23 December 2013 (UD13/23)
It is with great sadness that I inform you that Roger Davis has died following a road traffic collision as a pedestrian last Thursday. I know many of you will have known him personally either at school or at reunions. Our thoughts are with his family at this time.
20 December 2013 (UD13/22)
1) Deleted as obsolete.
2) Barrington Lawes says, "In his [Alwyn Hawkes] last piece he asked if anyone could identify Peter Pfaff′s car and I may have the answer. I vaguely knew his parents in Weston S Mare and I'm pretty sure they had an American car by the name of Hudson (Terraplane I think). Open topped if I remember correctly and quite racy for those days. Quite possibly this was the car being used by Peter."
3) John Coville remembers playing ‘Gilli Danda’ (see UD13/21 below) with Solanki who I believe came from Northern Rhodesia.
4) Bob Main has helped me out with the names of boys on the School Photo 1958. True some of the names may still be misplaced or in wrong order. I leave it to others to sort this out - I only put up what others have told me previously. As always if anyone spots something they think is incorrect, please give me the correction and I will amend it. It is a pity we did not all hold cards of our place number so that decades later our task would have been so much easier :-)
5) I have added in the transcript of my 1957 penultimate term diary.
23 November 2013 (UD13/21)
1) Do you remember playing a game with a small stick and a bat - Fahim Ahmad informs me that the game in Urdu is called Gilli Danda. Originally an Indian game prior to 'partition′ but also played in Pakistan. Played in most villages especially it seems where people cannot afford Cricket equipment. The English version is called 'tipcat,' 'tip-cat,' or 'cat and dog.'
There are various ways in which it is played; Google "Gilli Danda" and also go to videos. It was played at KS when I was there (1951-57). Fahim wonders if it was played in 1963-66? Who else remembers playing it?
2) Many thanks to Alwyn Hawkes who was the only person who responded to my request at (UD13/20) Item 2 below, regarding a Time Table of KS and Daily Itinerary. I have added his informatuion to his Anecdotes, in a slightly differrent format. If anyone else can add anything or firm up the times it would be good.
3) I recently rediscovered a print of the School Plays programme of 1957. There were no less than three - Juniors: "The Pied Piper of Hamelin", Seniors: "Holiday Eve" and the Staff chose: "The Crimson Cocoanut." If you would like to see the script of the latter it is in the Internet Archive, but be warned it is riddled with scanning typos. Scroll down, it is the first play.
The interesting facts that came from this were 2 new old boy's names and 2 new staff members. The boys being Hayter and Solanki IV; and the staff Mr Jackson and Miss Dangerfield. I have added them to the Attendance List.
26 October 2013 (UD13/20)
1) Thanks to Tom Mosey and Andrew Tillett for giving accounts of their evenings at the Fleetwood Mac concerts, and Farhud Batmanglich for starting the ball rolling.
2) I am writing an account of my time at King's School for my family. There is so much to write and think I could organise it better if I had an example of a Time Table and a Daily Itinerary. Can I have suggestions please? When I have collated the information I will add the composite, as probable school documents, to the site.
3) Some time ago Dieter Marx told me about having taken JHM with him and his wife on a trip to the French Riviera in 1957.
4) Jack Berber (UD13/19 Item 3) will be letting me have a few stories in due course and would come to a Reunion if anyone remembers him. He was only there a short time due to offer of other work: September 1966 to Spring 1967.
4 October 2013 (UD13/19)
1) Chris king says in referring to Rosemary Harding:
"I seem to remember her name at Kingsholme, but I cannot remember her face. The only female that I remember from those days was a very pretty young girl called Sherry Tonkin. That I think that was the first female I fancied. Anybody else remember her?" [I think he is referring to Sherry Tonkin. I will also remind him that Alwyn Hawkes suggests that Rosemary Harding is on the back row, 4th from the left in this picture. Ed]
2) I had an interesting email from someone doing research on the history of Crookham Court school - and in particular interested in any information about Jack Lee. Although I believe that Laurie Markes gave us all the available information in (UD12/03) if anyone can add any more, I will pass it on. Maybe someone who went with Jack Lee to Crookham Court.
3) I also had an email this week from Jack Berber, who says he taught Science and Maths in the 60s. Does anyone remember him?
4) Mick Fleetwood concert photos: O2 Arena, London - thanks to Angus McLellan who attended with Tom Mosey and LG Arena Birmingham - thanks to Trevor Power who attended with Andrew Cameron-Tillett, Nigel Dodds and George Cooper. Any chance of reports please?
20 September 2013 (UD13/18)
1) I have added a picture sent to me recently by the Kingsholme old boy's son mentioned below (UD13/17). The picture shows the late Alan George Peters in Weston SM in 1928. If anyone knew him or knew of him, his son would be pleased to hear.
2) I have just received an email from Rosemary Bunch - those of you at KS in the 1960s will know her as Mrs Rosemary Mosey and those who were at Kingsholme with her, as the then Miss Rosemary Harding. She has expressed a wish to come to the next reunion. This is very exciting news as I am sure you will agree. If anyone would like her email address please let me know.
14 September 2013 (UD13/17)
You may be wondering why there has not been a recent Update to the site. This is partly down to my very busy life - but mainly because I have not received any new material from anyone apart from these two items.
1) There is a nice tribute to Roger Emmett in the Bucks Free Press discovered by Malcolm Stacey.
2) I had an email recently from a gentleman researching his family tree. His father was a scholar at Kingsholme School in Weston SM, but being born in 1921 it is unlikely that any of you knew him. If perchance anyone had an older brother there I would be grateful for any information additional to what is on the Kingsholme page of the site.
18 July 2013 (UD13/16)
1) Account of the funeral of Roger Emmett written by Peter Mayes. You will require your members password to access this.
2) Henry Forti asks if anyone has information on Errol, Huchet or Karmona, please?
24 June 2013 (UD13/15)
George Cooper has informed me of the sad news that Roger Emmett has died from a heart attack. He will be sadly missed by many. I should know the funeral arrangements in a day or two.
9 June 2013 (UD13/14)
1) Re: (UD13/13) As someone said I have given myself a lot of emails to reply to - at least the replies are to people who actually read the Updates.
2) Some of the older group of Old Boys will remember a student of around 1953-56 - Arias de la Canal, from Mexico. If you can read Spanish it might help, but if not have a look anyway. A Google search of "fredo arias de la canal", then adding "King's School" will show that the introduction of one of his books says he was born in 1939 and he schooled at ”King's School, Sherborne, Oxford” (amongst other notable institutions. Ed.) I leave it for others to search out his contact details and send an invitation to our next reunion!
3) I have spent some time doing searches across my own site to add forenames for a number of old boys. I have also systematically been through the Cast Lists of the School Plays - here I got new boys, forenames and confirmed dates. This brings the total up to 663 pupils over the 20 years. There may be a few duplicates and a few unrecorded but I think the Register is now practically complete.
4) Alwyn Hawkes offers Part 8 possibly the final part of his memories.
3 June 2013 (UD13/13)
Special Notice:
Some of you may have discovered a few password protected pages or links on the site. Only if you were a student or staff member at the school, with few exceptions, will you be allowed access to these. Please contact me. Once assured of your status I will give you Login details.
1st June 2013 (UD13/12)
1) Alexander Samson has provided a photograph of the KS Scout group in 1950. He has also sent a group picture from the April Reunion showing all but 2 Old Boys who missed the call.
2) Clifford Jones reports:
I had a fantastic holiday a couple of weeks ago on a small island off the coast of Greece called Kythnos. The highlight of the trip as may have guessed was to spend the day with Manos Ignatiadis (Ig II).
Our holiday was Friday to Friday but coming back to Athens we stayed a couple of nights at a hotel on the outskirts of Athens and met Mano on the Saturday morning. I was getting fidgety sitting in the hotel reception waiting for him so I walked out into the sunshine and there he was walking towards me with a big smile calling out my name.
It was like going back to our school days and 50 years or so didn't matter. We talked all day about Kings and ourselves while Mano took us around Athens; though a lot of time was spent at the Acropolis new museum which was fascinating, so we ended up having lunch there.
Back at the hotel Mano produced an old school photo album until it was time for him to go in the evening.
28 May 2013 (UD13/11)
1) I have added a report and photos of the May 2013 Reunion.
2) Deleted as obsolete.
9 May 2013 (UD13/10) not UD 13/12 as originally mailed out
1) Farhud Batmanglich wrote to me explaining that a few months ago he received a request from Roger Emmett to see if Mick Fleetwood would attend one of our Reunions. He says:
"As you may be already be aware, Fleetwood Mac band is on tour again and they will be in UK towards the end of September, and from what I hear they are pretty much sold out for most of the shows.
I had dinner with Mike Fleetwood a few weeks ago when he was in Washington, DC. I suggested to him that it may be nice if indeed a group of Old Boys were interested to see one of the concerts, one could arrange and get tickets so we could all go together as a group, and afterwards gather and meet our one world famous alumni!
If indeed there were a good number seriously interested, I could get a hold of Mike and have him arrange back stage VIP passes and all of that."
Any Old Boy who does not have Farhud's email address please let me know.
2) I have included the names of all the Old Boys who attended The April Reunion.
3 May 2013 (UD13/09)
Deleted as obsolete.
2 May 2013 (UD13/08)
1) I have added a Personal Collection for Zahir Sultan - as usual float your cursor over the photo for information, plus I have printed the names of the large group photo.
2) I have added more photos (courtesy Tim Prestage) and information to the April Reunion Report.
28 April 2013 (UD13/07)
Al Hawkes' Sherborne Tri-annual Reunion 21st April 2013:
I have written a short Review of the day, but hopefully a review and photographs will be contributed by someone who was on the tour.
I was informed that John Gay has recently died - can someone clarify the information please, as I only have listed Robert Gay I (1953-59) and Keith Gay II (1955-63).
9 April 2013 (UD13/06)
This is just an update of arrangements for Alwyn Hawkes′ Reunon on Sunday 21st April. Good News: We have managed to secure a tour of Sherborne House and grounds. So any of those who are coming to the ticket only event later and have not yet looked round the House will have an opportunity to do so if they wish.
They will meet up by the Church at 12 noon, Stuart Colmer will be leading the tour. The church service should have finished shortly before then. The tour should finish about 1pm giving time to get down to the venue in Sherborne for 1.15pm.
I will report back on the day in due course.
Apologies to those of you not attending but this was the easiest way of bringing the information to the attention of all concerned.
20 March 2013 (UD13/05)
1) Angus McLellan informed me of the sad news that Nick Poole died on 6th March after a short illness.
2) From feedback from Old Boys it seems that the first decade of school uniforms came from Daniel Neal and the latter from The Famous.
3) Deleted as obsolete.
3 March 2013 (UD13/04)
1) Alwyn Hawkes kindly loaned me an obituary of Lawrence Neal of Daniel Neal and Sons, printed in the Times 1996. Although I have been unable to find a free link to The Times where his article was published, I do have links to the Independent where much of their obituary is almost word for word and Flickr which features a series of period adverts of Daniel Neal - the series is under the name of Alwyn Ladell. Where you can leave a comment for him if you choose.
2) Deleted as obsolete.
The running order of the day is a church service if any would like to attend at 11am, a walk in or near the grounds (depending upon whether we can get permission from the House) and later a buffet at The Reading Room.
Alwyn′s event was originally for the older Old Boys - the first decaders, who may have less in common with latter year attendees. However due to numbers of the those initially invited dwindling over the years, he had opened it up to those who had contributed to the Altar Rail fund. As things stand he has about 30 people including wives or partners. Since the venue has the capacity for more he wishes to extend his invitation to others who may be interested.
If any of you would like Alwyn's contact details please let me know. The affair is ′tickets only′ at £14 per head, so it is no good just turning up at the door and expecting to be fed!
3) What amazing appetites we had back then. From my Diary dated Sunday 23 June 1957:
"Windrush Cafe: Chips, egg, sausages, tea, coca-cola, bread and butter. 1 ½ punnets of strawberries, 2 packets of crisps, milk lunch." I note also Friday 28 June "Pocket money 1/6". I remember it bought a lot of sweets but top-up food generally from money obtained as 'contraband' in Tuck Parcels or from parental visits.
11 February 2013 (UD13/03)
1) I note that back in 2007 Bill Marshall said, "I saw a Michael de Courcy Dashwood in the obituaries last year (2006) who was probably a contemporary, badly wounded with the Bedfordshire Regiment in Korea whilst I was still at school." (I note also a funeral notice in the Telegraph at that time. I had not realised that he had actually attended KS. I have added his name to our In Memoriam page.Ed.)
2) There has been a lot of interest in the School Uniform item (UD13-02) Item 2:
a) Peter Stern:
With regard to Daniel Neal, they had two stores in London, Portman Square and Kensington, and five provincial stores at Bournemouth, Bristol, Cheltenham, Exeter and Birmingham.
As a Londoner, my uniform was puchased from the Portman Square branch. One thing I can still remember about the shoe department and see in my 'mind's eye', was an X-ray machine that was used for shoe fitting and was available for parents and children, to see the fit of their shoes and the bones in their feet! This, of course was before the dangers of X-rays were known. The machine was a free standing device which the child would step onto with three viewing tubes, one each for the shop assistant, parent and child. There was no security device and a child could use the machine themselves!
'Daniel Neal' was sold as a going concern to John Lewis in 1963.
b) Nick Sweet:
In 1956 I had my school uniform from Daniel Neal and Sons. It was ordered in their Bristol shop and sent down from Cheltenham. However,
the quality of their clothes deteriorated dramaticlly leading to a lot of complaints from disgruntled parents. The Famous was selected as the new
supplier in late 1959 or early 1960. They were a very old established outfitter (circa mid 1800's I think) who specialised in military and school uniforms.
Bill StAubyn is quite correct, they have recently closed down, although I think I read somewhere that they were still going to do school uniforms on line.
3) Thanks to Tony Hanks: names added to the Field Events Sport Group (bottom left photo.) I have added some names to a Prize Winners photo top left, can anyone help with the other names please? Ed.
4) I have scanned Tony Hanks' Album and added them here.
8 February 2013 (UD13/02)
1) Zahir Sultan (1952-54) telephone me, he now lives in Germany. He has since mentioned a number of names two of which I have added to the Attendance Register - Anastasiades and Fateh Massud. Can anyone help with their dates of attendance please.
2) Bill StAubyn tells me that "The Famous" the KS clothing store in Cheltenham has closed. In my day I think it was "Daniel Neal and Sons Ltd" who clothed the earlier KS boys.
3) Nigel Dodds watched Mick Fleetwood, who left KS in 1962,on "Top Gear". I have the BBC iPlayer link. This will be very interesting for both Fleetwood Mac fans and especially people who were at school with him.
01 January 2013 (UD13/01)
1) For all the Klingons amongst you" DIS chu' botIvjaj" (May you all enjoy the new year) and for the rest A Happy New Year - see your greeting in your own language and thanks to those of you who sent Christmas greetings by post, email or e-card.
2) John Coville has given us a glimpse into his life at King's circa 1957. He has provided a scan of 17th/18th of February. He promises more to follow.
3) My thanks to Michael Checkley (Kingsholme 1946, leaving KS after School Cert. July 1950) for providing a new name, that of his contemprary Hugh Porter.
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