Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

I have put a few old photos on the web at http://www.mary-lynch.pwp.blueyonder.co ... CH_photos/

Most of them are my own work, developed and printed in the school dark room.

MKM wrote:I have put a few old photos on the web at http://www.mary-lynch.pwp.blueyonder.co ... CH_photos/

Most of them are my own work, developed and printed in the school dark room.

Are Mary, Alex and Caroline the ones who post here?

The very ones!

Lovely photos, Mary - thank you so much!

How did you get away with such a short skirt? Enough to make SWSNBN quiver with wrath....

Munch

the Mary is MKM who posted the photos. all 3 of them were the same year as me but were in 6's together, with Munch a year ahead.

Lovely picture of Mary in her Harris tweed coat (apparently they cost £105 in 1966) and velour hat.

If I remember correctly, the Harris Tweed coats came in gradually. The first ones had raglan sleeves and were only for the VI form - I think we lesser creatures had a different coat - it was before macs came in. Kerren can you help? Later the tweed coats came in for everyone and the new ones were the style Mary is wearing.

Thanks for sharing the photos - I enjoyed looking at them.

I seem to remember having a scratchy black coat when I first arrived (there's a photo of me on my first Long Saturday). It had a belt with a leather buckle, if I remember rightly. We wore it with a full brimmed velour hat (in summer we had panamas).
I much preferred the Harris Tweed coats when they came in, and the velour hats with the smaller brimsd (as in Mary's pictures....). But I don't remember any phasing in - although given the cost of the coats I am not surprised! They really were splendid - warm, comfortable and smart and not at all school uniform so could be worn in the holidays.

kerrensimmonds wrote:I seem to remember having a scratchy black coat when I first arrived (there's a photo of me on my first Long Saturday). It had a belt with a leather buckle, if I remember rightly. We wore it with a full brimmed velour hat (in summer we had panamas).
I much preferred the Harris Tweed coats when they came in, and the velour hats with the smaller brimsd (as in Mary's pictures....). But I don't remember any phasing in - although given the cost of the coats I am not surprised! They really were splendid - warm, comfortable and smart and not at all school uniform so could be worn in the holidays.

I can remember wearing mine to church on Christmas Day in my first year. I also read a lesson.

I think that was the only Christmas I wore it though.

I remember going to Church one Christmas Day - after I had left - and finding someone in the congregation wearing hers. She'd been one of my Sunday School children, and had now gone to Hertford. It brought a lump to my throat!

The raglan sleeves were the bigger sizes, square set sleeves smaller - so obviously juniors got the square shoulders.

It was the only Harris tweed coat that I have ever "owned" - wish we could have had the option of buying one when we left, even if 2nd/3rd hand....
B.

I have ,somewhat belatedly, just seen these photos for the first time. Thankyou Mary for posting them. I have hardly any photos of myself when I was young ( lost or destroyed for various reasons i won't go into !) so it's quite emotional to see them.

I haven't seen Susan Knight ( I think I'm pushing her along in a wheelbarrow in that pic....possibly Mary,Sue and I shared a garden) for about 35 years.She lived at Herne HIll in those days and was one of my best friends....fiery,passionate,great conversationalist being incredibly plain speaking and honest and very good at sport ( the latter unlike myself )...Along with Siobhan,Mary Mc. and a few others in Sixes, Sue was also an excellent card player.She wasn't afraid of anything...I wonder what happened to her ?

On the Sixes holding up the cup pics Siobhan Kierans (small and dark and VERY sporty) features along with another talented girl I haven't seen since those days ...Roberta Ayles ( Rounders,swimming...always a winner and an amazing artist ). In one of the "sport" photos Siobhan and I think myself are wearing strange dark all-in-one outfits and it kind of rings a bell....made of veloury material for sport...am I imagining things ? I can see many old Sixes in those pics and can remember the names.

Love the "Harris Tweed" and "Sunday Velour" Mary. Those coats were snug,warm and comfy. I wore mine in the hols in Winter. My mother would never have afforded anything as luxurious. One Winter holiday I stayed at Siobhan's in Brixton aged about 13/14 . We both got the tube from The Oval to the Ideal Home Exhibition (Olympia ?) wearing our Harris Tweeds. Somehow at this exhibition we came across a group of older ladies on a "Bridge" (the card game) stall who invited us to play against them and were stunned when we we beat them hands down (strange visions ,we must have seemed, in Harris Tweed )....DR had taught us Bridge at school and we used to play for hours in Sixes in our spare time.....er....and I should add...that we had all kinds of bizarre ruses for communicating to our partner what our hand contained.SHAMEFUL MINXES

The Hertford Mercury Bio. Lab pic. features (from memory 'cos I can't figure out on Vista how to post and look at the photos at the same time) Valerie Williams,Diana Garnham,Liz Plummer (Jay...who posts here),Judith Points,Mary Mc....Susan Knight? and Mrs Lewis the teacher who opened the bio lab windows with a long pole rather than observe our sniggering faces as she taught human reproduction (and very scientific it was too !).

Mary looks so cute in her too short summer dress. I was a wardrobe girl and probably aided and abetted girls in their efforts to hold on to grown-out-of clothing One of the problems was that we continued to wear summer uniform after the hols ,if the weather was still warm ,and we had all grown.

There's Caroline (icomefromthelandownunder) in her very trendy looking NHS specs ,sitting with Judith ....revealed for all on the forum to see. Nice pic !

Best wishes to all.

Mary,if you see this,could you possibly email me those pics if you don't mind? alexandrathrift@yahoo.co.uk

On the sports day ones I can also see Judith? Staines, with the glasses and bunches, whose sister Philippa was the year below me in 5s. I met Judith at the French Institute in South Ken a few years later when I was doing French at UCL and she was at, I think, the old Westfield College (before it merged with Queen Mary).

I'm pretty sure one of the pictures has been printed as a mirror image, as the chapel should be on the far right corner looking away from the houses (or has that already been pointed out?)

Hi Jo,

Mary developed the photos herself in the CH dark room.

You are right Jo. I think many of them are back-to-front. I had thought the same for the one which shows me pushing Sue Knight in a wheelbarrow.The swings (behind us) faced the other way so I guess the pic should be the other way.It's the back of the science block and not the school block we can see. My spatial awareness is hopeless but it looks wrong ! My parting is on the wrong side/ or is it the right side...but it should be a mirror image ?....aaaaargh...you see...the spatial bit of my brain must be missing which is why I could never do very difficult maths !

The thing that puzzles me is that Mary was a fantastic mathematician......

I expect they are back to front. I may have been good at maths, but my eye-sight was poor. But are you sure it's a wheel-barrow Alex? I thought it was the see-saw.

The good news is that I've found some old negatives, so when I get round to scanning them I can publish them the right way round. There seem to be a few negatives that I don't have prints for too.

Hi Mary,

Thanks for e-mailing the pics.

I am hoping to see you all at that Travelodge, though I haven't booked anything yet. I spoke to Jacquie Tomlinson ( 3s... year below us) on the phone yesterday.She often visits Hertford Town as she lives near and strongly suggests,as the museum is titchy, that we visit in very small groups. I vaguely remember visiting the museum,when I was at school,on one of my forays into town

The photo: Yes...it's probably a see-saw ! I had remembered that we had a garden at the back of the school block and Sue is wearing her pinny (but not me ) so I guess we weren't doing the gardening ,where I'm sure pinnies were compulsory.Also , I'm not sure that even Sue Knight could have persuaded me to push her around in a wheelbarrow