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Post by conradcopy on Dec 16, 2009 0:00:19 GMT
Conrad Sutcliffe here – now we are talking serious memory lane stuff. Here are some disconnected jottings based on the postings I have read this evening.
I was there the day the piano prank was played. It was speech day and the formidable Vera Frazer-James (county councillor and chairwoman of the school governors) was on the stage with ‘Crunch’, Stan Locker, Genial George Joslin, ‘Bubbles’ Allen, Don Roberts and all the rest of them in their gowns and college scarfs.
Does anyone remember the for sale sign prank. Someone shinned up the drainpipe leading to the bell tower above the lecture theatre and stuck a Waycott’s board on the old bell tower,
Steve Henley always claimed he had trials for Leicester City as a goalie. Like me he went over to the dark side (rugby union) as did his brother. Was he called Chris? Steve was a half-decent cricketer who played for Babbacombe.
Hoppy – John Burman Hopwood to be precise – was still alive a couple of years ago and living in Polsham Park, Paignton.
Who can forget Bill and George the lunchtime dinner supervisors? Who remembers them ordering entire tables out? “Tables one, four and 21 get out the lot of you!”
As for Alan Wills… a man who, and I will try to be delicate here, singed the hairs around his nether parts more than once attempting to set his fharts on fire. He came out of the Navy after about 12 years as a PO or CPO and opened a piano shop in Paignton (honest).
Dave Cutts I am still in touch with from time to time, He runs his own computer shop in Totnes and has a fearsome thirst. Cuttsie is still in touch with Alan Wills.
John Fitzgerald Letherington Stokes. A gentle man who I will always remember with affection.
I never got into volley, but preferred football in the yard between the sixth-form block and the Wendy House, at least I did before taking up smoking and disappearing behind the huts in Oakwell Road for a cigarette during breaks in lessons.
As for Tracey Cass having a porn mag, surely some mistake? That would have been O’Halloran, or that randy little sod Phil Percy. Does anyone remember the lads from Audley Park coming down one lunchtime for a scrap behind the ATC hut because Percy had been showing an interest in one of the girls up there? I went to primary school with him.
I do get into the school quite often and always pass the 1973 school photo just to make sure I am on it. Delighted to see there is a copy of it on the running web page. I am one of those at the front. The lad on my left in glasses is Brian Haslam (I think) and I suspect a lad called Vince McNulty is on my right, We are sitting two rows in front of teachers Mr Hallett and Mr Thorpe.
I am guessing that Andygulls is Andy Loosemore? Am I right? Saw on a previous posting mention of various old teachers, Geoff Coon (he of the wooden stick for hitting kids over the head with) is alive and living in Ashburton.
Mr Bunce I saw at a funeral recently, passing the cake round at the reception afterwards. Don Roberts is still going strong and booming down the telephone every time I talk to him.
Looking at Jon’s post from Oct 17 I think he is slightly off course with a couple of his memories. There are some good joggers in there though.
The gym slipper user was a maths teacher called Kerswell who was given a free transfer to Tweenaway in our second or third year. Hoppy didn’t teach history but RE.
Taffy Cannings, who died not that long ago, was a dyed in the wool football man. I think people assumed he was a rugby coach because of the Welsh accent. It turned out he used to be a bus driver before the war. He was passed unfit for military service and went through some war-time training scheme to train teachers in a hurry.
Moving on. Tommy Hood – a legend! He named his son Robin. Enough said.
Pikey was a member of the flat earth society, but denies it now when mentioned.
It all seems a long time ago now. For most of us we started there 37 years ago. I don’t know about you lot but I hardly ever see anyone from the year we must all have been in. There were 150 of us (give or take); a couple have died, Kev Morris for one and someone told me Keith Dobney (I have never seen any evidence) so there should be 148 or so still extant.
Mark Whitehall went on to become something big in the legal profession, Iuean Cooper is a very serious policeman (Special Branch, I think), Roger Miles Metcalfe was last seen behind a bank counter about 25 years ago and Mark Treais has had an ‘interesting’ life which has ended up with him being Paignton Rugby Club’s physio.
I see Colin Shorthouse’s photo in the paper every now and again. That’s it.
I still have my sixth-form tie and scarf. How sad is that? Sadly the Spragge tie has long gone.
We should organise a reunion to mark all of us reaching 50 in the near future. I know a bloke at the Herald Express who would give us some publicity. I can be contacted via conradcopy@btinternet.com
Conrad Sutcliffe (1A 1972).
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Post by Deleted on Dec 16, 2009 10:15:19 GMT
Good to see Conrad contributing to this thread. He would have been a scroat in the first and second years when I was in the sixth form (and, even then, still slightly older than the now venerable Jimmy Parker). He doesn’t know me but years later, through Dave Street (a TUFC volunteer who I knew from school), I heard mention of a character called “Conrad” who was often seen to be lurking in the shadows and dark passageways of Plainmoor. Now, after all that time, I suspect it’s the very individual who supplies such wonderfully jaunty cricket copy to the local press and media (in the vein of “as Mann breezed to another peerless half-century”).
Leaving aside the unfortunate “darkside” business – catch Conrad’s Devon rugby notes in the Sunday Janner each week – I must say that Devon cricket is incredibly fortunate to have such a dedicated publicist and reporter in the shape of Conrad Sutcliffe. Furthermore, I would like to think his finely-honed prose is testimony to a fine education provided by the likes of Stan Locker.
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Post by capitalgull on Dec 16, 2009 10:37:17 GMT
I see from the Herald Express there is sad news from the TBGS football team that won the U19 National Cup in 1984 with the death of captain Mark Gennard at the age of only 42. Very sad news indeed. I remember him being one of the sixth formers when I was a newbie at TBGS and I was in the same year (and plenty of same classes) as his brother Richard, who was also a very talented footballer/all round sportsman. www.thisissouthdevon.co.uk/news/Footballer-Mark-kind-hearted-man/article-1612049-detail/article.html |
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Post by jmgull on Dec 16, 2009 15:10:27 GMT
Now, after all that time, I suspect it’s the very individual who supplies such wonderfully jaunty cricket copy to the local press and media (in the vein of “as Mann breezed to another peerless half-century”). I must say that Devon cricket is incredibly fortunate to have such a dedicated publicist and reporter in the shape of Conrad Sutcliffe. ...Thanks Barty, you're too kind - afraid to say half centuries are all too rare these days.....and i did once hit a breezy peerless one against Ivybridge in about 1986 ;D Conrad's love for Cricket certainly comes out in his writing, you are right that Conrad manages to get an awful lot of space for his coverage from the local rags. Apart from that he also works hard behind the scenes for his club South Devon and for some of the competitions such as the historic Brockman Cup etc. His famous pre season predictions are however normally useless! He once tipped us for relegation and we ended up winning the title  |
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Post by Mr_W on Dec 16, 2009 23:43:18 GMT
...great to hear from you Conrad on this thread!! - Chris Donovan of 1C (1972) here!....... .....I certainly remember you as well from the early years of TBGS anyway - sure I recall you being on our dinner-table - along with Alastair Duncan, Anthony Bennett, Alan Wills and some others also......altogether now tables 6, 7 and 8 Arrrrrtttt!!!......... .....re: your slip over to t'dark side of rugger/cricket - I certainly also remember you playing in goal down on the lower pitch by Queensway RC Primary up at Shiphay one VERY muddy afternoon and having a fantakkers game - ring any bells?  ... ...anyway - wouldn't it be fab if we could organise some form of reunion - Das Schnitz to play of course - reckon crispygull (Chris Pascoe) would be up for that as well for sure!!!!!!....... .........oh, re Hoppy and his teaching RE/History etc, well all I know is that in the first year only when we were in 1C in 1972 he deffo took us for History over in his music room - and he certainly employed "Old Hoppy" the gym slipper to make up errant boys marks under 5/10 in the tests to the necessary 5 mark to pass!!!!.......never did us any harm!....maybe he was some form of stand-in that year or something? ....... .......and as for his singing lessons..... .....Taffa teffe, taffa teffe....... ..In An English Country Garden....on a bats back I will fly etc.... .........and summat about Noah and his Ark - gonna make it rain and rain and rain and rain etc? ? - 40 days of nights of rain gonna wash those sinners down the drain or something - any ideas anyone??.......... cheers all Chris Donovan Gosport Hampshire (1C - 1972) |
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Post by midlandstufc on Dec 17, 2009 17:45:48 GMT
I see from the Herald Express there is sad news from the TBGS football team that won the U19 National Cup in 1984 with the death of captain Mark Gennard at the age of only 42. Very sad news indeed. I remember him being one of the sixth formers when I was a newbie at TBGS and I was in the same year (and plenty of same classes) as his brother Richard, who was also a very talented footballer/all round sportsman. www.thisissouthdevon.co.uk/news/Footballer-Mark-kind-hearted-man/article-1612049-detail/article.htmlMy ma rang me up to tell me the news. I was two years below him and played football with the other brother Anthony. Mark was a big lad for his age and (I think) captained the England youth side at some point. Strange how things turn out - you would have thought he would have gone on to pro football but that's not how things went for many TBGS lads. There were two other lads who represented England at youth in his year - think Dave Penney was one, can't remember the other. The school turned out to see them winning the U19 title but I remember the trip up to Liverpool against their Grammar School in the semis the most. Long time ago now - can't believe how much of those a decade older than me on here remember! Conrad mentioned Bunce and Roberts earlier - crickey the memories flood back when you've got the names. |
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Post by aussie on Dec 17, 2009 18:09:39 GMT
I see from the Herald Express there is sad news from the TBGS football team that won the U19 National Cup in 1984 with the death of captain Mark Gennard at the age of only 42. Very sad news indeed. I remember him being one of the sixth formers when I was a newbie at TBGS and I was in the same year (and plenty of same classes) as his brother Richard, who was also a very talented footballer/all round sportsman. www.thisissouthdevon.co.uk/news/Footballer-Mark-kind-hearted-man/article-1612049-detail/article.htmlMy ma rang me up to tell me the news. I was two years below him and played football with the other brother Anthony. Mark was a big lad for his age and (I think) captained the England youth side at some point. Strange how things turn out - you would have thought he would have gone on to pro football but that's not how things went for many TBGS lads. There were two other lads who represented England at youth in his year - think Dave Penney was one, can't remember the other. The school turned out to see them winning the U19 title but I remember the trip up to Liverpool against their Grammar School in the semis the most. Long time ago now - can't believe how much of those a decade older than me on here remember! Conrad mentioned Bunce and Roberts earlier - crickey the memories flood back when you've got the names. Lors and a couple of others have flown over to Alicante today for the funeral and to pay their respect to the man that everyone had something good to say about! I asked them to pass on our thoughts! Pages 1 and 3 of yesterdays Herald Express @thisissouthdevon.co.uk has a few words from people that matter! RIP Mark. |
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Post by stewart on Dec 17, 2009 23:48:40 GMT
I feel almost like an impostor after seeing and reading through this thread, as most of you seem to have been pupils in the 1970s, whereas my own period of attendance at the Grammar School was 1957 to 1965.
I was particularly interested in the 1968 photograph and the comparison with the 1973 one in terms of which teachers from my own time were still there.
The headmaster during my time at the school was John Harmer, who was very much a Mr Chips type of teacher who retired in 1965 and left his final assembly in floods of tears. He was prone to outrageous malapropisms and other ludicrous statements, and a book produced by some pupil or other which contained all of these was in great demand at one time.
His favourite probably was: "If you haven't got any work to do, you had better get on and do it."
I saw John Hopwood at Paignton Parish Church a couple of years ago, and couldn't believe that he was still alive. He had induced me to be a choirboy there for a couple of years in the late 50s, and I was hoping that he would remember me, but he was clearly in an advanced stage of some illness, perhaps Alzheimers ?
Someone said in an earlier post that John Stokes was a true gentleman, or words to that effect, but I'm afraid I can't agree with that at all, in fact I found him to be something of a sadist. If he caught any boy talking in his gym lessons, he would hit him on the backside with a plimsoll or sometimes even a cricket bat.
When I told my gran about this, she came up to the school and confronted him, and told him that she would report him to the police if he continued this cruel behaviour. Plus ca change !!
Mr Allen (Ptollo) was definitely the most unhinged and unfathomable teacher in the school in that era. I found him to be a brilliant Latin teacher, but prone to ridiculous outbursts of utter nonsense. On the last day of each term, he would buy a new pair of shoes and charge down the corridor shouting: "Yippee, end of term." I see that he was still there in 1973 and wonder how on earth he kept his position for so long.
Finally, going back to the two photos, I note that John Bates and Geoff Gilham, among others including Briggs, Kneebone, Roper and Richardson, are no longer there in 1973, and I wonder if anyone knew those two and where they went afterwards ?
I also spotted George Joslin in the 1973 photograph sitting next to the headmaster, a place always previously occupied by Ned Kneebone (3rd in command) and wondered if this had any significance ? Despite his gruff manner, I always thought that our 'Hitler' had a heart of gold and his teaching methods of the French language were revolutionary and absolutely top class.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 18, 2009 21:17:53 GMT
Mark was a big lad for his age and (I think) captained the England youth side at some point. Strange how things turn out - you would have thought he would have gone on to pro football but that's not how things went for many TBGS lads. Sad news about Mark Gennard but it's difficult to comment on the potential of players who played for the England Schools U18 side because it was essentially a team for school sixth formers and those attending colleges which just happened to be affiliated to the ESFA. Because fewer people "stayed on" in those days - and some towns had abolished sixth forms in favour of colleges - the U18 side probably represented no more than 15% of the age group (and certainly not those who were apprentices or trainees with professional clubs). In that sense the typical player would have been an A level student with university or career intentions that ultimately put football a little in the background. This doesn't mean they weren't good enough to become professionals - as some did (including Leroy Rosenoir and Wes Saunders) - but most found an appropriate level of non-league football which fitted their career and study plans. For example, I knew a lad from Somerset who played for England Schools U18s in the 1990s and tried non-league football for a short while before a career with one of the big accountancy firms got in the way. Another, a goalkeeper from the late 1970s, was teaching in a local sixth form college around that time. Nonetheless good luck to those who played at that level. It must have been a great honour and a thrill and - with a number of internationals and national titles - TBGS certainly punched above its weight on the football field in those days. Mark Gennard did play for Exmouth Town for a while - when they had a good side - as the list of 1989/90 players below shows. It's from the programme for a game against Weymouth (in the FA Cup) in which he doesn't appear to have featured. Mind you, there's plenty of interest in the line-ups to show a few selected pages:    |
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Post by Jon on Dec 19, 2009 11:54:04 GMT
Sad news about Mark Gennard .... It's worth mentioning that Mark Gennard did actually make a first team appearance for TUFC- in a Plainmoor friendly against Burnley around the time that Webby took over. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 19, 2009 12:07:41 GMT
It's worth mentioning that Mark Gennard did actually make a first team appearance for TUFC- in a Plainmoor friendly against Burnley around the time that Webby took over. I'd forgotten how the grammar school successes of those days would have been in stark contrast to the gloom that had descended on Plainmoor. Signing professional for Torquay United might not have been an appealing career option to astute young men of that generation... |
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Post by midlandstufc on Dec 19, 2009 16:10:34 GMT
Seeing the team posted of Exmouth by Barton - and I may be wrong - Andy Rowland could have been the other England u-18 player of that team. I certainly don't have a good memory for names, however. Agood point made about the numbers of school players at that age and the different aspirations and career choices made depending on the outlook on life you had been given from the school you went to (family money helped most of them too also!  . |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 19, 2009 21:00:01 GMT
Seeing the team posted of Exmouth by Barton - and I may be wrong - Andy Rowland could have been the other England u-18 player of that team. Yes, that's right. Mark Gennard played for England Schools U18s in 1984 and 1985; Andy Rowland in 1984. I believe Andy Rowland then went to university before ending up playing for Exmouth. Then, aged twenty four, he signed for Southampton just a few weeks after that cup tie against Weymouth. Later, in March 1991, he signed for Torquay United - for a relatively sizeable fee if I remember correctly - and played around twenty first-team games (including coming on as sub in the Wembley victory over Blackpool). I always thought it was curious how he took such a circuitous route to eventually play for Torquay United. |
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Post by merse on Dec 19, 2009 22:03:00 GMT
 Andy Rowlands eh? Of whom the late great John Charles, who had forgotten more than Rowlands ever knew about jumping for headers; proclaimed from a press box once ..................."what is he, could it be six foot two? Yet when he jumps for a cross he might as well be two foot six"Playing for England Schools at Under 18? Any self respecting footballer who was professional material would have left school long before then.................you might as well as pick an England eleven from those left over from a pick up game in the park! 
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Post by Deleted on Dec 20, 2009 7:53:36 GMT
Stewart's memories from that slightly earlier era are most welcome. I arrived at the old institution a couple of years after he left and remember the average age of the teaching staff being rather on the high side (with many of the incumbents probably being in place since the end of the war). Doing the sums now, I imagine many of those characters would have been born between 1905 and 1920 meaning that some of the people who taught me may have started teaching in the 1920s. What a thought!
John Stokes, dare I suggest, may have been an example of "muscular Christianity" - but why was he called "Bumsy"? (he was, wasn't he?). It's hard to date him (and a few others) precisely: would they have been of the generation who started teaching before WW2? Or the post-war intake who had served during the war? (and perhaps slotted into teaching during the demob process?).
And, yes, Mr Allen - so brilliantly summed up by Stewart. What was his nickname all about? Stewart spells it "Ptollo" whilst I only heard it as "Tullo", something that was never explained in our era (and, alas, I was never a classical scholar who may have instantly understood the meaning). He didn't teach me - although I remember him supervising lessons - so I was only witness to relatively small outbursts of his insanity and certainly never saw him beat his chest and yell "I'm Tullo Man!" (as was rumoured).
As for the 1973 picture, I dimly recall Stan Locker being deputy to Crunch (as the head teacher Smith was known in the fashion of Smith's crisps) with George Joslin next in command. As for John Bates I can't remember much beyond his nickname "Master" (please, no explanations for that one).
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