Tag: Alleyn's School

Alleyn’s Concert “A Big Flop”, “Concert Went Well”, Trial By Jury, Battle Of Stamford Bridge…Reviewed With Evidence, Late March 1975

An artist’s impression of the Alleyn’s Lower School Orchestra in Spring 1975, sometimes misattributed as “The Battle of Stamford Bridge, from The Life of King Edward the Confessor by Matthew Of Paris“

I somehow remained in the Lower School Orchestra that season, despite having shown no aptitude whatsoever for playing the violin, even though the violin was “the family instrument” on my mother’s side.

Turn It Up To Max & Spit: The Baltic Origins Of My Mother’s (Marcus) Family Revealed

My mother’s pain at my musical ineptitude was exacerbated by the cruel fact that Andy Levinson, from our street, showed some real talent for the violin. How could that be fair? The Levinsons were a medical family. Andy should have been fiddling around with medical instruments, not literally fiddling with far more musical instrument success than Ian, who was, after all, trying his very best.

Me switching to the viola for a while didn’t help. For the March 1975 concert, I was consigned to the second violins, ensuring that I had a little less to do, thus causing minimal disruption to the overall sound of the orchestra.

“There are other options, little Ian. Have you considered viols, viola da gamba…”

Anyway, all of the above is context…as is the fact that my mum was still grumpy and still hobbling around the place in mid to late March, I think with walking sticks rather than crutches by then, having had her hip replaced in mid February.

Here’s the diary:

Here’s a transliteration of that diary page.

Sunday, 16 March 1975 classes good. Feld’s lunch. Came home with Grandma Anne. Kalooki 2p up. TV Golden Shot.

Monday, 17 March 1975 – Fives good. Prepared for Tuesday. TV Likely Lads, Alias Smith and Jones, Goodies/Rolf Harris.

Tuesday, 18 March 1975 – first day of concert. In my opinion a big flop. TV Flintstones (Rock Quarry)

I’ll return shortly to the question of whether or not the concert was a big flop.

Meanwhile, and far more interestingly, for some reason I thought it important to note the name of the Flintstones episode I enjoyed that same day. This meant that, 50 years later, I could track that episode down and include it in Ogblog. I might have had five thumbs back then but clearly I also had forethought.

Wednesday, 19 March 1975 – concert went well this evening. Watched Trial By Jury. Mr. Tindale very good indeed.

“It’s hard to tell how the concert went from these conflicting reviews, but the judgement on Mr Tindale as the judge is very clear”, Tindale J.

Thursday, 20 March 1975 – some good results. Classes good. TV Man About The House, Dave Allen.

Friday, 21 March 1975 – concert went well. TV Porridge, MASH.

Saturday, 22 March 1975 – went to 1st soccer match Chelsea V Middlesbrough. Concert, mum & dad, Trial By Jury.

I have written up my first ever visit to a football match – a visit to Stamford Bridge, previously – click here or below:

My “First Soccer Match”, Chelsea v Middlesbrough, Stamford Bridge, 22 March 1975

But had the concert been any good or not? We need evidence. Below is an extract from Mr Kingman’s Scribblerus review of the entire event, mostly covering the Psalm 150 bit which was the bit in which I participated.

If you are aching to read the entire review, including the review of Trevor Tindale’s performance in Trial By Jury, click here for a pdf of the full page.

Sunday. 23 March 1975 – classes mock Seder. Recorded Psalm 150 and me. Took up most of the afternoon and evening.

Good gracious! Is it possible that the recording of me & Psalm 150 has survived these 50 years? Of course it is more than possible.

Firstly, my rather lengthy intro, which is also a supplement to my diary notes, I suppose:

Then the five minute concert piece recording that apparently took much of the day. Arguably, that was not time especially well spent. Had I spent more hours learning my instrument than twiddling knobs on the tape recorder, who knows how my playing might have sounded. As it is, you need a trigger warning, only click if you have robust hearing and a broad mind:

Mercifully, that is the only known recording of my attempts with the violin.

My final recollection from the concert is my mother’s comment, in the form of a question, after my performance:

Why was your bow going up at the same time as everyone else’s coming down…and coming down while everyone else’s was going up?

I never forgot that damning question, mum; never.

A Highly Representative Fortnight For Alleyn’s School While In My Second Year, Early March 1975

Trevor Tindale – an excellent judge of character

Quite early in this fortnight, my mother emerged from hospital following her pre-op (plate removal I think) ahead of her hip replacement, grumping at home on crutches during that period. This element gets little mention in my diary after her escape.

Grumpy? Me?

Sunday 2 March 1975 – classes good. Visited mum today [in Kings College Hospital] great improvement – TV Cat Ballou.

Monday 3 March 1975 – mum came out of hospital. Adam’s ribs. TV Smith and Jones, Goodies.

Tuesday 4 March 1975 – classes very good. Kentucky chicken. TV The Great Match.

Wednesday, 5 March 1975 – hockey good. Worked on practical. TV Pioneers of Photography, Worldwide, Rhoda, The Evacuees.

Thursday, 6 March 1975 – classes good. TV The Roman Way, Dave Allen, Controversy.

Friday, 7 March 1975 – uneventful school. Went to Doreen and co [Benjamin family] for dinner. TV Porridge, MASH.

Saturday, 8 March 1975 uneventful. TV Doctor Who, Walt Disney, Pot Black, film: Elephant Walk.

Sunday, 9 March 1975 – classes/parents. Went to Pam and Michael’s fish!?!?!? TV Ice Skating, The Great War, The Golden Shot.

Pam & Michael (my aunt and uncle) a few month’s later

Mum was still temporarily unable to cook and dad was not the cooking type – hence the myriad of take-aways and kind invitations by neighbours and family. I remember that there was something memorable about Auntie Pam’s fish dish that Sunday. Dad’s verdict went beyond colourful punctuation.

Monday 10 March 1975 – fives good. TV Likely Lads, Alias Smith and Jones, Goodies (goody goody yum yum).

Tuesday 11 March 1975 fives match v Rutlish, Loftus etc. Tea nice. TV McMillan and wife.

Wednesday, 12 March 1975 yet more fives v Henry Thornton. Cookie and me, 89–64 and all – 13 points Tea nice. TV Rhoda/Mary Tyler Moore.

Thursday 13 March 1975 Psalm 150 practice good. TV Man About The House, Taste For Adventure, Dave Allen At Large.

Friday, 14 March 1975 form dito from PE. TV Porridge v good.

Saturday 15 March 1975 exeat, shule, Gabriel’s bar [bar mitzvah?]. TV Doctor Who, Walt Disney, Pop Black.

A lot of fives there, at the start of the week, including two representative matches; the first against Rutlish School, the second against Henry Thornton. I am pretty sure that these matches were both played at home. Hence, the consistent verdict of “tea nice” is surely a big thumbs-up for the Alleyn’s dinner ladies.

I’m sure there are many readers who would like more detail on the contents of that tea. Sadly, my diary is silent on those details. Alan “Cookie” Cooke might remember the vital tea details. I’ll hazard a guess that white bread with butter and jelly-type jam utterly devoid of solid fruit content would have qualified as “nice” in my book, especially if some sort of spongy cake was also involved. Tea would have been served in the buttery, I’m pretty sure.

I remember taking great pride in representing the school at fives and I also remember getting few chances as a junior to do so. I was a bit surprised to see that we played two representative matches in as many days.

I’m not sure what “Loftus” means in the context of the Rutish game, but I suspect we nicknamed one of the Rutish players for his height and I suspect that he and his mates got the better of us, especially as I document in great detail our superior points tally against Henry Thornton.

Cookie – please chime in if you remember anything about these matches. I do recall thinking that we paired well in doubles, both in internal matches and these representative ones.

Trevor Tindale oversaw proceedings and wrote a small paragraph about lower school fives in Scribblerus that year.

I’ll leave it to you, dear reader, to decide whether Trevor was a fine judge of character with regard to my sporting maturity.

Revives For Fives, An Afternoon Of Hard Ball At Lord’s, 28 February 2022
The MCC Real Tennis Club Weekend & Related Potty Adventures, 31 January To 2 February 2025

In truth my memory of these 50 years ago events is weak. I don’t remember who Gabriel was, on that Saturday; apologies to him.

But I must warn everyone that I not only remember a fair bit about the Psalm 150 “performance”, but the diary, Scribblerus and even my archive of reel-to-reel tapes preserves plenty of…arguably too much…information. To be reported in more detail next time.

Me Mugged, Mum Knifed…All In A 10 Day Stretch Around Alleyn’s School & Camberwell in Late February 1975

DeepAI Imagines The 01 Once Daily Streatham Hill To London Bridge

We had our own special train that took us from Streatham Hill directly to North Dulwich (and then on to London Bridge). A great service for us Alleyn’s kids from Streatham Hill, not needing to change. It was even named/numbered the 01, perhaps in honour of its once a day status.

Of course it was not just for us Alleyn’s kids; there were kids from other schools – Tulse Hill Comp. and William Penn to name but two – on that train too. No self-respecting adults rode on that train as far as I can remember.

In the early days, there were very few of us from Alleyn’s who got on at the start of that run – possibly just me and Andy Levinson. We loved the fact that we could see the train in the siding and that it pulled into the station, seemingly for us.

Andy a couple of years later

Latterly for sure Rupert Jefferies, Justin Sutton and I think one or two others from Alleyn’s joined the train at Streatham Hill, but those guys I think started after the “mugging” described below.

Friday 21 February 1975 – “mugged” on train. TV Sportstown, Rhoda, Porridge and MASH v good.

I remember a fair bit about the incident, although I don’t think I could identify the brace of assailants now. In those days, British Rail had 10×10 person compartment carriages on those suburban trains. Andy and I usually had a compartment to ourselves, but on this occasion we were joined by two larger lads. They seemed well big to us, but we were 12; they might have been 15 or 16.

Hey boys, they shouted, have you got any money…and we said…

…very little. We had very little money. We were schoolboys who had no need for money on a regular school day, so I suspect we had a couple of bob between us. (That’s 10p if younger readers are unfamiliar with the terminology).

We gave them what little we had and then, I remember this so clearly, the assailants sort-of boxed…pretty much just slapped, our ears, perhaps in frustration at the paucity of their haul and/or possibly because our suits betrayed the fact that we were from a posh school.

Ultra-violence it wasn’t, which is why my diary entry used the term “mugged” rather than, for example, MUGGED.

Saturday 22 February 19 75 – TV Doctor Who, Walt Disney. David Aarons – Monopoly, I won. [He] taught me gin rummy.

Two Saturdays in a row my parents must have gone out, two Saturdays in a row David Aarons (one of Lionel & Dina Aarons’s children) came around. Mum and dad must have been fitting in a few socials ahead of mum going in for her hip replacement.

At age 12-and-a-half, I clearly didn’t have it in me to use the term “babysitting” in my diary, but that is what this would have been. David could have only just turned 16 by then. Prior to David, it was quite often one of his big sisters, Ruth or Judith, who would babysit for me. They had probably outgrown that role by then – indeed one of them at least was probably already at University by then. I don’t think the fourth Aarons “kid”, Robert, ever babysat for me.

I remember those sessions with David well. My perception was that he treated me more like a grown up than his sisters. Possibly I WAS quite a bit more grown up with him, or at least a fair bit closer to his age and stage of life. I do remember him teaching me games, although I had quite forgotten that he set me on the road to Gin Rummy. I remember him using some choice phrases that I liked and emulated for a while. I especially liked:

Expletive deleted…

…when indicated a desire to swear but the restraint to avoid doing so. I still use that one occasionally. I was saddened to learn that he died of brain cancer tragically young.

Sunday 23 February 1975 – classes good. Chinese good. Came home after lunch. TV The Great War, Who Do You Do.

Monday 24 February 1975 – went to visit mum in hospital. TV Goodies, Call My Bluff.

Tuesday 25 February 1975 – went to visit mum again. Rather uneventful day. Saw muggers in next door café.

Dad couldn’t cook to save his life, so while mum was in hospital having a pre-operation (plate removal from a failed attempt to avoid hip replacement) ahead of her hip replacement surgery, we ate almost every night in restaurants and cafes – either in Streatham, Camberwell or somewhere inbetween.

I recall the fact that I spotted the previous week’s assailants in a cafe just a few days later and pointed the fact out to my dad. It was one of those moments when you realise that your dad is not the all-embracing protector that your childhood assumes him to be. I can’t remember exactly what dad said, but it would have been something along the lines of…

…put it out of your mind, son.

It’s possible that he didn’t believe that I had really spotted the right guys. After all, even the police had a lousy reputation for identifying and nailing the right young criminals in such circumstances.But I’m equally sure that dad would have, quite rightly, felt loathe to take on such a situation.

Wednesday 26 February 1975 – went into Uncle Cyril’s cos of operation, went to [Cyril’s] shop, masala yum yum, played chess and I won!

Uncle Cyril in this instance is our next door neighbour Cyril Barnett. This was probably the first time that Cyril and his wife Marion took me in the back of their van up to Chalk Farm to deliver stock to his shop and have a treat at Marine Ices as a reward for helping them.

What would “elf & safety” say about a 12 year old kid rattling around in the back of a van with a whole load of shutters on rails? We could probably have Cyril and Marion taken away in chains for that today, but back then we all rolled with such risks and I rather enjoyed the thrill of those van rides…

Cyril: proof positive that you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs

…and I absolutely loved Marine Ices masala-flavoured ice cream. I fear the place has now gone, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.

Thursday, 27 February 1975 – visited mummy after shop. Dinner, “Adam’s Ribs”. TV The Roman Way, Dave Allen At Large.

”Dinner Adam’s Ribs” is a reference to a segment in MASH, where one of the characters was dreaming about his favourite Chinese spare ribs restaurant, which was named Adam’s Ribs. After visiting mum in Kings College Hospital, Dad and I found a Chinese restaurant in Camberwell where we both thought the spare ribs especially fine, so we declared that they were Adam’s Ribs.

Friday 28 February 1975 – Went to shop. Visited mummy. TV Porridge and MASH..

Saturday 1 March 1975 – Went to Andrew after school. Played snooker. Visited mummy again.

Mum was in hospital for 10 days or so, I think, preparing to having her Stanmore inserted in May.

It is strange sitting writing this article in the clinic, almost 50 years to the day that mum started the process of a hip replacement, having just yesterday had mine replaced. She got 40 years out of hers, I doubt if I’ll need or want 40 years out of mine!

A Private Lesson In Arthroplasty, Hockey, Supervising Entrance Exams, Viola Mooted, A Field Trip To Kew Gardens & Far Too Much TV: Alleyn’s School & Beyond In The First Half Of February 1975

Arnold & Leatrice Levene…Interesting!

Let’s be honest – my handwriting did not improve during my Alleyn’s years

Sunday 2 February 1975 – classes good. Grandma Anne for tea. TV Film: Bueno Sera, Mrs Campbell.

Monday 3 February 1975– Fives good. TV Likely Lads, Alias Smith and Jones v good.

Tuesday 4 February 1975 – classes good. Went to Uncle Arnold’s. Very interesting. TV The Mighty Continent.

“Uncle Arnold’s” means Arnold Levene‘s house. Arnold, Leatrice and their several children (some of whom, especially Rachel and Caroline, will crop up at times in my diaries) lived in Abbotswood Road, about five minutes walk from our place. Arnold & Leatrice were good friends with my parents.

“Uncle Arnold” was a consultant pathologist at the Royal Marsden and also had a side-line as a coroner’s pathologist.

I remember this visit incredibly clearly for the “interesting” episode to which i refer. Arnold had learnt that my mother was due to have total hip arthroplasty later in February.

Presumably, while undertaking a post mortem around that time, he uncovered a Stanmore prosthetic hip, the very type my mother was due to have. Arnold must have thought that it would “do the boy good” to see the exact type of hip joint that his mother was about to receive, so he presented me with that rather gory trophy on this visit, explaining in great detail how such prosthetics work.

This image borrowed from the journal article linked here on fair use grounds to help educate readers.

Mum was more than a little horrified. Dad was more than a little amused. “What’s Ian supposed to do with that?”, asked mum, pointing at the prosthetic which still showed some visible signs of its recent physical location.

He should take it to school, to show his schoolmates, and thereafter use it as a doorstop…

…was Arnold’s typically blunt reply.

I took Arnold’s advice for many decades, although it also lived tucked away in drawers at times, when Resting from doorstop duties. But at some point a few years ago, Janie decided that the item spooked her, so I either deep filed it very deeply indeed (I cannot find it) or I agreed to part company with it.

Which is a shame, as, 50 years later, I am about to get a prosthetic hip joint of my own. And although mine will be all ceramic and quite possibly pink, I’d quite like to see “old, faithful Stan” again. Not sure I’d want to wear a second hand one, though.

Sounds as though “trying hockey” was a good idea for me

Wednesday 5 February 1975 – Hockey v good. 3-2 us, I scored two of the three. TV Anna and the King, Top Crown and Till Death Us Do Part.

Thursday 6 February 1975 – classes good. TV The Roman Way, After That…This, The Two Ronnies.

Friday 7 February 1975 – PE good. TV Sportstown. Chico and the Man, Nellie (not on your) and MASH.

Saturday, 8 February 1975 – got nasty cold. Went shopping. TV Doctor Who, Disney, Pot Black, Jane Eyre and Kojak v good.

Sunday 9 February 1975 – still bad cold. Missed classes. TV Who Do You Do!?!?!?

Monday 10 February 1975 – prepared for entrance exams. TV Likely Lads, Smith and Jones, Goodies, Call My Bluff.

Tuesday, 11 February 1975 – entrance exam – Tindale. V good. TV. MacMillan & Wife, Androcles & The Lion film.

I vaguely recall helping to supervise entrance exams and feeling very grown up that we second years were entrusted with the enormous responsibility of “sitting there”. Trevor Tindale no doubt made the role feel terribly important and will have marshalled us in his inimitable and positive manner, hence the name check.

Androcles and the Lion was one of those “of their time” 1950s epic movies, starring Jean Simmons & Victor Mature. My dad loved GB Shaw’s writing, which is probably why we watched it.

“Whatever you do, don’t mention the Roman-Parthian wars…”.

The so-called-AI app that I use to turn my dictation into text, named that film “Andrew Cleese & the Lion”, which I rather like as an alternative. John’s brother, presumably?

Wednesday 12 February 1975 – Chapel (no). TV Top Crown, Till Death Us Do Part.

Thursday 13 February 1975 – could learn viola. TV the Roman Way, The Two Ronnies.

To understand why “could learn viola” is a funny line, you need to understand how utterly awful I was at playing the violin. The noise was excruciating.

My mother wanted me to play, because I come from a long line of elite violinists…

Turn It Up To Max & Spit: The Baltic Origins Of My Mother’s (Marcus) Family Revealed

That particular bit of the family talent gene pool didn’t make it to me. Nor did a switch to viola do anything other than lower the tone even further. [Did you see what I did there?]

Deeper doo-doo

Friday 14 February 1975 – field day. Kew Gardens. ‘Green grows my bogling fork”. Went to Paul’s after, great day. TV Sportstown, Paper Moon and MASH v good.

In truth I remember little about the field trip to Kew Gardens. I don’t think it was our first choice. Gardens have never really been my thing…neither have outdoor places when the weather is cold been my thing.

But I do remember Paul Deacon teaching me the “Green Grows My Bogling Fork” song…

…aka Green Grow My Nadgers Oh

Paul Deacon might choose to explain himself or comment further upon the inexplicable.

Saturday 15 February 1975 – half term, uneventful. TV Doctor Who, Walt Disney, David Aarons – Monopoly.

Sunday, 16 February 1975 – classes talk. Afternoon went with Ida Manny and Anthony. TV Who Do You Do? Kalooki.

Monday 17 February 1975 – uneventful. Played with games etc. TV Likely Lads, Alias Smith & Jones, Goodies and Call My Bluff.

Tuesday, 18 February 1975 – went shopping, classes good. TV McMillan and Wife, The Mighty Continent.

I’ll write up the David Aarons story next time, as he came around again the following Saturday.

I cannot get that wretched Green Grows My Bogling Fork song out of my head again now. Thank you, Paul Deacon!

I wonder whether one should use a Chamley or a Stanmore prosthetic hip as a bogling fork? Surely some medical people among my readership can advice.

After Soccer At Alleyn’s: Barton Found In 2025, Plus Soccer-Free (Trying Hockey & Playing Fives) Remainder Of January 1975 For Me

Is that Chris Grant and others trying hockey in this 1975/76 picture?

This article is a sequel to my recent piece about the first half of January 1975 which involved what must surely be the worst defeat I ever suffered on a football pitch:

The End Of The Hols & Start Of Lent Term 1975 At Alleyn’s, During Which My Poor Little Class, 2AK, Got Mauled On The Soccer Field

That article was enhanced by some timely correspondence from the antipodes, with Nigel Allott, who more-or-less confessed to being the goalie in that match. Whether his family’s flight to the antipodes a year or so later was connected with that humiliation is a matter purely for conjecture. I find it hard to imagine any other reason to emigrate to New Zealand in 1976. ?

But then, a few days after publication, in mid-January 2025, a coincidental encounter with another prominent Alleyn’s Old Boy Goalie, Simon Barton.

Finding Barton, Hidden In Plain Sight

For those of you who don’t follow Ogblog comprehensively, I should explain that my sports enthusiasm since school has focussed on cricket and tennis – latterly that most wonderful sport real tennis, which I took up in 2016.

I have even managed some modicum of success at real tennis, not least on the following occasion:

Finally…Unprecedented Success At Tennis, The Queen’s Club, 11 May & 27 May 2022

Real tennis is a friendly, welcoming game. Enthusiasts encourage new players, for whom our fiendishly complex game is always extremely difficult at first. We use handicapping, which helps us to play “mixed ability / mixed experience” games. At Lord’s, which is my home court, I curate club nights, which are convivial and friendly. The mini matches we play are competitive, but with a very small “c”.

Recently I have encountered a relative newbie – a chap named Simon Barton, whom I partnered in a friendly game of doubles the other other day. In the sort of locker room chat that goes on in places such as the MCC locker room, Simon mentioned that he was to play a golf match the following week against the Old Alleynians, to which I instinctively said:

ah, great, make sure you sock it to them!

When Simon wondered why I said that and I explained that I am an AOB, he exclaimed…

…so am I!…

…and of course we started swapping Alleyn’s stories.

The coincidence is all the more strange, because a quick trawl of the Scribblerus resources I have been mining for pictures of late, revealed Simon’s name underneath the “goalies eye view” picture I used in my early January 1975 piece, linked above:

Once Simon has gained a bit more experience at real tennis and once I have recovered from my impending hip replacement surgery, I hope we can represent the AOBs in The Cattermull Cup, which is THE handicap school alumni tournament for real tennis. Target – spring 2026.

Second Half Of January 1975 – When I Mercifully Switched Away From Footie

Sunday, 19 January 1975 – Classes morning. Afternoon [Grandma] Jenny and Doris [Marcus – widow of my mother’s cousin Harry]. Very nice change [from seeing my Harris grandma, Anne]. TV Planet of the Apes.

Monday, 20 January 1975 – Games choice – hockey. TV Likely Lads, Smith and Jones, Call My Bluff, Churchill’s People.

Tuesday 21 January 1975 – uneventful. Classes good. TV The Mighty continent on World War II – very interesting.

Wednesday, 22 January 1975 – Fives – great tuition from Mr Tindale. Evening went to Peacock club to arrange Bar mitzvah [party].

Thursday, 23 January 1975 – classes good. TV Roman Way, After That…This and The Two Ronnies- very good

Friday, 24 January 1975 – Biology – petri dishes. TV Sportstown, MASH.

Saturday 25 January 1975 – Exeat [i.e. no Saturday morning school]. Went to Shule. Afternoon uneventful. TV Doctor Who, Generation Game, Pot Black.

It’s interesting, to me, that I was noting the content of biology classes at that time. Chris Liffen was our 2AK biology teacher. I remember that he was strict and could be tetchy if he thought you were being lazy or lazy-minded, but he took great pains to try to make the lessons interesting, which clearly worked with me and inspired me to jot down a reminder of the content in my diary. Don’t try to quiz me on topics such as petri dishes, bacteria and/or milk.

Not quite this level of fives

Sunday, 26 January 1975 – Classes good. Kalloki 4p

Monday, 27 January 1975 – Tu BiShvat [a sort-of ecological Jewish festival – I had to Google it], so went to classes. TV Alias Smith Jones, Call My Bluff, Churchill’s People.

Tuesday, 28 January 1975 – No classes because of yesterday – otherwise uneventful. [I love the way the absence of an activity was the most…indeed the only…eventful thing I could mention that day]

Wednesday 29 January 1975 – Fives v good. Alan [Cooke] and I beat Tug & Athaide, and Barnett & Friersen. I beat Fred and Alan 15-10 TV Till Death Us Do Part

Thursday 30 January 1975 – Classes v good. TV After That…This and The Two Ronnies

Friday 31 January 1975 – Uneventful. Biology bacteria and milk. TV Sportstown and MASH and Rhoda v good.

Saturday 1 February 1975 – School morning. Afternoon played on my own. TV Doctor Who, Generation Game, Jane Eyre and Kojak.

Who loves ya, baby? inkknife_2000 (7.5 million views +), CC BY-SA 2.0

More important questions than “who loves ya, baby?”:

  1. Who was nicknamed Tug?
  2. Who was nicknamed Fred?

Answers in the comments (or by private message if guesses).

Update On The Exam Questions

I really should read my own resources before asking questions. According to my 1974/75 class names list, “Pullinger” was known as “Tug”. I suspect also that “Fred” doesn’t read Fred at all, but reads “Brad” for Dave Bradshaw:

My Second Class At Alleyn’s School, 2AK, And Some Nicknames, guessing 1 January 1975

Still prepared to be corrected on such points.

The End Of The Hols & Start Of Lent Term 1975 At Alleyn’s, During Which My Poor Little Class, 2AK, Got Mauled On The Soccer Field

Unable To Face It – picture from a 1970s Scribblerus

OK, which of you horrible other classes led to my humiliating diary confession:

Monday 13 January 1975 – lost football match 16-1…

Was it you, 2BJ? Or more likely you, 2BM? Surely not 2AS? If no-one owns up to this, I might have to put all of you into detention.

16-1. How must that have felt at the time?

All was lost, but that the heavens fought…

…that’s what I probably said at the time…or words to that effect

Coincidentally, I received some cheery correspondence the other day (just shy of 50 years after the events described in this article), from Nigel Allott, who was in 1s and 2AK with us “back then”, but fled England with his family for New Zealand of all places about a year after The Carnage Match.

What is it with New Zealand and Alleyn’s alums named Nigel? Sir Nigel Godfrey might choose to help answer this question.

Anyway, Nigel Allott writes:

I’ve just stumbled across your site while browsing other Alleyn’s information. I am the Allott that appears in your diary class lists. We left for New Zealand after the first term of Year 3, but I remember a few of the class well, and enjoyed my time at Alleyn’s.

Given that I was planning this article at the time, I thought it only polite, as part of my reply, to ask Nigel about THAT match:

…Do you remember us (2AK) losing a football match 16-1 to another class on 13 January?  That must have been a tough score line to take…

Nigel responded:

I can’t remember the football match, but it is likely I was in goal watching the ball go past. I knew so little about football when I started at Alleyns that I was always put in goal because it kept me facing the right way!

I do remember enjoying field trips along the South Downs, although there was one field trip when our bus slid off the M4 on black ice near Heathrow (we might have been going somewhere else that time).

Yes, I have written up one of those field trips:

Alleyn’s School First Year (1S) Field Trip With John Clarke, 22 to 24 June 1974

As for keeping goal, which became my gig on the rare occasions I played football after that season, I suspect that it was only Nigel’s superior skills at lobbying for the goalie role that kept me and my two left feet away from it until Nigel and family abandoned the school. My memories of house football in the year or two following 2AK are solely about me being in goal.

A terrified-goalie’s-eye view, another 1970s Scribblerus picture

I hope it wasn’t the humiliating 16-1 defeat at football that drove Nigel and his family to flee to the furthest-flung corner of the dominions, where word of this sporting humiliation would probably not have reached…until now.

Let’s trawl the rest of my diary around that time. It wasn’t all about losing football matches 16-1. But, I mean, 16-1?! I wonder who scored the one? No, I’m over it again now.

Sunday, 5 January 1975 – Classes morning. Afternoon Grandma Anne Kalooki lost 5p. TV Planet of the Apes, Colombo, and No honestly. V good.

Monday, 6 January 1975 – Cloudy. Morning uneventful. Afternoon Andrew [Levinson]. TV Likely Lads, Alias Smith and Jones, Call My Bluff, and Churchill’s People.

Tuesday, 7 January 1975 – Fair. Went shopping in morning. Played in afternoon. TV film Right Left and Centre with Ian Carmichael and Alistair Sims v good.

Actually that film was called Left, Right & Centre. You can watch it on Daily Motion if you wish:

Wednesday, 8 January 1975 – Returned to school. TV Benny Hill v good indeed.

Thursday, 9 January 1975 – Classes good. Improved on model aeroplane – Cessna Skywagon.

Ah, the model kit that Auntie Pam and Uncle Michael gave me was a balsa wood Cessna Skywagon kit. The kit looked a bit like this. I vaguely recall the smell of the glue being the best bit of this exercise from my point of view. Not really ideal for cack-handed 12-year-olds, balsa wood model airplanes.

Friday 10 January 1975 – PE – swam butterfly. Nearly finished model. TV Rhoda and MASH v good.

Saturday, 11 January 1975 – School in morning. Bonfire in afternoon. TV ?!!!

I let the side down there, not noting the viewing. BBC Genome to the rescue. I’m going to guess Pot Black, Lulu and Kojak.

Sunday, 12 January 1975 – Classes morning. Afternoon Grandma Anne at home. Kalooki 19p. TV Planet of the Apes, film Billy Liar v good.

I vaguely remember doing Billy Liar in class, either with Ian Sandbrook in 1S or Michael Lempriere in 2AK. I don’t suppose we were able to give it the Tom Courtney treatment in class. here’s the film trailer.

I remember at one time, a few years later, my mother wondered out loud whether I should apply to “work for Keith Waterhouse”. As I was dabbling with comedy writing at the time, I thought she might, uncharacteristically, be encouraging me to pursue my avocation ahead of knuckling down to a reputable job. Then I realised that mum must have been confusing Keith Waterhouse with Price Waterhouse.

Monday 13 January 1975 – Lost football match 16 –1. TV Likely Lads, Alias Smith and Jones, Call My Bluff and Churchill’s People.

Tuesday, 14 January 1975 – Rouse switched with handicraft. [50 years later, I have no idea what that means]. Classes good. TV, The Mighty Continent.

Wednesday 15 January 1975 – Fives v good. TV Till Death Us Do Part.

Thursday, 16 January 1975 – Physics good. No drama. Classes good. TV After That…This and The Two Ronnies

Friday, 17 January 1975 – Biology – bacteria. TV Sportstown, MASH.

Saturday 18 January 1975 – School morning. Afternoon uneventful. TV Pot Black, Thriller and Kojak.

Actually, the diary entry the following Monday provides some unintentional comedy in the light of the 16-1 defeat at soccer.

…games choice – hockey…

After a 16-1 defeat at soccer, switching to hockey instead seems like a sound move.

Actually, I now have a sneaking suspicion that my 2 December diary entry which mentions “extra with Rothbart” after the football, see the following linked piece…

The Return Of The 12-Year-Old Alleyn’s Diarist, Late November To Early December 1974

…might well have been a taster of hockey with Bernard Rothbart to encourage some of us to switch to his favoured sport. No doubt he had spotted a glimmer of talent for “hard ball and stick” games…or more likely Mr Rothbart had spotted an utter absence of talent for footy-type games.

“Try hockey, kid. Maybe, just maybe you could be a contender.” Another 1970s Scribblerus image.

Tomorrow, Tomorrow, I’ll Name Names, Tomorrow…Playing Call My Bluff In An English Class, Was It 1S Or 2AK? 1974 or 1975

I had a memory flash in September 2024 from an event at Alleyn’s School that must have been about 50 years ago now.

Janie and I went to see Here In America at The Orange Tree, Richmond:

Here In America by David Edgar, Orange Tree Theatre, 14 September 2024

Great play/production btw. The play is about the Second Red Scare in the 1950s.

It brought back to my mind a memory of playing Call My Bluff in an English class. That simple panel game had teams of three trying to convince the other team of three that “bluff” definitions of unusual words were actually true…and that true definitions were in fact bluffs.

Call My Bluff was “appointment to view” stuff in the 1970s – certainly in our household. Mind you, there wasn’t exactly a lot of choice back then.

The class version of the game was to split into teams of three and try to convince the rest of the class to vote for bluffs rather than the true definitions.

My team was given the word MCCARTHYISM. I must have recently learnt a passage of Hebrew in Hebrew classes with the word “machar” (מָחָר) in it. I quoted the short passage and explained that the word “machar” means tomorrow. I then strung out this small truth into a flight of fancy that there is a sect of Judaism, known as MCCARTHYISM, that venerates the future.

I know what you are thinking. The word would surely be spelt MACHARTHEISM if it had that definition. But such subtleties were probably beyond almost all of us at that age. I must have made the idea seem convincing.

When the class voted on the three definitions proposed for the word MCCARTHYISM, the true definition came second and my bluff got the most votes.

For some reason, this moment of smartarsed glory must have resided at the back of my memory all these decades, only to be revived by seeing Here In America.

But I also recall that, even at the time, I learnt quite a lot from this tiny episode. I learnt that using a grain of truth to disguise a lie (or bluff) is a very effective method of concealment. I learnt that nobody likes a smartarse, because the episode, while momentarily pleasing the teacher, did not make me popular with my class. And I subsequently learnt that my possession of a moral compass and my lack of a poker face would make me a very bad candidate for a future in bluffing.

But did we play that game in 1S, with Ian Sandbrook, or in 2AK with Mike Lempriere? I don’t recall.

Still, McCarthyism is all about naming names and I have named names for both of those classes:

My First Class At Alleyn’s School, 1S, And Some Nicknames, guessing 8 January 1974
My Second Class At Alleyn’s School, 2AK, And Some Nicknames, guessing 1 January 1975

So if you are, or have ever been, a member of one of those classes…

…and if you recall playing Call My Bluff in class…

…please let me know everything that you know. Yes, I mean everything.

Just answer the question.

And, of course, name yet more names…

After Alleyn’s Advent Term: Comic Capers, Jolly Japes, Marathon Mania, Tempos & Timpos, 15 to 21 December 1974

Although sparse and almost illegible, the notes in my diary from that week bring back a flood of memories.

Here is the page for that week in its glorious technicolour sparseness and illegibility:

I was going through a “coloured tempo pen” phase at that time. I think the Saturday entry was written in invisible ink, which I then remedied with the “antidote” stuff that makes invisible ink visible. That is not conventional diarist method, I now realise, but that idea must have made sense to me at the time…probably because I had bought invisible ink from the joke shop that week.

Let me start deciphering diary entries:

Sunday, 15 December 1974 – Hanukkah party at classes. Dined at Feld’s. [Visited] Jacksons to teach backgammon. TV Planet of the Apes v good

Monday, 16 December 1974 – Played at Andrew’s all day. TV Likely Lads, Waltons and Carry On Christmas very good indeed.

Aficionados of Motown music will be disappointed to learn that I did not visit nor teach backgammon to The Jackson Five.

Just to be clear, I did not teach any of these people backgammon. Not Jackie, not Tito, not Jermaine, not Marlon and not Michael.

The Jacksons, in this instance, were Doreen Benjamin’s parents. Doreen’s mum, Jessie Jackson…yes, I know…was a very close friend of Grandma Jenny and Doreen was a very close friend of mum’s.

For the avoidance of doubt, I neither visited nor taught backgammon to the Reverend Jesse Jackson either

Tuesday, 17 December 1974 – Andrew and I went to “Bossils”? and Hamleys. Classes v good. Mum and dad went to [Angela and John’s] wedding. Fooled all with joke shop hot sweets.

With Hanukkah well before Christmas that year, I suspect that I had already received some seasonal gift money, as had Andy Levinson no doubt, so we were both in a position to treat ourselves on a big day out during the school holidays.

We probably knew where to go (e.g. Hamleys) because of a tradition we were lucky enough to be conjoined in when we were a bit smaller. Mrs Garrett, grandmother of our friend from the street, Bernard Garrett (no, not the Bernard Garrett depicted in the film The Banker), took us up to Hamleys with Bernard a couple of times in the early 1970s as a Christmas treat.

I’m not sure where the joke shop was – I recall visiting Davenports near The British Museum with Andy, but that must have been a different trip I think. I think the source of our joke shop sweets, stinkeroos and invisible ink was a joke shop at the Carnaby end of Soho.

“Fooled all with joke shop sweets” makes me think of the comics we used to read when we were little. I was allowed one a week; my comic of choice was Whizzer and Chips.

I’m sure the conceit that two comics had merged into one made me think I was getting as BOGOF by choosing Whizzer and Chips. Someone else in the street (possibly Andy Levinson) or maybe at Primary School (Alan Cooke?) was more the Beano type, so I would sometimes swap and get to see more than one comic in a week.

I think I had outgrown such comics by the age of 12, but I had clearly not completely outgrown the language I learnt from them. Yaroo!

Wednesday, 18 December 1974 – Dentist in the morning first thing. Essential filling. Andrew in afternoon. “Enhanced”? stinkeroo from the joke shop worked. Went to Fairfield Hall with Paul Deacon – very nice time there.

Mum and dad’s evening at Angela and John’s wedding feast had not been a total success, as I recall. Dad had rather overindulged and mum felt he had embarrassed her. This combination of mum berating and dad hungover was quite clear to me that next morning. Meanwhile I was suffering from my own collywobbles ahead of that trip to the dentist for an “essential filling”.

I have had very few fillings in my lifetime – this might have been my first one or possibly the second.

Our dentist was Harry Wachtel, a gentleman of n Austrian origin, who had been a refugee from the Nazis. He spoke with a thick Germanic accent and did not suffer fools gladly.

I didn’t think that Mr Wachtel had CCTV cameras in his surgery. Yet, a couple of years later, John Schlesinger recreated, in Marathon Man, the scene of that filling, with such exceptional accuracy…I’m now thinking that Harry Wachtel must have filmed that filling event and sent the rushes to John Schlesinger. There is no other possible explanation for the following movie scene:

I cannot remember what Paul Deacon and I went to see at The Fairfield Hall on 18 December 1974. Do you remember, Paul? In any case, many thanks to you, Paul, (or should I say, thanks to your folks) for treating me along with you. My diary suggests that we had a great time.

Thursday, 19 December 1974 – morning Andrews. Lunch at Andrews. Afternoon at home with Andrew -> Classes – TV Mastermind and Xmas Oneupmanship v good.

Friday, 20 December 1974 – Alan [Cooke] here all day – very nice indeed. TV Goodies and the Beanstalk very good. G Anne’s v good got lots of presents.

Saturday, 21 December 1974 – Made a start on model Auntie Pam gave me. TV “something clover v good”?

I’m going to guess that Cookie and I spent a fair part of that day playing the bespoke game we invented with my Hot Wheels car track and a rather motley collection of Timpo Wild West buildings, which we would half-heartedly construct at the end of the Hot Wheels run and then demolish with the Hot Wheels cars.

Maybe you had to be there…or maybe you had to be 10-12 to appreciate this activity, but Alan and I would spend hours at this activity. Hey, Alan – look at those e-bay links – it wouldn’t cost THAT much to recreate the scene. I’m sure Janie would understand and I’m sure we could make space here for yet more clutter.

Sadly, my terrible handwriting, together with the effluxion of time makes the TV element of my log illegible. Happily, BBC Genome comes to the rescue, enabling me to confirm that I rated Doctor In Clover “v good”.

End Term At Alleyn’s, A Big Moka & An Aufruf, 8 to 14 December 1974

Angela & John Kessler, this photo just nine months after their wedding

The diary page for this week is as colourful as it is (almost) unintelligible:

It is my profound belief that, although artificial intelligence can read the charred remains of 2000-year-old Herculaneum scrolls, the technology would still struggle to make sense of my diabolical writing and spelling from 1974

Allow me to try to interpret the above scrawl for you:

Sunday, 8 December 1974 – First light in play [Hanukah play at chedar, presumably]. Dined at Schmidt’s. The Great War, Sykes, David Copperfield and A Change Of Ground.

Monday, 9 December 1974 – Last full day of term. Uneventful. TV Waltons, Call My Bluff, and Horizon v good indeed.

Tuesday 10 December 1974 – Christmas dinner v good. Classes rehearsal. Mission Impossible and Rhoda v good.

Wednesday, 11 December 1974 – Rather uneventful. Left school 2 o’clock, Carol rehearsal. Disappearing World – Ongka’s Big Moka Rather amusing?????

I don’t much review television programmes (probably just as well given the amount of TV I was watching back then), but a few years ago I wrote up my memories of Ongka’s Big Moka, because it had such a profound effect on me, sparking my interest in South-East Asia/Oceania.

Ongka’s Big Moka, Television Documentary, 11 December 1974

Thursday, 12 December 1974 – Left school 2:20 carol service. Classes good. TV Mastermind good.

Friday, 13 December 1974 – Broke up today. Not a very good report…

…hardly surprising given the amount of TV I was watching in the evenings when I should have been doing my homework. Honestly…

TV Dad’s Army, Ken Dodd and MASH v good.

Saturday, 14 December 1974 – Went to ooof roof [John & Angela’s aufruf]. Meal was excellent. TV Run Wild Run Free film, Stanley Baxter, and Candid Camera very good indeed

I didn’t at the time spot the juxtaposition of watching the Melanesian tribal ceremony, Ongka’s Big Moka, and, a few days later, attending the Jewish tribal ceremony that was Angela and John’s aufruf. For those who don’t like to click, the aufruf is a tradition of calling up the groom in synagogue on the Saturday before the wedding.

I am glad that I gave that aufruf meal an “excellent” review 50 years ago, as that should please Angela and John ahead of their impending golden wedding anniversary. I do remember enjoying the aufruf event very much, conversing with the grown ups and feeling a little more grown up myself for the experience. I distinctly remember finding the film Run Wild Run Free rather childish and mawkish, perhaps in comparison.

What might seem a lot less grown up…and might please Angela and John a bit less, is my abiding memory that I insisted, in the build up to the day, on pronouncing the word “aufruf”…

woof-woof

…to the extent that I recall mum telling me, wagging finger style, that I was not to make that silly joke at the event.

I’m the curator of my own jokes now, mum

I, A Critic: Why Use 800 Words When 8 Words Might Do?, Alleyn’s School Bear Pit, The Lesson by Eugène Ionesco & The Real Inspector Hound by Tom Stoppard, 7 December 1974

Images scraped with loving care from Alleyn’s Scriblerus

I went with my parents on the Saturday evening to see the last night of that year’s Bear Pit production; a double-header no less – The Lesson & The Real Inspector Hound.

Let us gloss over the monumental water polo victory in the morning…11-7 that reads, just in case you are finding my handwriting a little hard to read.

Let us not linger over the fact that the 12-year-old me thought it important to say that I thought the Generation Game was good…

…whereas 12-year-old me failed completely to mention that Barry White – “The Walrus Of Love” – “The Pachyderm Of Passion” – was riding high at the top of the charts at that time with this classic sound:

No. Let us please focus on Bear Pit production for December 1974. My job back then as a juvenile critic was to be clear, incisive and decisive in my opinions. I think I achieved that:

Bear Pit. The Lesson – boring. Inspector Hound – good.

The late, great, Trevor Tindale spent at lest 100 times as many words saying…if I have understood the thrust of his argument correctly…more or less exactly the same thing in Scriblerus some months later.

If you prefer to read Scriblerus pages from pdfs, here is a scrape of those two pages as a pdf.

But you might not want all that detail:

The Lesson – boring.

The Real Inspector Hound -good.