I attended St. Aloysius' Infants School in the early 1970s, when it still had the outside toilets down at the bottom of the playground. I can remember being picked up by my Nana at lunchtime and walking to her flat in Hardie Court to eat my lunch. You could look out of her kitchen window and see all the way down to the big cranes on the Tyne.

You could also see Greenfields School for special needs children and I remember watching the pupils playing on the grass at lunchtime.

I also remember one day a horse and cart came along the street with a load of potatoes. It went over a bump in the road and some potatoes fell off the cart. The driver didn't notice and carried on down the road, but women from the ground floor flats came running out into the street to pick them up. I don't imagine that you would see that today!