Figure 1.--Here I am after school, about 1969 about a year before I moved on to my grammar (secondary) school. I was about 10 years old. I'm holding an ice cream that I had just finished. |
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My older brother and I attended the same primary school. It was a traditional Church of England school in West London. I started there in September 1964. We had a strict uniform: cap, blazer, shirt and
tie, shorts (grey), gartered socks with green rings around the tops, black shoes even from the earliest years (age 5). Caps must have died out--I only remember having one when I first started at the school). We
wore grey shirts most of the time but white was allowed too and as my older brother always chose (from when I was aware of it) to wear a white shirt I always insisted on wearing a grey one--just to be different! I also remember objecting to wearing his "hand me down" shorts as at that time (I was about 9). They were too "baggy" in comparison with my friends'. I learned tom always wore by socks fully pulled up and with garters. It was big trouble at school to have your socks down, the only worse offence regarding clothing I can recall is having your hands in your pockets. One incident I do recall was when we had a trainee teacher for P.E. in primary school.
The photo here was taken after school outside a block of flats (figure 1). I am holding an ice-cream. I remember being annoyed that I had to come and pose for that photo as I was in the middle of eating it. In the full photo if you look carefully you can see my brother in his white shirt in the reflection - or part of him. [HBC has cropped the image so this is not possible.] I had refused to have my picture taken with him! You can tell it is after school because I have taken my tie off. This wasn't allowed at school. Another rule, ice-cream, or sweets of any kind, were not allowed in school. The picture was taken after school by a visiting relative and I hadn't changed out of my school clothes--just taken my tie and blazer off which I always did in the Summer as soon as I was far enough away from school and safe to do so.
My older brother and I attended the same primary school. It was a traditional Church of England school in West London. I started there as a little nipper in September 1964.
We had a strict uniform: cap, blazer, shirt and
tie, shorts (grey), gartered socks with green rings around the tops, black shoes even from the earliest years (age 5). Caps must have died out--I only remember having one when I first started at the school). HBC note: It is interesting that some state schools had elaborate unifoms with blazers and not just private schools.] We wore grey shirts most of the time but white was allowed too and as my older brother always chose (from when I was aware of it) to wear a white shirt I always insisted on wearing a grey one--just to be different! I also remember objecting to wearing his "hand me down" shorts as at that time (I was about 9). They were too "baggy" in comparison with my friends'. The school didn't allow corduroy shorts. At least I think that was the case – I never saw any boy
wearing them. Some wore thicker type shorts in the Winter and lighter grey cotton ones in Summer but never cords. Some schools might have – but I never saw them in London. I've noted on HBC that some boys word cord shorts as part of their uniform. I think this was mostly private preparatory schools.
We always seemed to have trouble getting off to school in the morning. No wonder it took us so long to get ready to go out in the mornings! None of us ever wanted to wear the clothes
we had but what one of our brothers was wearing! That day I wanted blue sandals and short socks like my little brother and he wanted to wear a school uniform like us "big boys". By the way - short socks were never allowed at my primary school even when we were allowed to wear sandals (brown ! ) in the Summer we still had to wear
long socks and keep them pulled up but the girls could wear short socks in the Summer. One outfit I recall in particular bmum used to dress my little broither in was a pair of strap (suspender) shorts.
One of the first things I remember being told when I started my primary school was that you were not allowed to wear your cap indoors. We each had our own peg in the "cloakroom" where you would hang up your overcoat and cap before proceeding to the classrooms. I recall that these pegs had two hooks. One to hang your coat on and a larger one above it for t! he cap. The junior school cloakrooms had similar hooks, but by the time I went there you no longer had to wear caps.
The school had a cafeteria where we had our dinner (lunch). We all brought our money on Monday. We boys had pockets, the girls were less advantaged--no pockets in their dresses. So many carried little purses. The weekly cost was six shillings! My Mum always wrapped ours up in a hankercheif - two half-crowns and a shilling - and then made us tuck it into the inside pocket of our blazers. That usually worked fine. I vividly recall, however, that once it didn't. I lost mine once after playing on the way to school and when the school secretary came to collect the money I panicked and was inconsolable. My teacher made me turn out all of my pockets and my satchell too but I knew that the money had been in my blazer. I thought that I wouldn't be able to have dinner for a week - and I daredn't tell my Mum as six shillings seemed a fortune then.
You also had to change out of welligton boots for your normal shoes in the Winter in these cloakrooms. That's why I always hated wearing wellingtons. My mum made us if it had been snowing to keep our feet dry and because she was the one who had to pay for new shoes. I disliked it primarily because it meant I had to carry my school shoes in to school in a seperate bag as well as my satchell. And if it was a P.E. day as well and I had to take in my plimpsoles as well. I had to deal with three sets of footwear with me! I still remember the hassles with mum over those wellingtons. They were hard to get off (especially if your hands were cold) and you normally ended up pulling your socks off with them too! [HBC note: An american reader in the late 1940s remembers a similar exxperience with galoshes.] Now kids wear trainers all the time - but technology has improved the ability of clothes to cope with the weather so I suppose that's what affects fashion too.
Thought I'd give you my experiences on this subject. I've already explained to HBC (in talking about Germany) how I loved my sandals as a kid
and wore them for as long as my mum would let me – well into the Autumn. Most kids in contrast couldn't wait to get back into “proper shoes”. There was no school rules on when sandals could be worn--it was just when mum's decided and most kids did at my primary school in the Summer. We boys still had to wear our long socks with sandals for school even though girls could wear short
socks. I preferred this for some reason. I hated it when my mum made me wear short socks out of school.
I could write about what and was not considered o.k. to wear to my primary school in the winter and will seperately if you want. This too changed during my time at the school. I learned tom always wore by socks fully pulled up and with garters. It was big trouble at school to have your socks down, the only worse offence regarding clothing I can recall is having your hands in your pockets - one teacher threatened that the next time she saw a boy with his hands in his pockets she'd get the girls to sew them up (the girls did "needlework" when we were doing "technical drawing" with the headteacher). I think it must have been a pretty general thing at the time. Like I said one of the first things I remember from school was being told that boys couldn't wear caps indoors then boys being constantly told to pull their socks up and take their hands out of their pockets. This last wasn't just in school because I remember other adults telling me off for having hands in pockets because it looked "slovenly". I remember asking an Aunt of mine why once and her telling me that if you tripped on the pavement you would fall flat on your face--but I think she was joking.
Winter always seemed to start for me around bonfire night – November 5th.It was around the time the clocks went back to and with the darker nights the cold weather seemed to come on.Clothes came into this too as kids would beg their mum's for old clothes to stuff with newspaper to make the guy – which we could then use to make a bit of money to buy fireworks.We never had any old
men's clothes to stuff – but I used to help my mates make theirs and we'd share out the money.It was also a few days after my birthday so I may have got some new clothes for that.There's a few clothes of mine that I would have liked to chuck on the bonfire – but I've told you about that.I also told you about the time I burnt my socks around bonfire night so you had to be careful – if we went round to a mates who were having a bonfire mum always made us wear our oldest clothes in case of accidents like that.
When my older brother left the school I came into my own in the "top class". He went off to the local grammar school and so
I wouldn't feel left out when he got his new uniform I also got new clothes--my own grey jumper and new shorts all of my own - he got long trousers but it didn't
bother me then I was just pleased to have clothes to call my own for school. We wore more or less what we liked after school let out in the afternoon. We played
out of what was available--playing mostly football after school. We often played in our uniforms--ties, blazers and jumpers discarded. The latter being used to form
the goals
I remember "Beacon Readers" from primary school. They were graded reading books for different ages. Our school did have a library - but the books in there were mostly for the older children - the "top class". But we also had "class libaries" which were really just racks with a few books on them. There were also whole sets of books in the cupboard which we read as a class. We took turns in reading aloud to the teacher which could be a trial for some! I remember aq title from one of the HBC pages--"Careful Hans" and did read it and re-read it. We were allowed to choose a book when we couldn't go out to play because of the weather. I remember the book as being soft covered and well-thumbed with large print and illustrations - it must have been in the school for years! I remember Hans helping his grandmother make cheese or something - and something went wrong - maybe he was being too careful! Anyway - I had forgotten that up until I saw the HBC page. When I moved up to another class this book was no longer available to me.
One incident I do recall was when we had a trainee teacher for P.E. in primary school. We did not have a gym and did P.E. in the main school hall. She made us boys take off our shirts and shorts. We normally just took off our shoes, socks. and ties. There was no P.E. kit except for rubber soled plimpsoles if we were going outside. I remember from then on trying to avoid wearing a pair of the old-fashioned white briefs that my grandmother used to buy us in case it happened again--which it didn't. I recall that it was the first time as a boy that I'd really been aware of underwear as far as school was concerned. We just wore what Mum put out for us without any real thought on the matter.
The other time we got out of the classroom was for “Music and Movement” which was broadcast on the radio by the BBC. This involved moving to music as instucted by the broadcaster – always a woman with a typical BBC plummy accent that,as I got older, I found patronising – but then the broadcasts were aimed at all ages. One scenario I remember was that you'd start off being an
“acorn” all hunched up as small as possible on the floor and then gradually “grow” into a “big tall oak tree” standing on tiptoe and stretching out your arms as instructed by the plummy voice and the tinkling piano music.
I remember a bit about my school rules when we went out of school on trips. We went on quite a few trips in my last year at the school – mainly educational and involving follow-up projects. Some involved getting a coach – not a private one but an I.L.E.A. (Inner London Educational Authority) one – they had a fleet and they were dead slow. We went to Hatfield House (a Jacobean Palace to the North of London) and to Berkhampstead Castle – a Norman castle. Otherwise we went to the London museums and for these we took the tube.Once we went by boat to Greenwich which was great – except that we shared the trip with two other schools and on the way back we got into some fights and our teacher made us sit below deck for the whole journey back.
I did well on my 11+ exam and had been accepted at a grammar school. An English grammar school is different than an American grammar school. In America, a grammar school means an elementary or primary school. In England a grammar school is an secondary school with an acadenically oriented program, A test was given to 11 year ols in primary school. Only those who did well were able to attend a grammar school. The others went to secondary moderns. At the time, educational authorities were just beginning to introduce comprehensive schools.
My brother and I went to the same primary school which had a strict uniform. After we moved, my mother enrolled our little brothervinto a primary school without any uniform at all. He wound up wear jeans or jean shorts quite commonly to school. Quite different to our experience. I think my mum was less strict with him - she realised us older two had survived o.k. It's also a reflection of changing attitudes anyway concerning clothing. The only seasonal changes I remember him having arguments about was when mum made him wear shorts for school in the Spring. As I said we older boys had had no choice - shorts were the rule at primary school. After we moved he went to a non-uniform school so could wear jeans even in the Winter. Mum still made him wear jean shorts or other casual shorts to school from the Spring though, as I said, she thought sunshine was good for us.
A French reader writes, "It was interesting to read about Bill's school experiences and the school rules in England. I noticed the school rule about having your hands in your pockets. Also in France this was not permited and considered much worse if you had the both hands in your pockets! We could keep our hands inside our coat pockets, but not in one's pants pocket. This rule had to be observed in the secondary school. We couldn't imagine speaking to a teacher with hands in our pockets! Normaly to ask or to speak to a teacher we would keep our hands behind our backs."
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