Tag: Brixton Shule

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

Tony King, Form Master Of 2AK

Some readers might recall an intense period of 11-year-old diary writing, which ran out of steam towards the end of April 1974…

Russell, Herbie, Cougar, Fives, Tennis, Latin & Then Months Of Silence: The Last Few Days Of Holiday & The First Few Days Back At Alleyn’s, Late April 1974

…after which my diary fell silent for seven months. During those seven months, I…

..went a bit madrigal with my dad:

You Don’t Have To Be Madrigal To Learn About Music Here, But It Helps: Madrigals Of Love And War From The Radio, 4 June 1974, Plus The Top Five From That Week To Worm Their Ways Back Into Your Ears

… finished my first year at Alleyn’s, including a memorable IS field trip with John Clark…

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

…messed about during the summer, watching and playing cricket – the latter both in the back drive and on Tooting Bec Common

Stumps In the Back Drive, Thank You, Cyril Barnett, circa 1 July 1974
Back When I Didn’t Know My Asif From My Sarfraz, Cricket On Tooting Bec Common, Summer 1974

…and went to Sicily with my parents, turning 12 while I was there… [Ogblog yet to be writ on this topic. Alleyn’s pals didn’t want to know all about it in autumn 1974, I doubt if anyone is desperate to know about it in autumn 2024]. The photos can be viewed through this link or below.

Corso Umberto At Fenicula End IMG00041

Then I went back to school, joining 2AK. By the end of November, I was ready to be a diarist again – indeed I kept a diary pretty much unbroken for the next 14 years, after which I switched to event logs to accompany my appointment diaries.

I think I might have taken some guidance from my parents or friends on what to write about, in the immediate aftermath of my return to diary writing. I talk a lot about what I saw on TV and for a while prefaced each daily report with a one word summary of the weather. The latter habit soon passed. The watching much TV habit passed once I finished school, so my knowledge of soap operas and comedy shows is extremely patchy for the 1980s and almost non-existent by the 1990s, when for many years I had no TV at all!

My handwriting was truly terrible back in my school days, made worse by the use of coloured Tempo felt tip pens (or occasionally pencil or goodness-knows-what-sort-of-writing-implement) for the diary.

I am reliably informed by educationalist friends that my bad handwriting and terrible spelling would no longer justify a clip around the ear and recriminations about my laziness by school-teachers. Apparently it is a condition known as dysgraphia, which would open up all manner of possibilities for my special needs, including the provision of IT equipment in class and at home to assist me, plus, presumably, pity rather than opprobrium.

Anyway, let me try to transliterate the first few days of my return to being a diarist:

Saturday, 30 November 1974 – Performed whodunnit play. Afternoon uneventful. Dick Emery and Upstairs Downstairs good.

Sunday, 1 December 1974 – Classes started a Hanukah play. Afternoon Grandma Anne’s. Planet of the Apes on TV v good.

Monday 2 December 1974 – Inter-form soccer v good. Extra + Rothbart. TV Likely Lads, Waltons and Call My Bluff v good.

Tuesday, 3 December 1974 – French, maths and Latin tests. Classes v good. TV Paper Moon and Mighty Continent.

I cannot remember anything about the whodunnit play, but I think Michael Lempriere was our English teacher that year (other 2AK folk might confirm or deny) – if so, then drama-oriented English class activities were very much his thing.

Weirdly, although I report that the inter-form soccer on the Monday was “v good”, the rear of the diary also records, dutifully, that our opponents were 2AS and that we lost 2-6. Was I really that good a loser back then?

I have no idea what “Extra + Rothbart” means, other than a sneaking suspicion that Bernard Rothbart must have refereed that game and presumably gave us some extra practice and/or coaching after the match, that pleased me. I remember Mr Rothbart a chess and hockey master, not soccer. And of course I will never forget about his sad demise just five year’s later:

Sunday School: Bernard Rothbart’s Funeral, 9 December 1979

Wednesday, 4 December 1974 – [see the specific posting about that auspicious day linked here and below]

A Marathon Day Of Court Sport; Fives At Alleyn’s School And Fridge Ball At Woodfield Avenue, 4 December 1974

Thursday, 5 December 1974 – 40 out of 50 for Latin test – good. No other positions. Learnt Hanukkah baruchas [prayers] with Mr Morris. Mastermind and Monty Python v good.

Friday, 6 December 1974 – Rather uneventful. PE good. Ken Dodd quite good.

The PE was more likely to have been with Mr Sherlock or Mr Berry than with my form master, Tony King. But they were all of the sporty teachers, for sure.

Sherlock, Berry & King

A Trio Of Firsts: My First Pictorial Appearance In A Newspaper, Almost Certainly My First Performance In A Show & “My First Girlfriend”, May 1966

My mum kept certain things and threw lots of things away. Two artefacts from an event at Nightingale survived the sands of time and mum’s occasional “mad-on” clear-outs across the decades.

The above clipping from the Jewish Chronicle is dated 27 May 1966.

Children of the Yavneh Jewish Kindergarten [based at Brixton Shule], presenting fruits for Shavuot at the Home For Aged Jews, Wandsworth [now named Nightingale House]

What a wonderful way to entrench the Jewish festival of Shavuot into the hearts and minds of the little children. Except, that, as history showed 50+ years later, it didn’t work on me and at least one other of the attendees:

A Winning Day, Culminating At Bill’s For A “Shavuot Not” BBYO Youth Club Regathering: , 1 June 2017

The Play’s The Thing…

The document below provides more detail about the event, which was presumably held a few days before the date of the newspaper notice:

A better quality picture, clearly from the same event. But Reuben Turner’s note hopes that people “will enjoy the play”. My guess is that he used a picture from the Shavuot event in his promotion letter for a play that was put on some days or weeks later.

I can only wonder at what the play might have been – perhaps a depiction of the traditional Shavuot story – The Book of Ruth.

Naomi entreating Ruth and Orpah to return to the land of Moab. William Blake, actually. Not Reubens…and not Turner

But in any case, what a cast!

The picture with Mr Turner’s letter has survived better, enabling me to identify several of the youngsters. I cannot name the adults in the picture – I’d hazard a guess that the man is Reuben Turner. The picture of the woman looks disconcertingly like my dad in drag, but I don’t think that was the case.

I am pretty sure I can name several of the kids, working from right to left…

…oy, so I must have learnt something at Yavneh…

  • Sara Monty [fairly sure] (standing);
  • Me (standing);
  • Sandra Corbman (sitting);
  • Maxine [Camlish?] (sitting);
  • Eve Cedar (standing);
  • Boy I cannot name (standing);
  • Girl I cannot name (sitting);
  • Jonathan Davies (standing);
  • Girl I cannot name (sitting);
  • Girl I cannot name (standing);
  • Jonathan Gold [fairly sure] (sitting);
  • Half a girl I can barely see, let alone name (standing).

Any help that a reader might offer to help fill in the gaps and/or pass this relic on to those who were in it would be much appreciated.

If anyone out there remembers anything at all about the show, I’d love to know. But it might well be that my love of theatre started there, 58 years ago as I write in 2024.

“My First Girlfriend”

I have very little recollection of my time at Yavneh Kindergarten, other than an impressionistic sense that I was happy there most of the time and that the experience did its job of preparing me to start school that autumn.

My only tangible memory is one that has been handed down to me by my mum, who used to take great pleasure in relating the following story in circumstances that might cause me maximum embarrassment.

One day, when my father asked me, as oft he would, to “report on the events of the day at Kindergarten”, I proudly announced:

I’ve got a girlfriend. She’s called Sandra.

When asked for more detail about my girlfriend, I stated that:

…we roll in the barrel together.

Whether my parents were able to keep a straight face at the time, and if so, how, I’ll never know.

As it happens, Sandra and I never did go out with one another, but we spent a fair chunk of our youth together through BBYO in Streatham and are still very much in touch to this day. Indeed Sandra was one of the Shavuot avoiders at our 2017 regathering and I expect to see her at the 2024 regathering about 10 days after this piece is published…

…if she is still speaking to me by then!

Update: Sandra Responds…

Brilliant stuff Ian. I also have some memories of being happy there but unfortunately I don’t remember the barrel. 😂