Tributes after death of Edith aged 101
The funeral was held last week of centenarian Edith Lord, of Stacksteads. In this special tribute compiled with the help of Edith’s daughter Wendy Walmsley, Stuart Pike looks back at 101 years of change in the Rossendale Valley, viewed from the colourful perspective of one remarkable woman’s life.
EDITH Lord, who passed away peacefully at her home in Booth Road, on December 11, was born in Rossendale on April Fools’ Day 1918.
A time when women didn’t have the vote, there was no NHS, few homes had gas or electricity, indoor toilets were virtually non existent and having a bath meant sitting in a tin tub in front of a coal fire, the water being shared by all family members.
Edith died in her own centrally heated home with specially adapted bathroom, surrounded by various appliances to enable her to remain independent and during the last three weeks of her life being cared for by NHS nurses and doctors and nurses from Rossendale Hospice with family members always by her side.
Edith’s parents Samuel Wright and Priscilla Hargreaves were of old Valley stock, tracing their ancestry back to the first Hargreaves’ who came to settle in Rossendale in the early 1700s.
Edith was the youngest of five children all of whom were born at home. A brother and a sister died in infancy, leaving her with two brothers, Alan and Harry.
EDUCATION
Edith was a bright child but her education didn’t come easy. Compulsory education had been around for some years and at age five Edith attended St Mary’s school in Rawtenstall. To do so she had to walk over a mile through fields and farm tracks from her parents’ remote upland farm. Then she had to negotiate the centre of Rawtenstall with its level crossing, trams, horse drawn vehicles and the ever increasing numbers of motor vehicles. It was a journey she did alone. Parents had to work long hours to keep their family fed and clothed, no time to take a child to school.
Life improved when the family moved to Higher Cloughfold and Edith won a scholarship to Bacup and Rawtenstall Grammar School. Basic education was provided free by the state but a grammar school, further or higher education had to be paid for. General thinking at the time was that it was a waste to educate girls, but Edith was lucky. Not only was she allowed to attend grammar school but was also allowed to take the equivalent of today’s GCSEs at age 16. Most children left school at 14 and started work in one of the many flourishing industries in the Valley; weaving, spinning, coal mining and quarrying to mention a few. Even with enlightened parents, education past age 16 for a child from a working class family was not an option. Your wage packet was handed unopened to your mother.
WORK
Edith was able to embark on a career in the office of a local manufacturer. Working a 48-hour week, she still found time to attend night school to become a skilled shorthand typist and was the first woman to be employed in Rawtenstall Town Hall. Her duties were varied, and she fondly remembered travelling around in the chauffeurdriven Mayoral car collecting rents from council properties. Less fondly she recalled liaising with the gas and electricity showrooms to ensure residents were able to cook on the new cookers being installed throughout Rossendale. Cooking was not one of her talents!
War was declared in 1939 and as men left to join the forces more and more women were employed.
Edith enrolled as a student nurse at Manchester Royal Infirmary. She excelled in the academic work and made several close friends she maintained contact with until in her 90s.
This period in her life had to end when she married her husband Albert in 1947. Married women could not be employed as nurses and so she had to resign. This didn’t just apply to nurses; teaching, the civil service and other middle class professions were not open to married women.
Edith’s husband was a master plumber, owned and managed rental properties in the Rossendale area and was proprietor of P. Lord and Sons Ltd, a shop dealing in electrical, plumbing and cycling goods. Edith worked in the shop and became a director of the company. The separation of the property side of the business from the plumbing side gave her a directorship of Rushbank Holdings Ltd and she continued as a working director and company secretary until retiring in 2012 aged 94, a working life of 78 years. Not many can beat that.
MARRIAGE
Edith met her husband Albert Lord during the war. They corresponded when he was serving with the 51st Highland Division in Germany.
On paper it was not a marriage made in heaven. Edith was a well educated, teetotal, committed Baptist attending chapel regularly and with many of her social activities centred around the church. Albert enjoyed a drink and his attendance at church never involved anything more than sorting out the drains, unblocking the ladies’ toilet or patching up the guttering.
As a strict nonconformist, Edith regarded gambling with abhorrence, Albert rarely went a day without a bet on the horses.
It was a strong marriage based on respect, tolerance and more than a little bit of give and take. Sadly Albert died in 1993 after 46 years of marriage. Son Christopher, daughters Wendy, Helen and Mary, nine grandchildren, 14 great-grandchildren and one great, greatgrandson all saw Edith as the matriarch of the family.
MUSIC
As befits a descendant of the Larks of Dean, music was always an important part of Edith’s life. She sang with the Rossendale Ladies Choir and various church choirs. She played the piano in Sunday schools and for church activities. She also played the organ for many years at Waterbarn Baptist Church into her 90s.
WIDOWHOOD
Following a period of mourning, Edith embraced life as a widow. With her sister-in-law and old school friend Jenny Lord, she embarked on a life of adventure, exploring all the UK, Eire, the Channel Isles and most of Europe interspersed with visits to family in the States.
Various family members were enrolled to accompany Edith on her travels, all of whom returned exhausted and in need of a relaxing break!
A full life, an active life and, as one of her grandchildren commented at her funeral, always in the fast lane.
She died, as she wished, in her own home, comfortable and pain-free. She just went to sleep.