Figure 1.-.

Some of our Australian reades have provided us information on their school experiences. These accounts provide interesing insights into Australian school uniforms and the school experience.

School sandals: The 1960s

I can remember wearing short grey pants with grey long sock when I was in grade 5 at that time I only had brown shoes. When Summer came all the other boys had sandals like the picture I have enclosed. My Mother ended up buying me a pair of Harrison Idaho T Bar sandals made by Clarks Shoes. At that time all the Boys wore brown sandals and the girls wore the same kind of sandal but in the colour Blue. I wore short pants like most of the other boys till I went to high school. Were I wore long pants grey shirt and tie short socks. I can still remember being the odd one out as my new high school uniform cost so much I had to keep wearing my T bar sandals to school As all the other boys were wearing black shoes. Only the girls were wearing the T Bar sandals in blue.

Tony: The 1960s

I wore a blazer, white shirt, tie, shorts and knee socks to secondary (Catholic) school due to both a uniform option, and the wishes of my parents. It was never an issue, and come to think of it, because quite a few kids at that school wore shorts, it never bothered me at all. (Safety in numbers I guess.) The wearing of shorts was not compulsory, but some parents had this 'attitude' and they purchased what they saw fit. The shorts were grey and went down about three quarters way to the knees, and they were not as baggy as some depicted in the pictures on the web. The local high school boys 'ribbed' us a bit, but this was due to the fact that we had to wear uniforms, not any particular component of that uniform. Caps were compulsory for the first three years, but we managed to lose them fairly often, and in 1969, the school relaxed the rule, and some time later the caps were discontinued. I, along with a few of my mates, up until we were in Form 5 (16 or 17 years old) wore the shorts and never really thought about them. We wore them all year round, and I, myself never really had discussions with parent about long pants. Looking back, I have no regrets about wearing shorts to school, you could not tear out the knees in them, and I still tend to wear shorts with long socks now, particularly in the warmer months.

Patrick: The 1960s-70s

I attended a catholic primary school from 1967-75. It was in the northern wheatbelt area. The actual school was in Port Pirie, South Australia. We had a light blue cotton shirt, grey vee neck jumper with the two colours of blue and yellow on the vee and lower sleeves, grey shorts in summer and usually long trousers in the winter climes. We had grey long socks with the same colours on the top tips. The next school I was perceived to go to was a catholic boys school called 'Salesian College'. I feared for the worst (no girls), a blazer (what the heck was a blazer), hightly polished shoes, short hair policy (oh no), blue tie, grey vee neck jumper, boring English schoolboy style dark grey poliester/cotton trousers. Shorts were worn only by grades 6 and 7 but occasionally 8 and 9ers did also. My school Saint Marks merged with the Salesians and became Saint Marks College which was co-ed). We wore the Salesian version of the 'new' uniforn.

Created: July 13, 2002
Last updated: July 15, 2002