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Loxton St School - Mr Pullen

  • Thread starter Thread starter Kandor
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Kandor

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I remember the second time he took us to visit Sutton Park.
He arranged it as a field trip of course, something to show us that life wasn't just grime and crowded houses, but that there was a wild and interesting side of life to discover too..
I remember he told us to collect things to take back to class so we could discuss them..
My friends bought back, leaves, fungi and pieces of bark.
I bought back three Squirrels and a Park bench..
Mr Pullen went barmy...
Loxton St was in its final year then, It's classrooms were Dickensian,
The school meals were like something from Oliver Twist..and the toilets?
straight from Dante's Inferno...it just lacked the sign..Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.
But if it helped, I was little and handsome.
It was at this time I moved from Ashted Row to Hindlow Close,
Hindlow Close had four bedrooms, it also had something we had never known before...A Bathroom and Central Heating.
Dad put the underfloor heating on once...then we got our first bill..
It was never used again in the 17 years he lived there.
So now, I was little, cold AND handsome.
I was now about to start Duddeston Manor Bi-Lateral school,
Life was about to get a tad more complicated...
I was completely hopeless at sport, Oh, I had staying power,
gallons of it in fact...I could run for miles, its just I was so little...As I said earlier, I was only 5ft tall when I left school.
I found this so hard to understand when my Dad and all my Uncles ranged from 6ft 1ins to an incredible 6ft 7.
We take tall people for granted now, but think about then, really tall guys were met with 'Lofty' and 'whats the weather like up there?'
No...my family were tall and I was the class midget....
I remember one day in Gym, my friend and I were messing about on a Vault, jumping on the long hanging ropes..
I remember Allan diving on to one of the ropes..I kindly screamed out advice 'Miss!'..he carefully followed that advice and landed on one tooth, snapping it in half....he has had to wear a false one ever since..my, I did laugh!
It was however, my turn just weeks later when playing Pirates I climbed up on to the Basketball board, I'd been there but minutes when a Teacher (Mr Croxall) walked into the Gym and ordered me down..
I remember jumping and as I landed I came down on one leg and it twisted sidewards
I remember screaming loud enough and high enough to break glass as my dislocated knee swelled up like a balloon..
And that toothless %$&*$% Allan C laughed...
 
Loxton v Duddy

Loxton Street secondary and I suspect the same at Bloomsbury Girls. The boys went down the dairy the girls to the Hughe’s biscuit factory. Not quite a simple as that, but you get the drift. There was no real enthusiasm, the lessons on the whole were boring with few teaching aids and little to hold the interest of the young developing mind. Although, Mr. Pullen did his best with the few resources he had.
Does anyone remember the weird story he told about his friends going mad one at a time his voice getting lower and lower, then jumping up and running around the room screaming! It’s a wonder he never scared anyone to death or the lad he called Dolly???
Thank God I got a seat by the window in the huts I spent many hours just looking out or listening to the sounds of the outside world. I don’t know what I would have done if I had progressed to the second year at Loxton and moved in to the main building with classrooms with high windows so you could not see out. We did get a taste of things to come when we had our weekly RE lesson. We all filed in to one of the classes in the main building where we were issued with a bible and told to read – for the whole lesson – every RE lesson. I think I would have died of boredom.
Morning assembly was torture, hundreds of boys assembled in the hall to sing morning hymns and wait for Mr. Parker to nominate boys for the morning caning in his room, usually for being found smoking. Us first years were by the door, which was a blessing, as many a morning I was led outside white as a ghost with a sickly feeling, in to the fresh air. Others deeper in the congregation were not so lucky and I remember a couple actually fainting. I don’t remember any windows in the hall? So it was all down to lack of oxygen I suppose.
I wasted a year of my secondary education here through pure lack of interest, the draconian surroundings and in general the poor teaching methods. I am certain if I had done my full term there, my life would have taken a different course. I don’t even remember ever being given homework!

What a breath of fresh air when we were transferred to Duddeston Manor, light airy classrooms, Science labs, Art rooms, Metalwork and proper Music lessons; with instruments. They gave me a trumpet; I couldn’t believe it. It was like being let out of prison after wasting a year inside Loxton. (not as I have any experience of HM long term hotels)
I don’t think I ever caught up the year I lost at Loxton, never fully getting back in to the swing of secondary education and left in the forth year after saying I was staying on. I was not allowed in to the leaving ceremony and was left to just walk out, with a couple of others in the same boat. However, Duddy did give me the direction I decided to go down as a career, as I found I was very interested in Chemistry, a subject not taught at Loxton more general science. I did well in this subject and after leaving Duddy started in a Laboratory and went on to higher education in metallurgy and more labs and then in to the murky world of metal trading.
 
hello re, loxton street school
i was a pupil there from 1962 to its demolition and was a regular customer of mr R L Parker 's caning sessions had numb fingers for most of my time there . i remember mr pullen he was soft spoken and easy going a refreshing change from the rest which brings me to mr Mulready nick name (rubber neck) re teacher who was the complete opposite my eardrums took a bashing in his class .i remember scraps in the playground which were fist fights which went on for quite some time if not discovered by a teacher quite different from today where anything goes .
duddeston manor was a space age school in comparison but sadly i hated it and was a pupil for only three months .
used to get the 56 bus to school in coleshill street outside the tripe shop
but it was a sweet shop can anyone explain this, also our local pub corner of ryder street and gem street was the crown and anchor but everyone called it the bunch.
Regards
Bernard
 
hi bernard i used to catch the bus at the same place just up from the prince of wales pub was in rubber necks class then went to duddeston must have been about the same time my name is peter mclaughlin i lived at 12 a terrace lawrence street all the best
 
KeithH, I remember the science labs in Duddy, all in one wing on the first floor. Val Loseby was Biology teacher, she always wore her hair in a severly tied back bun. Physics teacher was Mick something(bad memory), he was really tall and skinny, with a huge adams apple and glasses. The first chemistry teacher at the school was a young guy who went blind having had a tetse fly crawl across his eyes in Africa, again can't recall his name. Maths was taught by Richard Sharp, who also taught me to play chess. History was Sue Tully, a shortish black haired dollybird, (my favourite lesson). The head was a Mr. Southern. Can't recall the PE teachers name but he was tall and ginger, weird combination, or so it seemed. Geography and my form teacher was a Mr. Graham.
I remember one day in biology, we were told to split into pairs and take our partners pulse. Then we had to run down the corridor, down the stairs and outside around the football pitch and then back up the stairs and have our pulse taken again. I freaked Val Loseby out because my pulse went down from 72 to 51. She made me run it again after she'd taken my pulse, with the result that my pulse dropped to 47. They tried to get me interested in long distance running after that but, with absolutely no success.
 
Just pulled the name of the physics teacher out of the mists of time, Mickey Batten. I think he and Val Loseby had something going on.
 
They did netsniper but when they broke up Mickey Batten stepped in. I remember Val Loseby really well. She was a laugh, when she let her hair down, literally, and had a couple of bevvies. Mickey Batten chilled out after a couple too. Val looked completely different with her hair down, I'd even say pretty. That look she had with her hair scraped back so severely, was almost frightening.
 
mr pullen with puppet theatre at loxton st was big buddy with woodwork and music teacher mr woods. both moved to duddeston manor where mr wood ran the metal/woodwork class in the annex by the bike sheds.both were excellant teachers. mr southern was head who seemedto have a liking for corpral punishment. remember my old man grabbing him by the throat for leaving some bad scaring on my ....,dont think he caned anyone again.you may remember the prep room between the lab rooms,this is where miss pat stone the lab assisstant would give me extra lessons after school hours. biology mainly.do hope the german languages teacher recovered from our relentless bad behaviour. remember chris & carol jones, liz taylor, lin moseley cresswell,pat egan,les robinson robert jones pete langston .john godson.at least i got a better education when i left , if you too went to loxton/duddeston school please except my condolences
 
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