Mass nudity in the swimming baths

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little_r
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Post by little_r »

i recall mr.torkington throwing bruce mc gowan into the pool, unfortuneatley he forgot it was the shallow end! oops! :oops:
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Post by J.R. »

sejintenej wrote:Certainly no swimming costume until you could swim the 5 lengths; I can't remember about the dive. More interesting was the annual summer visit to the beach near Bognor Regis; I'll allow the "ladies" maginations to run riot!
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Post by loringa »

If I remember correctly, Sgt Guest used to run the school post office with his wife. He also taught judo and fencing, again if memory serves me.

During my time (73-80) the RSM wasn't an RSM at all but a former Royal Naval Fleet Chief Petty Officer (E H 'Ted' Bradley) universally known as 'Chief.' He was a great bloke with some good dits (such as swimming off the beach in Crete in 1941 until he found a ship to pick him up) but the most disgusting pipe. He single-handedly ran the shooting team because the official master i/c took no interest whatsoever. I kept in touch with him after he retired to Horsham but lost contact in the mid 1990s. I understand that his wife became ill and she may have died about this time as he stopped attending school functions. Does anyone know whether he's still alive and, hopefully, hale and hearty?
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Mass nudity

Post by jhopgood »

I must be getting a touch of the selective memories, as I have no recollection of not using a swimming costume whilst learning to swim. I remember classes taking place at midday and having to do five lengths and dive in, the small pool had water in it then, as well as having to open my eyes under water to count fingers, but the absence of a swimming costume bemuses me.
Maybe I didn't notice as swimming took place in the summer term, and by then I had become used to the communal baths in the trough after winter sports.
The trough was exactly that, room for about 4 people sitting down, all facing the same way. There were showers overhead, large copper things with holes punched in them, but they were rarely used, and then mainly to give a cold shower to someone.
Not at all hygienic, and most of us were confounded when they built the new changing rooms and there were individual showers.
I remember the swimming competition and something called the plunge, where competitors dived in at the shallow end and without using a swimming motion, tried to get as far up the pool as possible. One competitor was disqualified when he raised a thumb as he went past the previous record.
I also remember the american starting basketball, but it never really took over from asphalt cricket. Not much room for that these days.
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Post by UserRemovedAccount »

Concerning the R.S.M., the man in the early 1950s was named Carter, although he was normally referred to as (if I remember correctly) the "sagger-magger." His son was in Peele A, became a Grecian and went on to university. The armoury in the early 1950s contained some extraordinary weapons, including a number of Martini-Henry rifles (vintage late 19th century!!) and at least one PIAT anti-tank weapon (vintage 1940), but the majority of weapons were Lee-Enfields, a mixture of the SMLE (World War One) and Number 4s (World War Two).
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Post by loringa »

A PIAT (or some form of anti-tank weapon) was found in the gym underneath the old boxing ring when it was dismantled in about 1974. The weapon plus a number of rounds, or so the story goes, were dumped in Doctor's Lake. Presumably they are still there, corroding quietly away.
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Post by Spoonbill »

Anyone remember Mark Gelpke pushing Mr Torkington into the swimming pool fully-clothed as a dare? Classic stuff.

To his eternal credit, Torkington took it very well. He merely made MG foot the bill for watch-repairs and dry cleaning. What an absolute saint.

Where are you now, Mark Gelpke? Derailing trains for a laugh?
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Mass Nudity in the Swimming Baths

Post by seakins »

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, you became a 'Red Bather' when you swam two lengths without stopping, and a 'Blue Bather' when you swam five lengths. As indicated, the blue bather covering was two triangles, one front and one back. There was no requirement to dive although most boys started with a dive. But I never saw an actual red bather double-triangle. M Seakins
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Mass Nudity in the Swimming Baths

Post by seakins »

My first year in Peele A (1946-1947) I was a member of the Life-Saving Club and managed to secure the Intermediate Certificate. We had theory classes on Mondays at 12:15 and practical classes in the Swimming Baths on Sunday afternoons. The next year, Headmaster HLO Flecker decreed that there were to be no more organized activities on Sundays and so Life-Saving classes were discontinued. I wish that I had had enough nerve to point out that the Morning Chapel, Evening Chapel, Divinity Prep and Letter-Writing on a Sunday were four organized activities on a Sunday. M Seakins
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SUNDAYS

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Concerning organised activities on Sundays, was there not also something called "House Out of Bounds" or "HOOB" which lasted from 2 o'clock to some time at about 3.30 or 4pm. Admittedly it was not organised in that you could go more or less where you wanted, but it was still a compulsory activity. Then there was as much as an hour's free time before "letter-writing."
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Re: Mass Nudity in the Swimming Baths

Post by sejintenej »

seakins wrote:The next year, Headmaster HLO Flecker decreed that there were to be no more organized activities on Sundays and so Life-Saving classes were discontinued. I wish that I had had enough nerve to point out that the Morning Chapel, Evening Chapel, Divinity Prep and Letter-Writing on a Sunday were four organized activities on a Sunday. M Seakins
Lifesaving was re-introduced as part of the CCF Civil Defence section curriculum (?sp) in about 1959.
Petard249 wrote:Concerning organised activities on Sundays, was there not also something called "House Out of Bounds" or "HOOB" which lasted from 2 o'clock to some time at about 3.30 or 4pm. Admittedly it was not organised in that you could go more or less where you wanted, but it was still a compulsory activity. Then there was as much as an hour's free time before "letter-writing."
Quite right (except if it was raining). In addition, Tuesday afternoons (before 4.30 pm classes) were for hobbies and you had to be out of the house for those. That was what kept the Scout Group alive.

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Post by sejintenej »

loringa wrote:A PIAT (or some form of anti-tank weapon) was found in the gym underneath the old boxing ring when it was dismantled in about 1974. The weapon plus a number of rounds, or so the story goes, were dumped in Doctor's Lake. Presumably they are still there, corroding quietly away.
Just come across this: the weapon was almost certainly the MOBAT (Mobile Anti-Tank launcher) which was zeroed in with a bren which was attached to the side. (Brens took standard .303 Lee Enfield ammo.) Was towed behind a standard vehicle - land rover, 3 tonner etc. Remember zeroing it in once but they didn't have live rocket rounds - or so they said
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Post by JohnCKirk »

I started out in the old swimming pool, although I think that the diving pool had already been emptied by that point (in 1985). They had a rule that everyone had to go swimming pretty much every day until you could do a certain distance (5 lengths? 10 lengths?), and then you dropped back to once a week; most people "qualified" right away.

There was no mandatory nudity as such, but the boys just got changed in cubicles (with plastic curtains rather than doors) around the edge of the pool, while the girls had their own changing room. There were a few times when someone would get thrown in the pool naked (other boys would come into your cubicle and grab you just as you'd taken off your trunks), which happened to me once; this was at the deep end, and there were people (including girls) sitting by the shallow end waiting for the next class, but I think it was far away/quick enough to just be a vague blur :) (I was then handed a towel as I climbed out.)
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Post by Richard Ruck »

JohnCKirk wrote:I started out in the old swimming pool, although I think that the diving pool had already been emptied by that point (in 1985). They had a rule that everyone had to go swimming pretty much every day until you could do a certain distance (5 lengths? 10 lengths?), and then you dropped back to once a week; most people "qualified" right away.

There was no mandatory nudity as such, but the boys just got changed in cubicles (with plastic curtains rather than doors) around the edge of the pool, while the girls had their own changing room. There were a few times when someone would get thrown in the pool naked (other boys would come into your cubicle and grab you just as you'd taken off your trunks), which happened to me once; this was at the deep end, and there were people (including girls) sitting by the shallow end waiting for the next class, but I think it was far away/quick enough to just be a vague blur :) (I was then handed a towel as I climbed out.)
We just had to do 2 lengths, and there were certainly no curtains anywhere.

Then again, there were no girls anywhere, either.......
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Post by jhopgood »

Ours was 5 lengths, dive and count the fingers on a hand held under water. Your own hand didn't count.
Does anyone remember a competition called the Plunge, where it was a question of seeing how far you could get after diving in without moving hands or feet?
It took place during the swimming competition.
Can't remember who it was, but he was disqualified as even though he far "outplunged" everyone else. His mistake was to give a thumbs up signe before he gave up.
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