At a very young age,I was taught catagorically that men from Workington had to be termed "Jam eaters" and believe me it was not intended to be complimentary!

i was a good friend of the late ike douglas who was from whitehaven and worked the mines for over 50 years.This conversation came up many times and he even said it was the whitehaven miners who where jam eaters.

i have worked all over west cumbria, and although i live in workington, i feel i am a high sider jam eater,
were the jammies whitehavens the marras,

i love jam, and most of my friends do too. we just dont care what people say.

I work with people from workington and they are still eating jam sandwiches.

I do regret to say that i am from workington and like my jam.

I work with an Egremont guy Richard, and he is definitely a jam eater. We see it on his chin when he comes in to the office in the morning, some things never change ;-)

During the Second World War everyone was urged to recycle their jam jars and Moor Row and Scalegill won the prize for the most saved jam jars..hence the village became known as Jam City

I am from Workington and during the late 50's I worked at Sellafield on contract work with mainly people from the Whitehaven area. Never once was I called a "jameater" it was always a "highsider" so I'm not so sure about the origin of the saying. I have heard another story that because there was jam factory at Maryport the miners from that area were able to get jam for their sandwiches whereas the miners from Whitehaven had to put up with "dripping" on their sandwiches. I think it really is a fairy tale told so many times nobody knows how it started but it is used more nowadays than at any time I can remember.

working down the pit when i left school i remember jam being the only thing with any taste, but the people from workington knew that long before the whitehaven lads did, thats why they are the true jam eaters.