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St Chads Schools

niksagkram

Always a Villa fan
Hi all. Anybody here a former pupil at St. Chads? I attended the schools on Brearly St. and Shadwell Street, behind the Cathedral, in the 60s. I believe Sister Marie was my head mistresss, with several other nuns as a supporting cast. Very strict, they were!!

Mark Gaskin
 
Hi Mark

I went to St Chads primary and secondary schools, I left in 1961.Mr Wells was the headmaster at Shadwell St and a real nice guy.The head at Brearley St was Sister Etna not a nice person at all, as a lot of the old pupils who knew her will tell you.

Where abouts in Hanley St were you? I lived in Cliveland St

Regards

Dave
 
Hi Mark

I went to St Chads primary and secondary schools, I left in 1961.Mr Wells was the headmaster at Shadwell St and a real nice guy.The head at Brearley St was Sister Etna not a nice person at all, as a lot of the old pupils who knew her will tell you.

Where abouts in Hanley St were you? I lived in Cliveland St

Regards

Dave
Hi Dave. We lived at #55 Hanley St. about half way up I think. We were right next to a factory anyway. A wood mill of some type I think. Next door to us was a Mr & Mrs Fisher, who ran the newsagents up on Summer Lane.

As for St. Chad's, I started there in '63 I think, so a little after your time. I don't remember any of the teachers at Brearly St. though.

Mark
 
hi dave
ye sister moderator edit to remove named person was at brearly street and she was an anti christ.she was well known for punching kids in the back. then there was moderator edit to remove named person and she was just as bad
 
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My dad attended St Chads in Brearley St in the mid-1930s! The head was Sister Columba - who lived at the convent in Whittall St - where my dad lived in a café at number 3.
 
i went to infants at st chads brealey street,st chads junior shadwell street,and back to st chads secondary modern brealey street .i remember a fantastic teacher mr byrne in my last year.teacher who did not like me winning races,in school sports was mr winstone who did all he could to stop me.funny thing this made me more determined and has helped me through my life.i started school 1958 finished 1967.would love to hear more stories about st chads.there seems very little information about this time.
 
I used to go to st chads infant, junior, went to the rosary for thrree years and went back to st chads seniors for last four year. I remember one teacher in the infants an oldish woman called mrs conners also mr wells headmaster in the junior school. In the seniors I remember sister moderator edit to remove named person the she devil ....... I think a sister veronica was in the cse class. There was miss o'conner, a 4th yr teacher, a very nice teacher, mr winstone who smoked like a chimney. He used to keep an eye on the lads toilets and catch us smoking and confiscate the cigarettes.mr begley, assistant headmaster, he used to love any reason to use the cane. If we were ever late for assembly in the morning he'd cane us all after assembly. Miss mcmahon who had us for 1st yr and miss byrnes for 2nd yr
 
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Hello,
I too went to St.Chads infant school I suppose it would be in the 30s. The best memory was that in the summer at break time we used to have cold drinks and wintertime we had horlicks. I also remember when we got back to school after dinner we had to stand up one at a time and tell the Sister what we had eaten for dinner. Woe betide you if you said you had not had a proper dinner.She certainly made us suffer!! I suppose the fact that we didn't get breakfast, dinner or any thing else did not matter. It was my job to call at the convent on the way home from school to see if they had any stale bread ???? If they did we had tea that night !!!! The quizzing us about what we had had for dinner was tell a lie or tell the truth and suffer the conseqences!!!!! {bet you can quess which one we did.} Periodicly, we had to line up in the hall and when we got to the front by the stage there were large sheets of white paper, we were given a tooth comb and told to comb your hair over the paper. If you had lice they used to cut the underneath layer of hair off. Obviously everyone in the school knew and avoided you. I don't think I can tell you about when I used to have to go to confession and the questions I was asked. Think I had better go and have a strong cup of coffee { wish I still Smoked ??} I feel physically sick.
Betty.
 
Bloody hell betty i think you need something stronger than a cup of coffee. I'm surprised they didn't strip you naked in front of everyone and powder you with ddt and I thought I had it bad. Regards nijinski
 
Hi Nijinski, You've awoken a few memories from the past. Regarding Mr Begley if as I was you were in his class he was an alright guy,if you weren't you feared him.As you mentioned caning the latecomers one day he had a particularly large queue for the cane(perhaps you were one of them) on this particular day he was late coming to the class room after assembly so a couple of us lads got his cane and chopped it using the guillotine that was in the room,he was not amused I can tell you we paid for it but at least all the latecomers got off having the cane. Regards Dave.
 
Hi All
I attended St Chad's Secondary School between 1968 and 1973 and have some fond memories of my time there (and some not so great). I still keep in touch with a group of classmates from the 4th and 5th years when we were studying for our CSE's with Sr Veronica and Mr Welton (maths & tech drawing). I still see Sr Veronica and we have some good laughs about our experiences at the school. I do recall some of the names listed in posting 8 - I had Miss O'Connor in 1st year, Miss McMahon and also a Welsh lady (can't recall her name just now) in 2nd year, Miss Tranter (later Mrs Hamilton) in 3rd year and of course Sr V for the final two years. I didn't have much to do with Mr Begley who I think left while I was in the 3rd or 4th year and Mr Cushnan replaced him (and who turned out to be a less desirable character than all the others). Sr Ethna was hard but the situation at that time required a hard leader and I know I had a few canings from her - especially in the first year and after one lunch time incident where a group of us were fooling around at a cake shop on Newtown Row which resulted in a broken window! I did have some poor photos of the school but haven't seen them for a while but should I find them I'll try and post them here. Interesting to hear if others have any photos as I know the hacking episode has resulted in earlier photos being no longer available.

Fred G
 
I went to St Chads Infants, Juniors and seniors between 52 and 64. I remember Sr Etna Sr Veronica, Mr Conklin Mr Begley, Miss Brennan, Mr Byrne, Mr Walton, Mrs ?? the office lady. In the Juniors at Shadwell St I remember Mr Wells the headmaster, Mr Heneberry, I lived in New John St West and remember going to Alma St School for metalwork and woodwork. would love to see any photographs.
 
Hi Terry, I also attended those schools in the same years. I remember you in Mr Byrnes class, it was 1968 when I finished. The kids I were pals with in the last year were I think a Martin Maddox, Miles Miley and Linda Degen,I wonder what they are doing these days. I heard that Sister Etna passed away in the eighties and the last time I saw Mr Winstone was as a patient at the old general hospital in the early eighties where I worked as a nurse. I lived in Miller St at the time just off Newtown row, not much of the old Aston left now. I believe the Stag pub is still standing on the corner of Brearley st. They were hard but happy day's for me.
 
I attended St Chad's infants and juniors, Brearley St and Shadwell Street between 1964 and 1971. Sister Marie was headteacher of the infants then moved to the juniors the same year i did. I can remember Miss O'Connor in the 1st year (she seemed like a very old lady but was probably only in her 50s!). I also remeber Miss Fleming and Miss Lynch who was my favourite teacher. The senior school was upstairs from the infants. Luckily i didn't attend that but i can remember my sisters (Surname Tierney) coming home with many stories about Sister moderator edit to remove named person What a wicked woman! Sister Helen, in the junior school was lovely :)
 
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Wife works at the new St Chads some of the former pupils are still working there, Josephine Mattailo is one that people may remember, and maybe her sisters, she still see Sr Veronica as well
 
Anybody remember any pupils names from when they were at St. Chad's? I was there from 63-69. A couple of names I recall are Derek Duffy, and Patrick Carter. Patrick was a really good artist, as I recall, he used to draw all the Thunderbirds. (Remember them?) I remember we used to play "James Bond" and our "secret" code names were just our names backwards. (Check out my user name) :) Susan Bridges was one also, I think, but I may be mixing up my schools now. We moved to Perry Common in '69 and she may have been there.
 
I went to the infants in Brearley St round 1970/71, we moved to the new school at Hospital Street (Sr Gabriel was the head, not very popular!). I remember when we raised the money to have a chapel at he school and all walking up to the Cathedral for mass on St Chad's day (no idea when it is now though). We all walked to the cinema to see Oliver Twist when it came out. I guess I could look up the year but I haven't lol When I got to seniors it was back to Brearley St and Icknield St. (bit of a walk between buildings during lunch if we didn't get the bus!). Mr Cushanan was still the headmaster when I left after 2nd year - I wanted to do O level's and they were going to announce the school closing soon. I remember being in the playground at Brearley St and Mr Cushanan put his head out of the window, it must have been just after he was questioned - I never knew the outcome I don't think. Everyone just stopped, no one made a sound, just looked at him. It wasn't arranged or anything but he backed away and closed the window and everyone went back to playing. Do you remember those outside toilets! One of the older teachers used to ask girls to go with her as she didn't like going out on her own during school discos. We were evacuated once, it must have been not long after the pub bombings, there was a parcel left under the stairs and they were worried it was a bomb. Turned out to be a package of scissors but we got the rest of the day off classes. I also remember our history teacher was Mr Rowland, his brother was in Dexy's Midnight Runners (was Dexters then) and they played the school disco at Brearley Street. Mr Gollogly was the sports teacher. Miss Ward was deputy head. I was in Campion House, started in Moore House. My 2nd year I got 132 merit marks! What a suck up eh? lol.. Our house master's name escapes me now but I can remember him walking into the class room and telling everyone to open up their desks. He took a cane out of his case and caned everyone with an untidy desk, sometimes he'd do that if you weren't wearing your tie. Cant imagine it now, my kids think I'm making it up. One of the lads in our class broke a window and we managed to prise up one of the loose bits of parquet flooring to hid the glass, I don't think anyone ever got found out for that one.
 
Anybody remember any pupils names from when they were at St. Chad's? I was there from 63-69. A couple of names I recall are Derek Duffy, and Patrick Carter. Patrick was a really good artist, as I recall, he used to draw all the Thunderbirds. (Remember them?) I remember we used to play "James Bond" and our "secret" code names were just our names backwards. (Check out my user name) :) Susan Bridges was one also, I think, but I may be mixing up my schools now. We moved to Perry Common in '69 and she may have been there.

There must have been a couple of Patterson's there in 69. Philip, Mark and Teresa Patterson were all ahead of me, their younger sister was in my class - started 1970. This is the infants/juniors.
 
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