South Shields Grammar-Technical School for Boys   
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  Welcome to the Guestbook
Feel free to add messages relating to the site and the school. The only rules are: real names only, no personal attacks and no unrelated messages (inappropriate messages may be edited/withdrawn without warning).
It would be appreciated if you gave an email address, where you now live and said when you were at the school, but you don't have to.
Plase note that if you click on an email address below you will need to replace ~DOT~ with . and ~AT~ with @ in your email program. The Guestbook presents these this way to avoid email address harvesters collecting your email addresses from the page. I know it's a pain, but it's very much better than the alternative.

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There are 500 messages in the guestbook
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Viewing messages 1 to 10

Alex Patterson, VUA 1946-1951 | ad1935ap~AT~gmail~DOT~com
Hello Mike and all readers,
Thanks again Mike for your continuing work with our website. I echo Neale's wishes for a Happy New Year and let's hope it's a gentler and kinder new year to us all. We could do with a bit of good news now and again. If we keep writing to the site, it will cheer us up and give us something to think about. We're still here, and that's worth something to celebrate.
Cheerio and our very best wishes to all from a cool minus 2 degrees North York,
Alex
Mon 1-Jan-2024 15:37 - North York, Ontario, Canada
Mike Todd | old~DOT~boys~AT~boyshighschool~DOT~co~DOT~uk
Thanks, Neale - although 8 hours early for you

Happy New Year to all.
Mon 1-Jan-2024 00:13
Neale Backhouse | nealebackh~AT~gmail~DOT~com
Happy New Year Mike and to all fellow travellers. Let's hope 2024 brings us something to celebrate. We certainly need it!! Cheers, Neale.
Sun 31-Dec-2023 23:59 - Victoria BC.
Mike Todd | old~DOT~boys~AT~boyshighschool~DOT~co~DOT~uk
How about that, James - would be nice to meet up some time.
Sun 24-Dec-2023 22:10
James Hyde | james_hyde2001~AT~yahoo~DOT~com
Hi Mike, just realised you live in Rothbury. I've retired to Thropton!
Fri 22-Dec-2023 17:09 - Thropton
Mike Todd | old~DOT~boys~AT~boyshighschool~DOT~co~DOT~uk
IMPORTANT INFORMATION
I've had some major problems with the site and have had to take the contact register offline until it's fixed.

I'm hoping that the rest of the site,including the Guestbook will continue to work successfully.
Sun 26-Nov-2023 14:47
Ian Reid
Dipped into your excellent archive over the last couple of years and delighted you still manage to keep going. I’m in the archive from 13+ to Prefect (Chairman of the Reception and Stewardship Service Group) early seventies. Great to be reminded of old friends and acquaintances.
Thu 16-Nov-2023 06:44 - Tynemouth, UK
Eric Moyse | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com
My good friend Joyce Howe nee Williams has sent me this extract from a History of Appleby Grammar School, which some of you might find interesting.
One of the immediate consequences of the outbreak of war was the evacuation of schoolchildren from potentially dangerous areas ; Appleby received its quota from South Shields. Instead of some twenty five new boys, over fifty were admitted in the course of the year, and the number on roll rose to at least one hundred and fifty. As the raids which had been anticipated did not materialise and “the phoney war” dragged on, many of the High School boys returned to South Shields, and by the summer of 1940 numbers were almost back to their normal hundred and thirty-five. They had shared the use of the lab., woodwork shed and playing field, but had little other effect on the normal working of the school.

The situation was very different in the Autumn term. Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain and the first of the strategic bombing raids brought not only the South Shields boys back to Appleby but Wagon Repairs Ltd., a large industrial concern from Birmingham as well. Their headquarters were Bongate Hall and Eden Grove (Bolton) but families found temporary homes in Appleby and several of the surrounding villages. School numbers shot up to a hundred and eighty-three, continued to rise, and reached an all-time high of two hundred and seventeen during 1942. Additional accommodation had to be found, and both the Sands Chapel schoolroom and Bongate Institute were pressed into use as extra classrooms. The fifty-three boarders could not all be housed on the premises, so ten were found billets with families living near the school. All required a midday meal, as did a large number of day boys, and Mrs Budden, matron and cook displayed tremendous ingenuity and foresight in their attempts to provide adequate fare. The trenches on the field were strengthened and roofed over, the rest of the premises received its cladding of sandbags and corrugated sheeting, and the swimming pool remained empty of water.







At the end of the summer term, 1944, the boys from South Shields, together with their master, Mr Hall, returned home.

Tue 14-Nov-2023 11:29 - Reading Berkshire
Eric Moyse | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com
How I came to do A level German. Towards the end of first year the decision was made as to which of us should do Latinand which German. I had opted for Latin. Pablo/Dopey Dunston, who taught Latin, took my form (111B)for English and one day he told us how hard it was compared with German. He went on so long about it that I thought that he did not want me there so when the time came I went to the German class instead of the Latin. Pablo vaguely asked where Moyse was and when told, he merely said "Oh." I stayed with German and went onto achieve a very shaky A Level under the tutelege of Mr Romanis.
Fri 10-Nov-2023 10:44 - Reading Bekshire
Mike
Sadly not, Alex - Guestbook is text only.

If you wanted to share it though, send it to me old.boys@boyshighschool.co.uk and I'll put it on the server and link to it.
Thu 19-Oct-2023 19:52

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