No . 130 The Trusty Servant
‘ Says nothing but likes cricket ’ - he went to King ’ s London to read Physiology and then appeared at Clifton Prep School teaching Chemistry , Classics and MiC of cricket : Richard Woodrow .
We started the A-level Nuffield course trial in 1966 and I was lucky enough to be the first teacher of the class which included four ‘ Bunny girls ’, four bright girls from Winchester County High School . They all gained high grades at every stage , at one went on to read Medicine at Cambridge . At first the boys said , ‘ Of course girls do well , but they just work all the time ’, but they were forced to amend their prejudices when one of the girls asked to be away for an international hockey trial .
Winchester introduced me to house tutoring ( with the redoubtable Colin Badcock in Chawker ’ s ), some lowgrade cricket and even some rugby on a Thursday afternoon as well as playing rugby at the Winchester club with David Jewell ( Science , 62-67 ). Helping with athletics ( Sir David Clementi ( E , 62-67 ) was our star sprinter ) and cross-country was also part of my education . The boys were almost uniformly intelligent , polite and good fun . You needed to know your subject , but boys shared your enthusiasm and it was a very rewarding time for me .
The traditions of the school were well-established . Evening tutorials , work handed in even on Sundays , Morning Hills , boys fishing for trout in the Itchen during a free period and the baffling Notions . Win Coll football combined the worst elements of rugby and soccer . It is hard to explain and even more difficult to leave such an environment . Indeed , many fine teachers remained at
Sir Desmond Lee
Winchester for their entire career while others did move on to promotion elsewhere . From my time , John Gammell ( 44-45 , 47-68 ) left to be Head of Repton , Hubert Doggart ( 50-72 ) to run King ’ s Bruton and David Jewell to be successively Head of Bristol Cathedral School , Repton and Haileybury . Tommy Cookson ( I , 55-60 ; Co Ro 67-72 , 74-90 ) went to King Edward VI Southampton and thence to run Sevenoaks , a school in the Far East and finally back to be Headmaster at Winchester ( 03-05 ).
Career development , reviews or appraisal were unheard of , but I did meet with Sir Desmond towards the end of my third year to discuss progress . I explained my ambition to run a department and perhaps move back to the Bristol area , with family links in Somerset and South Wales . Sir Desmond said the Biology post at Clifton ( where he had been Headmaster ) would come up in a couple of years and might be very suitable . Two weeks later the Clifton Biology post was advertised as the incumbent had decided to take early retirement . I applied , was offered the post , but had to wait for two terms while Winchester found my replacement . At that same time Bunny moved to Bath University , where he became Professor of Education , and so our association continued .
Times were different then , as a few anecdotes will confirm . Staff meetings only twice each term , first and last day , when little seemed to happen except everybody woke up when Ronnie Hamilton ( 33-69 ) explained the arrangements for the delivery of the Harvey ’ s wine orders ! There was a discussion on visual aids when one don said he had heard of a thing called an overhead projector but was unsure of its use . The science dons kept quiet as we had individual overhead projectors in our laboratories ! The Headmaster said he knew about maps that could be pulled down rather like roller blinds with a lavatory chain . Dons asked why you would need maps ( no Geography taught at Winchester at that time ), but the Classicists came to the rescue , explaining it would be good to be able to show maps of the Greek and Roman empires at different times ! We debated , and agreed , making the school doctor an honorary member of the Common Room but our Physical Education teachers ( PT Instructors ) were firmly excluded . There was an annual cricket match of Staff versus Servants . I remember going into the Common Room at the end of a very hot day to be met by the legendary Leslie Russon ( 40-69 ; Leslie and Agatha Russon ’ s German texts were standard works ). Leslie said he thought he had fallen asleep twice during a lesson earlier that day . ‘ How do you know ?’ we asked . ‘ Well ,’ he
11