Freda’s open book of memories

FREDA MILLETT: captivating

Martyn MEETS: Freda Millett, author and former keeper of Oldham’s local history

CAPTIVATING is the adjective that springs to mind whenever I meet Freda Millett and after spending two hours in the company of this sparky, effervescent woman I have no reason to change my assumption.

Freda is almost a living legend, having chronicled the social history of her home town in 12 books and a series of exhibitions at the former local history centre in Greaves Street, which became the local history museum.

She officially retired in 1994 as assistant curator and keeper of local history but continues to research and write and is a prolific speaker at events all over the borough and beyond.

In 1995, she was rewarded for her love of her birthplace when she became Woman of Oldham.

This remarkable lady has touched the lives of so many of us here in Oldham through her books and, she hesitates here, before stating: “There won’t be any more. No, I don’t think so.”

I for one don’t believe her . . . she is already hinting at another project based around Oldham men who fought Franco is Spain’s civil war and if I was a betting man I’d have a bob or two on this being her next publication.

For Freda is a woman of her time and can’t sit still for a moment. On arrival I was offered tea or coffee and ended up with a bacon sandwich — “You don’t mind Lurpak do you?” came the call from the kitchen — and a glass of red wine.

It was 10am and there I was sipping red wine and a good one it was too. No complaints from me, this is clearly the way to live...

My mum used to have a saying for infectiously happy people like Freda describing them as “little buggers”. It was to ring true throughout our chat.

Freda lives in a simply gorgeous house overlooking the Huddersfield Canal at Dobcross, in one of the converted weaving sheds abutting the Stonebottom Mill.

It is a stunning conversion, the walls seeping with memories and photographs reflecting Freda’s love of history.

Pride of place is a restored black and white image of her late mother, who died giving birth to her second child.

“I was brought up by my gran, our dad Reuben simply took my sister and myself over there to live and then he had the life of Riley, really. He lived the life of a single man.

“Now and again he took us out — when gran insisted — and I remember him once taking us up to the lido and Grotton for a swim.

“Then he drove off in his car, after leaving us with sixpence for an ice cream, and I presume he was having a few beers in the Grotton Hotel.”

Living with gran is one of Freda’s favourite subjects for her legendary talks and those days have clearly influenced much of her adult life.

Well before the proper age, she was sent to the local North Moor School with an aunt, who was teacher, and the minuscule Freda would sit at a tiny desk in the classroom alongside the traditional high desk of the day.

Later, when Freda and her sister had to attend school, their gran would watch them don their gabardines at the front door and, before marching them off to North Moor, would insist they listen to “Thought of the Day” proffered by Hannen Swaffer in the Daily Herald. “It went straight in one ear and out the other” giggled Freda with her infectious laugh.

She was a little bugger even then.

During our two hours she often referred to her parents, and her upbringing with her gran in Coldhurst, but if there was a trace of regret it was soon forgotten with tales of gran’s influence on her life.

Gran, and here was another cherished portrait, insisted on Freda having a “proper education” and also demanded — when the time came — that the young Mistress Millet apply for her first job, in the checking office at the Co-op.

Her gran saw the advert for the job and took her along —handing over her share book with the words: “Show them this, it will help.”

Freda wasn’t convinced but did as she was told, which wasn’t always the case, but respect for her gran was absolute.

“There were 10 of us, all girls,” she recalled, adding: “We had to sit an exam. We all sat round a massive polished table in the boardroom in the Co-op offices in King Street and we had to do six sums, describe a picture and complete an application form. There were only two jobs, and I got one of them — the other went to Brenda Broadbent, who is still my friend to this day.”

Freda was one of around 20 girls who had to collate and check all the divi payments for Co-op’s customers. She recalls one day being sent out on an errand by the office manager and having to pass people in the divi queue.

“How much are they paying today?” they would inquire of Freda as she hurried past — this woman didn’t and still doesn’t do anything at less than full throttle — and Freda called back: “Three shillings!”

“Is that all? It was three and six last time.”

“ It’s because they’ve bought a new funeral car!”

Freda laughed at the memories and they were legion from her time at the Co-op where she and the other girls “made life hell” for the beleaguered office manager, whose wife would be present at the front door on pay day to collect his wages.

“He always had the daily paper open at the racing,” she almost winked at me in a confidential tone.

She left the Co-op when she started a family — she has two children Jen and Tim — having being courted by her husband for many, many years.

“I met John when he was a butcher’s delivery boy for my uncle Fred. He was older than me but always had time for me and always went out of his way to help me.

“We lost touch when he joined the Army during the war and he was part of the D-Day landings in Normandy,” she recalled.

True loved blossomed when John was demobbed and tried to locate Freda one New Year’s Eve. “I was dancing at Billington’s and he turned up . . . I was a little poser in those days and was seeing one or two other young men, you know,” she confided.

Eventually John put his foot down and suggested that Freda should concentrate her affections on him and so began a marriage that lasted all too short a time.

John died 23 years ago — only eight weeks after completing a labour of love, by building his own house in Grasscroft — where Freda lived until her move to the idyllic setting in Dobcross six years ago.

The house had a living tree in the corner and was considered something of a novelty, but Freda wasn’t so convinced and rang around nurseries, gardeners and farmers until she found someone who would come along and remove it, roots and all, to be replanted.

Eventually she found a farmer who turned up with his son and a trailer to remove it.

“It was a lovely tree and I couldn’t let it die, but he was a bit shocked when he turned up and saw how big it was.”

These days Freda spends here time reading, and researching, forever researching the history of Oldham.

She developed a love of reading at an early age and joined the library at North Moor.

“I started out intending to read every book, so I just picked up the first one in the A section and read that. But I only got as far as D...”

When her family grew older Freda began to look for work and landed her dream job —working as an assistant at the library. And so began a love affair with Oldham history that endures to this day.