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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only rules are: real names only, no personal attacks and no unrelated messages (inappropriate messages may be edited/withdrawn without warning).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 21 to 30

Eric Moyse 1946 to 1952 (Boys) | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com

Sorry, Alex but this is Artificial Intelligence so it must be right:

AI Overview
"Ha'way" is a Geordie (Newcastle/North East England) term that generally means "come on" or "hurry up". It can also be used as an expression of encouragement, particularly in the phrase "Ha'way the lads", often heard at football matches. The term is thought to have originated from "have way" or "hold away".

Fri 25-Jul-2025 10:40 - Reading, Berkshire

Alex Patterson, VUA 1946 - 1951 | ad1935ap~AT~gmail~DOT~com

In keeping with my New Year’s resolution to contribute at least one entry a month to the Guestbook…here comes July’s entry. It was prompted by Eric’s latest welcome plethora of messages and subsequent replies. When I read Eric’s observations on “Howay the Lads”, I immediately went to my latest best pal, ChatGBT, and asked the question. This is what came back.
———————————————————————————————————————
“The
Geordie expression "Howay the Lads" is a rallying cry or cheer originating from the Tyneside area in North East England, especially associated with Newcastle upon Tyne and Sunderland. It roughly translates to "Come on, the lads!" and is most commonly heard at football matches and other spirited gatherings.
Derivation of "Howay"
The word "Howay" is believed to have developed from a contraction and regional pronunciation of "away" or "come away", influenced by the Northumbrian dialect. Linguists often link it to older or variant forms of English spoken in the North East, where vowel shifts and dropped consonants are common.
Possible roots:
"Come away" → pronounced as something like "c'm'way" → phonetically altered over time to "Howay" in the local dialect.
It may also have been influenced by Middle English or Scots forms. For example, in Scots dialect, “awa’” means “away.”
So in Geordie:
"Howay" = Come on / Hurry up / Let’s go
"The lads" = The team / the boys / our group
Usage:
"Howay, man!" = Come on, man!
"Howay the Lads!" = Come on, the boys! (usually supportive and enthusiastic)
This expression is now deeply embedded in local identity, especially in Newcastle United football culture and other areas of North East England.
———————————————————————————————————————

Neale mentioned that he had seen me on TV, and I couldn’t for the life of me remember what or when it could have been.
When I talked to one of my granddaughters about the mystery, she said, “You did that interview about your street in South Shields a few years ago.” Then of course it all came back to me.
I could pinpoint exactly when it took place, because it was the week after the Icelandic volcanic explosion that paralyzed air travel in Europe in April 2010. We were stranded in Paris Orly without any means of getting to Newcastle. Unfortunately for me, I suffered one of my rare (and most recent) labrynthitis attacks just after we landed. Marjorie managed, with the help of a waiter from an airport bistro, to get me onto the bus for the Air France local Hotel. Then our niece drove all the way from Newcastle to the Paris airport hotel and drove us back through the Chunnel all the way back to Newcastle, where I was bedridden for the next week. Prior to all this, I had been in touch with Janis Blower of the Shields Gazette who had a series called “Tyne Travellers” in which she asked people to write about their lives after leaving South Shields. So I wrote the story of our travels, about 5,000 words, that she cut down to perhaps 1500 words. On March 12, 2004, she turned it into a beautiful article, the two centre pages of the Gazette with four colour photos that I had provided with the text, and I have a laminated copy of it right in front of me in my office as I write.
When I recovered from my labrynthitis, I dropped in to the Gazette office on spec to see Janis again to thank her again for the article and she remembered us and commented on a man called Gary Wilkinson who was filming documentaries about Tyneside. She gave me his number and I called him right away. I explained who I was, where I had lived and he said, “I’ve just finished the Holborn movie, but if you can come up right now I can interview you and cut you in. Which is what I did…and the rest is history. The DVD with me in is called ‘The Hills of Holborn’ and he sent me a subsequent video called, ‘Skuetenders’ , about the Lawe Top, where we lived in our early married years. They might be on YouTube.
I’ve just finished my painting of a coffee shop we used to go to in New York City, called Serendipity…I love the word. Anyhow we saw the movie named after the shop and decided we would go visit. It was fantastic, all of the waiters (sorry waitstaff) were actors looking for parts, one had actually been an extra in the movie and we sat at the table where the two principals in the movie had dated. So we ordered what they had… “Frozen Hot Chocolate”… it was huge and memorable. I took a photo of the place when we left and have copied that with a few mods but I’m very happy with the end result.
That’s enough for now…I’m off to supper, we’ve got a great chef!! Bye from a 28 C North York
Alex

Wed 23-Jul-2025 22:49 - North York, Ontario, Canada

Eric Moyse 1946 to 1952 (Boys) | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com

Me again. Just catching up.
My earliest memory is of waking up one morning at wor cooncil hoose in Fir Grove, Cleadon Estate to see sheets of corrugated iron being delivered in order to have air-raid shelters built in the garden. We lived there until about 1949 when we moved to Norfolk Road on the then new Marsden Estate. We had an uninterrupted view of the Leas and the North Sea.
Last year I plucked up my courage and knocked on the door of Number 73 and explained that I had lived there as a son of the first tenants. I was let in and saw that marvellous view up to Newbiggin by the Sea and along towards Whitburn. The Marsden Rattler seems to have disappeared, however.
In full nostalgia mode, a few months ago I submitted an article to the "Shields Gazette", which appeared online with a title something like "A South Shields' man's vivid(not my word) memories of World War II". Fame at last!

Fri 18-Jul-2025 17:50 - Reading, Berkshire

Eric Moyse 1946 to 1952 (Boys) | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com

All right, more incendiary confessions -- or is it telling on Freddy Auty? Some while ago I was on Cleadon Hills, near the waterworks, with a neighbour friend. He lit some gorse and the conflagaration was, to our young eyes, enough to set the hillside on fire. Fortunately, it did not, which is why I am alive to tell the tale. Sorry, Freddy, wherever you are.

Fri 18-Jul-2025 16:58 - Reading, Berkshire

Eric Moyse 1946 to 1952 (Boys) | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com

Thanks Neale The invitation to the H of C came because our daughter, Susan had helped a parliamentary candidates' canvassing in the midlands. We had contributed to petrol (that may be gas to you) costs and this was a thank you.

Fri 18-Jul-2025 16:49 - Reading, Berkshire

Neale Backhouse | neale1447~AT~gmail~DOT~com

Glad to have you back Eric, not quite ninety but almost there. Also glad to hear that Doreen is doing well. I wonder how many of our contemporaries are still alive and kicking. Maybe you have knowledge of case histories that you might impart? Oh and please elaborate on "Houses of Parliament" story. What tales of glory or infamy brought that about? Or are all ninety year old couples celebrated in England?
Cheers, Neale.

Tue 15-Jul-2025 18:55 - Victoria BC

Eric Moyse 1946 to 1952 (Boys) | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com

Catching up:
Real fans cannot bear even to look eg Sunderland's promotion match and England beating India today by, was it, 22 runs?I had to look these results up afterwards.
On the question of Ha'way and Howay, I hate to say this but I think Newcastle have it right and Sunderland have it wrong for surely it is a contraction of "Have way."
Going back to the 26th School Scouts, here was indeed a waiting list and preference was given to A formers. As I had been demoted to the B stream I had to wait but I was let in after a few months (I stayed in B forms until second year sixth despite having been in nothing but A streams since their inception).

Mon 14-Jul-2025 18:24 - Reading, Berkshire

Eric Moyse | eric~DOT~moyse35~AT~yahoo~DOT~com

Having not looked at this website for some months I was delighted to find that our two Canadians are still among those contributing. Congratulations to Neale and Alex and to all survivors fom our school year and before. Happily that includes my wife Doreen as well as myself.
I know that you are all avid readers of Hansard. You will no doubt therefore have seen that onthe 4th of June Doreen and I were congratulated from the floor of the House of Commons on 2025 being the year when both of us reach 90 years of age (in my case subject to another few months' survival).
I wil be shortly be catching up with the news from this website and may have some fascinating memories to share.
Anyway best of luck and thanks once again to Mike.

Sun 13-Jul-2025 20:21 - Reading, Berkshire

Mike

Apologies for not following up the Marsden photo - I don't check in that often!

Unfortunately the Guestbook is text only, so embedding a photo isn't possible.

I'll see if I can link it.

Tue 1-Jul-2025 18:11 - Rothbury

Bruce Graham | bsgraham~AT~btinternet~DOT~com

Any more criminals out there?

Much later in life when my parents were living in one of the (council) pensioners houses right at the end of Lizard Lane Thomson's Quarry was my favourite venue for exercising our dogs on our occasional visits to SS.

Mon 30-Jun-2025 16:54 - ruskington lincolnshie

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