York. It was brought in by Stephen Lane, an East Riding councillor for Pocklington, whose aunt, Dulcie Stonehouse, once went to the school.

That photograph prompted a number of readers to get in touch – including retired Sheriff Hutton farmer Eric Weightman. He was a pupil at the school during the war years, starting there as a ten-year-old in 1942.

He admits he wasn’t the most academic of pupils. “I never wanted to go to school,” he said. “I was only interested in farming. On my report, they used to write “too agricultural minded”.”

He used to come in to the school by bus every day – one of many farmers’ sons and daughters who did so.

Many went on to be quite successful, he said – so the school was obviously doing something right. “There are a lot of us who have done well, have had our own businesses.”

Another reader who got in touch was retired insurance man Peter Thomson. He has only a distant connection to the school. Two of his wife Margaret’s great-uncles once went there.

What he and his wife do have is a number of items of memorabilia relating to the school.

They found them when they were sorting through Margaret’s late father Arnold Cooper’s effects. They reveal something of the life of the former headmaster, George Golledge.

Mr Golledge, who was originally from Doncaster, was head of the school for more than 40 years, from 1898 to 1939. A photograph of him, printed on the back of a menu for the Haughton Old Boys Association’s 31st annual dinner in 1938, shows a distinguished, sensitive-looking man in a bow tie and tweed jacket.

He died in 1946, aged 72.

An obituary in the Gazette and Herald talked about his early musical education at Doncaster parish church, his further studies at Durham University, and early appointments as a music teacher and choirmaster, before he came to Haughton in 1898.

He was, therefore, the headmaster who oversaw the school’s move to St Saviourgate in 1901, where it remained until 1947.

Mr Golledge was clearly was a man of some musical talent. Among the items Mr Thomson and his wife found is an old musical score Mr Golledge wrote. It is called Sonja, and is dedicated to Mr Golledge’s granddaughter Sonja.

Mr Thomson has actually played the music on a piano. He said: “It’s a nice tune, very light-hearted.” He would like to know if Sonja, or any of her relatives or descendants, are still around. If so, please get in touch through Yesterday Once More, and we will put you in touch with Mr Thomson.

Another reader with a direct, although distant, connection to the school is Denis Hutchinson.

Mr Hutchinson, a retired railway clerical worker who lives off Stockton Lane, has a copy of an old geography book – The Geography of the British Islands – written by one Thomas Haughton.

Thomas, Mr Hutchinson believes, was the nephew of William Haughton, who founded the school in 1773, and was himself a teacher at the school. Mr Hutchinson said: “He was the great-uncle of my grandfather.”