SECONDARY SCHOOL FOR ME, 1962-65, YEARS 7-9...

 KING EDWARD’S GRAMMAR SCHOOL ASTON, 1962-1965... 

(YEARS 7-9…)

The summer holidays were over, following Year 6 at Hillstone Junior School and I was to attend secondary school at K.E.G.S. Aston wearing my new cap, pleasing my pedantic father of course, plus a claret and royal blue tie and a blazer with a school badge sewn on by my mum. 

I would sometimes travel with Dave Whalley, also from Hillstone, using the 55 and 8 (Inner Circle) bus routes. In 1957, the 55 ‘bus terminated at Shard End Crescent where new shops were replacing the previous prefabricated buildings. I recall suffering a haircut there on one occasion after moving to the area.  

Soon afterwards, the bus route was extended to Packington Avenue/Hurst Lane, nearer my house. Shops were later built closer too, in Kitsland Road and much later the terminus was extended even further, past Longmeadow Girls’ Secondary School, these days of course no longer standing.

WHERE I CAUGHT THE 55 BUS IN SHARD END...

LONGMEADOW SCHOOL FOR GIRLS.
ALONG WITH ALDERLEA SCHOOL FOR BOYS, IT WAS CLOSED MANY YEARS AGO. 
A POLITICAL MOVE, PERHAPS...

The Aston cap was expected to be worn en route to and from school on buses, or in the street and if a prefect spotted you not wearing one, you would be reported and a detention meanly administered. Clearly, other kids on buses would give you stick but I was fortunate that only a very few Aston lads travelled on the 55 bus anyway and so I escaped any punishments…

The rules were later relaxed whilst I attended the school and subsequently caps were no longer required.

NECHELLS: PART OF MY SCENIC ROUTE TO SCHOOL...

THE HOME OF ANSELLS, THE MIDLAND BEER MAKERS.
I WOULD WORK SOME SUMMER HOLIDAYS THERE AFTER LEAVING SCHOOL...

AFTER GETTING OFF THE NUMBER 8 BUS, I WOULD WALK UP THE HILL BETWEEN THE BREWERY AND THE SHOPS ON THE LEFT TO MY SCHOOL, PASSING THE HP SAUCE FACTORY...
THE ODOURS OF HOPS AND SAUCE ARE STILL WITH ME...

The uniform was secured during the summer holiday and of course I had been in hospital for an operation too. Two grey shirts were purchased, two pairs of short grey trousers too and also the cheaper blazer of a thicker material than the more expensive and smarter ‘barathea’ type. Obviously, many of the boys in Year 7 at Aston wore the better quality blazer… 

MY FIRST DAY AT ASTON.
THE SATCHEL DIDN'T LAST LONG BUT IT WAS A LOVELY GIFT FROM MY AUTIE IVY...

I was accompanied on one practice run to school on the buses and that was that, so on the very first day, a shy, timid lad travelled alone to his new school, knowing only one other person. However, David Whalley was soon friends with lads from his own form and we drifted apart, bar the occasional meeting on a 55 bus home.

I was a King Edward’s boy at last. I had successfully realised my father’s need for me to qualify for such a school and gain some parity with twin cousins Dave and Derek, who had attended K.E.G.S. Camp Hill. I had simply and obediently gone along with it all…

My earliest memories were of being in Form 1C. 1A housed the boys with higher 11-Plus examination passes, which included Dave Whalley but in 1B and 1C the rest of us had been sorted alphabetically, with surnames A to J in 1B and K to Z in 1C…

Jeff Rawle, who gained fame as a professional TV actor after moving to Sheffield in his teens, appearing as Billy Liar, then in Drop the Dead Donkey and countless other productions, including Hollyoaks, sat two seats in front of me. Brian Kensit, who became a long-standing friend was at the front of the first row and our teacher was Mr Merzon, an American from Michigan. He taught history (Greeks and Romans) and English.  It was so cold in the old building that he forced the school into agreeing to light a daily fire in a disused, original fireplace in a corner of the classroom. I think I liked Mr Merzon, a pin-headed, bespectacled, unsmiling guy.  I finished 11^th in the end of year exams and was promoted to 2B in Year 8.

PART OF MY YEAR 7 REPORT...

During that first year a wild-haired lad, awfully strange creature called Davis, tried to verbally intimidate fellow Year 7 lads. We were later to call him Sam, after the singer, Sammy Davis Junior, although he was white and looked nothing like the singer/dancer.… He spent the first week or so calling all obvious new boys a ‘fag’ but he was a new boy himself… 

However, I became immediately aware of my short, grey trousers, which stood out in a sea of long trousers and it wasn’t many months before my cousin Steve Heslop’s cast-off long grey trousers came my way.  I wore a couple of his used white shirts too but mum and dad also managed to buy another couple of my favoured grey ones.  

AH, LONG TROUSERS, ONCE COUSIN STEVE'S...

I was selected to Floyd House, the blue team and life began to get upsetting. I was very shy with little character but my sports interest was to pull me through school life like a bodyboard on a wave. 

The school hall, ‘Big School’ was used for P.E. at that time and had the coats of arms of attached to the walls. Mr Floyd was one of those previous headteachers and two other house teams, Temperley and Manton (which I was transferred to later in my career there) were named after similar individuals.

Those first days were hell for me. The lunch-room was in a cellar and I remember holding back the tears as I sat at a table of eight, with prefects presiding, wondering if I would ever get through the purgatory. Unfortunately, I recall mainly the pale-green cabbage, which tasted so bitter, different to my mum’s dark green pulp, which was also vile but in a different way. This might explain my lack of pleasure in handling sea-weed…  

I took sandwiches to eat later that year.

More cellar horror involved woodwork. This led to a fear of Tuesdays. I hated the subject, the cellar, the smell of the loathsome wood glue and possibly most of all, the teacher.  This was ‘Scab’ Ward. He was mostly bald, mean-eyed, quietly-spoken and scabby. Very scabby indeed. It was no wonder I didn’t follow my dad’s leaning towards D.I.Y. The guy terrified me… 

I tried to achieve, I tried hard but my woodwork examination result was less than 40%. That was good for me. It was only later in life that I realised that many of the school’s tools were designed for right-handed users and that had been one reason why I had experienced such problems with saws and screws. Luckily, a new extension to the school, just across the road was to open in my second year, housing a new canteen, laboratories and a modern gymnasium.  

Geography was presided over by ‘Slasher’ Lazenbury, a fellow whose teaching methods included bullying, frightening and belittling, counter-balanced by cruelty. A pleasant man, then. Homework was usually a threat, “Read chapters 1 & 2 for a test next week…”  

The first time we were tested, he issued paper about three inches by two inches to each of us, sitting there silent, shaking and puzzled. After one’s name was written at the top, plus the date and the form name, there was possibly room for eight answers. Slasher’s tests usually had around twenty questions.  

A foolish boy raised a hand: “I’ve got no more room, Sir!” I think the  boy expected sympathy, understanding, or even a new piece of paper. He was told, “Well FIND room boy…” Yes, a very pleasant man. He used to sit at his desk, leaning back, often thrashing the air with a tie of his graduate’s gown. Threatening? Surely not.

We were never taught anything in his classes, merely being forced to answer questions about the chapters we had been told to read from a textbook at home. Nice work if you can get it…

We also suffered a surely sadistic music teacher, A.J. Cooke whose comment on my report card was ‘Rather weak’. He joyfully whipped at the knees of some boys under the swing-out, new-fangled desks in the music room, using the black belt of his teaching gown. Early on we were forced to go to the front of the room and sing individually, which was terrifying for a shy boy like myself who had actually been in the choir at primary school but after a couple of notes emitted from my nervous mouth the teacher yelled at me to sit down. I was really upset…  

AJ COOKE, SECOND MASTER FROM THE RIGHT, WEARING GLASSES...
ON HIS RIGHT IS HARRY TYSON...
STILL GIVES ME THE CREEPS TODAY...

Strange then that there was a recitation prize for reading a poem out loud in Year 8. My father insisted I took part and I had to learn a prescribed poem by heart. One of the contestants, Page, spoke with a very posh voice and I wondered why the hell I was doing this thing. Incredibly, I won the Hales Recitation Prize… I chose a book to receive at Speech Day, which my dad told me had to be a science book, or something. The book was called ‘Physical Chemistry' I recall but I never once looked at it.

I was due to take part in the recitation in Year 9 too but I dropped out at the last moment because I hadn’t learned the words of the prescribed poem… 

That posh lad was in 3A with me in Year 9 when we stood in a silent line, in alphabetical order to receive our TB injection. He was directly in front of me, then fainted as his name was called… Thanks for that. I was next… However, I walked forth with no hesitation as others began to falter and grumble behind me. I guess I was shit scared but I was in the rugby and cricket teams and I wasn’t going to back down… 

However, the most evil of all of my teachers was Harry ‘There’s going to be an investigation…’ Tyson. This pompous little shit of a mathematician struck fear into even the brave. 

His slow, threatening northern accent seemed to announce your execution when it was cutting through the nervous atmosphere to hit you between the eyes. Anything taught us by Tyson, which was rare in class time, would be backed up by invaluable sheets of rules, explanations, examples, definitions and reminders. We were expected to take those home, copy them out word for word into an exercise book and learn them. Tyson would warn, "Learn yer notes…” 

I’m afraid my lesson was learned the hard way. OK, I had worked hard at home to commit to memory the definitions of geometric shapes. Yet I was unlucky enough to be picked upon to answer a question the following week. My answer was almost word-perfect. Almost… I was to feel the wrath of a man who would not accept a definition even one word different from that on his damned but eventually really useful note-sheets.

LABORIOUS COPYING OUT AT HOME...

I shall never forget what a parallelogram is. I shall never spell it incorrectly, for my punishment was to write out the definition one hundred times. It was upsetting because I was well behaved and I knew that I was one of the few boys to have actually bothered to learn the definitions at all. To rub it in he asked me what a trapezium was too. Just two words in the wrong order meant more ‘lines’ awaited me. Thanks, Harry Tyson… 

THE FATEFUL PAGE...

I had quite enjoyed maths until I met this evil specimen of a dictator. He was distinctly reminiscent of Hitler in the guise of the comedian Ted Ray. He was an awful man. As fifth-formers, we were to suffer the man’s torrid tones again and I recall big Rob ‘Figgy’ Freeman sitting at the back of the class one day. Tyson demanded in a slimy tone: “Come here Freeman.” In silence, Rob, around five feet eleven inches tall and a forward in the rugby team lurched forth to his ruler. 

This sixteen year old was no angel and we awaited Rob’s bespectacled sneer of defiance. Instead, Tyson spat: “You’re frightened of me, aren’t you Freeman?” Rob replied with head bowed, “Yes Sir.” Eyes down folks, the man had just assumed complete mastery and nobody dared to react in an untoward manner. 

I met Mr Tyson when I was an adult, walking to Villa Park one evening. He was strolling to the game too and I was a teacher by then. We spoke. He was smaller than me. I felt like shoving a parallelogram up his arse until it resembled a trapezium…

I soon met David Rutherford, a spotty and utterly serious boy from Hodge Hill, with whom I had absolutely nothing in common. We used to catch the same buses however and became friends. He collected bus numbers, as well as train numbers and at some point he and I walked to Water Orton station a couple of times to spot trains… 

DAVID RUTHERFORD IS SECOND FROM THE LEFT, FRONT ROW...

I suppose Nigel Welch tried to be a friend too but he was an incredible pain. In 2B French, the master Mr Adams would enter the room and we would all stand up as expected but before even passing Welch’s desk, the moustachioed teacher would bawl out: “Welch, get out!” Nigel would spend the vast majority of French lessons lurking in a corridor…

THE HEADTEACHER MR BRANDON IS CLEAR TO SEE BUT AT HIS LEFT KNEE IS NIGEL OAKES, THEN WELCH IS LEANING FORWARDS TO OAKES' LEFT, NEXT TO MY MATE BRIAN KENSIT.

CLIFF HICKMAN SITS AT MR BRANDON'S RIGHT KNEE, ALWAYS A FAVOURITE, HE CAPTAINED ENGLAND'S UNDER-15 CRICKET TEAM ON A TOUR TO HOLLAND AND NOT ONLY SCORED A CENTURY THERE BUT MET A GIRL ON THE BOAT WHO WAS TWO YEARS OLDER THAN HIM.
THEY WOULD LATER MARRY...

NEXT TO CLIFF IS GORDON BROWN (NOT THE ONE YOU MIGHT BE THINKING OF) BUT THIS BROWN WOULD EVENTUALLY BECOME HEAD BOY.

ODD THAT EVEN IN YEAR 8, THOSE TWO ARE PICTURED CLOSE TO THE HEADMASTER...

JUST SAYIN'... 

Possibly my one salvation of the first year was a precious sporting moment around Easter time. There was to be an inter-class rugby tournament. During the two terms from September to March, we had been shown the rules, the skills and the rudimentary ideals of rugby-football and it was painfully obvious that form 1A was going to be unbeatable.  

Bigger, quicker and stronger boys piled up 30 points against my 1C team. Near the end however we mounted an attack and won a scrum, some yards from 1A’s goal-line. I was playing scrum-half, the busy position and as I fed the ball into the scrum, it was heeled back by my team’s hooker and I picked it up, dodged to the blind side of the collapsing scrum and dived for the goal-line as a tackle went in. A try… 

We lost 3-30 (scoring a try earned only 3 points in those days) but I had been noticed and a sporting person’s life at K.E.G.S. Aston was very much more rewarding than that of a swot, a wimp, or a freak. I was shy and small but fast and becoming mesomorphic too. I was to play for the school’s Under 13 team in my 2^nd year at full-back, because of my ability to tackle, catch kicks and use either foot to clear danger.  

HMM, GET THOSE HANDS IN, PETE...

I don’t ever remember really enjoying school during that first year for I was in awe of so many older boys, in fear of some intimidating teachers and I was also aware that some students achieved great marks, seemingly with no work and my complete lack of personality, confidence, being poorly-read and possessing a total lack of worldly wisdom made me feel like what I was, a shy sportsman who could spell and knew his times-tables, from a council house in Shard End. Crucially, I knew little of life…

SLASHER LAZENBURY IS THE SECOND SEATED MASTER FROM THE LEFT...

Perhaps I hated the school, I don’t know. But I went each day, didn’t complain and mum and dad were apparently awfully proud of me.  Yet I was unable to uphold this pride as the years wore on. I began to rebel without going face to face with my father but by having a few laughs at school. 

My second year was to bring success as the full-back in the rugby team, the wicket-keeper in the cricket team and a pleasing second place in the end of year exams.  I had made it to 3A…  

NOTE THE HAVERSACK...

No more athletics for me though. I had finished eighth in the 100 yards final in the Year 7 sprint at sports day. Gosh, some of those boys were so big and Alvin Anson, the only boy of colour, who would soon emigrate to Canada was an arrow. I was literally the small fish in a large pond…

Cross-country running was also not something I was involved in, basically because I played rugby instead but one awful day, I was asked to represent Floyd House in the annual inter-house race through Aston Park, past the famous Aston Hall built by Sir Thomas Holte and of course Villa Park, behind the school. This must have been in Year 8 or Year 9 and remarkably I finished in the first five, claiming a few points for my house. I never agreed to do that again…

Little did I know that I would end up teaching at Aston Hall, in role as Sir Thomas Holte in the mid-1980s… 

AN OLD POSTCARD OF ASTON HALL...

Basketball was a real disappointment for me, for I would love to have played in the squad. However, practices were held after school and I lived so far away, needing to catch two buses home to Shard End, that I simply had to forego any chance to stay and take part. 

Had my father owned a car at that time, maybe a lift home might have been possible. I doubt that though, for after 1965, when he did buy his first car, never once did he take me to far off schools on Saturday mornings to play rugby for Aston. He was ‘working’, as mentioned in the articles about his life. 

Thus I was forced to make solo journeys to distant Birmingham schools to play rugby and cricket, following written instructions from my sports teachers.  

ME, THIRD FROM THE LEFT, FRONT ROW...

The wicket-keeping had been a dream, ever since watching TV’s Grandstand in black and white when I was around seven years old. I saw Australian wicketkeeper Wally Grout with his unusual crouch, arms and gloves wrapped around the outsides of his pads, not neatly inside them as most players did. I liked that… 

MY SPORTING INSPIRATION: WALLY GROUT...

As a young kid I had had no gloves or pads or anybody to play with and so I had donned mum’s gardening gloves, wore my football socks and tucked dad’s soccer shin-pads down the tops of the socks, so that the flap effect of cricket pads was achieved. I thought I was so cool, yet doubtless looked a total imbecile. I simply had to become a wicket-keeper though. And I did… 

My second year was only memorable for Welch’s dismissals and the class being made to stand to attention in the playground for over an hour by that same French teacher, who hated Welch so much. Damned painful that was, too. The tuck shop’s superb banana creamy ice-lollies featured strongly in my diet and I sliced my knee open in a chasing-game tumble. Rugby and cricket were important to me at school and in cricket my spectacular diving and catching ensured that I was the permanent wicketkeeper.  

However, I was really pleased to gain access to Form 3A, the elite. I was quite happy with French, German, Maths and English but the sciences, craft with Scab Ward and geography were difficult for me. History, biology and physical education were acceptable but art was a nightmare…

YEAR 8 REPORT...

Nigel Welch was good at one thing: a football game played on one edge of the teacher’s desk in breaks on cold winter days.  The desk was shaped a bit like a rostrum, with a raised middle section and two lower side surfaces, one of which we played on. We flicked a halfpenny piece to knock a sixpence through two ‘goalposts’, or marks on the ends of the ageing, rectangular wooden surface.  He was good. I had many close games against him.

I reckon I was distracted from my work somewhat in the third year by such intellectual but unsporting freaks as Peter Allcock and ‘Sam’ Davis; yes, he had reappeared in my life as a friend!  He was nicknamed simply ‘Davis’, he was bespectacled and he flaunted lots of fair, wild hair but looked nothing like Sammy Davis Junior. Big John Thierry (part-French) had already taken a group of us to the cinema to see ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ for his birthday celebration but sadly it didn’t win him many friends.  

ME WITH PETE ALLCOCK & SAM...

John Higgins, a football fan became a good pal for me and we travelled to West Bromwich Albion, Walsall and Shrewsbury to watch games together. I went to his house in Handsworth Wood after school a few times and attended games in my school uniform, arriving home very late. 

He later lived in Marazion, Cornwall during his working life but he now resides in the Telford area. I still see him, for he is a non-league football ‘groundhopper’, who travels the world too, just to watch football…

The highlight of my third year however, was the summer term, spent away from home, boarding at Longdon Hall. Between Lichfield and Rugeley, Longdon Hall was situated in a quiet village and was the residence of our school’s headmaster, Mr Brandon.  

MY DAD'S RECEIPT FOR PAYMENT, ALLOWING ME TO GO TO LONGDON HALL...

Each term, Year 9 pupils were given the opportunity to stay there, living in dormitories and mixing household chores, farm-work and school lessons. 3A’s turn came in the summer term but unfortunately, being in the cricket team S. P. Smith and I had to  take buses back to Brum for matches on Saturdays. This was a real pain. 

In fact, we were once admonished when the team photograph was to be taken back at school one day because our ‘whites’ carried green stains, especially mine, as a diving wicketkeeper. Out at Longdon of course, we had been unable to clean our trousers and we were in no position to look pristine for team photos. The teachers failed to accept our explanation… 

Each day a teacher came out to work with us, we spent an hour or so on our homework and then we tackled our chores. The inimitable Harry Tyson came out to teach mathematics. Well, he sat back and we worked examples, threatening, “There’s going to be an investigation…" Joy…

There was no getting away from his note-sheets, northern threats and investigations. About twenty-five of us spent that summer term at Longdon in three rooms of seven and one room of four. My dad had saved money carefully for over two years to send me there and I suppose he and mum must have gone without  things so that I was able to board at Longdon and be part of the King Edwards scheme of things. It was the right thing to do for him. He was so proud of me apparently but only when he referred to me, out of my earshot…

So, in the next article, Longdon Hall will be discussed…