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Video transcript
The Hartlepool 'Friends of the Library' group undertook a project to show how the roads
which made up the shopping centre of the town used to look before the modern covered
shopping centre was constructed at Middleton Grange. The shops that made up this
well loved shopping area, that was central to life in Hartlepool, are now almost all
demolished. I remember how my grandmother used to travel across town to visit us at
Seaton Carew every Saturday and then I would accompany her and my mother "into
town" to do the weekly shop in Lynn Street. I had the task of carrying their shopping
bags as we negotiated the packed pavements. We always returned from the Saturday
shopping expedition with a chicken which my mother would cook for tea in a large
'pressure cooker' before my grandmother returned home.
My mother died last year but a recent trip around Beamish museum's archives brought
back further memories of them. Both my mother, Iris, and my grandmother, Barbara
Florence Cornforth, used to make mats for their own use before I was born. They were
constructed on a hessian backing made from recycled potato or flour sacks using strips
of woolen fabric cut from old clothing. The proggy hook was used to draw the material
through holes in the sacking. "Proggy mats" had the profile of sand dunes because the
ends of the material were retracted into the backing, whereas "Clippy mats" had the
profile of grass because the loops of material were clipped into tufts. Leaving the tufts
longer meant that the mats resembled "Shag pile" which was the carpeting craze of the
1970's. Mats formed using different styles, patterns, colours and thicknesses made
worthless materials resemble expensive carpets once laid on the floor with furniture
arranged over them.
They were not made following a set pattern but merely constructed according to
whatever material was available. I clearly remember an innovation they came up with in
the late 1960's that I have never seen anywhere else. It was a time when nylons and
coloured tights were readily available. Unfortunately these items were
manufactured to be disposable because, before run proof knits, they easily
'clicked' or were 'laddered'. Rather than throw them away, this ready supply of holed
tights was collected by my grandmother who used the nylon to make a new generation
of 'proggy' mats. The nylon construction made the mats waterproof and extremely
durable and I well remember the small runner (made mostly from "American Tan" tights)
that kept my feet warm as I washed dishes at the kitchen sink for my mother.