‘Coal Minds’: Education and Mobility in Fife’s Coal Mining Communities
For many students coming to St Andrews from working-class communities, a university education offered access to a wider range of occupations. Several students from Fife coal-mining communities who matriculated in the early 1920s went on to pursue careers in education.
This article was written in May 2026 by Jamie Watt, then a second-year student of Modern History.
Today, coal dust runs through the blood of people living in Central and West Fife. You would have to search far and wide to find someone without a coal miner as an immediate relative. In the early-twentieth century, when the industry was at its peak, a working life in the coal mines was almost a foregone conclusion for many Fifers. But did anyone from a mining background actually buck this trend?
Of course, as the industry declined, people started to explore other options. But in the 1920s, mining was both ubiquitous and inescapable. It was not just a job, but a way of life. Thousands of Fifers worked ‘doon the pit’ and, over the years, transformed the job into a family tradition, a sense of community, and an identity that ultimately came to define the region.
Stepping away from this expected path to study at university was uncommon. Only eight individuals from Fife coal mining backgrounds could be identified among the 539 in the University of St Andrews class lists for the years 1920–23. But their route out was not as radical or significant as it might have seemed.
For these eight, university education would have been like a ladder: a tool that anyone can use in order to climb up and reach higher socio-economic levels. Given how few of them, actually attended St Andrews, getting in also represented a rare – and momentous – chance for them to finally break the rigid mould of the mining community, to explore diverse career options, and to ultimately achieve their full potential. For the first time, a life dictated by greater personal choice, not necessity, seemed possible. It was, therefore, incredibly important that they seized every opportunity that came their way; there was no time to waste.
When Graduation Day finally came around, these students, likely standing in St. Salvator’s Quadrangle, proudly clutching their new degrees, must have felt hopeful for the future. Beyond the old, sandstone walls of the quad lay paths untrodden by their relatives and peers back home. Yet, as they all exited under the famous gothic archway and onto North Street, their routes effectively converged. Rather than scattering into a plethora of vocations, most found themselves heading down the same professional pathway: teaching.
Figure 1 shows the different occupations pursued by graduates from the Fife coal-mining villages. Graduates from more affluent backgrounds – the children of headmasters, businessowners and doctors – pursued a range of careers including surgery, the arts, and teaching. But those from coal-mining backgrounds almost all became teachers. After all, compared to being a miner, being a teacher carried with it stability, good pay and respect.
The differences between the groups become more apparent on the maps below. While graduates from non-coal mining backgrounds dispersed widely, the mining cohort operated almost like a boomerang: they left their communities to go to university in St Andrews, but as soon as they qualified to teach, they flew right back to where they started.
Of course, it may be argued that those entering into professions like medicine were more likely to move around regardless of their background; that was the nature of the profession. But, even within teaching, geographical mobility remained higher outside of the coal mining cohort. The tale of two Cowdenbeath teachers, James Mailer (1905–1962) and John Paul (1905–?), illustrates this.
James Mailer, the son of a miner, essentially embarked on a grand tour of Cowdenbeath. He started off at Foulford Primary School, ventured a few minutes up the road to Beath High School, circled right back to Foulford and eventually advanced up the High Street to Broad Street Primary School. It was only after twenty-years of barely crossing a postcode boundary that he finally decided to leave Cowdenbeath, by moving a massive four miles up the road to Ballingry.
If these standards are anything to go by, then John Paul was essentially a nomad. Born into a local entrepreneurial family, he treated Cowdenbeath as a mere pit stop in his journey: he worked at St Columba’s in the town for only a handful of years, before charging towards the Anglo-Scottish border and into Berwick-upon-Tweed.
While it is impossible to know exactly why most of this cohort chose to become teachers, and return to their local communities in doing so, the trend likely reflects a sense of bounded aspiration created by various systemic barriers. These students were undoubtedly ambitious: they had the drive to go to university at a time when these institutions were still predominantly exclusive. Their decision to opt for a teaching career, therefore, may well have been dictated by their background, which left them without the connections, financial resources or role models required to pursue ‘riskier’ professions, rather than a lack of academic prowess. These factors may have made returning home to a familiar network and environment a necessity, not a preference, which was contrary to their initial expectations for university.