The manager of the cinema would award marks to the children, prizes such as free cinema tickets and sweets could be won by the highest scoring monitors.

Watch James Walsh’ memories of being a monitor at the Gainsborough cinema:

“One of  my  earlier  memories was  around 1934. We  were  one of the  first  families  to  move into the  new  Housing  estate of  Daley  Road,  No.  8, that was  before the  Regal  was  built, we  used to  have  to  walk from  Daley Road.  to  either  the  Coliseum in  Linacre  Road  or  the  Stella  in  Seaforth.  For  a while  we used  to  go to  the  Stella  on  a  Saturday, as we  followed the  Serial  of  Roy  Rogers. The  usual  Matinee charge  was  two pence, but  every  Saturday they had a  special  “A  Penny  Rush” a  few  minutes  before the  start  the  manager  used  to  come out and  shout,  “Penny  Rush door number” whatever it  was  for  the  day, and the  first  half a dozen at that  door  got  in  for  a  penny, which meant you had an extra penny for sweets. There used to be a  mad  scarper  for  that  door.  I think I did reasonably well at that.”

Tom Lennon (I live  in  Brisbane  Australia now)