Stoneham remembered Kevin
Thanks for posting your Stoneham blog – you and I were contemporaries, I too went to Stoneham in 1963, from Norcot School in Tilehurst but left in October 1966 when my family moved away. The names you mention ring many bells, both staff and pupils and encouraged me to look out my old copies of the school magazine. Other names I recall include Beaumont, Bartlett and Burt, also Jenner and Jones. You are right about Paul Hodder, I played rugby with him and both he and Honey went on to be selected for England. As for Radley, he seemed to win everything and I have a picture of him leading the school athletics team with me two rows back. You mention a school trip to Europe. I think I was on the same trip and amongst the various photos I took I do have a couple of group pictures of various boys. Thanks again for reawakening memories from 60 years ago.
R.I.P Mike Saddend to hear the news about Mike. At Old Swinford 1975 to 1982. My last year was in Founders, I remember our study being on top floor right next to Mike's flat and him complaining about the cigarette smoke that used to seep into his bedroom. Fond memories a kind fair man who was taken far too soon. R.I.P Mike
I woz there I was there from Sept '62 until april '66. I was in 1C,2C,3C but because I was going to leave at Easter'66 I had to go into 4D to give someone else a chance. I remember most of the teachers you mention. Paul Hodder was a year below me, in the same class as my brother Don. Other teachers I remember was Mr Grinter P.E. Mr Archer aka Sturmey. (cycle gears) Mr Cooper History aka Hank because he wore glasses similar to Hank Marvin. He offered to teach me the clarinet after classes but all I wanted to do was play football. Fool! When I started school meals, I was put on the same table as Bingo and "fitzy" and became mates with them. They were a year older I was. Sadly Steve died in a cycling accident soon after leaving school. I only knew a couple of grammar boys. Steven Harvey who lived opposite me in Southcote Lane and Philip Baker. I really enjoyed reading your account of the school at that time. Excellent.
Frank Hello Kevin
Now living in Spain having just bought a hotel with my partner Jo its dia de todos los santos tomorrow and dia de los fieles difuntos on Tuesday and I was thinking about Neil amongst others whom I have 'lost' along the way.
Deciding to put Neil Skidmore into Google I discovered that there are many! I never realised it would be a common name. Amongst the strangers I found you blog from 2014.
I remember that 1990 night and the Bathams pub crawls very clearly. It was a fab night at Frank and Donna's England losing to Italy in the third and fourth place play off.
I'd known frank since we were 12 and I'll never forget coming back to school for o level results and he had a full beard - always way ahead of his time!. I remember going down to see him a couple of days after Donna died after 2 years surviving with Pancreatic Cancer and he seemed to be existing on merry down cider and cigarettes. He really was a supremely intelligent man and had planned his demise with great precision.
Anyway on that evening he was a charming to me as ever and played all the music he knew I'd love until finally he said to me. "right Ken you'd better go you've got people that need you" he was referring to my wife and two daughters. The implication was that now that Donna was dead there was no one that needed him. He was wrong of course.
His family asked me to speak at his funeral which I did, remembering a massively talented intelligent and practical man whom we knew as brother, friend husband, teacher, mathematician mechanic, solver of problems and merry down cider drinker.
On the brother front, I think that when Neil died, Fred inherited your albums. Fred and Jan still live in Stourbridge and Fred is carrying on the musical tradition and runs a music recording studio n ow as well as continuing to play with his amazing Hammond trio (Jimmy Smith, Jimmy McGriff, Groove Holmes etc . )
Pleased to hear you're still going Kevin.
Neil myself and Chris Burton our fenomenal flute player had all played music together since we met at Ingestre Hall aged about 18. I last man standing now as the fenomenon that was Chris died from COVID Complications in the early part of the Pandemic.
Frank was one of the best and I miss him so much, especially the New Years Eve phone calls.
I once called him from a jazz club in Madrid where the band were playing some of the coolest John Coltrane covers that you could shut your eyes and dream that it really was McCoy Tyner on the piano. I just played it to him over the phone with no comment.
A few months later he and Donna decided to go to the self same club only to find a band playing his nightmare that was trad!! very funny!!
All my best to you Kevin
Ken
Happy Days Again happy memories of my childhood in Reading. I attended St Michael’s Primary School in Tilehurst Having been a border line11+ attended E.P Collier School in Caversham. Oh Happy Days! Thanks Kevin for the memories
Bringing back memories Thank you for your blog. What memories you brought back to me!? Thank you. I remember the Cadena well, shopping with my mother in Broad Street, Baylis supermarket and of course Green Shield stamps. Just one point, I remember going to Jackson’s outfitters for school uniform (EP Collier school) but remember being fascinated by the manual cash system of wires across the shop where transactions were put into a capsule but whizzed across the ceiling in a pulley system rather than pneumatic- maybe my memory is fading lol. Oh that malty smell coming from Courage Brewery as I waited for the No22 bus to Horncastle!! Thanks again for the memories
Mr. Stebbing This article brought back memories of my 3 years at BISC. Mr. Stebbing was my eng language teacher all 3 years. What has stayed with me about him is how beautifully he gifted us the English language… he made it artistic and robust at the same time. And his handwriting was classy! I’m pretty sure he joined us for a few badminton sessions after school where I saw a different relaxed , jovial side of him.
All in all I’m in gratitude of him and only wish the best in his soul journey!
The findings from a recent research complement well with your observations: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-10/poorer-australians-four-times-more-likely-to-die-of-covid-19/100448564
London Road Thanks so much for this. I stumbled across your blog looking for information on the London Street bookshop. It sounds like you have well and truly shaken the dust of Reading off your feet!
Bob Wood had a lasting effect on my life. Hello Kevin,
I really enjoyed your piece on Bob Wood. I remember him vividly as my English teacher at Oldswinford (1963-70). It's a peculiar fact that I have remembered him more than any other teacher, for good reasons. He created in me a lifetime's excitement with books, and also with the physical act of writing with a fountain pen. His reading aloud of 'King Solomon's Mines' had me enthralled. I couldn't wait to get to class to hear the next chapter. His love of Keats became my love of Keats too. I adored 'Cider with Rosie'. His odd facial twitching in class was endlessly parodied by the students, of whom he seemed only incidentally aware. He and Peter Mansell have remained with me all through my adult life, and fed my intentions of becoming an artist and musician. Bob had the most beautiful italic handwriting and would annotate our essays at length in his large red gorgeous characters, very carefully and slowly rendered. I loved to watch him write. He had a variety of pens for this, each yielding a different result. Peter Mansell introduced me to classical music. He played his record collection during art classes, and as a career artist, I do the same, thanks to him. He was also an excellent watercolor artist and that also became my medium. I was pushed out of the arts and into the sciences early at school, but my real education was already in place. As an aside: My daughter is a professional writer and artist, and in a way, thanks to those two characters.
Neighbours 1981 to 1983 Hello Kevin, we were neighbours to your mum from February 1981 to November 1983, having bought number 34 from the the son of Mrs Wiggins after she had passed away. We paid £17,250 for it and it was a stretch for us to obtain a mortgage for it.
Our house was a mirror image of yours, and when we moved in it was un-modernised- still having an outside toilet, and a small bathroom upstairs. Rather than build an extension to the rear to house a downstairs bathroom, we removed the dividing wall between the rooms above the kitchen and installed a full bathroom there, so we had just two bedrooms. We then knocked the outside loo into the kitchen, bricked up the door and installed a window in the end wall looking out into the garden- I say garden, but initially it would have looked out into the ramshackle lean-to shed that had been built up close up against your mum's bathroom wall. When we removed this shed, it exposed the wall of your mum's bathroom which was not in the best shape. We wondered if it had been built when the shed was already there as it had not been pointed properly on our side. We spoke to your mum about this, and our builder rendered it for her.
When we moved in there was a structure at the end of the garden made out of curved corrugated iron sheets that was being used as another shed. We wondered whether this had been an Anderson shelter. Anyway we cut that up and replaced it with a wooden shed. We can only remember there being one apple tree in our garden when we moved in and it produced a poor crop of not particularly nice apples, so we removed that too.
Your mum was very friendly to us from the start, and gave us her old washing machine when she upgraded to an automatic one. It was a hot tub with an agitator and used to jump across the kitchen floor when in use, and had an electric powered mangle on the top. It was a great boon to us at the time as it saved us going to the launderette at the bottom of the road.
We well remember your cat Monty as having a very powerful stare- when we first moved in he scared the life out of us when we opened the curtains to the rear sitting room to find him sitting on the window sill.
On the other side of your mum's house at the time we lived there was John Wyeth's motorcycle repair shop. He was a friendly guy and would give me advice and help with the various old bangers I drove when they refused to start. At weekends there would often be large number of bikers hanging around outside his premises, but they never bothered us.
We have fond memories of the first house we bought together in Hatherley Rd and my wife Tracy shed a few tears the day we left. Thank you for your interesting account of your early life "next door"
All the best
Paul
Thanks for message! I really enjoyed reading about your time in No. 34. I was living in Stourbridge in those days, returning during the school holidays (I was a teacher) to visit my mum. John Wyeth sold his workshop 3 years ago. All the best!
Old Swinford Blues ! You were my block master , Founders I think you also used to dole out our pocket money 25p a week ! Keep safe Mr Mulqueen you were ace ! 👍loved the poem …but not quite Hardy
OSH ... I remember u well, Marcus! Thank u for your kind words. Have u heard me recite my blues on Youtube?
I am 69 now and semi-retired in Vietnam, which is having its worst time with Covid.
All the best, mate ...
I was a student Thank you for this write up of Mr. Stebbing. It occurred to me that I might find something about him on the internet. I was a student for part of a year at BISC and remember his dramatic retelling of the story of Gilgamesh and of Alexander's journey to Siwa to this day. It was really gripping stuff and I always imagined he was really a drama teacher. He didn't think much of my written efforts but I really did appreciate his classes! They say you never forget a good teacher - and it is true!
Fascinating journey When I look back at my education at International schools, I feel that the teachers at International school brought their own curiosity to their students; their open-mindedness to experience different cultures to their students. In essence, the teachers were the perfect students of life - exploring, growing and expanding their perspectives. After reading about your journey, I believe that my education at BISC was a game-changer for me because of teachers like you and your journey. I felt I was taught how to keep growing, how to keep expanding horizons and never settle for one narrative as the universal truth. I do believe my education was richer because of the experience and this zest for vibrant cultures that you and your colleagues brought to our class.
Thank u, Shradda! Shradda, let's keep in touch. I am interested to hear what your son thinks of the short stories I have sent him.
BTW, Cairo was also a 'game-changer' for me, and my next job, In Dar es Salaam, was too!
Soft rain Thank you for publishing this. It seems to me that most of the insightful SF stories have been lost and replaced by Star Wars-like fantasy. My favourite novel, which I read in the '60s was "Flowers for Algernon". I didn't often cry when I finished a story but I did with this one. It changed my attitude to people with disabilities. I had a cousin who was a Downs person who I couldn't relate to until I read this book. I believed it changed my life.
It was through Derek Hepworth that I met Ken when he was about to move to a static park home. He was very good company indeed. And certainly a great character.
Derek came into my life in Leicestershire and later I stayed with him below the Castle on the outskirts of Prestiegne. Had lovely walks. I would love to get in touch with Derek again if this is possible. I am in Northamptonshire and able to drive. I am slightly over 35!! Aren't we all.
Best wishes to you. and keep safe.
I've been teaching English for 48 years - in England, Egypt, Tanzania, Argentina, Venezuela, Ghana and now Vietnam. At 70, I'm still going strong and have no wish to retire. I enjoy my job, which gives me plenty of time to relax and travel. In toto, I've visited 68 countries. I'm married to a Vietnamese woman and have been living in Ho Chi Minh City since 2001.
Outside of work I am a chess fanatic (Tanzanian National Champion in 1991), devotee of blues and jazz music, imbiber of fine malt whiskies (especially from Islay), bibliophile (Shakespeare, Thomas Hardy, Brian Moore, Philip Larkin, Di... full info
Nigel Balchin
non-member comment
Stoneham remembered
Kevin Thanks for posting your Stoneham blog – you and I were contemporaries, I too went to Stoneham in 1963, from Norcot School in Tilehurst but left in October 1966 when my family moved away. The names you mention ring many bells, both staff and pupils and encouraged me to look out my old copies of the school magazine. Other names I recall include Beaumont, Bartlett and Burt, also Jenner and Jones. You are right about Paul Hodder, I played rugby with him and both he and Honey went on to be selected for England. As for Radley, he seemed to win everything and I have a picture of him leading the school athletics team with me two rows back. You mention a school trip to Europe. I think I was on the same trip and amongst the various photos I took I do have a couple of group pictures of various boys. Thanks again for reawakening memories from 60 years ago.