Dear Old Lewesians,
Last March 83 members attended the Annual Dinner and A.G.M. The service, conducted by Mr. J. Fanner, was held in the School Chapel and Mr. N. R. Bradshaw took as the theme of his address the words "To give and not to count the cost". Unfortunately the school choir was unable to lead the singing of the hymns owing to a previous appointment, and many of those present were disappointed as they felt this detracted from the atmosphere.
Again the catering was carried out by Bull House and so a high standard was assured. After the meal the Chairman proposed the health of the School and in reply Mr. Fanner gave a full and varied account of school life over the year. Mr. H. Taylor proposed the toast of the Old Lewesians Association and in the process told many humerous anecdotes of school life and in particular of school camps abroad. Mr. Bradshaw replied on behalf of the Association and his reminiscences ranged from " The story of the Lost Tooth " to memories of the Stratford camps.
At the end of the Easter term, Mr. Fanner, who has been Headmaster of the school for the last six years, will be leaving to take up his appointment as Head of Alleyn's School, Dulwich. Recent O.L.s know him as headmaster, but we on the committee appreciate him as a loyal friend of the Association. He attends our committee meetings regularly and is most helpful in placing the school and its facilities at our disposal. Although six years is not long, Mr. Fanner's work will form its own chapter in the history of the school. By our constitution he will remain an O.L., so although he will be leaving Lewes we hope he will not lose touch with the Association.
The committee has agreed to join with the school and staff in a presentation to Mr. Fanner. All O.L. who wish to contribute to a leaving gift should send it to the O.L. Treasurer (address above). DO THIS NOW and at the latest by 10th March 1967.
March l8th. is the date of the Annual Dinner and A.G.M. which will follow the usual pattern. The Service will start at 6pm. conducted by the Headmaster and The Rev. Paul Bishop.
The committee felt that the cost in recent years may have kept younger members away and have therefore requested a shorter menu with a consequent lowering of price. We hope this will meet with your approval. Dr. Stephen Fleet has been asked to reply to the toast of the Association.
Last year I appealed for an O.L. to act as a "Letter-Box" for the Association. This has been answered by J. B. Wheeler, Esq. whose address is 2 Belgrave Road,Seaford. This is a wonderful gesture and on behalf of the Association I thank him most sincerely. Any O.L.'s who have any news for the O.L.notes should write to him. Many O.L's write to Mr.Bradshaw personally and he is always pleased to hear from them and he passes on the news to the committee for the notes.
The O.L. notes are not enclosed in this envelope [ but they can be found below ] as we find we are in need of more time for duplicating. They will ee handed out at the A.G.M. and we will post them in the early Spring to those members who are unable to be present.
May I make the annual appeal for SUBSCRIPTIONS. Five Shillings is due again BUT One Pound will keep you in membership for five years. Please make the effort to send us a combined cheque for the Dinner and Subscription.
The Barbican will be published by the date of the Dinner and you can buy your copy then. Mr. Fanner has issued an appeal for old copies of the Barbican. He is putting past copies in order with a view to having them bound and finds the following are missing, 1937, 1939 to 48 incl, 1955. If any O.L. has a copy of one or more of the missing numbers we should be very glad if he could present it to the School.
[ Webmaster's Note: Presumably the Fanner collection at the school was that which eventually found its way via various hands into the County Archive though we don't know if that was a complete set or if it was bound. We do know that NRB had the two bound volumes covering 1931 to 1939 because we have them in our possession - they were given to us by the Bradshaw family in 2002. It is highly likely that NRB had the other issues but whether they were ever bound we cannot say. Can anyone shed any light on this ? ]
The committee look forward to seeing YOU at the Dinner on March 18th. 1967 and would ask all those who left school during the last 6 yrs to make a special effort to come and say farewell to Mr.Fanner.
We wish all Old Lewesians success and happiness in
1967.
Yours very sincerely
GEOFF BAIRD.
David Smith is this year's captain of Lewes R.F.C .
Malcolm Young has gone into residence at St. Edmund Hall, Oxford, and played in the Freshers' Rugger trial.
G. R. Crouch has secured a post in Sussex as an organic chemist. He hopes the writer's car will become as well known as his previous one. Not so kind a wish as it would appear. Twenty-four years old?
We have heard of the marriages of Chris Chatfield, Richard Coote and Richard Field. Chris got a 1st and a doctorate at Imperial College and is now on the staff of McGill University in Canada.
Richard Coote went to Jamaica on V.S.0. and is now at an American University.
Richard Field is a curate in Tottenham.
Raymond Pearmain has taken up a post as a costs and works accountant in Tanzania.
Robert Snelling has returned to Sussex as Head of Social Education at Ringmer School.
Geoff Baird is deputy head there. It must be a good school.
Stan Pilbeam paid a visit to Sussex from Australia - unfortunately owing to the death of his father. He is consultant to eight hospitals in the Ballarat area.
Condolences to Frank Pitt, with the British forces in Cyprus. A blow on the shin playing hockey and a wrong diagnosis have placed him in hospital for weeks.
Trever Beeforth has left the University of Bath and is now a lecturer in Electronic Engineering at the University of Sussex. We thought they would have to come for help to O.L.'s soon.
0n the opposite side of the road at the Brighton College of Education [ now the University of Brighton ], is Tony Reynolds, who has deserted the form room to become a lecturer.
Philip Ridley, British Trade Commissioner at Washington with his son Tim - now an undergraduate at Cambridge, climbed Mount Katahdin, the highest in Maine. They tried to sing the School Song - " Floreat Lewesia " - but were out of breath.
Stephen Fleet - a don at Cambridge - has been given £20,000. No good. You won't touch him. It is for electon-microscope work on catalysts.
Michael Thatcher, who entered the R.A.F. as an apprentice in 1960 is now a Flying Officer. He served in Borneo during the confrontation. John Cornwall from Firle joined the R.A.F. in 1950. He is now a Warrant 0fficer in Singapore.
Gerald Cook has left the Navy and is now living near Chichester. He has been appointed to the post of Regional Director (South) of the Missions to Seamen - general organiser and fund raiser.
Seen on the towpath at Oxford during Eights Week - Guy English (Merton 1st VIII), John Sandercock, Cliff Lauer (Worcester 1st VIII), John Iles and J. A. Senior. There were other O.L.'s about, e.g. Nigel Thorp, but we failed to spot them.
Martin Wenham has left Scientific research and joined the staff of King Edward VII Grammar School, Coalville, Leicestershire.
We heard that Alan Blake, who left school in 1960, is the youngest 1st Pilot in B.E.A.
Alan Fenner, one of our old originals, is head of the Building and Structural Engineering College, Durban. He wished he could have been at the last O.L. dinner.
We have listened to Pop Smith broadcasting on several occasions. He appeared as " Musician of the Week " in a series called " Studio Portrait ".
The law page of The Times contained an account of a breach of promise case in the High Court in which Counsel for the Defence was Cyril Newman. Now then you chaps ! If you are in trouble you know where to go.
The last Old Boys' Notes recorded Ian Sloane, H. M. Diplomatic Service, as waiting in Saigon for a visa to go to Hanoi. He waited for a year, but the visa never came and he has gone to Lahore in Pakistan -- "Safer, but much duller". He mentions the incessant din in Saigon "while the relatively quiet night curfew hours are punctuated by dull explosions from bombs and gunfire". Communication with other cities was almost entirely by air as the roads are unsafe even in daylight.
John Buckwell, of East Chiltington, after an apprenticeship at Southwick Power Station, National Service in R.E.M.E. and a number of posts at various stations in different parts of the country, is now an Instructor Mechanical Engineer at a new Atomic Power Station.
Last Old Boys' Notes recorded Roy Stevens as Assistant Registrar at Leeds University. Incorrect. He is lecturer in English in the Department of Education. He has written " An approach to Literature " in Longmans " Education Today " Series. Heads of English Departments please note. We still remeber Roy's outstanding " Bottom " (capital "B" please) in the 1940 production of " A Midsummer Night's Dream ".
Sorry to report Bill Euston and Don Jarvis have had heart trouble, -- organic not emotional. We hope for speedy and complete recovery.
David Irvine is Navigating Officer on H.M.S.Keppel, operating mostly against submarines. Was duty officer over the Christmas period.
Ran into Robin Appleby - as cheerful as ever. He is working for the Dental Board.
David Joslin speaking "Its been a wonderful season for hay-making. I stopped an early morning rush hour train when 109 bullocks got onto the line. Foot and mouth not in it.
From Clive Perry. " Publishing going well. I,m just off to Africa for three months to get some sunshine, if not business." Oh to be in the corridors of power.
Had a photograph of a handsome fellow in Toronto. Could hardly recognise the urchin to whom I taught -- or tried to teach -- history in VB in the war. Alan Stuart. He vets insurance claims, but speaks and writes on rehabilitation.
Freddie Cossick's cheerful Xmas greetings. "What a very bad game this year !" Clue ? Oxford lost the 'Varsity Rugger match.
Peter Gem, headmaster of Oswestry School, umpires, refs, shows parents round and teaches 17 periods a week. But by using Lewes methods he has raised enough money for new changing room, showers and music school. " Floreat Lewesia "!
Diamid McLauglin has returned to London from the staff of the European Coal and Steel community and is now enginerring our entry into E.E.C. We are sure he will succeed where dear "Harold" has failed.
Note on Ronald Smith above. Forgot to say he spent a night in the private wing of the Duchess at Dunnobin Castle. Most unlike him. No cause for alarm. The castle is now a school, -- with TWO headmasters. Poor little brutes.
James Lohoar is in Ottawa working for the Canadian Ministry of Agriculture. He still plays Rugger with those rough Canadians. He met Bob Drummond while doing so and handed on the Old Boys' notes. He also met David Norman on his way from Nigeria for a holiday in U.S.A. Hang out those ties (Old Boys'). Someone will claim acquaintance.
The Rev. Pat. Goodsell in his card a year ago included "Dorothy". This years there is also " Christopher ". Hearty congrats.
Miles Britchfield is a C.S. Executive Officer in Bath. For a long spell he was at Rosyth. He married last April and hopes to return to Scotland. What! So soon?
Jack Franklin, Headmaster of Bungay Grammar School, is battling against the plans of the L.E.A. for "comprehensivisation", backed he says by unanimus support from of staff, governors, and parents. But of Course !
David Helsdon, working for the G.P.O. in London, has plans to join with two other chaps and open a business in Tangier. What about a hostel for O.L.s on holiday?
Eddie Wood is still with Rolls Royce. Now there are Rachel, Peter, Caroline and Marion. But we always understood that Rolls frowned on mass production.
Bob Ford hopes there will be staff of the right calibre for his growing comprehensive school in Essex. He is a neighbour of Ronnie Bowman.
Welcome letter and card from S. G. Aston, one of our early stalwarts, who, in the mid-thirties, joined the Meteorological Service. He has been at Antrim in Northern Ireland since he returned from Tripoli in 1958. He has passed his half-century and can truly sing "Forty Years On". He has four children -- all apparently bright like father -- and his eldest boy is one of the Oxbridge candidates to read medicine.
Chris Davy is in Mexico City -- how well times. A mexican dye firm got into trouble and appealed to I.C.I. for help. I.C.I. sent Christpoher. "Mexico here we come" -- from Lewes of course.
Letter from Richard Yarrow. He was head of the Physics Department at Tottenham Grammar School which has now gone "comprehensive". In addition tohis Physics he is now "Pastoral Head" of 250 boys. He says he spends a lot of his time filling in Juvenile Court forms. Science Departments in comprehensives are, he maintains, understaffed and inadequately staffed. "I find that half my time my degree and the money spent on my training is hardly used. I seem to be a sergeant again in the army."
In any O.L.s want a free night in London, Keith Bacon still runs the R.A.C club in Pall Mall.
Peter English says he is enjoying his work as a lecturer at Exeter University.
H. M. Davies is headmaster of Freeport High School in the Bahamas. His school is quite international and includes 124 Americans and 127 British and Europeans as well as the "home grown".
Ross Wells and family have returned from Mombasa. He is now teaching in Nottinghamshire.
Nick Buck, a vet in Uganda hopes to be over on leave for a spell this year.
R. E. Lawson, our rebel Old Boy, - Major Rhodesian Forces - sent a marvellous picture of an antelope. Makes one feel politicians are nuts.
From a curacy ar Burnham-on-Sea, Frank Stevens has gone to Clevedon, Somerset as Vicar.
To David Lacey the winter is a close season for matrimony. Too busy reporting Soccer for the Guardian.
Ian Wesson has joined the oldest preactice in Croyden as a G.P. Congrats on the birth of a son last April. As a partner he is beginning to feel quite respectable.
John Holford has left Shoreham Grammar School for the Grammar School at Devizes. His place of residence -- not the house -- Potterne -- is mentioned in Domesday Book.
Peter Noel is teaching in Essex and is still chasing a degree in French.
Saw a photograph in a Yorkshire paper of the wedding of a Miss J. Buller-Sinfield. You have guessed right. It was our Derrick's daighter. Time marches on. The bride and groom drove from the church in a 1907 Renault !!
Michael Blunden of Ripe has been offered a place at four Universities. He has still to decide which shall be his choice.
Eric Barfoot, D.F.C. who has spent nearly thirty years in the R.A.F. is a mature student at the College of Education at Bletchley. Brian, his boy, is reading for the B.Ed. at Loughborough.
Michael Walton, after his sojourn in France, is teaching at Saint Joan High School, New Brunswick. He spent Xmas in U.S.A.
David Norman who came home for a spell after the Nigerian trouble last year, has returned with his wife and child to his University post there. Devotion to the African.
Geoff. Ford, Group Captain, R.A.F. is returning from Germany to a post at Whitehall. He has a boy at Marlborough.
Alfie Rogers writes from time to time from New South Wales. On Bill Euston's retirement, he comments on his indebtedness to Bill's teaching and on a standing high jump of three feet once performed by the Senior English Master. He mentions W.M. Gourlay's once confessed ambition to earn £1000 a year and, challenged on what would be his aim when that was accomplished, he said, as a true Scot, "earn £2000". Alfie spoke by phone to Stan Pilbeam at the airport as Stan was about to set out for England. "Quite a minor thrill speaking to someone with whom one last spoke 21 years previously and half-a-world away."
Congrats to F. G. Howard who has obtained a B.Sc. Degree at London University in Geogology [sic] and Zoology and an appointment in the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries for Scotland at Aberdeen. Sassenach goes north instead of Scot coming South.
John Bird, "Sir Anthony" in "The Rivals" is a Senior Lecturer at Margaret McMillan College, Deptford.
Adrian Dickinson graduated on July 12th last, married a Classicist at the University on July 15th, left the country soon afterwards - with his wife, of course -- we believe for Italy, and was interviewed for a job at Eton before his departure.
The Sutherland Brothers - Peter, Law articles in London after Oxford; William in his last year at St. Lukes, Exeter; Andrew at York University after V.S.O. in Sarawak; Malcolm still at School and hoping for Cranwell.
Interesting news of the Thorpe brothers formerly of Ringmer. Peter is in Victoria, Australia, and is Technical Assistant on the staff of the Gas and Fuel Corporation plant in Morisell and lives in a lovely dairying district outside the Latroke Valley smog belt. Norman is Managing Director of a firm of electrical engineers in the City and commutes daily from kings Langley. Peter has two daughters and Norman two boys and two girls. WE are indebted to Peter's wife Margaret for the above information.
Jack Henshaw, on the Prices and Income Board, when he wrote, had completed Newsprint and Aluminium and was grappling with the wages of three million workers in Engineering. Sounds worse than School mastering.
Michael Short has returned to U.S.A. and is in Detroit. He is wroking for the Ford Motor Company and gets a new car of his choice every year. After the grey skies of Manchester Michael and his family appreciate the gorgeous American Summers -- four months at between 80° and 90°F. They are having a new house built.
Jeremy Greenland decided after Oxford to do a spell on V.S.O. at a boarding school in Burundi run in conjunction with the Ruandi Mission. He is now in charge of the school but will be returning to England shortly. Conditions at the school appear primitive by English standards based on the principle od "make do and mend".
Card from Michael Allan; with his wife at an American University. Something was proving "great fun" but we could not read what.
"The Browning Version". All in Australia, Nicholas 300 miles SSW of Alice Springs working as assistant sheep and cattle overseer; David medical Practitioner 40 miles northof the family base at Uralla, NSW; George a curate ar Inverell 80 miles NNW of Uralla. David and George married each with a son. Family reunion accomplished by means of a Piper aircraft.
Humphrey Gilbert should now be at Bristol University reading Geology. From 1966 to 67 he went out to Kenya and got a job yeaching in a "bush" school in very primitive conditions. Wives cost £400. He does not say how many he brought back to Bristol.
Quentin Lonmom called looking very fit. After school he joined the Civil Service and the the Colonial Police but now holds a business appontment in Zambia or was it Ghana.
Had a card from Jack Towner, Colonial Service, Hong Kong. Saigon, Rhodesia, Hong Kong -- do we cause or settle the rows there?
Card too from Peter Osborne, but no news. Poor chap! After Sandhurst he was smashed up in Korea and invalided out.
Tony Cottingham in the R.A.F. has recently done a Junior Command and Staff School Course. He hopes to do a little "showing off" at Biggin Hill Battle of Britain celebrations this year. David, brother of Tony, passed his final Chartered Accountant examination and is now on V.S.O. at Nakuru, Kenya. His job is to audit the accounts of the Cooperative Societies which have been untouched since1963/64. Numerous people (natives) have appropriated money and dsiappeared. Pleny of game, wild birds and wonderful scenery.
David Pincot id still a master at Colston's School, Bristol. Verypleased that his school had beaten both Tonbridge and Clifton at Rugger. He told us that Brian Woods is a Major in Royal Signals in Malta; Ian Hill, civil engineer working on the new Victoria line, while Ian's twin is a metallurgist but David could not remember where.
Long letter from Robert Treadaway, teaching in Hull. Houses at least £1000 cheaper than in the South; one of his pupils had just got the top scholarship in English at Christ's College, Cambridge; Robert produces his school's plays and takes parties to Nottingham Playhouse and Stratford; he himself acts in a Hull University group; one daughter aged two.
John Mould sent us a card from Malta -- the 18th state in the Council of Europe. John is on the staff there.
Ken Perkins, Lt. Col & O.C. 1st Regt: Royal Horse Artillary, broke his ribs playing Rugger against the Welsh Guards. The dog then chewed up his Rugger boots so he feeld he should "call it a day". He won't. He will play in bare feet.
Ian Winchester was first secretary in the Embassy in Damascus when the Israeli-Arab war started. Where he fled we do not know. Last occasion he hopped it to Cairo in 1956, when we bombed Suez.
Met Sammy Gates in Southover -- now a seniod officer in the Education branch of the R.A.F. at Halton. He also does a little extra-mural lecturing for Oxfrod University.
Gerald Burt was the Methodist Chaplain to Hull University and is believed to hold the same post at Southampton.
Saw D. G. Shrubb making for Lewes station with a large suitcase -- obviously returning to The Hague, where he is on the staff of Shell. We believe a directorship is in prospect.
Keith Eastman, senior Maths. Master at City of Norwich School, sent us a list of six Oxbridge Schols gained by his school this year. They are due to go "comprehensive" in 1969, " and the egalitarians" he says, " can't wait for that adte to arrive." "I can't see us ever again getting six Oxbridge awards."
Sorry to end on such a note. But this record of O.L.s activities and achievements should shatter the complacency of our own egalitarians -- if they are honest enough to consider them.
To all O.L.s who sent cards and are not "mentioned in
despatches" thanks and appreciation.
N. R. B.