The monthly meeting of Blantyre School Board took place on the evening of Tuesday 17th October 1893 where the subject was whether to let various local groups have use of the school in evenings for the use of dance classes.
Now, this may not seem a particularly big decision these days given schools are empty in evenings, but back in the 1890’s, the school had one purpose only and really considered shouldn’t be open out of hours. The applications by the dance instructors were read out and immediately prompted many votes of “absolutely not” and “no”. The problem was that the Board had a few evening classes running for adults and the sound of dancing and music would be too distractive.
Mr Small was repeating the motion, when suddenly the meeting took a strange turn of events, when the gas started flickering and after a moment blinking, went out completely, leaving the Board in complete darkness in their meeting room.
Mr Douglas piped up in the dark, with a remark quite witty suggesting Mr Small’s motion had left them all in the dark. Much laughter in the blackness.
Eventually a lamp was found and lit and the business of the meeting continued. Dance classes were then voted on and refused.
AI imagines this story for illustration.
