Pyramus and Thisbe
This was the class that performed Pyramus and Thisbe in the Shakespeare concert of 1964. The play used a step ladder of dubious stability borrowed from the caretaker, Mr. Brown. There is a piece about the concert here.
Snow in January 1964
If you were in the class or at the school in those days you may well remember the heavy snow that fell on the Sunday night of 12th January 1964 and everyone woke up to huge snow drifts with absolutely no transport moving that morning. A lot of children thought that a day off school was a good idea and maybe it was going to be a repeat of the long, snowy winter of 1963. This proved not to be the case and things got back to normal in a couple of days.
Do you remember?
Do you have memories of this time? Were you in the play? Please share your memories by posting a comment below.
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I played Quince in Pyramus and Thisbe. In the photograph (left to right):
Back row: Colin Yeates, Cliff Woolley, Steve Forrest, Graham ‘chip’ Wood, Nick Disano, Patrick Middleton, Malcolm Hemsley.
Middle row: Alan Elliott, Ron Ayling, Paul Weston, Peter Baker, Graham Fayers, Manny Dawkins, Richard Szypulski, Dave Jones.
Front: ?, Jill West,?, Sheila Green, Lorraine Petit, Lynda Edmunds, Shirley Best, Paul Sutton.
If anyone can provide the missing names it would be appreciated.
Are you the same Mr. Wilson who was a student teacher? I had a passion for train spotting and I believe you had quite an interest as well. The third year visited the Bluebell Railway in the summer of 1964. It is frightening to think it was 53 years ago!
I believe the two missing girls from the above list are Christine Abbott and Linda Thornton. Most of this class went into Miss Rose’s class,4R, in 1964/5. Many in the photograph took part in the production of the Golden Goose. A photo of the cast can be seen on the Golden Goose, Summer 1965 page.
Hello Richard, yes I was at Coldean for a lot of ’63/64.When I found the photo, I was able to remember some of your names and even put the names to faces of some of you. Now you have named nearly everyone!I never did get involved with train-spotting, (standing around on draughty platforms, ticking off numbers and loco. types.) I did have a passing interest on what was on the turntable of Brighton Loco Works directly over the wall up New England Road, which could be easily seen from the top deck of the buses ( and trolleybuses ) which went up there.Do you remember trying to do maths using the Cuisenaire rods. Those coloured sticks of wood where the ten was 10 cms. long and coloured red, while the One was a white 1cm. cube and they were invariably set up by children as dice. I think more building went on than maths.
I remember the snow on the day you mentioned above. During Autumn of 1963 a lot of teachers went off sick. These included Mrs. Locke and Mr. Tonkinson who took 3A and 3B. You (Mr. Wilson) temporarily ran 3A whilst a supply teacher Miss Hammond took 3B. The latter teacher married during her time with us and became Mrs. Baines. The Kennedy assassination took place during this period and my memory is very clear of this time.
I remember the Cuisenaire rods very well. Every table had a set. At the end of the lesson the teacher would check that every rod was accounted for before the lid was placed on the box. So if you lost one, especially the minute white, you used to leave a space on the bottom layer and tried to hide the gap. When I went to secondary school other pupils from different primary schools told tales about these rods. Apparently one parent at Carden school instructed their child to tip ink on them! Some parents did not approve of new teaching methods!
I remember Mrs Locke very well ,she had a son called Johnie he used to come to school with her. I was at Coldean school from 1953-1959.
Margaret Mayhead nee Szypulski.
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