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7 hours ago, Merthyr Imp said:

 Yes - down Gainsford Crescent, along Hucknall Road, through the marble arch (cue funny jokes about 200-mile runs), then was it back along Andover Road? (I've forgotten).

 

That was the usual cross-country route, but I remember on at least one occasion going down Hucknall Road, along Valley Road, then back to school via Edwards Lane and Arnold Road. I remember it particularly because we did it once with snow on the ground (maybe 1963) and the following day I'd lost my voice and had a couple of weeks off sick with what my mother described on my sick note as 'influenza with a bronchitis cough'.

 

 

Hope you got over the cough OK Merthyr!!

 

I dont think the cross country route included Marble Arch when I was at HP 1960-1965, though I suppose differing routes may have been used.  When they showed us the 'school film', one shot showed lads running past our house on Southglade Road, but just over the hedge on the field side.  We never ran that with school.

 

As I recall our route was:

 

Out of school via cycle path down to Arnold Rd.

Right along Arnold Rd then right again along Hucknall Rd, carrying on past 'Marble Arch' and Rigley's Wagon Works to the next arch under the railway. (Where Tesco is now) 

Along 'Lover's Lane' to a big tree where the path split.  One way went through a farm yard, the other skirted above and to the left.  We were supposed to take that one. 

A couple of Staff members would be up there pointing us to the right back over the ridge to another track which was roughly where 'The Ridgeway' is now. 

Back along there heading generally towards Rigley's again but turning left down a path past where Southglade Sports Centre now stands and out onto the bottom of Southglade Rd.

Up Padstow Road, down the other side and along Raymede Drive to Gainsford Crs.

Left up Gainsford for a few yards and into the school front entrance.

Round the bike sheds and Tennis courts and then onto the field.

 

That last bit is where a kid called Pete Whitehurst cheated me out of first place in rthe house cross country competition, by taking the shorter route along the back of the workshops and gym to come first.

 

I said nothing.  Except quietly to him later.  :aggressive:

 

Col

 

Edit.  Looking again at Cliff's pic above.  The 1955 pic of me and my late sister Pam which I think I've posted here a few times, was taken of us roughly halfway between the Andover shops and the bottom of Eardly Rd, which is just seen on the lower right of the pic.  We were on the side opposite the shops.

 

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The route I remember was down the cycle track, left along Arnold Road/Oxclose Lane as far as the Oxclose pub, then through the fields to Southglade Road? was this the steep hill? The best I could do was 7th, maybe in 1961.

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Hi Jim,

I guess the various memories show that different routes were used.

 

Maybe Merthyr's memory of a Valley Rd. route makes sense in the context of a snowy winter because I spent most of my time on those fields which became Top Valley etc., winter and summer.  In 1963 the snow was al least a foot deep on those fields for weeks on end with much deeper drifts in places.  I don't imagine many staff members would have volunteered to trudge out there in those conditions.

The steep hill you recall was possibly Padstow Rd which runs from the bottom of Southglade Rd and over to Raymede Drive.

 

Merthyr.  You just beat me to it.... ;)

 

If I knew how to make marks etc on photos or maps, I think I might be able to draw the route I recall.

 

Col

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I played Rugby a lot too.  I was rubbish at it but I did play for school once.  Against Bramcote Hills GS I think. I think I was quite 'athletic' for my age in first and second year, so I tended to be able to run about a lot and keep playing.  But it soon became apparent to all, me included, that I had absolutely no idea of tactics etc.

I ran cross country for school once.  A Saturday morning fixture against a school in Mansfield.  Possibly Mansfield Grammar.  Was that one of those King Henry VIII schools?  I didn't perform well at all and never understood why, because I was always running, but I was never picked again.

 

I don't recall how the cross country was organised.  We had Rugby in winter, Cricket in summer, swimming at least in the lower school, P.E. in the gym and then all the track and field stuff that counted towards the 'Standards' competition. 

 

I recall the house competition was organised by year.  I always finished in at least the first ten or so in my year.  Only thing I was any good at.

 

Col

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Jim,

I remember the competition. It's the 'standards' competition I referred to above.  But I have no recollection of the flags.  Isn't it odd how we all remember different things?

I was in Sherwood. Green and Grey.  I preferred practically all the other house colours..

As I recall the competition involved every boy being entered for every event and you got either A B or C for your efforts.  This was translated into points which were added up for each house.  Only two specifics stick in my miind.

 

1.  I think  6 minutes 5 seconds was the time for either an A or B in the mile.  I did under 6 mins 5 for 4 laps of the 440 track.

2.  I was generally a hopeless sprinter, much more suited to distance stuff.  But in the 220 one time, something just 'clicked' and I absolutely 'aced' it and got an 'A'.  Didn't do that twice though!  ;)

 

Col

 

 

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I hated cross country, absolutly hated it, I was no good at sports, the only thing I played for the school was in the Junior Chess team.

 

I did lower and change the order of the flags on the post one sports day. Proberbly 1958 or 1959.

 

The photo of the "Marble Arch" is a great reminder. I went through it each way on route to school.

 

Brian.

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High Pavement and Padstow schools were only across the road from each other,but they may have been a million miles away............never any trouble between us,hardly ever mixed...........but I remember a football and Rugby match was arranged between us on Padstows football pitch and then on High Pavements rugby pitch............the football was naturally a formality and we thrashed HP........thinking we'd do the same at Rugby.......not really knowing the rules of Rugby we went for it.........kicking,thumping and gouging the HP lads....the game was abandoned........and next morning in Assembley we were berated by the Headmaster and made to feel ashamed......we thought our tactics were within the rules and didn't mean any harm.................lol...................anyway they got their own back the following year and thrashed us at cricket............

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8 hours ago, DJ360 said:

 

I don't recall how the cross country was organised.  We had Rugby in winter, Cricket in summer, swimming at least in the lower school, P.E. in the gym and then all the track and field stuff that counted towards the 'Standards' competition. 

 

 

As I remember (could be wrong!) it was rugby from September right through to Easter, with sometimes cross-country, plus hockey just about enough times to learn how it was played, but mostly rugby.  Then it was athletics from Easter until the May half term, followed by cricket from then until the summer holidays.

 

Swimming was once a week in the first year, but then I think ceased as a regular thing some time in the second.

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# 181 That seems a reasonable description Merthyr.  Some people also I believe fitted in Rowing. 

 

Benjamin  #180.  There was occasional 'banter' across Gainsford Crescent.  I recall some of the Padstow lads used to call us 'Cads', which I always thought a rather odd use of the word.  Still I don't recall us ever coming to blows.  :)

 

On Southglade Rd a number of us went to HP within a year or so of each other, but we still got on well with the Padstow lads and the odd one who went to the Bilateral school ( Greenwood? )

 

I think the Bestwood connection was stronger than any school allegiance.

 

Col

 

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# 182 Valuer Jim, my Dad passed to go to High Pavement in the early 1930s but refused to go because they played rugby there.  His parents didn't argue and he went instead to Cottesmore, played for Nottingham Boys, Notts County and RAF during his time overseas in WW2.  Even in his 90s he couldn't abide rugby although I made him go with me to watch his grandsons play! 

 

 

 

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Jim, I seem to recall that the 'why can't we play football in HP?'  question arose at school council with monotonous regularity.

 

The answer was always the same.  'You can play football in the street and you can join any number of football clubs/teams.'

 

I was rubbish at all of it.

 

We still haven't mentioned Boxing.  It was still done when I was at HP. Quite literally a 'Knockout' competition IIRC.

 

We had heats on mats in the Gym.  I lasted about 20 seconds before I was floored by a 'haymaker' from my opponent and that was the end of my boxing career.  The competition continued in similar fashion I believe and the finals were held in the Assembly Hall.  I think around Easter, but again I can't be sure.

 

Col

 

 

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As you say Col never any bother between the schools.........some of my Whipple pals went to HP......Michael Ham and David Green off Leybourne being two of them...........

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Peter Bowles the actor went to High Pavement..........and mentions in his book (although not by name) Bestwood Estate,he lived on Kersall drive,.......and says he..............''Had to go through a rough estate on his way there''................cheeky git.......lol.

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At High Pavement I can vaguely remember there being rowing but in the ordinary course of things we weren't involved in it - maybe it was for the upper years only? No recollection of boxing (apart of course in the yard when there were cries of 'scrap!!') and certainly was not something offered or taught as part of PE - at least not to the forms I was in. 

 

Regarding PE, basketball was the big thing there which we had to play, and I remember we also did a little badminton - although like with hockey, just about enough to learn it and that was about all.

 

Yes, hockey was an option to rugby, but there were so few places available you were very lucky if you got to play it regularly instead of being stuck with rugby.  The thing about that was the secondary moderns played football, and the grammar schools played rugby.  Having pretentions to being like the public schools is what I always put it down to.

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17 minutes ago, benjamin1945 said:

Peter Bowles the actor went to High Pavement..........

 

A couple of other actors who went to the school were John Bird, who became best known for his appearances on all the satire shows on TV, and John Turner who was in the TV series 'Knight Errant' - I remember he visited the school once when I was there.

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Hi Benj.  I don't recall your two friends, but then you are much older than me.  ;)

 

Peter Bowles.  As you say.  Cheeky Git!!  Kersall Drive/Saxondale area in my memory was little different to Bestwood except not as good  :)

 

I imagine he would have walked either through Marble Arch or over the crossing at the end of Southglade, neither of which led to particulary 'bandit infested' routes to school.

 

In all honesty, the only area I was a bit wary of as a kid was 'Raymede Steps' because unless you were actually visiting one of the houses you had no real reason to be there and I always felt like an unwelcome intruder.

 

Col

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Yes Col.......the Raymede steps........when I was Marsdens Granville.......imagine what it was like delivering the groceries up there...........more often than not i'd carry them up the steps and get someone to watch me Bike while doing it..........but after,the free-wheel ride down Bankings was lovely......

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Merthyr,

I hadn't picked up on John Turner though I do recall 'Knight Errant'.  I do recall that at the 1988 Bicentenary there was a picture of another British actor who was I believe something of a minor 'Hearthrob' in the 1930s, but I've never been able to recall his name or find out more.  Another actor, Phillip Voss   ( http://www.unitedagents.co.uk/philip-voss) seems to have been a classmate of Bowles.

 

Freda Jackson, who played a starring role in the 1948 film 'No Room at the Inn' and was in many others, including a few Hammer Horror films also seems to have been at HP during the 'Co-ed' phase. 

 

The book 'High Pavement Remembered' also mentions two ladies from much earlier.  'Miss Lorna Duveen' became a popular Hollywood actress during the silent era, and Hilda Boot, 'Russianised' her name to Hilda Butsova and performed with the Diaghilev Russian Ballet alongside Ninette De Valois and Alicia Markova, before joining Anna Pavlova's touring company and moving on to a successful teaching career.

 

Col

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6 hours ago, DJ360 said:

Merthyr,

I hadn't picked up on John Turner though I do recall 'Knight Errant'. 

 

Hilda Boot, 'Russianised' her name to Hilda Butsova and performed with the Diaghilev Russian Ballet alongside Ninette De Valois and Alicia Markova,

 

Col

 

I remember John Turner, because as I said he visited the school once, and it was during one break time that he appeared in the yard and was surrounded by autograph hunters. Someone said he was the star of 'Knight Errant', but as I'd never seen the series I didn't bother joining in the crowd.

 

Re Russianised names, as you probably know, Alicia Markova was really Alice Marks.

 

 

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#190 + #191 the steps and bankings I had forgot all about those, the daily trudge up the bankings to whipple  but great in the snow ice and the steps, I can only remember going up them once I was only 9 or 10 didn't like it never went again. This brings to mind raymede close and the narrow road when you went there everyone could see you , when built they never thought residents would ever own a car.

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