Burnley Grammar School

Between 1951 and 1955 I was away at a boarding school for boys. Our late Queen still had not quite come to the throne for a short time yet, Churchill was about to become the Prime Minister again for the second time, that's how long ago it was. It was an age of total deference to any authority figures. I would not have chosen to go to a boarding school myself but I made one or two lifelong friendships and I'm now 83 but with the mind half that age I like to think.

I was minded to write because I have seen so many of you on here take great issue with the upper half of the body being shown off whilst in PE. This was the usual way boys did PE as a boarder at my school too. It didn't appear to be an issue in any way at all. It was something we would do without thinking, because actually we had even more to lose.

The younger boys, of which I was one in 1951 would never wear a costume to swim. We would have completely naked swimming instruction weekly, if my mind is correct until the age of possibly about 13. Once again, there were no complaints, I refer to the deference of the time again. Your tutors were without question and you did what they said. They were always right, or so they wanted you to believe. Personally I would not have chosen to do that but the novelty soon faded and it seemed completely normal within our school community. It was more than 20 years later when one of my lifelong friends from school caught up with me, now a lecturer himself, sometime in the 1970's and I found out how much he deplored our school and our compulsory naked swimming class with something like 20 boys. I did not feel so strongly and accepted it for what it was at the time and place it happened.

The days of a 1950's boarder were so strict, so deferential and so regimented and discipline was everything, there was a cane and a belt and they probably came out too often for things we now regard as silly. I had my fair share. Our personal privacy did not amount to much, we shared it all together, saw so much together, ate together, slept together, washed together, worked together, even wrote to our parents together on Tuesday nights set aside to do so.

PE was fiercely competitive. Team games would foster this the most. Everybody also learnt to swim rather well, I should add. We were encouraged to be active every day. Everybody learnt to do everything rather well. I even did some rowing with a school canoe. I always wanted to have nice strong toned arms and I got them through school PE. I remember we were fed very well in school and I enjoyed all the food and there was often room for seconds inspite of some ongoing shortages and restrictions at the time.

I went in a boy and felt I came out a man. PE helped shape that.

Comment by: Antony on 27th April 2023 at 03:23


I think anybody is entitled to question the motives of teachers like that, though I suspect, in the majority of cases it is a power thing - they get off on giving their orders knowing they can't be disobeyed. It reminds you of those occasional cases that get to court where some minor ranking Army officer has condoned or even encouraged some of those revolting "initiation" ceremonies on new recruits - most of them it is a power trip but a minority do get some sort of sexual pleasure from it, even if it is "just" voyeurism. Certainly our teacher was suspect, and after we left school a friend told me that he had been one of his victims. Of course, with some teachers they get away with it, even if they hide in plain sight because their colleagues choose to keep their grubby secrets quiet. One of our two weird schoolmasters had a fetish for discipline and enjoyed using the cane - even some of his colleagues referred to him as "Thrasher". They clearly suspected his proclivities (this one wasn't a PE teacher. thankfully) At the moment, two proven retired paedophile schoolmasters are fighting deportation from South Africa to return to the UK to face charges. As they are in their 80s, they no doubt hope they will avoid this, but in my view if they had their fun 50 years ago it is time they paid for it, and it shows their extreme cowardice that they are trying so hard not to face court.

There really should have been tighter guidelines throughout the decades - it has only been the last 20/25 years that CRB checks were made on them and nobody knows how many teachers "got away with it"

In your case, Antony it begs the question if the boys had not been "showering properly" what would or could they have done about it?. I think you have every right to question their motives.

What makes a bath a rugby bath, rather than just a bath? It makes me think of those old fashioned things that football teams once had. A very macho thing of old, you'd never get women doing that.

Robbie, I thought America was more prudish about nude culture in general and your comment would surprise me. I think of Europe as far more relaxed and keen about such things.

Someone said to me at work talking about this site that communal showers are very common still in American schools, I have no idea if that is correct but they had worked and lived there for a while with a family, but went on to say that showers at school here in the UK and in continental Europe are no longer common which I think is quite untrue. They may not be as common as in the 60's to 80's heyday of the things I agree, but then it was close to 100% in those days. Nathan you've said your place has them and they are used but does that mean your school insists they must be used or what? I agree though that there should be more PE not less and certainly can't agree you could choose to never do any at school. I think we just sometimes have to face up to our insecurities at times, such as PE brings on, not run away from them.

Alan.

My secondary school was Langley Park Boy's in Beckenham and at the time the PE teachers insistance on standing at the entrance to the mandatory fully nude showers to, "Check the boys were showering properly," was the subject of scorn and disgust among us boys. Looking back the signs that this was a thinly veiled excuse for something much darker have only become ever more obvious as I have become an adult myself - not least the obvious bullying by the sports staff that had a pervasive impact on the culture in the school. It took many forms, physical, mental and psychological.
They had a massive communal rugby bath as well, with showers round the edge. I'm very aware this was not the norm for most kids my age growing up. Nobody really needed a school PE bath but we'd sometimes get one. Claims of urinating in the water for a laugh got made but it was hard to be sure if they had.

The first actual communal shower I took was aged 9 in middle school. That seemed a far more innocent experience, but I was mighty surprised when they got sprung on me at that age, we would just enjoy the water and not having any clothes on seemed to make us quite lively at that tender age. So different to secondary showers.

1970. I'm 12 that year. A funny little story about how you can be a bit too keen to have a school shower sometimes and come a cropper by being too quick about it.

At school whoever got back to the changing room first was often tasked with turning the showers on for everyone else and themselves even if the teacher wasn't present.

I raced back off a gymnasium PE lesson once and as I was first back I went to the closet where we had to switch the water on and get the shower going. I was very soon stripped completely off and straight in, no bother and getting wet through and was joined by a number of other boys too. I came out and some of the class still hadn't got back and the teacher hadn't shown up yet, but I was already drying myself down.

At the exact moment I'd finished drying myself and began dressing the final few from class came through the door with our PE teacher who looked around suspiciously and came straight up to me, saw I looked dry, despite my damp hair, asked if I'd had a shower but didn't believe my answer and accused me of just dipping my head only. He didn't believe the two other boys who vouched for me and so I got sent back in for another shower having undressed again. It was quite funny I suppose. I wasn't even the kind of boy in school who would make excuses to avoid going in the showers after PE so I don't know why he disbelieved me that I'd faked one, but he was one of those PE teachers who was always on the lookout for anyone he thought was trying to avoid a shower. I also got a slapped hand on my bum for my perceived fakery as I was being sent on my way to do it again. All par for the course at that period of time.

I was completely useless at most PE with no co-ordination of any kind but was always a trier and one thing I was quick to find out was you might be quite utterly unskilled at things but they'll like you if you're a trier. The only thing I could do with any competence was run fast in a straight line.

I differ with others here by almost never doing shirtless gym lessons. It was always navy shorts and a white vest or t-shirt, either was allowed but shoes and socks were never permitted for gym PE of any type. I remember having cold feet a lot and also seeing a sort of grey dust collecting over the course of the lessons on the bottom of everyones feet, mine included, that had started quite clean. I'm sure the school gym was only cleaned once a year or something.

The main thrust about this shirtless PE chat is as far as I can make out down to one thing - should boys in school have been made to do it or allowed to decide for themselves. Am I correct or is there more to it?

I have followed the shirtless p.e. debate with interest. I was in high school from 1977 to 1984. We did shirtless sessions in the gym, had compulsory showers and had two decent p.e. teachers. One was older and stricter but both were respected.
I am posting because this afternoon at about 5.50 pm I drove past the local sports centre on the way to the supermarket and observed 12 teenage lads playing football in one of the cages. At least half were shirtless. This appeared to be by their own choice as there did not appear to be any adult supervision. Whilst I accept that some people did not like being forced to remove their good what I observed shows that left to their own devices some young people will choose to remove their tops when it is hit or they are getting two warm. This was on the Northwest coast.

PE should certainly be compulsory on the curriculum until 16 otherwise I'd be looking for a new job.

My Roman Catholic secondary in Greater Manchester is quite traditional for PE. Even showering is still available, and it's used.

There are already far too many overweight children before they even reach secondary school that need PE whether they like it or not.

Replying to Jason,
I agree with you entirely that there should be no opt out for PE under the age of 16 and also no opt out for PE kit rules. Opting out of a vital part of education is not a good way to prepare for adulthood, children need to learn how to be part of a team and team games help to develop vital social skills.

No way should school PE be optional from the day you start at school. I don't even think it should become part of the options process when you are 13 or 14 either just because you aren't so good at things or are getting bashful about what you look like. If school completely gave up on any physical activity for those who didn't want to do it then what message would that send. Some of these young people probably don't do anything at home either. As it is the amount of PE is down at least half compared to only a few years ago. Most of us always had a couple of lessons each week, some had more and for longer too. Along with that I'll add why should there be opt outs on certain kit, or lack of, or basic showering after PE. It sounds more like giving the run of things to the pupils in school and not the staff. I think things were just about right in my youth a few decades back now.

@ Nick Lucas
Thanks for replying - its just that I know a Nick Lucas who lives in the Dover area and ... its a small world!
On reflection you couldn't be him (or v.v.) - I recall he had a 'rough' time at school and I can't imagine him being 'sporty', although he did take up scuba diving to a fairly high standard in later years.

There's been a lot of v sensible (to me, anyway) posts made in recent times - too many to reply to.

Comment by: Mark on 25th April 2023 at 22:13


Yes, Mark, after the age of 14/15, by that time you know what path you are heading down - those who want to be involved in sports in their working lives will certainly want to continue to persist in it, but if your skills are clearly in a different direction, science or the arts, it makes much more sense to concentrate on the subjects that interest you, and are good at. The subject didn't interest me, but I might have had more respect for it had our PE teacher not been - well, what he was. I have mentioned his proclivities in the past.

One of my PE teachers who took me regularly actually lived about five doors down the road from me. His son was the same age as me and in my form. School was half a mile away from our houses and I'd often see the teacher leave home in the morning and walk past on his walk to school. I always made sure to avoid catching him incase I ended up having to walk with him. He was always carrying a brown Adidas sports bag, probably bringing his own PE kit to school in it every single day.

One one early afternoon he took us out on a cross country and changed the direction so we ended up going past his actual house, and mine, just so he could quickly pop in and grab something. We all had to stop outside for a few moments running on the spot until he came back out.

The other thing was his son sometimes found himself in the changing room after PE with his father there and if that happened he was let off showering while the rest of us had to. I mean, what kind of teenage boy would ever want to do that in front of their father, so I didn't blame him.

All the fifth formers came back off a major cross country running effort in what was about 1978 and I'd never seen so many naked lads all trying to shower and find space as I did that day in school and to make matters worse the chap that took us out for PE got in the thick of it with us. Shock of shocks on top of that was the discovery that many of us were better well endowed than our teacher, poor chap. Never understood why he'd set himself up for that kind of discovery or why a PE teacher thought it was his place to ever share in that situation. Just another day in the life of your usual comprehensive back in the day.

TimH. No, but fairly close actually. Bordon in Hampshire. What made you ask about Dover? I wasn't specific to anything.

I wasn't quite expecting the kind of reaction I received but I stand by it. Jim you are correct in your dissection. I remember being spoken to and seeing others spoken to in the ways I described, that's the point I was making.

I was one of those so called star pupils in PE because I won things but good as it sounds it also brings further problems with ever higher expectations and the stress that comes with it. I was on the school gym team and then on the athletics team which I only did to please my teacher and not myself. But they are still good memories.

I've seen many of your posts Alan, do you think you should have had the right to opt out of PE completely when you were at school?

Or if you accept you had to do it maybe you think you should have the right to opt out of many of the requirements that went along with it, whether it's dropping football or cross country, being able to avoid going shirtless or showering even.

Was it the actual PE or just the teachers that were the deal with you here?

Perhaps PE should be an option from the start. But if it was I can see that the percentage take up by the age of about 12 would be very low indeed wouldn't it, so you just have to make children do PE until 16 for their own good.

At an open evening in November 1994 which I attended at my school with both my parents at the age of 15 we went around the teachers present and stopped at my very own main PE teacher for a short chat in which he told mum he was concerned about my continuing general lack of confidence and self esteem in PE which led to a marvellous answer back from my mum who I had told about his habit of belittling us. Very robustly (she was always direct with people) mum fired back, and I'm obviously slightly paraphrasing here - "oh really, well maybe if you spent a little less time going around calling the boys girls names and picking up on their imperfections he might not have had such a problem in the first place" - and I just remember he couldn't answer and didn't even try. He was the man who took me for PE who I found to remain permanently negative in his use of words and would often refer to some of us with a girls name and pass personal comments when things didn't go right. So my name Nick became Nicola and so on.

From 90 to 95 PE was twice a week. We did lots of skins v shirts team games, mainly basketball, and roughly half the gym time during those years we spent shirtless and the other half wearing a simple vest, mainly white with a badge logo. Taking a PE shower was compulsory until I was in my final year and we shared together as there were no individual stalls or anything like that.

Sorry to have upset some of you. I plead guilty to typing NICK's name wrong (sorry Nick) -a typo that would happen to me be it 4 am or 4 pm - you don't know what time I start my work each day, however he wrote:

"Boys used to be treated far more grown up with less attention paid to their individual feelings I think......It was the same for everyone, I now look back with a certain fondness."

Sounds as if he approves of the one size fits all mentality Thank goodness those days have gone, and the feelings of pupils are taken more into consideration that they were in the good old days for which Nick has such fondness. I was trying to point out some of the low points. If the capital punishment reference was too hard for you, I understand that at one time people had outdoor lavatories, and you might need to take a trip halfway down the garden in the pouring rain or snow in winter. Would Nick or any other nostalgia lovers like that, or approve of that?

Somebody mentions 'looking back with fondness', and gets a blast about the past from Alan. That was a huge overreaction to such a genteel phrase.

May I suggest a very well known book by Dale Carnegie.

A completely irrelevant deflection Alan. I only remember corporal punishment in school, not capital. (Joke) Half past four in the morning doesn't seem the best time to think clearly.

I wonder if you misread the NICK post Alan. It was clearly being written from the alternate perspective of those who told those in school what to do and NOT his own particular view of how to be with people. It was a basic factual truth anyway wasn't it. I didn't see anything about the good old days either. Just expressing a fondness for your schooldays that you might not have felt at the time is a quite common thinking process and it doesn't in any way mean you approve of the wider world as it was so I'm not sure why there was a need to bring hanging into it. All very random Alan and I'm not sure why you felt the need to bite back so hard at a name I don't think I've seen on here before. Chill man.

Tim, what made you think the same poster comes from Dover?

Nick
Do we know each other? You don't live in the Dover area, do you?
T

Nick Lucas on 24th April 2023 at 22:40


The good old days, eh Mick?. The days when you could get hanged for a murder you didn't commit, but if you were REALLY lucky you would get a free pardon sixty years after the event. The Bentley case for example - just one of many. The good old days were not that good, unless viewed through rose tinted glasses.

I will take on board the suggestions surrounding the film I have although I was hoping to place it on a more specific history type of site, so if anyone has any further suggestions of anywhere suitable for an old digitally transferred cine of the kind I described please let me know. Thanks.

Nate, I was more concerned by seeing my father filming me I think, rather than worrying what some girls might be thinking about how I looked. The girls I knew at school were always very nice and well mannered.

Born back in 1947 I was at school in 1959 and of a similar age to those young ones seen in that photograph here from the same year, although I was brought up in Horsham.

The picture shows it much like it was. The teacher would always set himself apart from the boys and look different. While the boys would not be expected to turn up and do gym in much more than the shorts expected of them, and a top in the gym for the class would almost have seemed like an overindulgence if we had been allowed to wear one, there was no chance the teacher in charge of us would ever stoop to being in gym class with us without one on.

I do have some less favourable memories of the school horse however. The gym at school felt quite austere and dowdy, the rules somewhat draconian at times. Teacher, more than one actually, would use the horse as a means to chastise boys in gym on the spot. I personally associate the gym horse as much with PE as I do with corporal punishment. The horse at school was where boys in trouble would have to lean against to be given the slipper in gym or the cane. I was both slippered and caned up against the gym horse so it brings mixed feelings as an object to look at.

(I was caned by the headmaster for smoking and slippered in PE too many times to remember what for)

It may seem quite disgusting now but boys in those days of the late 1950s would often be given a physical reprimand only for failing to achieve for a demanding teacher and this was where I found myself. Our whole class was once up against the gym horse and slippered for inattention, the innocent taking the hit too. I remember that one.

The school shower of the time was never a very appealing prospect. Quite often it was so cold that we would actually shiver or the water would run cold surprisingly fast on us but we would have to stay in. To this day I do not know if this was done purposefully or happened naturally because of the school's system, so my main memory is of cold showers, very unwelcome when you come in from the cold.

I told this to my late father and he called it character building. Well I think I'm of good character so just maybe he was right.

Boys used to be treated far more grown up with less attention paid to their individual feelings I think. Football, don't like it? Tough, get on the pitch and start chasing the ball. Cross country, can't hack a long run, tough, get moving those legs now. Swimming, don't like the water? Tough, get in and get your head under. Goings skins with no top, worried about showing your body? Who cares, get that shirt off now. Showers, you hate them, don't want to be naked in front of everyone? Not interested, get your stuff off and get in them pronto, move it. PE for so many was like a kind of ten to twelve year physical conscription of sorts that forced you into something you'd never have done if left to your own devices. This is my experience in a brief paragraph. It was the same for everyone, I now look back with a certain fondness.

The girls saw us all barechested When we started to strip off outside the teachers made sure the girls had a really good view when we stripped off being just a few feet away from them. It was normal for all the lads were told to strip off for the lesson but occasionally we'd be split into teams of skins vs vests (school colour was pale blue) When we were indoors the teachers ran us into the ground and we all showed sweat usually by mid point and the girls passing by the sports hall just had to look through the outsized windows to see us exercising. It wasn't unusual for a posse to gather and watch if they were on their lunch. They did pay attention to how we looked. When we first starting stripping off It took a good couple of months for the jokes to die down but there were always the occasional comments about how we looked physically. It was all part of school and being honest I did welcome the attention, for me it was a nice change.

Comment by: Steve R on 23rd April 2023 at 00:25

Our school requires that all pupils who do PE must take a shower. Unless a teacher decides otherwise, showering is considered compulsory throughout all school years. Please make sure a towel is supplied as part of the PE kit at all times.

Exemptions only allowed on documented medical grounds supplied by parents for any PE activities and/or showering requirement. A written note is preferable but a telephone call will be accepted initially.




^ This sounds like my school.

But what I always wanted to know was what reason, medical or otherwise, could there be that would mean you were fit and able to take part in PE but were not able to take a shower afterwards. If you're fit to do PE you're fit to shower surely.

I once got my eldest adult sister, she was 22 and I was 13, to ring the school and pretend to be my mum to get me out of a winter cross country PE day and it worked like a dream and I was keen for her to do it again a few weeks later but she told me she wouldn't and I never tried again.

Mark, girls can be absolute rotters among boys when they get to that certain age.

I'll give you a clear example. But it's worth saying although I always shared PE lessons up until the end of primary school with girls my age we were always covered up much the same as each other to look at.

Going up into the seniors after primary we never ever shared any PE lessons with any girls at all but it was where we had our introduction to the so called benefits of shirtless physical work spending our PE lessons stripped off down to the waist every week in the school gym and a huge amount outdoors too.

No problems doing PE like that in the gym, just the boys in there, but outside the girls class could frequently be doing their stuff, netball, hockey or whatever very near the boys and catch plenty of us getting athletic. It was during one of these PE lessons that one of the girls PE teachers came over and asked one of our PE teachers if she could borrow a couple of boys to bring out some benches from the gym. Me and someone else got sent over and took the brunt of more than enough teenage girly comments lifting the benches stripped down shirtless under instruction of their PE teacher. I could have killed my own PE teacher for choosing me to do that and set me up into the lion's den of the girls PE class with comments flying thick and fast about mine and the other one's less than athletic appearance as they saw and mocked us. But that wasn't just it in that moment, there were weeks of comments afterwards too about it that refused to let up. All because I helped the girls PE teacher lift a couple of benches in my boys PE kit without my shirt on. It has been 39 years since and I still remember it and the comments like it was yesterday. Not the worst thing that can ever happen to anybody I know but a clear example for you Mark.