Ricky Ralph came up to visit me last Saturday. He said he enjoyed reading my posts about Mt Waverley and was looking forward to reading more. Rick and I met in 1964 at Malvern Grammar, our first year of secondary school. We were in the same class but didn't become close friends until say 1966/67 by which time we had moved on to Caulfield Grammar, Malvern being its Junior school. What brought us together was probably that we didn't quite fit into the system very well and felt some resentment to the rigid discipline, especially as it was sometimes unfair and to be truthful quite absurd. Ralphie wants me to be brutally honest and tell all as it was. I don't know about that, that period of my life I find a little embarrassing looking back, say 15-20yo. At least he's given me the green light to write about him. Rick's parents moved to Mt Waverley in about 67/68 and by then we were best mates who spent nearly all our spare time together.
But first I have to finish the Mt Waverley Primary school story. In Grade 4 Mr Laub watched as me and Bill Genat kissed our girlfriends Janyne and Marilyn before they boarded their bus to home. Other kids were with Mr Laub and they tipped Bill and me off that he'd seen us kiss the girls and we'd be in strife. Next day he asked us to stay back and gave us a bit of a lecture that we were not to be doing that, his exact words I can't recall, but the gist of it was that we should leave that sort of thing till we were about 18. We would have been 9 yo so 18 seemed like never.
The next year I was in a different Grade 5 to Janyne, much to my disappointment. I had Mr Worthy (Bob), a good bloke whom I liked a lot. As he called the roll first day when he came to me, nearly last as I always was as it was alphabetical, he asked me did I have an older brother. When I said yes Joddy, who had been in Mr. Worthy's class two years earlier, he just stared at me. Meredith said when she went into Mr Worthy's class two years later, when he did the roll first day, he asked her did she have two older brothers and when she said yes he put his head on the desk and covered it with his hands. Mind you I was always quite well behaved and a good student at primary school. Mr Worthy did have occasion to give me the strap once, along with Graeme Burrowes and Chris Barker. He caught us teasing Gay Elliot, who had an unfortunate habit of bursting into tears in class and got the nickname 'Geeza'. Now Burrowes was a bit of a nutcase, he had the reputation of being the best tweedie fighter and challenged all comers. I don't claim that me and Chris were innocent but it was definitely Burrowes who was relentless in his taunting of Gay- "Geeza, Geeza, Geeza," until she'd burst into tears. This day at lunchtime Gay broke down and I don't remember if she dobbed us or Worthy caught us but after lunch we had to line up for the strap. Burrowes was first and he almost screamed with each cut. Chris next, winced and grimaced but was noiseless. Other kids in the class told me I got the hardest but I neither flinched or made a sound. I don't even know if it hurt, I think the brain just shut off. This was toward the end of the year and a few days later in a casual sort of moment me and a few others were near Mr Worthy's desk and I found him looking at me with a bit of a stare. When I looked back at him, holding eye contact for some seconds, he said, "I'm beginning to lose my fear of you now."
What he meant was he'd had Jod two years earlier and had been traumatized by the experience, and was expecting me to explode at some point, especially when he strapped me. I remember when Jod was in Bob Worthy's class a couple of years earlier there was an incident where Jod refused to do what he was asked, yelled expletives and bolted out of the class, climbed onto the roof of the toilets and into the pine trees and they couldn't get him down.
Grade five saw my love affair with Janyne come to an end. In seperate classes now (they probably did this on purpose) she seemed to be avoiding me at playtime and lunchtime. I went up to her one day, she was playing knuckles with her friends, sitting on the asphalt in a circle. I said to her "You said you wanted marry me when we grow up."
She replied, "Oh that was last year." It was over, but I did carry a torch for her for years, secretly.
By this time I was great mates with Graeme Forster, we were inseperable for five years or so. I had holidays with his family at Lorne and Torquay and we were always playing cricket, football, shuttlecock, or snooker or billiards, or riding bikes somewhere. His nickname was Bubs, because he had brothers 3 and 4 years older and the name had stuck from his early days.
We were in Terry Stabler's class in Grade 6, a fantastic year. Mr Stabler was English and very popular with his class. We spent time nearly everyday playing rounders. In the 1980's and 90's Mr Stabler used to come to our farm to buy honey. He lived in Berwick then. I thanked him for that happy year and commented on how relaxed and fun it was and asked him how he got away with letting us play rounders for much of the day. He said that class was not supposed to be his, all the bright well behaved kids were selected to give another teacher an easy time because they were recovering from an operation, or almost retired, something like that. It may have been Davo or Skippy himself, Mr Skipworth was the headmaster, a good old bloke, rotund, silver haired, always wearing a dark suit with braces. At the last minute it didn't happen and Terry Stabler got the gig. He said he really didn't have to do anything as all the kids were on top of the carriculum from early.
Football and cricket were a big deal in the last two years of primary school. In Grade 5 I played in the school footy team, Graeme did too, and we won the comp. The next year not so good. We played against Syndal, Glen Waverley, Chadstone, and later Pinewood, and maybe others that escape me. I had great success in cricket, bowling leg spin, copying Richie Benaud. I had figures of 7/10 in one match, 4/5 in another. Geoff Burston and I saved the day against Syndal in one match with a big partnership after a top order collapse. Geoff later was an accomplished bass guitarist in 'The Black Sorrows' who were quite famous for a time. Robert Rose cleaned me up one day though against Pinewood, carting my leggies all over the ground. He was the son of Bob Rose, Collingwood legend, and played cricket for Victoria in the 70's, and football for Collingwood and Footscray, .
That'll probably do for my Mt.Waverley PS recollections. I have been good friends with Ian Sinclair who was in Jod's year for about the last fifty years, he lives in Whitehorse in the Yukon Canada. His brother Colin who was in my year and captain of the football team in our last year runs a fishing tackle shop in Adaminaby and takes people fly fishing. Graeme Strachan died in a helicopter crash in Qld. Graeme Forster last I heard was living on the Gold Coast. So was Janyne Wilcox. Other names such as John Weatherley, John Fitzgibbon, Steven Perry, Gary Royal, Bruce Warne, Alan Lightfoot, Philip Shine, Bill Edwards, twins Frank and John Gammon, Ross Walters, David Jewell, Tony Smith, Jimmy Slatter, Denis Chambers, Jeremy Hartley, Terry Thorrington, Gail Beaton, Pam McCauley, Pam Hope, Meg Ockendon, Marilyn Williams, Dianne Cunliffe, Dianne Edgelow, Robin Hudson, Linda Wallace come to mind, as would more if I thought long enough. It's amazing what you do recall when you get immersed like this. I would be very curious to know what happened to all those kids I went through school with. A Mt.Waverley PS reunion from 1963 would be most interesting, but I don't think it possible. Too long ago and people would be dispersed all over Australia and the world.
Thursday, July 25, 2019
Wednesday, July 17, 2019
Mt Waverley Primary School
Formal education started for me at Mt. Waverley primary school in 1957. That class was known to all as 'Bubs', but I suppose it was Preps officially, as it was when my kids went to school. The teacher was Mrs Longmuir if my memory serves me, a pleasant lady, dark hair. I recall very little of the year except that first day mum walked with me to school and after that I was supposed to go with Jod who had started two years earlier, but I think I went by myself after the first day, Jod didn't want to know his little brother.
I had been to kindergarten the previous year and remember little of this except I didn't like it. The kinder was new if I'm right, a cream brick building at the 11 oclock point of the oval in Sherwood drive. I don't think there was a kinda prior. Jod didn't go to one. A walkway connected Sherwood Drive and Virginia St past the kinda and the progress hall on the Stephenson's Rd corner with Virginia St (a timber building that was used for community meetings and children's club things. I went to a gymnast club thing there a couple of times, later it was used to store mountains of newspapers for a service club before it caught fire and burned down one day) I was a quiet kid and wasn't really into the stuff they wanted me to do at kinda (drawing and cutting paper up and mucking about with clag?}. This is vague recollection, but my strongest memory of kinder is they had a pet frog in an old wash trough in the yard and we were asked to catch flies and bring them as food for the frog. Mum found this amusing but I seriously spent a lot of time one weekend trying to catch flies. When I turned up to kinder with some in a jar, the only kid that did, it created laughter for the ladies at kinder. Not understanding, I was annoyed.
My clearest recall of Bubs was sitting on the floor, with Mrs Longmuir asking questions and putting up numbers and things like letters and words on the blackboard. I always had my hand up to answer the questions when often no others did. This seemed to irritate Mrs Longmuir, she said seeing I was so good with the answers I could go outside and play and sent me out. I didn't realize this was some sort of reward (if it was) and when I got outside I didn't know what to do by myself and just sat miserable on the steps of the class rooms. From memory these were temporary classrooms, three in a row, Bubs first one, then grade one, then grade 2. I wasn't so quick to show I knew all the answers after this.
Grade one the teacher was Mrs Bennett, a middle aged well dressed woman with blue rinse hair and often puffing on a fag in class. She was agreeable and friendly but had a stern side. My only memory of an incident in her class is that she took exception to me twiddling my finger through my hair at the front, She warned me that if I kept doing it she'd put a bobby pin in my hair to hold it down. It was an unconscious habit I couldn't control so she pinned my hair which caused much amusement to the boys as bobby pins were a girl thing. I copped a bit of flack at lunchtime. Grade 2 we had Mrs Nicholson, a large woman with grey hair who had a bad temper and she'd lose it if a kid annoyed her and thump the daylights out of their back with a brutal hand. At the end of grade 2 I got an award from the Education Dept or someone for 5 pounds for being equal top of the class with Howard Partridge.
Memory gets a bit better come 1960, Grade 3. My teacher was a lovely young lady Mrs Lambert. I think her first name was Diane but I may be wrong. She was tall with dark hair and very pretty. I already knew her. The previous year she was a grade 4 teacher and had Jod in her class. Now Jod was always a hopeless student, could grasp nothing, and was defiant to boot. Mrs Lambert tried her utmost to help him. She contacted our parents and offered to tutor Jod at her house. Mum said Ok she would come home from work and take Jod to Mrs Lambert's house but there was a problem as there were two younger ones. Mrs Lambert said bring them too she will give them something to do. So Jod, and sometimes Meredith and me, were dropped at Mrs Lambert's house in Blackburn Rd while she tried her best with Jod. The work she gave me was dead easy so when I had her as a teacher in grade 3 she knew I was well up to speed. Mrs L's husband was a policeman and he came home a couple of times while the tutoring was on and he was a nice man. I'm not sure really if this was after school or on weekends or school holidays, They didn't have kids, being a young couple getting established. I would love to contact them now, I did try to track Mrs L once but no luck. They may well have passed on anyway as I'm now 67 so they would be in their mid/late 80's.
By 1960 the school had grown. I think there were two grade 3's, both large classes. Mt. Waverley was a boom suburb with all the baby boomer generation needing schooling. In the 60's I think it became the largest primary school in the state for enrollment. Mt Waverley was changed from semi rural to totally urban in a short tome. Yet next door to the school we still had a market garden that used draft horses. We had to separate our rubbish from our lunch into food scraps or other as the food scraps went to the pigs the market gardener kept. Outside the grade three four classes some trees for shade with wooden seats beneath and a monkey bar, and a row of large pine trees stretching up to the northern boundary. Under these trees was a toilet block, very old and inadequate, no sewage, pans emptied by night cart, and a bit further up a shelter shed and at the end a maypole and maybe some other play equipment. I may be wrong with some of this detail as we are talking about 60 years ago, so if other ex students stumble on this blog post I apologize for errors. On one side of the pine trees was a sort of fine yellow gravel that extended to Park Lane, on which formal and non formal running races were held and the girls played softball. On the other side of the pine trees was an oval or more a level paddock (across to Marriot's farm where the draft horses often grazed), where boys kicked the footy in recess and lunchtime. There were cricket nets and concrete pitches there, maybe only in the last few years I was there. In front of the buildings on the east side were netball courts on Park Lane boundary. Assembly was held here. (Once a week?) We'd line up in our grades to the flag and the God Save the Queen then march in single file to our classrooms to Colonel Bogey music or some such. I think maybe some parking for teachers cars too was on that boundary. I have enjoyed reminiscing about this as it has made me remember many pupils male and female that I haven't thought of in many years, too numerous to list.
In grade 3 I had my first love affair, with Janyne Wilcox. Her friend was Marilyn Ryan. My friend Bill Genat was in love with Marilyn.They both lived in East Oakleigh and I think just came to the school in that year. There was a shortage of schools for the burgeoning population which is why Mt Waverley had such a large enrolment. These girls came by bus I think with others of course. The love affair lasted a couple of years. I sometimes rode my bike to Janyne's house after school. I was in the same grade four class as Janyne with Mr Laub. We had graduated to the old original school building now and there were more than 60 kids in the class. No heating except for an open fire in extremely cold weather and it was the era of inkwells and nib pens still. Mr Laub was a good teacher, a small man, quietly spoken and well liked.
This post is going too long and will not be of much interest to people other than those from Mt. Waverley so I'll post this and finish my primary school story another time.
I had been to kindergarten the previous year and remember little of this except I didn't like it. The kinder was new if I'm right, a cream brick building at the 11 oclock point of the oval in Sherwood drive. I don't think there was a kinda prior. Jod didn't go to one. A walkway connected Sherwood Drive and Virginia St past the kinda and the progress hall on the Stephenson's Rd corner with Virginia St (a timber building that was used for community meetings and children's club things. I went to a gymnast club thing there a couple of times, later it was used to store mountains of newspapers for a service club before it caught fire and burned down one day) I was a quiet kid and wasn't really into the stuff they wanted me to do at kinda (drawing and cutting paper up and mucking about with clag?}. This is vague recollection, but my strongest memory of kinder is they had a pet frog in an old wash trough in the yard and we were asked to catch flies and bring them as food for the frog. Mum found this amusing but I seriously spent a lot of time one weekend trying to catch flies. When I turned up to kinder with some in a jar, the only kid that did, it created laughter for the ladies at kinder. Not understanding, I was annoyed.
My clearest recall of Bubs was sitting on the floor, with Mrs Longmuir asking questions and putting up numbers and things like letters and words on the blackboard. I always had my hand up to answer the questions when often no others did. This seemed to irritate Mrs Longmuir, she said seeing I was so good with the answers I could go outside and play and sent me out. I didn't realize this was some sort of reward (if it was) and when I got outside I didn't know what to do by myself and just sat miserable on the steps of the class rooms. From memory these were temporary classrooms, three in a row, Bubs first one, then grade one, then grade 2. I wasn't so quick to show I knew all the answers after this.
Grade one the teacher was Mrs Bennett, a middle aged well dressed woman with blue rinse hair and often puffing on a fag in class. She was agreeable and friendly but had a stern side. My only memory of an incident in her class is that she took exception to me twiddling my finger through my hair at the front, She warned me that if I kept doing it she'd put a bobby pin in my hair to hold it down. It was an unconscious habit I couldn't control so she pinned my hair which caused much amusement to the boys as bobby pins were a girl thing. I copped a bit of flack at lunchtime. Grade 2 we had Mrs Nicholson, a large woman with grey hair who had a bad temper and she'd lose it if a kid annoyed her and thump the daylights out of their back with a brutal hand. At the end of grade 2 I got an award from the Education Dept or someone for 5 pounds for being equal top of the class with Howard Partridge.
Memory gets a bit better come 1960, Grade 3. My teacher was a lovely young lady Mrs Lambert. I think her first name was Diane but I may be wrong. She was tall with dark hair and very pretty. I already knew her. The previous year she was a grade 4 teacher and had Jod in her class. Now Jod was always a hopeless student, could grasp nothing, and was defiant to boot. Mrs Lambert tried her utmost to help him. She contacted our parents and offered to tutor Jod at her house. Mum said Ok she would come home from work and take Jod to Mrs Lambert's house but there was a problem as there were two younger ones. Mrs Lambert said bring them too she will give them something to do. So Jod, and sometimes Meredith and me, were dropped at Mrs Lambert's house in Blackburn Rd while she tried her best with Jod. The work she gave me was dead easy so when I had her as a teacher in grade 3 she knew I was well up to speed. Mrs L's husband was a policeman and he came home a couple of times while the tutoring was on and he was a nice man. I'm not sure really if this was after school or on weekends or school holidays, They didn't have kids, being a young couple getting established. I would love to contact them now, I did try to track Mrs L once but no luck. They may well have passed on anyway as I'm now 67 so they would be in their mid/late 80's.
By 1960 the school had grown. I think there were two grade 3's, both large classes. Mt. Waverley was a boom suburb with all the baby boomer generation needing schooling. In the 60's I think it became the largest primary school in the state for enrollment. Mt Waverley was changed from semi rural to totally urban in a short tome. Yet next door to the school we still had a market garden that used draft horses. We had to separate our rubbish from our lunch into food scraps or other as the food scraps went to the pigs the market gardener kept. Outside the grade three four classes some trees for shade with wooden seats beneath and a monkey bar, and a row of large pine trees stretching up to the northern boundary. Under these trees was a toilet block, very old and inadequate, no sewage, pans emptied by night cart, and a bit further up a shelter shed and at the end a maypole and maybe some other play equipment. I may be wrong with some of this detail as we are talking about 60 years ago, so if other ex students stumble on this blog post I apologize for errors. On one side of the pine trees was a sort of fine yellow gravel that extended to Park Lane, on which formal and non formal running races were held and the girls played softball. On the other side of the pine trees was an oval or more a level paddock (across to Marriot's farm where the draft horses often grazed), where boys kicked the footy in recess and lunchtime. There were cricket nets and concrete pitches there, maybe only in the last few years I was there. In front of the buildings on the east side were netball courts on Park Lane boundary. Assembly was held here. (Once a week?) We'd line up in our grades to the flag and the God Save the Queen then march in single file to our classrooms to Colonel Bogey music or some such. I think maybe some parking for teachers cars too was on that boundary. I have enjoyed reminiscing about this as it has made me remember many pupils male and female that I haven't thought of in many years, too numerous to list.
In grade 3 I had my first love affair, with Janyne Wilcox. Her friend was Marilyn Ryan. My friend Bill Genat was in love with Marilyn.They both lived in East Oakleigh and I think just came to the school in that year. There was a shortage of schools for the burgeoning population which is why Mt Waverley had such a large enrolment. These girls came by bus I think with others of course. The love affair lasted a couple of years. I sometimes rode my bike to Janyne's house after school. I was in the same grade four class as Janyne with Mr Laub. We had graduated to the old original school building now and there were more than 60 kids in the class. No heating except for an open fire in extremely cold weather and it was the era of inkwells and nib pens still. Mr Laub was a good teacher, a small man, quietly spoken and well liked.
This post is going too long and will not be of much interest to people other than those from Mt. Waverley so I'll post this and finish my primary school story another time.
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