I believe I was the very last pupil to leave the school grounds. My parents lived in Senegal at the time and I was given a lift by the headmaster to Leeds to catch a train to London and a flight from Heathrow to Dakar via Paris.
I had to wait until the headmaster had thanked all the parents and seen all the other pupils off. I remember the heart-wrenching emotion, watching everyone leave, the tidal wave of tears as we said what we knew were our final goodbyes, especially from Fred, the headmaster!
The ethos of the school was very liberal and informal. There was no school uniform. I remember arriving in a formal suit and tie on my first day to be met by a long haired blond American called Pete in his ever present, matching, bleached jeans and jean jacket. The first thing he said to me (looking at my suit) was: "Better get rid of those dudes man!"
The atmosphere was so laid back it was almost horizontal. The senior pupils had their own self-painted and decorated wooden cubicles to study in, but spent much of their free time in the basement senior common room, endlessly listening to the classic hits of the era by Bread (I Would Give Everything I Own, Diary, Baby I'm A Want You), The Doors (Riders On The Storm), Neil Young (Heart of Gold), The Steve Miller Band (The Joker), John Martyn (May You Never) and John Lennon (Imagine) etc.
Roger Gerhardt was a wonderfully warm and enthusiastic French teacher, totally committed to the school. Frank Burgess a gentle, dedicated woodwork teacher with a home somewhere on the school grounds and a kind, pretty blonde daughter who was a pupil and whose name I've sadly forgotten.
Louis Jones was a friendly and patient graphic art and pottery teacher who skilfully introduced the charms of art even to novices who had never given it a second thought. John Deadman was a serious but engaging maths and science teacher whose wife Jen was a young, empathetic English teacher. They also lived on the school grounds (in the matron's quarters?). Chris de Sarum was a companionable and entertaining ecologist and Geography teacher who enlivened his subject. Bettina (Hay?) was a kind and gentle History teacher (and Deputy Head?). Fred Sessa was an energetic and charismatic Head Master and a superb and highly competitive basketball player who was always willing to play, effortlessly running rings around and soaring over the heads of pupils almost twice his height and less than half his age.
I will always remember the long sweeping drive, the imposing building and the beautiful and enchanting woodland beyond the swimming pool. I remember the tree house built by an ex-pupil nicknamed Monkey who was so attached to the school that, even after he left, he used to visit regularly, sleeping in the tree house and surviving the weekend on malt loaves and Irn Bru. I remember Benny who lived locally and always wore a WW1 greatcoat and sometimes came to school with his pet whippet. A quiet girl called Zoë later became famous for allegedly becoming obsessed with extreme bodybuilding, her troubled story featuring briefly in the national media.
I arrived at Wennington in the fifth form, taking my GCEs in the summer and going on to the lower and upper 6th at the more formal and conventional Rishworth School in Ripponden near Halifax to take my A Levels and complete my secondary education. I went on to Lancaster University, graduating with a BA Hons. After completing my MSc at Salford University, I pursued a career in one of my undergraduate minor disciplines and now run COMPUTAMEDICS.
COMPUTAMEDICS is a London-wide provider of after sales and post warranty I.T. maintenance, repair, upgrade and support services to homes and small-to-medium sized businesses.
I was only there for a short time but will always look back with fond affection on my year at Wennington. It is a shame the school didn't survive, but there were so few pupils left that, despite the donations and other efforts of many of the parents, mine included, the situation was clearly unsustainable.
It is difficult to list my contemporaries' names, because the informality meant that we almost never used our surnames. I remember many of their first names but few of their surnames. Those I remember are:Helen Richardson, Paul Lake, Sam Shields, Rod McLeod, 'hat', 'blue', maddie, gwen, paul, Ursula, pete, hank, benny, Claire, zoë, heather.
| Home | Site Map |