Leaving school

 

In the fifth form at Acklam Hall Grammar School, I was faced with a dilemma.

GCE examinations were to take place, the result of which were crucial in deciding whether to continue to sixth form for two years and another set of exams. The A levels are precursors to applying for a university place. Therefore, results in both GCSE and A level exams were important.

By only creeping past 11 plus exams by interview after failure in the exam itself, coupled with my poor academic performance at grammar school, did not bode well for further study.

On the other hand, it would mean two more years of rugby! The results of my GCE examinations would be crucial here. I got five passes out of eight subjects. It seemed OK. However, my brother got 7 out of eight sitting a year earlier as a fourth former! On reflection, the thought of five more years of study at school and university if I were successful in A levels which are much more specialised and harder was not appealing and I decided to leave after fifth form at the age of 16.

But what to do?

As the eldest in the family and a boy, you might think there would be pressure to seek a well-paid career path. But there was no pressure. Neither was there any real interest in specific careers. However, our family came from a long line of Mariners, so going to see became an obvious choice. Father was at sea and Grandpa, who lived with us, was a retired captain. For some reason I decided to try for the Royal Naval Officer College in Dartmouth. I do not know why, but I did.

You need to keep in mind that the year was 1956 and I was a middle-class Yorkshire Grammar School boy.

I was instructed to attend HMS Eaglet in Liverpool docks. Not sure how I got there, but late morning. In 1956 I climbed the gangway into the hull of a retired Royal Naval Man of War. A Petty Officer took me down into a large room where I discovered there were four of us, a grammar schoolboy from Lancashire, myself, and two youths dressed in Penguin suits, well, that's what it looked like. Black uniform and hats. Later I learnt was either Eton or Harrow public schools. Remember in the UK a public school is really a private school for the rich. So, it looks like there was a competition between grammar school and public school.

The Petty Officer explained that we must first undergo an intelligence test and that would be followed by an interview.

There were a lot of questions, and you will not be able to complete them all in the allotted time, he told us. So, we started on this multiple-choice type question and answers and myself and the Lancashire lad finished them all in time. Not so the two other boys. Hope this means we are OK. Then I was led into a large room with a long table on one side. Behind the table was a dizzy array of gold braid belonging to at least 6 Royal Naval or Royal Naval Reserve officers. On the other side of the table, was a single chair for me. Somewhat intimidating. It started with a range of questions about my background, academic and sport achievements. And then the bombshell!

What did I think of Hornblower! Well, I had read the books and enjoyed them, but what to say?? A good captain, a bad captain, so I garbled out the sort of answer knowing that it was not enough.

Thank you and wait in the next room, said one of the officers. Sometime later I was called in to hear that I had not made the grade. The same was true for the other grammar schoolboy from Lancashire, but the two public school boys were through! Such was life in the 1950’s, but no regret.

Sometime later Dad was on leave and suggested I try for the Merchant Navy, and he thought Thos. & Jno. Brockbank’s based in Liverpool was a respected shipping company. So I applied, got an interview and Dad and I took the train to Liverpool to meet the Marne Superintendent Captain Cadwallader. I must have made a good impression and /or my fathers presence helped because I got an acceptance letter soon after and my career as a Merchant navy officer was to begin.

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Acklam Hall grammar school

Acklam Hall grammar school

Five years of my teenage life was spent at Acklam Grammar School. And the school intention was that these years would turn me into an intelligent and capable adult, ready to take on a further higher education in university.

 It did not turn out like that.

My intelligence, as measured by academic achievement and progression, did not improve. And I remained bottom of my class in all five years. However, there was a slight improvement in the 5th year. That year was renamed 5G rather than 5C, supposedly because it included the German language in our class schedule.

Capability was a different asset. I seemed to develop a skill that always got me into trouble. A few examples will demonstrate that hidden character in me that blossomed in those years.

The target for such behaviour was often a teacher or classmate. Hilton of the woodwork incident was often the victim. Once we locked him in the classroom cupboard and only a question by the teacher about noise at the back of the class got him released. A favourite trick was to balance the wastepaper basket over the partly open classroom door so that when someone entered it fell on their head.

Unfortunately, it fell on the head of the elderly English literature teacher and broke his glasses! He repaired them with blue insulation tip and I'm sure he did that to reminder us of our silly prank.

Another time we interrupted the steady rhythm of the school by disengaging the bell rope outside the main school entrance. Those perfect senior pupils had the responsibility of ringing the bell to signify the end of play time, the start and end of lunch, etc. Very important. Well, we removed the rope, So no bell ringing! Cool.

Our English literature teacher tried to open up history through literature. For me, mostly unsuccessfully. There are two memorable moments I do remember. One was doing a recitation of Shakespeare. It was Henry the Fifth and he said, “once more unto the breach, dear friends, some more: or close the wall up with our English dead”.

Of course, I cannot place the historical circumstances, but do remember the start of that speech. Perhaps it was because of that fervent patriotism us English are known for. What Winston Churchill would have caught described as stubborn foolhardiness.

The second incident was a play where each class put on a play around a theme given to us by the teacher. We got TS Eliot. I'm not sure which one it was, but we were instructed that it was a serious statement on society. I played a woman, as did my classmate Paul Speed. Unfortunately, he had very short hair, so to compromise we tied a large ribbon round his head to signal that he was a woman. Things quickly unravelled, both physically and metaphorically. First, I managed to catch Paul's ribbon and it unravelled across the stage floor in the middle of a scene. Paul immediately stormed off the stage and the play halted until our teacher told us to continue from the next page.

Of course, by this time, we were completely rattled, and many missed lines appeared, and prompts were needed. To cop it all, we heard that our classmate stage manager had taken off with our collective snacks and was believed to be under the stage, wolfing them down. These class plays were competitive, and we awaited the outcome with some trepidation. The judge, Clem Heath, in a very dry humoristic way, stated that the class had managed to take a serious play and turn it into a comedy, successfully! Therefore, we were awarded the winner for Year 4!

There was a lot of mischief during my time at school and of course there was always a price to pay. It could be “go to the headmaster boy” or Foxtrot.

Standing outside the headmaster's office signified you were waiting to be physically punished with a cane across your buttocks. Seems quaint 60 years later, but that was the punishment. The headmaster let us choose what instrument he would use, The thin bamboo cane, a leather strap, or a canoe paddle. I chose the paddle on the presumption that such a broad area instrument would spread the load of the impact. Such was it, for over the years I had the honour of being introduced to all the instruments of punishment.

Then there was Foxtrot. The deputy headmaster, named Fox had designed a punishment that was also physical exercise. It involved walking around the covered quadrangle after school. It was overseen by the deputy headmaster as well. The number of rounds was determined by the severity of the offence.

I can say with some pride I covered many, many miles doing the foxtrot.

It was not all bad at school. I was clearly dumb at most academic pursuits, but I excelled at practical classes such as woodwork, gym, and sports.

When I reflect why that was, I think there were two main reasons. A natural talent in mastering physical tasks, where there was always a goal and a sense of achievement., a completed flowerpot stand, ability to climb a rope in the gym or winning in a sport event.

I excelled in sport; in winter it was rugby and in summer it was athletics. Surprisingly I did well in the high jump. I say surprisingly because I'm not built for that sport being short and stocky. However, there was a new method of jumping. Previously we used the straddle technique where your stomach was nearest to the bar, and you straddled your legs over. The Fosbury flop was totally different. You approached the bar at speed and jumped, turning your back to the bar, and flopped over. I never mastered that technique. So, my tenure as school high jumper was short.

Junior school; me top right

Rugby was quite a different story. I started as a prop forward, in the front row of the scrum, supporting the hooker, whose job was to hook the ball backwards so the scrum half could retrieve it and deliver it to the running backs. However, I was not strong enough for that brutal position. So transferred to a wing forward position. Now, the wing forward has two jobs, pushing the scrum and attack the opposing scrum half if the opposite side got the ball, or protect his own scrum half if we got the ball. Here also I was not heavy or tall enough, so I migrated to a scrum half position where I excelled.

Senior school;me top right

The scrum half had to retrieve the ball from the scrum and then distribute it to the wingers through the flyhalf who started the attack. I was so quick that I could follow the wingers and join in the line as an extra runner. This was a great advantage over our competitors. So, from junior level to finally represented the school in my fifth year was a real achievement normally only accorded to the 6th formers. I got noticed by the county and made it to the Schoolboy County trials. Alas, that was the end of my rise to fame in the Rugby World. 

Anyway, there were other considerations to consider. Leave school and find a job. Or go on to sixth form and extend schooling into university.

Again, examination results would determine the outcome.

The dreaded A levels.

 

First years at Grammar School

 Acklam Hall Grammar School

I remember the day the term 11 plus was mentioned.

It was one spring day and dad said “son”, he always called me son, your 11 plus exam is soon. Are you prepared? Well, the answer was no, I had not even heard of it. Apparently, it is a written exam. The results of which determined whether you follow a route to university education or secondary school and a trades career like plumbing or building.

 A sort of intelligence test as they called them in the 1950’s. The day arrived and we were given a pamphlet full of questions. Of which we had a set period of time to complete. You need to remember that in the 1950’s the UK was not metric, far from it. It had its own weird set of standards. For instance, money, pounds, shillings, and pence. 12 pennies to a shilling, 20 shillings to a pound plus half pennies and farthings. Worse was length with fractions of an inch, feet, and yards stop. 3/8 of an inch, 2 feet, 6 inches, etc. Then there was weights and volume. 16 ounces to a pound, 14 pounds to a stone. Then we had volume. Cups, pints, quarts, and gallons. All very confusing, yet the 11 plus had questions like “You have a pint glass and a quart bottle. How many times must you fill them to produce 2 1/2 gallons of water”! What! Two cups equal one pint. 2 pints equal 1 quart. 4 quarts equal one gallon. Needless to say, Dad received a letter on my performance. I had failed. But marginally so, I was sent for interview where they proceeded to ask me the same dumb questions, but this time I needed quick mental arithmetic in order to give a response.

I remember an elderly teacher trying to help me with pints and quarts. But I returned home despondent, Sure I had failed, but no I had passed and my route to grammar school and higher education was secured.

[1]

If I thought Whinney Banks School was different to Bay School, Acklam Hall Grammar School was on another Planet. It was an old Georgian manor in its own grounds with Adams ceilings and enormous grounds with playing pitches for cricket and rugby.

 [2]

Secondly there was uniform, complete set of clothes. Only our underpants were our own. Socks. Shirt, trousers, (shorts for juniors with long socks), blazer with badge, school tie and cap! Without them there were penalties! Secondly, it was a boy only school, no girls. Just as I was starting to get interested in the opposite sex.

Thirdly, it was run on military lines with punishment. If you deviated from the rules, something I seem to do all the time! The first-year intake was divided into three classes, A, B&C, and the membership of a class seemed to depend on the 11 plus exam results.

You can guess where I was after my dismal 11 plus performance. You are right 1C. And soon to be bottom of that class. So, I had the distinction of being the dumbest in my year, which meant in year one, bottom of the whole school! Our day started in the Assembly Hall on the first floor of the main building. Very grand, with Adam ceiling and a stage at one end.

[3]

We all trooped in class by class facing the stage. As you can imagine, there was a lot of shoving and pushing and a constant babble of noise, only silenced by the arrival of a gowned headmaster on the stage, and the shouted command to be silent. All the teachers were present in their black gowns, like Ravens ready to pounce on their prey. Douglas, stop fighting, said our class teacher from the side. Then the headmaster told us of the latest school news before intoning a prayer, and we all sang a hymn from our hymn sheet. So, we then dispersed to various classrooms and teaching began.

I soon found out that abstract subjects such as science were difficult and mathematics virtually impossible. X’s and Y’s did not seem to represent anything I could recognise. And worse, we are expected to do arithmetic exercises on them and substitute numerical values for X and Y to produce a graph! I mean X ^2 + 2 X y = 10. What is that?

Worst of all were art classes where I met my nemesis. We were to paint a portrait of a woman who sat half naked on a stool. Where to start? Without guidance, I drew a “matchstick person”, with straight lines for legs and arms. This got me a clip over the ear and ordered to leave the art class immediately and never return. The outcome was to be placed in the woodwork class where I excelled. However, the teacher was very strict and threw pieces of wood towards us if we did not follow orders.

One boy, Hilton, was struggling to follow the procedure to mark out his wood and was rebuffed by the teacher who shouted so we could all hear. “Stop, you stupid boy. You might as well cut your wood into small pieces”! Dutifully, Hilton, sawed his project into small pieces and waited until the next inspection by the teacher. The result was as expected. “You stupid boy”, said the teacher. Red in the face he grabbed Hilton by the ear and threw him out of the class, never to return! Perhaps all of us in the class were problem pupils. We certainly caused chaos as we progressed 1C to 2C to 3C.

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[1] Douglas. John, View of Acklam Hall.

[2] Douglas, John, Peter and John in Junior School Uniform. Taken in the Garden.

[3] Douglas, John, Class 1C.

Blue Eyes

 

My mothers early years - written by my brother Peter Douglas

We were in my Father’s Day cabin.  He wanted me to meet the officers prior to the ship sailing across the Atlantic.  Mother had died 3 years before and I had already travelled on a couple of voyages with my shipmaster father.  This promised to be as exciting as the others. No doubt Dad hoped that somewhere I would find someone who was prepared to put up with what he called my feisty nature and marry me before my 30th birthday.  There wasn’t long to go.  Maybe there would be someone in Savannah our first stop, someone like Rhett Butler the hero in the new book I was reading.

 

The Chief Engineer was like so many other engineers I had met, a dour Scotsman, the First Mate a Geordie, and the Wireless Operator from Hull.  The second mate was on watch, but my father called the Third Mate up from supervising the last of the cargo loading.  

Mum is in the middle and Dad sitting to the right

He was a slim young man of medium height but tall to me.  He had dark wavy hair and a pair of the bluest of blue twinkly eyes.  Eyes that I had seen before, but where?  He was called George, and he was born in Whitby, a local lad then as far as I was concerned.  And then I knew where and when I had seen those eyes many years before.

 

 

My grandfather William had been a shipmaster.  He had retired just as the Armistice was declared 6 years before.  I was living with him and my grandmother at the time as Mother was away visiting my father, whose ship was docked in Amsterdam.  Granddad did his rent collecting alone, till he hurt his hand, and this Saturday I had gone with him.  I felt very important.  I had finished grammar school a few weeks ago, and hoped I could make a career in music.  My job today though was to record the money Grandad received into the rent books.  Grandmama had made sure I was smartly dressed, not like my preferred tomboyish style.  I had on a navy-blue skirt and a white blouse; my long brown hair was plaited neatly and each plait was tied with a white ribbon.  My polished black shoes had a neat strap across white ankle socks.

 Leaving the house I struggled to keep up with my grandad’s tall rangy stride as we climbed the bank towards the station. We caught the 10:30 train and arrived in Whitby after half an hour.  I never tired of the ride along the cliff edge, watching the sea breaking against the rocks below.  Today though the sea was calm below a clear blue sky.  Soon the train crossed over the viaduct high above the river Esk before reversing and dropped down into the valley and Whitby Town station.  As I stepped down onto the platform, I noticed a speck of soot on my white blouse.  Without thinking I brushed it off leaving a dark smear across the cotton.  Somehow, I seemed to attract dirt.

 ‘Never mind,’ chuckled my grandfather, ‘I’ve got some on my sling, so we are a right pair.’  He gestured to the triangular cotton bandage supporting his right arm.  ‘Let’s be off and get the job done, then we’ll see what treat we can find for ourselves.’

 There were only four houses to visit, but they were well scattered. We visited both sides of the river, never going very far before my Granddad stopped to chat with someone he knew.  When he was at sea a lot of the ships had been built in Whitby and owned by local people who would band together to buy a 64^th share.  They knew and appreciated him as someone who had kept their investment afloat. 

 It was almost 12:00 before we had visited the last house and I had made the last, almost neat, entry into the rent books.  Returning across the bridge Granddad said that he always met the Chief Pilot and shared a drink with him before returning home.  He would still do this, but before then he would buy me a soft drink and an iced bun.  I felt quite grown up as we sat in the smart café and a waitress in a black dress, white pinny and a white laced headband served us.  Grandad just had a cup of tea.  He chatted mostly about his greatest passion, his garden, which I loved to help him with.  His dad had been a farm labourer and he had learned the joy of growing things at an early age.

 After Grandad had settled the bill and received a big smile for the generous tip he left for the waitress, we walked to the harbour.  As ever the port was full of herring drifters, moored three and four deep against the harbour wall.  The smell of fish was everywhere, but one with which I was familiar.  We met the Chief Pilot outside his house along the quayside.  I was told to take a little walk along the pier and meet them back at the Pilot’s House in half an hour. 

 I watched the work of the fishermen for a while as they slung ashore the boxes of fish and tidied the nets.  Beyond the herring drifters a small rowing boat was being handled by a bunch of young boys.  They were jumping in and out of the boat, swimming around and splashing in the harbour.  It looked as though they were enjoying themselves.

 The sound of a band attracted me to the bandstand at the entrance to the West Pier.  I didn’t mind brass bands although I much preferred the piano and church organ.  One of the cornet players was funny, every time he blew really hard his cheeks bulged out like two rosy apples.  The band, dressed in black and gold uniforms, was quite good.  Their instruments twinkled in the sunlight as they played a few Gilbert & Sullivan tunes.  I lost track of the time and had to scurry back along the quayside.

 They were waiting for me near the pilot’s house and as I joined them from one side a group of young boys walked along the quayside from behind them.  I think they were the group who had been splashing about in the harbour. As they drew level the Chief Pilot gestured to one of the boys.

 ‘Come here, boy, I want you to meet Captain Emmerson.’

 Turning to Grandad he said, ‘This is one of my grandsons, he says he wants to go to sea when he is old enough’.

 Grandad shook his rather grubby hand and told him to work hard at his schooling and he may be lucky enough to see all the wonders of the world that he had seen.  He then introduced me, saying, ‘This young lady is my granddaughter Rachel’.

 He looked at me. His blue eyes twinkled under a shock of wavy hair and sat amidst a decidedly dirty face.

 ‘Hello Miss’, he offered his hand to shake.

 My face must have shown my disgust at the state of it, but I took it.  He grinned and then said, ‘You’ve got some soot on your blouse.’

 I think I must have blushed because he grinned even more, and my Granddad looked away.

 ‘Must be off for lunch, Grampa, good morning to you all’ the urchin said, and striding past me gave a little tug on one of my plaits.

 ‘I’ll get you for that someday,’ I vowed to myself.

 

 

Now here he was again, no longer an urchin, but a good-looking young man in his early twenties.  I realised that my desire, for revenge for that hair pull, had changed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Group travel

 

Trials and tribulations at the airport

Lately we have been using group travel to travel abroad instead of all the planning necessary when you do it yourself. It is convenient and you meet interesting people also in the group. The downside is that the itinerary is decided, and timing is sometimes not convenient.

Take our last trip to Puglia in southern Italy in October.

The travel instructions stated that we meet up at the airport at 0515, that is very early for us and necessitated an overnight stay in an airport hotel.

Early morning in the airport was chaos, it seems that all charter companies have early morning departures. We rush to find a free check-in automat, no friendly face just a machine that seems to demand an ever-increasing number of personal details before spewing out baggage tags and boarding passes. Pushed out of the queue by impatient persons behind us we found a free space to attach our baggage tags and store our baggage id tags, not in your passport at it tears up the pages but, in a wallet, or handbag.

Then join a long queue for what is called “baggage drop” which in reality is another self-service action to place your baggage on the conveyor and ensure you have used the barcode reader correctly. Will it go or will it not. Stress, stress, stress. I thought this was a holiday!

And we are not finished yet! A slowly moving crocodile of people shedding water bottles passes through a security check-in to join another queue for depositing personal items for security examination.

Off with coats, hats, belts, and wallets, take electronic equipment out of the hand luggage. Must remember a Kindle is considered an electronic item. Do not want my tray to end up in the “investigate further” lane.

For me with two artificial knees, there is always a beep as I pass through the electronic gate, beep and I am guided to another electronic search gate where a particular stance is required with feet apart and hands over your head. I feel like a criminal being body searched but I know it is for my own safety.

All is OK and I can go through and pick up my belongings, find a free space to dress myself, place all my personal belongings back in my bag, check I have not forgotten anything, and I am free to enter the airport.

All I really want to do is lie down and have a rest but this is “holiday” so I guess a coffee and baguette will have to do before we start another round of search for our gate and boarding of the aircraft.

Some start to what is supposed to be a relaxing holiday. I wonder when that will come!

 

Early School Days

 Robin Hoods Bay

My first recollection of school was around 1945 when I would be 5 years old. We lived in my grandfather’s large house in Robin Hoods Bay, a small fishing/farming community on the NE coast of Yorkshire.

Robin Hoods Bay was really divided in two, those that lived at the bottom of the bank in the old village and those that lived at the top of the bank.

Grandfather was a successful Captain, like many men in “the Bay” who bought new and expensive houses at the top of the bank. Our house, “Lincoln” had a large garden adjacent to the car park, a pantry, a “poshtub” in an outhouse where clothes were heated in a water bowl before being poshed, rinsed, and hug out to dry and a set of room indicators over the entrance hall inked to each room. The idea was that this was an indicator for servants where there was a request for service. Not sure why we had them as we had no servants!!

School was in the hamlet of Thorpe some one kilometre away up two steep hills, Donkey bank and Thorpe bank to an imposing stone building on the outskirts of Thorpe on the way up to Fylling Dales. We did this all-year-round summer, winter, sun, and rain.

The school was run by a man and wife teacher duo that lived onsite, so it paid to be on time, a demanding target most days!

There was no bus so we had to walk and often my brother and I would join up with the Lawson children as we made our way to school. That meant we often got up to some pranks on the way or on the way back.

I have absolutely no recollection of the teaching we received which might say something about my ability to learn or the content we were presented with. Remember this was late 1940’s and I was only seven or eight years old.

However, paradoxically I do remember some of the incidents that occurred on our trips to and from school.

One was the winter of 1947, one of the worst on record. It snowed for a week and left snowdrifts telegraph pole high. Snow clearing took a long time in coming.

However we must go to school so off we went on this winter adventure. After wading through knee high snow up Donkey Bank we came to a giant snowdrift outside the Vicarage on Thorpe Lane completely blocking the road.

Tunnelling through it was the only option if we where to get to school so without regards to safety we excitingly we buried down to the asphalt road and onward through the snowdrift to emerge some two metres later. What an adventure even though we were by now soaking wet.

So we arrived at school shivering and found we were the only ones to make it. Yes! Success!

However, our elation was short-lived as the teacher made us take off our clothes and hang them over the large potbellied stove in the corner of the room to dry. Once dry we dressed ourselves and were sent home as the school would be closed for two weeks until the snow melted sufficiently so that children from the outlying farms could reach school, experiencing that our snowdrift tunnel had survived so we arrived a little less wet than our outward journey.

Three years later we moved to a new house in Middlesbrough, and I was to attend Whinney Banks junior school.

The transition from village school in Robin Hoods Bay to a large junior school in a large town was a huge step for a ten-year-old boy.

Now there were classes of 20-30 pupils and a class timetable with different teachers and subjects such as PT and RI. What are they?

Physical training (PT) took place in a gymnasium with lots of apparatus that we had to use such as climbing ropes. We had to change for this class into shorts and sports shirt and plimsoles on our feet. These were black soft soled trainers.

Religious Instruction (RI) was quite different and very difficult to grasp. Here we were to focus on the Bible, both the old and new testaments and learn by heart the ten commandments. These lessons were often in a coded language relating to evils, sins, and heaven. All very difficult for a happy go lucky ten-year-old.

Then there were breaks as they were called, a sort of pause between classes when we could go out in the playground and meet up with our newfound pals and have fun. I must say fun often meant taunting other pupils, called bullying today!

It was in one of these breaks that I came across my first sighting of a boy “of colour”. I think he was either from Pakistan or India but spoke with a broad Middlesbrough accent. My first contact with multiculturalism.

We got free lunch when we could sit together in a huge canteen. The food was not very exciting consisting of stews and boiled vegetables and even worse semolina pudding that we called “frogs’ eyes” as the semolina popped in the custard.

My time at Whinney Banks was short as I was about to face my next educational hurdle, the “11 plus exam”. Success here would open opportunity to enter grammar school and eventually could lead to university. Failure meant attending secondary school and picking up a trade to follow.