Past Pupils

Malcolm Trew (1952)

I could write a book about my TGS days. If any of these teachers are still alive I fear they could be offended However, In my opinion, "Boney" was a much better organist / musician than "Nelly" whose music lessons were largely spent teaching us to draw a model keyboard and learn the school song. He specialised in tuneless improvisations as Assembly assembled. But Boney played "real" music including BACH. Rumour had it that Boney had been shell-shocked during the war - not true, as he later admitted to me in his retirement. It was just that he wasn't good at discipline. He regularly smashed metre rules on offender's heads, but was inaccurate with the chalk hurling. He was very inventive with his home made apparatus. I didn't have a high opinion of Harry Wright's teaching for he appeared more interested in those who could draw freehand than the rest of us. I hated Jerry Hawkins' method of assessing our PT skill and fitness through ridiculous power tests. He was well practised with the slipper applied to the rear end!

Then there was the time when Dr "err" (guess who) fell asleep on a hot boring summer afternoon when he was attempting to teach us 6 formers ph****s.

But there were some excellent teachers too, and I greatly enjoyed my time at TGS, entering fully into extra curricular activities. I pumped the school organ for 2 years with a guy named Robert B * * * * (?) and also acted in two Shakespeare productions, playing Portia (Brutus' wife) in Julius Caesar in Dec 1949, and Hermia in Midsummer Night's Dream in Dec 1951. Wearing a wig and long gown had an interesting effect on some of the boys, who used to open the door for me and treat me to buns from Fred Hill's cake shop.

I clearly remember the Annual Cross Country Runs which started at Woodford Green and entered part of Epping Forrest. I well remember the awesome day when 5 or 6 boys were lined up at the front of the hall to receive their punishment for attending a midweek match between Spurs and Real Madrid (?) despite prior warning of severe punishment if they missed school. Three 1st and 3rd formers were publicly caned, a couple of prefects were stripped of their office and 2 were expelled from school on the spot. These details may be slightly miss-remembered, but the effect was dramatic.

I was leader of the School Christian Union for two years after David Edgington ,who started it left school. I was also a Prefect and attendance monitor. I enjoyed my lunch breaks playing football or chess. It was a tradition in my time to "rag" the "firsties" by crushing them in the fivescourt. This practice was curtailed later when a boy's arm was broken and the matter was "taken further".

After leaving school in 1952 , I went back to work for some 4 months in "Auntie" Pickering's Chemistry Lab.

I think I was in Bruce house - which shows either my poor memory or that the house meetings were a bit of a time waster