“Hiya, chuck. Are you crossing?”
You always hear Pauline Rawlins before you see her. A fixture of various crossings in Levenshulme for a generation, the 58-year-old lollipop lady is at the stage where kids she ushered to primary school a generation ago are now using her traffic-stopping powers to ferry their own whippersnappers to class.
Walking to a cafe for our chat takes three times longer than a regular solo stroll. Minibus drivers caught up in roadworks exchange jokes with her, people shout greetings from the other side of the street, and even taking our seats at Station South is fraught with delay as a group of mums, fresh from dropping their kids off at school, butter Pauline up with compliments.
She has earned this local celebrity status, having chatted to thousands of people, saving three lives, and bringing the community together to fight off the threat of closing down her Broom Lane crossing – where she has been since 2011 – after the council installed a set of traffic lights 100 yards away.
“I was trying to save myself from those lights because they were originally supposed to be on the crossing,” she says over a cappuccino, her lollipop safely in its bag and leaning against the wooden table. “But because the road’s uneven they moved it down there – and they’ve already broken down twice.
“A workman came over and accused me of putting chewing gum in the mechanism and he was being was dead serious. Well, a) I don’t have chewing gun, and b) as if I’ve got time to be doing all that.”
Although she doesn’t carry chewing gum, Pauline always has a stash of dog biscuits at the ready, which has made her popular with the area’s canine residents. So much so that she made up bags of treats to see her four-legged customers through the six-week summer holidays. Perhaps word has even spread among Levenshulme’s dogs of her heroics in saving one of their number from certain death.
“The dog had got out of his house, and I saw him charging around all over Broom Lane,” Pauline says. “So, I stopped the traffic, got a load of abuse from a taxi driver for my trouble, and put this dog on the end of my stick. It was like I was doing the egg and spoon race.
“His owner lets onto me every morning now.”
Pauline came to lollipopping – her official role is a school crossing patroller, which she always says in a posh voice – in 2003 after already having 18 years under her belt working with people with disabilities for Manchester City Council.
However, it was a move made from necessity rather than choice.
“Basically, I came to this job because my daughter got cancer. So, when she took ill, I told them I wanted to carry on working, and I don’t want to sound big-headed, but I think I’ve got a gift for working with people. I thought that with lollipopping, I could still fit that in with my daughter, because we planned all her treatments around the school holidays.
“My original crossing was at the [South Levenshulme] Post Office. I was there until 2011 when George Osborne did all his cutbacks, and my crossing was under threat. It was only because Sandra, who used to do the crossing on Broom Lane, put a word in for me, and that’s how I got Broom Lane.”
Pauline’s daughter recovered and went onto to represent England in athletics. Her other daughter has followed her into lollipopping on the other side of Levenshulme, bucking what she says is a perception that all people who work crossings have just retired and want something to do keep active. ‘Our Nellie’ as Pauline calls it.
Despite Pauline’s love of her job, not all her interactions with the public leave a pleasant taste. She, and other lollipoppers, are often the target of abuse from drivers and even those who use their crossings.
“We’re in a society where it’s all rush-rush-rush and everything’s last minute. I’ve been spat at, I’ve had death threats, I’ve been run over. I got reported by this 50-year-old woman for not crossing her over. She was on her mobile nowhere near the crossing and she reported me. I was in bits. Anyway, a few months later the same woman just ran across the road and nearly got killed. What can you do?
“I got it this morning because of how bad the traffic was. This bloke shouting out of his window at me accusing of me of causing it all, but it was roadworks at the lights at the top.
“Sometimes you just have to completely ignore it because they want you to react. Other times there might be a police car that comes past to help out, but if you do ask them to move you tend to get abuse. So now, I take photos of the cars. It irritates them, but I send them onto my boss so that there’s a record of it.”
The upsides dwarf the downsides, though, with daily interactions with kids, parents, dogs and commuters giving her vocal cords plenty of exercise.
“It’s the only job I’ve ever had where I just feel happy,” she says as a second brew arrives. “This job is my social, it’s all that at home that’s my work. Even when my dad died, I only had three days off.”
It was Pauline’s dad who introduced her to her life’s obsession: speedway. A Belle Vue Aces fanatic, she grew up a five-minute walk from their old Hyde Road Stadium when Peter Collins ruled the track. A bona fide legend of the sport, he won the individual world championship in 1976 and finished second the following year while riding with a broken leg. He is also second in Pauline’s affections when it comes to speedway riders, with her love of Chris ‘Bomber’ Harris transcending sporting colours.
“He was only with Belle Vue for one season, and I was in Birmingham for most of that when my daughter was poorly, but he was my dad’s favourite rider, too,” she says of the Cornishman. “When my dad was at the speedway it was as if the dementia had gone. But the home wouldn’t let him out towards the end, so one time, my daughters – they both work at Belle Vue – got hold of Bomber and he did a beautiful message for my dad. I absolutely love him.”
Although she has never helped Bomber to cross the road, Pauline has helped – and had help from – a Levenshulme celebrity.
“The first campaign we had in 2013 when Broom Lane was hovering between amber and red for whether they were going to get rid of it. I was speaking to Max Beesley’s auntie who lived on Chapel Street, and it turns out he used to live round the corner. I was on the crossing one day and he came along with his hood over his head and he made it look as though he was a thug, and I was quite nervous crossing him. Anyway, we get to the other side and he pulls his hood down and says ‘Hello, Pauline.’
“He told me that he’d signed my petition, but then my boss at the time came along and said that I’d made that signature up. Of all the people to make up. Anyway, I’ve got a signed photograph of him in a frame that says, ‘To Pauline, the lovely lollipop lady.’
“Oh, and I’ve had Prince Charles. He was in a Mr Bean Mini.
“These two police cars pulled up and said to me: ‘Your lights will be going out in 20 minutes’. And I thought it must’ve been the end of the world. ‘All I can say is that you’ll see a black limo coming past, and whatever you do, don’t stop it.’
“And about 20 minutes later, this big black limo came past with a little yellow Mini behind it, and I looked, and Prince Charles went like that [waving]. He was in the Mini. I said that I want a plaque or something on this crossing to say that I’ve had Prince Charles. Apparently, he was opening something at Victoria Baths.”
There are no thoughts of early retirement – or any form of retirement – any time soon for Pauline, and with the backing of the people who live around Broom Lane, she’s already proven you can’t get rid of her that easily.
“No, I want to be here forever,” she says with a defiant clench of the fist. “I want to be in the Guinness Book of Records for being the world’s oldest lollipop lady. I don’t think I could leave. I’m too loyal to the people of Broom Lane.”
