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Post by carron on Oct 18, 2005 11:25:48 GMT 1
Sorry, I put this in the wrong thread. Here goes again. Does anyone remember the teachers in St. Illtyds School, Dowlais while I was there may years ago. Mr Bill Duggan, Mr Hennessy who would as a treat, if it was your birthday, give you pop and ice-cream in a glass, Mrs Jenkins, Mr Sullivan, Mrs Ferron, Ms Fitzgerald, Ms Farrell, Mrs Buckley, Miss Foley who was at one time the headmistress, Mrs Regan who to a shy six year old was the kindest person in the world. Mr & Mrs Price who both went on to teach at Bishop Hedley School. Sadly many of them are no longer with us.
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Post by Pat on Oct 23, 2005 23:26:55 GMT 1
yes I remember when Miss Foley was headmistress and my form teacher was Miss Callaghan
Pat
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Post by malharries on Oct 28, 2005 1:12:39 GMT 1
what about bill makay & he played football for the " saint's ". but you see,i was on the other side of the fence, going up to "gelli" mal
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Post by Nigel on Oct 28, 2005 15:28:30 GMT 1
Yes, I remember those teachers very well. I certainly remember having pop and ice-cream from Mr Hennessy and all through standard 2 filling the drawer of the unused sewing machines with sweet papers. What about the Coal Arches, how far would you go in?
Mrs Regan wasn't very happy when I coloured in one of her textbooks.
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Post by mal harries on Oct 28, 2005 22:56:10 GMT 1
I made a mistake yesterday,it was Dick Makay not Bill . do you remember the snow ball battles , I dont remember any one being realy hurt. No knives at school in those days. In the fifties I visited a school in North London ( Bounds Green ), and there was Dick Makay in a photogragh with the school cricket team.
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Post by carron on Oct 31, 2005 13:54:03 GMT 1
I certainly remember the coal arches, they were terrifying. If you ran from one end to the other you were fearless! I never made it further than when you couldn't see daylight. Some of the boys in my class actually played in there - heros one and all! I remember catching the school bus home up the Rocky Road and during the snow if there were any Gelli school kids around they would throw snowballs at the windows and the Inspector who was always on the bus (in case you didn't have a "weekly") would sometimes stop the bus and we would start singing the Gelli song (I'm sure some of you remember it - yes the one about eating sprats on a Sunday morning!) and they would sing it back only change the title. Happy days!!!!
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Pauline Okeefe nee Norbury
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Post by Pauline Okeefe nee Norbury on Jan 3, 2006 19:08:37 GMT 1
Pauline O'keefe nee Norbury,
I started in St.Illtyds in 1958,when I was five and remember most of the female teachers mentioned especially Mrs Price who became my form tutor in the top girls school as we called it she was a fantastic teacher and person,so was Miss Fuller,does anyone remember her?
I also remember the coal arches,very scary but we still played in there,but I too must say
Happy Days!!!!
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Post by carron on Jan 10, 2006 14:08:07 GMT 1
Hi Pauline,
I started in St. Illtyds school in about 1963 and I remember those teachers, in fact Miss Fuller has recently retired from Bishop Hedley School.
I also remember the children from the Gurnos area transferring to the new Aloysius School . I didn't see many of them again untill I went to Bishop Hedley.
The school now stands on the site of the old boys school (which was like a very large green shed - nicknamed the cowshed) The main school, which I went attended, is now a Nuns home.
My mother and grandmother both went to the school and we have all been married at St. Illtyds Church.
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Post by tarka on Jan 12, 2006 20:37:34 GMT 1
Reading these mails has brought so many memories back. Talk about 'Blast from the past' I also remember Bill Duggan, Mr Hennesy, Patrick Brennan and who could forget Moll Maloney? ;D The headmaster in my day was Mr Hourahn, I also remember Miss Connely, all fourteen stone of her but what a gal. I also remember having to take messages up to the girls school and there meeting the terrifying Miss Foley. The most enduring memory of her was the hair on her upper lip, not a pretty sight to a young impressionable boy. The description of the boy's from 'Gelli' isn't quite correct though. We always called them 'Welshies' how stupid is that? we of course as you all know were 'Irish' and of course Catholic so that set us apart from everyone else. We didn't celebrate St Davids day would you believe until I was nearly fifteen. How times have changed and thank God for the better I hope. Oh so many happy memories evoked by all of you, so I thank you one and all.
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Post by carron on Jan 13, 2006 10:28:37 GMT 1
Come to think of it I can't remember really celebtrating St. David's day either, but the girls used to dress up to celebrate St. Patrick's day in "Irish Coleen" costumes complete with green skirt, white shirt, green head skarf and a red cape, some girls would also dress as boys with trousers and white shirt and dickie bow!. I have a photograph of myself and class mates (all girls) dressed like this. We must have been about 8 years old then.
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Post by tarka on Jan 13, 2006 12:41:19 GMT 1
Carron, what I forgot was; when we did finally celebrate 'St Davids' day we were the envey of the other schools because we were then entitled to two holidays of course. The one thing I never did was take part in any of the 'Corpus Christy' parades. ;D I was always able to find an excuse, some of them quite bizarre, as I recall. Another great favorite of the boy's was the 'Rooms' ;)of course. This was where we used to play snooker and talk about the girls, oh happy days. ;D
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Post by carron on Jan 16, 2006 11:37:20 GMT 1
I remember the Corpus Christi parades. We didn't realise at the time how lovely it was to take part in this tradition, singing the Latin hymns (using our own words because we hadn't learned the proper ones or even miming - badly!). I can recall some of my non Catholic 'friends' watching us go by and laughing, embarrassing at the time because I was so young and didn't understand. It was the only day of the year when all my family would be together and afterwards we would all have ice-cream from the ice-cream van which must have done a roaring trade, funny though, the days back then always seemed sunny. The worse part though was the walk back home, it was fine to be dressed up to do the walk, but coming home up Galon Uchaf road or the Rocky road (depending on which route we took) with my new white shoes, which by now were crippling, I wasn't even allowed to take my veil off! was a nightmare I don't remember the 'Rooms' where were they then, probably a boy secret!
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Post by tarka on Jan 17, 2006 11:50:00 GMT 1
The 'Rooms' as we called them were opposite the Catholic Hall where we did P.T. I guess you could describe as being under the Church Alter. There were three or four snooker tables there so many a happy hour was spent in that semi dark atmosphere, without the knowledge of my parents of course. You described the route home from school! in which case you must remember the 'Fifty Steps' those seemingly endless steps on the way up to the bottom of Hayden Terrace. The worst times, or maybe they were the best times was when it snowed. You're absolutely right when you say the day's always seemed sunny, but by the same token the winters never seemed to without snow. You bring back so many memories.
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Post by SOPHIE on Feb 8, 2006 19:31:57 GMT 1
i am actully in st illtyd primary school now im 11 and my teacher is mr ingram and our head teacher is mr smith
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Post by Pat on Mar 5, 2006 15:44:27 GMT 1
Do any of you remember running as fast as you could to the little shop on the "Bont" where you could buy wonderful sweets like sherbert that would turn your fingers coloured? You would then run back to catch the bus to take you up the Rocky Road and if you missed it, you would then have to walk the dreaded "50 steps" Also, when you went to Grammar school, how you had to attend Friday Night class incase the dreaded Protestants influenced you.We were so serious in those days!!!
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