firbeck

This site is getting more replies than I expected. I'll tell you about my first day, I have an excellent memory. I started as a four year old in September 1955. While being a bit shy and apprehensive, I had a couple of friends on my road, Park Crescent, they were Linda Tagg and Jennifer Horrocks, I also had an older brother, who left the year I started, for Mundella Grammar, but he had friends that I still knew who were up there. My mother took me up Plantation Road and I took my Dinky Toys Sunderland Flying Boat with me for comfort. We went into the main entrance and I had to be introdu

Well, I did start to reply to Caz last evening, but had to abandon it as my son wanted a lift to a Ska and Reggae gig at Witham, thats Witham in Essex, I was impressed, 14 year old Goths aren't supposed to like that sort of thing, but he thought it was COOL............. Firbeck School was opened in 1950, prior to that, the local kids were sent to a variety of schools, my brother went to the Russell School in Wollaton village, then was transferred over to Firbeck shortly after it opened. As was suggested, go on to the Friendsreunited website and look it up, it's free. There are some great pho

I'll start one if you if you like, but I doubt whether that many people on here actually went to Firbeck. When I started it only had 5 classrooms, 25 odd to a class I reckon, I bet there's no more than half a dozen people on here that had anything to do with the school.

Sorry, but as I understand it, politics are tied up with everything, memories or otherwise, the very existance of Balloon Wood Flats was down to misguided politics, I shall leave it at that. Caz, I was intrigued to see that you had Mr Lomas as headmaster at Firbeck, when did he leave then. I take your point about him, he was a bit of a funny old wrinkly, I was there when he started which must have been about 1960. The problem with him was that his attitude was inconsistant, he could be very pleasant one minute then a nasty piece of work the next, he never seemed to let his guard down, I neve

I know which ones you are talking about and it was none of them, I've been sitting here singing along to their little tunes. I shall have to do a bit of research and find out which one it was, quite frankly it was a narration by some bloke with a typical BBC voice, but who was damn good at making train sounds, he could do anything and make it sound convincing, though, many years on, it might sound appalling to our ears nowadays.

Thats brought back memories. When I was a youth, my first job was as a trainee at a local architects practice. Day one, get to know everyone, go round and visit the various sites. Day two, well you've had some surveying experience, St Mary's is having a new organ built in Scandinavia, go and survey the tower and transepts, full elevations, sections and plans. Gulp, did it, even turned the gargoyles into caricatures of the senior partners, much to their amusement. Plans duly sent off to Scandinavia, the organ, which I recall is cantilevered over the choir, fitted perfectly, though I crappe

There's nothing wrong with social housing, just the useless idiots who plan these places, consider who is going to live in them, and the lack of interest in running them afterwards. I used to live in an attractive but expensive village in Essex called Finchingfield. When I got divorced, we had to sell the family house and the place was too expensive to buy an affordable property in afterwards, I was forced to rent a scummy, rip off farm cottage outside the village. Eventually the great and good local authority saw the light and constructed some very attractive, joint ownership and council pr

Balloon Woods flats were a disaster, they were designed by some morons to be the national way to go, I believe that identical developments were carried out in Sheffield and Glasgow, possibly other cities, including Newcastle, too. The existing local residents hated them from the start, which was understandable, chucking up such concrete monstrosities on what we would now call brown field sites, yet in such a prominent position on the edge of the green belt was unforgiveable. Unfortunately, this local hatred of 'Legoland' as it was referred to, was passed on to the poor sods who had to live i

Billy Fury, the English Elvis, are you out of your minds. The bloke was manipulated right from the start, it was obvious he was ill when he started, you just had to look at his performances and see from his face that something was wrong, he was always death warmed up. I'm sure he was a lovely bloke and tried his best, but it was no comparison to what was happening at the time with regard to the emergence of the Beatles and truly original music that his manipulted, old fashioned crowd couldn't aspire to. Lovely guy but a no hoper in the scheme of things at the time, whether he had been born

There was a bridle way running from Trowell Road, opposite Copsons, along the back of Firbeck school and next to Balloon Woods, over the old railway bridge, which is still there, had a branch off right to 'Jacksons Farm' and it's little coal mine, another branch off left to 'The Kennels' then on to and over a stone hump backed canal bridge and ending up at a farm, which despite my research on old maps, it's name still defeats me. We used to call it the 'Black Path', for obvious reasons, it was surfaced from the detritus of the various coal pits down there, if you sniff around the back of Firb

It's interesting what you hear. Yes the Lanc had an engine problem earlier in the week, but I recieved information from one of the ground crew that it had been sorted and only the crosswinds grounded it, after all it was at DX when it had it's bad moments though it once slewed round sidewise while trying to land at North Weald back in the 90's. Have you ever been to Hendon, a great museum but understaffed. If you are going next year, make sure you get there early as some, important parts, are closed after 12:00. Personally, I'd spend the day at DX, there's so much to see and do, I can guaran

Wow, just found this thread, it brings back many memories. First of all, looking at the picture of the shops on Cockington Road, the shop with the blinds down used to be Cocko Chippie, it was a great fish and chip shop, our family ritual in the 50's and 60's was to visit the city on a saturday morning, buy cod from the fish market and while mother was cooking it, coated in flour, the old man and I would go to Cocko chip shop and buy a load of chips, they were so good that they couldn't be reproduced at home, it was impossible. Can you remember those amazing crusty pies that they sold, I can s

C'mon, c'mon, where was your secret place then. I have another, we used to walk along the canal from Wollaton, on arriving at Trowell we used to walk along the road to Cossall, cut across a field into a magic wood on the left hand side. I think we spotted it from the opposite bank of the canal. We think it was used for possibly open cast mining on a small scale, it was full of cuttings and strange crumbly rock faces, full of the most amazing wild flowers and ferns, in the spring the bluebells were awsome, I reckon it's still there. Kids were kids, we had our gang, we used to appreciate all

Beefsteak Congratulations on some good photographs, I'm pleased that one airshow went down fairly well. Down in darkest Essex the weather was pretty poor, strong crosswinds with heavy showers, which made me decide not to go to Duxford, with good reason too, many aircraft cancelled for safety reasons over both days which made the planned attractions, like the Lancaster flying with the Vulcan, the first time 2 Gladiators were to be in the air together since 1952, a ten spitfire tailchase, all no chance, though the Spits managed it on the sunday. You critisize the BBMF for not turning up, but

I think I know which place you are talking about, would it be Bramcote Hills. In the 60's the mansion was still there, the top floor was converted to flats for the park workers, the northern wing was abandoned and derelict. We used to walk up the lane from Balloon Woods to Moor Farm, go along the footpath towards the Hemlock Stone and run through the field into the wood. As you say, it was a wonderful undisturbed place, we loved it, we could sit for hours and just take it all in, no one was about. I gather that a large fire in the 50's destroyed many of the ancient trees and the folly tower

The National Lottery grant proposal suggested a massive artificial tree towering over the remnants of the forest, what a joke, imagine what that would have looked like, thank God someone had a bit of sense not to throw money at such a ridiculous scheme. I used to play in there when I was a kid in the 50's, it was a magical place, can it not be left as that and not be tweaked to suit the bloody tourists, I'm sure anyway, that they would prefer to wander down those lovely shady glades without having Disney rubbish thrown in their faces, why can't things be left as they are. Ok a bit more inform

What a wierd reply, I've read some of your comments before, I fail to see what you are talking about, again. OK, I haven't been there, so what, how encouraging is it to want to enter some modern fronted monstrosity, it's a bloody joke. Like it or not, Notty is all about Robin Hood, a legend, but true in peoples eyes and the city has more real history than that, I happen to know that if the powers that be pulled their so called strapped fingers out of their backsides, they could excavate key areas of Nottingham Castle and turn it into a medieaval paradise, it has REAL history in the form of

Sorry, that shows my lack of recent Notty knowledge. I have to admit that despite my admiration for it, I've never travelled on the tram system, well, my mum lives in Wollaton, my son, in Lenton while at Uni, and it doesn't have anything to do with those places, on the other hand, I've been on the Robin Hood Line for the hell of it, I dragged my son up to Annesley to try and find evidence of the former sheds and walked down to Newstead Abbey. My personal opinion is that the routes should have been from the north down Mansfield Road, to the East from Sneinton and beyond, Clifton, Wollaton and

When the Vic Centre was being originally designed, it was proposed to put in a linking tunnel within it so that future use could be made of the old GCR. No chance, it took up too much car parking space. The Weekday Cross Viaduct was retained for a while as a nature reserve, but that got in the way of the trams, so that went. The tram route is a bit strange anyway. A lot of money was put into re-opening the Robin Hood line, so when that's up and running, they run the trams in parallel from Bulwell, what was the point of that. Funny how even during the massive redevelopment of Birmingham, Snow

Drury Hill was one of those great delights of Nottingham, it was a gross act of sheer vandalism to destroy it in the 70's in order to build that vile concrete monstrosity called Broad Marsh. How the local authority scum bags called planners got away with it, is beyond me. Imagine destroying such a place in London, York, or, closer to home, Lincoln, is unbelievable, whoever was responsible should be contemplating their plans in Sherwood Prison. Nottingham is a very ancient and historic city with little to show for it, unless you know where to look. I can remember that lovely road called Maid

It was indeed, I remember now, surely someone on here can recall this epic band. When I left school I went to work at Butlins in Minehead as a kitchen skivvie, prior to bogging off to Uni. Had a great time there and made many friends. Once in the 70's, I went into the Imperial with my girlfriend and came across one of my old mates, one of the Minehead chefs, unbeleivable, he'd taken up a job working on the Vic centre, and had called in there for a pint. It's very strange bumping into someone you never thought you would ever see again, what were the chances of that happening, quite remote I

Can anyone remember a local band called 'Almost Grown'. They used to play regular weekend nights in a pub on St James Street, who's name escapes me, in the late 60's. They were pretty sensational, their music being sort of Cream/Hendrix orientated, the lead guitarist was something else. One night, for some reason, they announced their retirement. We went to their farewell concert the week after, which was pretty sensational, it terminated with lots of Pete Townsend guitar and amp smashing, an unforgettable evening, never to be forgotten, does anyone else recall this.

Can anyone remember the sound of the famous 'Tin Can' in Thurland Street tunnel. We used to go regularly trainspotting at Grantham, catching the train from Vic. Initially the trains were hauled by ex LNER V3 2-6-2 tanks, they had a hell of an accelaration and speed, I recall hanging on for grim life in that tatty old non corridor stock that they used to use. Later on the trains came through from Derby Friargate and were hauled by grimy LMS Moguls, then towards the end it was diesel railcars, though you had a good view at least. Sorry, I digress. In the middle of Thurland Street Tunnel was a

Does anyone remember big Maurice who used to patrol the Dive Bar under the Hearty Good Fellow. He reminded us of Jaws from the Bond films, his head used to almost touch the ceiling. When we went out on the town at the weekends in the late 60's early 70's we used to get off the bus at Maid Marion Way and the Dive Bar was always our first port of call. Maurice never said much to anyone, but we always said hello and he greeted us with his customary 'evenin' gents'. It could be a bit rough in there, one night we were sitting down having a pint, minding our own business, when some bloke, for no

I warn you, lets hope Skills are setting off early as I reckon it will be a massive attendance if the Vulcan is going to be there. Being small, DX gets very crowded, you will find it a bit of a pain trying to get round the restoration hangars in particular. My advice is for you to watch the flying from what us regulars call the Tank Bank, thats an elevated area of ground next to the Land Warfare Hall, you not only get good views of landings and take offs, but overflights as well, and tanks doing their stuff. Good luck, you'll need it.