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Handsworth Technical School

Grovel Time! No Rupert, it matters very much: credit where credit is due. Were it not for you we could have missed out on all this fun and the chance for honest reappraisal. Sorry Rupert and sorry Old Mohawk too for any embarrasment, and as for poor old Harris....What can I say! Mike G. is quite right too, of course. Serves me right for showing off. Perhaps 70 "bumps" would fitting if any four of you could catch me!
As for Ozzie et al, how grand it would be to shake them all by the hand and to thank them for what they gave us and for just being the characters that they were. I do hope that they realised that we would come to love them in retrospect. John D.
 
Your quite right John. We have a lot to thank them for. The method of teaching in those days was far different from today but it must have worked for us.
 
I will third that and one wonders what ones existance would have been like without the input that we recieved from these individuals. I have used the results of their dedication to advantage everywhere that I have been.
 
I agree with most of the above but Ozzie - No way - he totally ignored the class I was in as he was more interested in setting up his beloved library [at Crayththorne Road] and left us to our our own devices such that when another teacher had to stand in for him one day not one could tell him where we had got to.
 
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The Houses and colours were - Faraday = Yellow - Watt = Red - Boulton = Blue and Murdoch = Green.
I went to HTS from 1965 to 1970 when the school had re-located to the junction of Craythorne Avenue and Acfold Road.
 
I don"t know if I am doing this text correctly,Ive only had my computer for 3 wks and my grandson posted my previous entries .... so here goes . I well remember Mr Hickman (geog). A dapper chap but not a lot going for him except his over whelming desire for the Austin Motor Co. to financially collapse and become a manufacturer of toasting forks. He must in the past have been devastated, possibly by refusal of a position there or was in receipt of problem car !!! However,he was in a way proved to be correct. Mr Hickman routinally gave questions from 1 to 10 and a memory map the pupil had to draw complete with main cities Re metalwork, I still have the garden gate latch on rear garden gate
 
Roverman I worked at Birmetals where we produced vast quatities of alluminium sheets for the P5 and P6 also the landrovers. Like you I am quite new at this technology
 
I left Handsworth Technical School many years ago, glad to leave and start an apprenticeship the following week, but I forgot to hand in a Mathematical Tables text book.
I can't return it to HTS but can return the photo of it to its original post
 
Fewer of us left that even know what these tables are and why they existed and how to use them. It's all done on a calculator now. Some people spent a whole working life just working out these log tables and sines and co-sines and tangents. Others worked on numbers for involute gearing....jobs that would drive you nuts. Imagine doing all of this to four, five and six figures without a computer. I still have two log table books and a set of involute gearing tables written long hand by someone...ever so neatly. Evidently they could not trust printers to transpose all of the numbers correctly.
 
Hi Rupert,
5 years since you started this thread and 249 replies - the school certainly left most of us with vivid memories. Swimming sessions in Grove lane baths, sports afternoons in Cherry Orchard playing fields, and of course 'Ozzie' who probably would not be happy about being mentioned so often on the internet !
oldmohawk
 
I don't know about Grove Lane baths but I think I found the playing field one time on GE. The changing hut seems to have gone but remarkably you can still see the outline on the ground where it used to be. It was always a rush to get dry after the swimming baths and to get back to the next class. I seem to think that playing field visits were always at the end of the day and I always looked forward to catching the Outer Circle 11 home afterwards. I don't remember Ozzie with bad feelings...he was the kind of charachter that one meets on occasion. He did not seem to be a happy person and in that respect at the time we would probably have been soulmates of sorts. You have to avoid sweating the small stuff in life. I keep on trying to achieve this state.
 
Was the English Teacher at Boulton in early 1950 a Mr Barret or Basset ? During the 3rd year He taught French to "O" Level grade
 
I seem to remember small lockers at Boulton road only. A member of my class prided himself in opening as many locks as he could from a large assortment of keys he carried with him. He did not have much luck with the very few combination locksl.
As I attended HTS from Jan 1951 it was during thelast term of the original 2 yr period that an extrayear was offered to qualify for subjectsin some form of institute known to pupils as "The Common Preliminary Course" To this day I still dont know to what course it was connected.
Our teaching was consequently ratcheted up a gear or two to qualify for this body However, after the first termof the 3rd yr it seems that the then "O Level" qualification was adopted by the school.
It was soon noticable that the former standard of teaching was slightly more advanced than that of the "O" Level requirement
Such was the standardof teaching at HTS I am glad to say I obtained 5 "O" Levels, even though we were taught through conflicting school corriculums.

Not to leave "Ozzie" out of my memories, I can bring to mind two examples of his style One involved the need for us to name the parts of speech of a sentence that went something like "That that that that is ,is not that that that is not that !!" He had afield day with us nearly reducing us to suicide What planet did he come from?

His marking of our books was also very strange. If a book was not handed in on time then all marks were lost with a poorer end of term position.He often choose to mark books at his desk. This meant standing at his side!!! He would initially give a mark ,say out of twenty, followed by a deduction of 1/2 apoint for blots crossing out
which might bring the work down to 15 out of twenty He then read the piece knocking off one markfor each missing full stop ,comma ,question mark ,spelling mistake,
lack of capital letters and paragraphs. Hence, it was impossible to ever get full marks no matter how good the content ; one could finish up with 5 ouy of 20 !!
 
Hi Anvilman - Thanks for your memories of the old school. I now remember I had a combination lock, quite a novelty back then.

Your description of 'ozzie's' working methods are just as I remember and I'm still thinking about 'That that that that is ,is not that that that is not that'.

I'm glad I went to HTS it set me up for a working life in Engineering.

oldmohawk
 
I was at Handsworth Tech. from 1958-1963 - Brilliant days, loved every minute - we were the first intake at the new Crathorne Ave School - the headmaster at the time was a Mr Mends with Mr Lewis as his deputy, I remember a lot of the teachers mentioned previously, Osborne, "Jackie" London, Emerson, "Pancho" Smith, Follett, Ball and Winder for games, also a teacher called Flutter - there was also a chemistry teacher called Storr and, when the "can you tell Stork from Butter?" ad. was on the telly - written every where at school was "can you tell Storr from Flutter?"
Jackie London threw a mean blackboard rubber!! - he once asked one of the boys "what would you rather do **** , watch the trains go by(as there was a track at the end of the fields) or learn Maths"? - when the boy said "watch the trains go by" the blackboard rubber nearly took his head off!.........Great days!
 
You would have been at HTS about a year before me Anvil. I left HTS in 1955 after taking the third year and 'O' levels so my first year must have been 52. I can't remember all of the teachers but Jackie stands out of course and the head at Boulton...Charlie Flutter (Two Gun) took us for third year math. He was great and had a sense of humor. It's funny but it all seemed longer than three years. I suppose that time seems to pass slowly when you are young. Yeah, a day with an Ozzie period would be a downer. Especially so if you did not have your homework done. Still English was not the favourite subject for most I suspect...'clausal analysis'...maybe a root canal would be prefferable.
 
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Your talk of the Log Books and Trig tables, and also relating to "Jackie" London, reminds me of those trig lessons with "Jackie"
Who remembers "SOHCAHTOA" ie Sine = Opp over Hyp etc. That served me well in my early working years, until the advent of the Electronic calculator, such a time saver that was, I cannot imagine now anyone wanting to use tables, converting sines, tangents etc into logrithms applying a little long hand addition or subtraction and then using the antilogrithms to supply the answer, it used to take ages. But now with modern Cad Design software, you just draw it and it does all of the work for you.
Yes it must have been the same for you, as I left in 1958.

Goffy
 
Hi Goffy - I left in '58. Used to know a ? Bates and a 'John Golsborough' amongst a few more.
 
Yeah, cad takes away the tedium and some think that 'that' is all there is to design. The outcome is only as good as what is put in though and although modern methods and implements help...Newton and Watt et.al. still reign and experience and developed design tallent is still the main requirement. The tools do not do that part. When you start with a blank computer screen...it is just the same as a blank sheet of drawing paper. There are an infinite number of things that you can do (in mechanical anyway). Gosh your chances of success arn't great...gulp!
Did you notice that thinking time is not considered to be neccessary.
 
Hi

Yes those Log Tables. I was blessed with an Engineering Zeus Book. This was
book that fitted in your overhauls. It had a washable type sheet. It seem to be
easier for table readings,
what with all this return to the fabulous 1950's times tables etc perhaps we can get the Schools to
re-start these tables again. These type of exercises made our minds sharper to store data.

Mike Jenks
 
Bernie D'Boult said:
Hi Goffy - I left in '58. Used to know a ? Bates and a 'John Golsborough' amongst a few more.
Click to expand...

Hi Bernie, I seem to remember the name Bates but not the other one, names that come to mind from our form are Round, Beacham (may be spelt differently) Derbyshire, Dugard, Pratt, Mortiboys, Burgess, and I am sure I will come up with some more, I meet up with one of the lads occasionally I'm sure he will remember a lot more.

Goffy
 
I've been reading through most of the posts about our old friend Mr. Osborne and his nicotine stained jacket. Recently I meet some one who had known Mr. O. and sggested that those stains were from snuff ! This would surely drop on to his jacket and stain more readily than products of combustion ! Nevertheless I am indebted to him for my English "O" Level and are the richer for being taught by him; a wonderful character.
 
Yet another HTS man. Yes...snuff. A stearn man and a day with a period of english was not one to be looked forward to mostly I suspect. Still I only saw him cane one student. He deserved it and probably should have been kicked out anyway...maybe someone who just failed the acceptance exams could have made far more of the opportunity. Welcome, were you at the old Goldshill/Boulton facility or later?
 
Rupert. I attended both Golds Hill Rd and Boulton Rd from Jan 1951 to Dec 1953 I have put forward a few posts on HTS and like everyone else (maybe) found it a massive life changing experience, for the better. Perhaps the teaching methods used at HTS ,should in the main, be a standard for modern times.
 
What for AM. If the UK is anything like Canada...you dont make much anymore and this aspect is not about to change. Our airports are surrounded by warehouses full of imported product and there are fewer and fewer jobs that require technical theoretical knowledge...service industry for our kind now. I was at HTS 52 to 55 mechanical so you would have had the same experience as me and used the same shed on the playing field and maybe even the same chisel in the woodshop to make your pattern. I am through with it all, thank goodness. Driving a forklift truck in an industry with a large union is considered to be a 'middle class' position now...at least by the union. It's all about leverage...not the kind that we know about.
 
Hi
I was at HTS 1960 - 65,Mends was Head,Lewis Deputy.
Also remember Rosier,Emmerson,Fryer,Osbourne,Hallett,Day,Plowright and can picture a few more but not sure of names.
Was a good school for exercise because which ever way you approached by public transport there was hell of a walk.
The 1 rule that has stuck in my head is on no account could you use the connecting doors between East & West wings.Had to go outside and walk across front of school.
Mr Osbourne and his bike is a memory that will stay with me always :)
I have a pic of the Swimming team 1964 I think,will find it out a post it see if anyone recognises them.
 
Hi

Just as you started I was putting my overhauls at ICI metals after some good years. For the next 5 years I
went back to Goldshill Road to to do Day release and Night school. In effect i did nearly 9 years around HTS
and HTC. I enjoyed those morning X country runs I could go for miles.
Happy days

Mike Jenks
 
Nice picture Rob, I left from 4A1 in 1958, I am sure I can recognise a few of those faces, they must have stayed on into the fifth year. great stuff
 
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