Mundella and the `Tower'


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Dear Pat,I wish you all the best with your wishful thinking for the people of the Meadows, but I find it hard to believe it will ever be the same again. The `rot' started in a big way with the closure of one of Nottingham`s most beautiful buildings(the Mundella Grammar School) and its replacement with a walled citadel of the most ugly liitle boxes I have ever seen. This enclave has become the last refuge of a small minority of the middle classes,behind which they hide from the reality of drugs,crime in its many forms, and social isolation.Unless the whole area is cleared,(the slums of the Meadows) the middle classes will never return. I remember the true community spirit that once existed here.(read the various `Meadows' web pages and the Mundella web page(www.mundella.org.uk)

I think this is fairly typical;

Throughout my entire stay at Mundella, lateness was one of my consistent attributes. But arriving at a different time to most other people you see a lot of different stuff. The lusty hymn singing on a summer's morning could be heard most of the way down Turney Street. At the school end of Turney Street and on Colligate Road, many of the neighbourhood people would stand at their doorways to listen to the sound. It was an impressive and moving experience. Many of the pupils, I am sure, went on to greater things at the Trent End in the course of time! As a raw fag in my short pants, I remember being overawed and a little scared at the volume of noise from 850 heartily singing souls in that packed Upper Hall.

Unless this spirit can be recaptured I don`t hold out much hope from wasting 40 million pounds on the proposed project. I would however be interested to learn how access to renewable energy is to be obtained from this project. An education system that destroys such buildings and the means by which huge numbers of the working and middle classes improved themselves to go on to better the economy of Britain must be regarded with much doubt. I wish you all the best regardless.

Letter to the post about the infamous `Tower' etc. kickme

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  • 2 weeks later...

I would dispute the notion that community spirit is gone form the Meadows. 30 years after leaving Mundella school, I am now working in the meadows childrens centre, and have often been struck by the vibrant community feeling which is still very strong, and have seen how people support each other. The diversity of race, culture, language, and class is huge, and often transient, but the meadows spirit is still as strong as it ever was. I dont live in the meadows but I know the area well.

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