Anyone go to the Gregg School in Broomhill 1952/1955?

[xenia 11]

Oh yes indeed!!!

 

Didnt she go to live in Hamburg?

[pjt 69 10]

Hi billhaley,nice to know your real name but i will not publish it on the open forum.I recognise all the names but i cannot put faces to them.I think i must have been a year behind you but i did play in goal against hull at the recreation ground god knows what year but i do remember saving a penalty.I was fairly tall for my age probably why they put me in goal.I found some old gregg photos at friends reunited and there is a photo of keats house 1957 and i am on the back row third from the left the photo is not very clear.

[pjt 69 10]

Been clearing the loft out and came across 1957 photo of the whole school and realised as imentioned in the previous thread that it was not me in the keats house photo but another name cropped up peter lancaster we both joined the R.A.F.together but i have not seen him for 40 years,I managed to trace his phone number in sheffield and we had quite a long conversation,he also played football for greggs.See the owls beat the blades to promotion

[billhaley 10]

Hi billhaley,nice to know your real name but i will not publish it on the open forum.I recognise all the names but i cannot put faces to them.I think i must have been a year behind you but i did play in goal against hull at the recreation ground god knows what year but i do remember saving a penalty.I was fairly tall for my age probably why they put me in goal.I found some old gregg photos at friends reunited and there is a photo of keats house 1957 and i am on the back row third from the left the photo is not very clear.

 

Hi pjt thanks for that as the police have been looking for me for years:D:D I have got the photos on the computer, and the whole '57 school one in traditional form which I am hoping to give to Annbee when she comes over. My memory for faces is bad too. Marvellous day at Hillsborough!!!

[billhaley 10]

Message for Harleyman.

I'm staying at the Rutland next month - will say hello to the old building for you - maybe I'll get to stay in my old classroom.

 

Do you remember which house you were in as there is a photo of Keats house '57 around as well?

[pjt 69 10]

Does anybody remember Barbara Hitchins and have seen her or been in contact with her

[Lensman 10]

I was at Greggs after failing my 11+ in 1956. The other week I had occasion to walk by the place, now much changed, with security gates &c, and wondered how on earth they managed to fit everyone into the school panorama photo I still have in my loft. The front garden there looks tiny now.

 

I well remember Rankin who often used to distribute empty tins of his "Four Square Green" tobacco tins to the class, with everyone clammering to get one. Rankin lived at Bubnell, Baslow, if I recall correctly.

Of the teachers there in my time, there was Fuchs, and also his wife, a tiny little woman who spoke with a thick Austrian accent and wore too much red lipstick. Mr Midgley was there too, and he was a very nice guy, although he tended to find it a bit difficult to control the art and PT classes.He also worked at Birkdale School. He was always a bit put on, I would guess. Along with him was Mr Barlow - can't recall his first name - who, like Mrs Wolstenholme, whom I recall was never far out of his company (!) smoked almost as much as Arnold. Mrs Anderson taught us geography and she was quite an attractive lady, from memory.

 

Of the pupils there in my time, I seem to remember the females more than the males (wonder why that is ). There was Mary Plummer who I briefly heard of on friends reunited site and now lives somewhere in the Home Counties; Jennifer Chadwick and Valerie Slater.Valerie was from Conisborough, and she had a wonderful figure. I met her by chance many years later, at a wedding reception at the White Rose Pub in Handsworth, and I asked her if she was married, to which she replied "No, still a batchelor girl". What a waste:love:

There was also Joan Swinscoe, mentioned elsewhere, who, despite being pretty good with her fists, I had a crush on. After getting her on her own one hot summers day in the front bay of the tram, as it headed towards Millhouses, I asked her to the Abbeydale cinema. I was crushed when told it was too hot for the pictures. End of story!

 

The chap I sat next to was called Howard Pease, a pretty good artist, such that, in boring lessions we would swap cartoon drawings under the desk amid muffled laughter. Howard lived at Thorpe Hesley.

 

The above-mentioned Mrs Wolstenholme had her son there at the school; always regarded as a bit of a mummy's boy or wimp, so it was decided to play a prank on him. I supplied a number of cascara laxative tablets and Chris Tym (Totley Rise and related to the butchers there) installed these into the poor lad's packed lunch. Sadly, we were rumbled before the food was consumed and lectured about the dangers of the lad being hospitalised, this, followed by six strokes of the cane in Arnold's Craven A smoke filled office, and followed by three days Saturday detention. My father was very amused by this but I suspect the law would have been called these days.

 

I later attended the school's dance - along with my girlfriend, later to become my wife - and this was held at the Locano, on London Road; it is now a supermarket I think. Here Rankin caused much muttering behind hands as he danced all night with Maxine Wragg, a prefect, many years his junior.It was probably the last school dance ever held.

 

The house captain of Keats house was one Richard Ellis and he regularly gravitated to the bombed out ruins of St Marks Church in company with Christine - whose surname I forget - for a bit of what we all imagined was some slap and tickle at lunchtimes.

 

Sports was usually held at the City Surveyors Ground (or 'Survivors' as many termed it) on Heeley Bank Road. From there Humphries used to take us cross country running up as far as Myrtle Springs and then down over the fields which are have long since been built over and where the trams now run.

 

Swimming was a treat, as this effectively meant half a day off. We went to the public baths at Broadfield Road by bus, a long trip from Newbould Lane and via Nether Edge. From the bus I always looked out for the big eye logo on the blue wall of Photofinishers, under which were the words 'photography for industry' and thought, yes, I would like to do that. After leaving Greggs in 1961 I got a job there, at a time when colour photography was just becoming widely available to the amateur; here I met my future wife and commenced my career in photography which has been my sole occupation for the last 50 years or more.

[robian 10]

Lensman - you are right about Rankin living at Baslow, somewhere on Eaton Hill I believe. The Austrian lady was in fact Mrs Humphrey, she taught geography as I recall. I don't ever remember seeing Mrs Fuchs at the school, although I left in '59.

 

Well remember Mr Barlow and Mrs Wostenholm being an item, they got married in '61. Maurice was his first name and he was quite well known to my late wife's family when they were at the Windsor Hotel in the late fifties. Tricky Dicky and the lady wife (though not legally) were regulars, with TD loudly announcing that he was there as the guest of the landlord and cadging free drinks all night. MB was always in attendance, sipping a shandy, waiting to drive them home at the end of the evening as by then they were both somewhat navigationally challenged. Once asked my wife why her father allowed TD to get away with it, she just smiled and said it probably had something to do with unpaid school fees as her two brothers were at Gregg at that time.

 

Thanks for mentioning Rankin with Maxine Wragg, confirming that memory wasn't playing me false and I had seen them together. As I remember, around mid '65 I was returning to work one lunchtime and spotted a red Mini parked beside the Bradford Woollen building at West Bar, with Rankin in the driving seat and Ms Wragg sitting next to him. I did wonder about their relationship.

[vicarry 10]

I particularly remember one character who was a teacher for a term (circa 1953) named Mr Green. He used to do a goose step type walk to and fro in front of the class and if any student asked to be excused for a potty call he'd yell out

"Yich! With speed"

The guy kept us in stitches but he'd turn mean if he caught anyone sniggering. He lasted only one term. I guess he was too much for even Dickie to keep on permanently.

 

My Bete Noir was a Mrs Thompson who taught algebra at which i was as thick as a brick.

She found that out and started to single me out for the treatment and I'd stand there looking like an idiot while the class sniggered. Then she started to make remarks about my strong Sheffield accent. This went on daily for about two weeks until I completely lost it. I was pretty big for my age and I yelled out "What the blankety blank do you expect me to talk like. I live here in Sheffield on Parson Cross not bleddy Nether Edge... and the next person who sniggers will get a fat lip at break time"

 

Shocked silence followed and a trip to Arnold's office. Five hefty ones with the cane on the old back side and a note to my dad.

 

When I told him the whole story he laughed his head off and said something like "serves the silly cow right"

 

That was the end of the treatment from Ms Thompson and as time went on I began to progress in the subject.

 

No teacher these days would single out a student for such ridicule.

Student- teacher psychology has come out of the dark ages.

 

I remember Mrs. Thompson but I had a different experience to yours re her teaching, I always thought that she was ok and a fair teacher. I think she was in Keats House (blue badge). Also, I think that I remember Mr. Green and I seem to remember he took us for commerce (I was in a RSA class). I seem to remember that he once told us that he won a competition for making up a sales slogan for Sharps toffee makers which was "Sharps the word for Toffee", I don't know if it was true or not. Do you remember a Mr. Powers an Irish english teacher and Mr. Mann the sports teacher. I was at the G/S when King George 6th died and tricky Dicky organised a school day trip down to London to watch the Kings funeral. First time I'd been to London and it's something I will never forget. I lived in Ecclesfield village which as you know was close on to Parsons Cross.

Edited January 26, 2013 by vicarry

[victormh 10]

Anyone remember a friend of mine from many years ago - Keith Crooks (or Crookes) lived at Wisewood, in the houses on the left before the crossroads when coming from Dykes Hall Road. Married their neighbours daughter Jean ??? in 1961/62. They had a daughter, Angela, born about 1962, maybe others over the years ???. After Greggs, Keith worked in the sales department of British Steel in the early 60's. He was tall, thin and wore spectacles at that time. He would have been at Greggs in the mid 50's. He will be about 73/74 years old now

 

Grey Eminence - Subang Jaya - Malaysia

[manxblades 10]

Anyone go to the Gregg School in Broomhill 1961/1963? I remember Mr Rankin, Mr Sutherland and many more. Mr Rankin (unknowingly) changed my life.

Edited February 1, 2013 by manxblades
Personal experience

[Hillpig 10]

My Uncle was Raymond Hillpig Smythe, who, despite what it says in wikipedia, was a student at Gregg. This was pre war, I realise its a long shot but does anyone remember him?