03 Twydall Infants

It paid to be careful when walking the narrow path to the Infants school from the gate at the bottom of Preston Way. Twice I’d been shoved into the adjacent stinging nettles – no fun at all in short pants – and I was determined it wouldn’t happen again.

Paul Parker: “I remember the row of poplar trees that made noises in the wind.”

Another thing I learned at the Infant’s was how to tie my shoe laces, an achievement that meant I no longer needed help when changing into plimsolls for PE in the hall.  I just wished I could skip. When the music played and the class skipped around in a big happy circle, I could only run around and do a little flip, every few strides, and hope nobody would notice. Oh the frustration.

A greater embarrassment came when the class separated into teams for a relay race run across a series of mats and benches to the final obstacle, a horizontal ladder, set four feet off the ground. Upon crawling across the ladder on hands and knees, each competitor had to sit cross legged on a mat beneath the ladder before the next team member could start.  Doing PE in our underwear rarely posed a problem but crawling across that ladder with my knees splayed caused my underpants to gape. Excitable shrieks from the girls below confirmed something was bobbing about in fresh air but in that position there was nothing I could do but hurry along.

I learned too, that some people could be mean. I well knew it was against the rules to leave the school grounds and so did the little madam that saw me edging along the path towards the Preston Way gate one dinnertime. A quick dash home for something I’d forgotten (possibly my football boots) was none of her business but she followed me all the way to the gate and swore she’d tell when I made a run for it.

The race to Crundale Road and back couldn’t have taken much more than ten minutes, but the breakout came to nothing. Nobody was at home when I got there and the anxiety I suffered on my return to school made me wish I hadn’t bothered. 

Under the supervision of Mister Baker the caretaker, we boys occasionally played football on the field, though there was never any discipline to it. Between two isolated goalkeepers, thirty boys – all eager for a kick – chased the ball up and down and back again.

As the summer term drew to an end we were marched up to the Junior School for an introductory visit. Twydall Junior School seemed huge, quite overwhelming, but with a summer fete, a trip to London Zoo and six week holiday to come before the move up to the juniors, any apprehension was put on hold.

What a wonderful summer it was. Miss Thorpe even took us out of the classroom one day to sit in the sunshine and do our work outside. And the summer fete was marvellous. The best part was the fancy dress competition. I didn’t know if Mam was kidding when she first told me about it, but I was all for it when she said she’d dress me up as a clown. And so it came to pass that I, with red nose and painted face, clomped up to the main gate on Twydall Lane one Saturday afternoon in my dad’s old boots. Accompanied by Mam and my little brothers, I attracted quite a lot of attention on the way. People laughed, others pointed, and when an old lady came out of Forbuoys and asked where we were going, and Mam explained, I was delighted when the old lady said I was sure to win.

Everyone cheered when the entrants for the fancy dress competition entered the roped off playground to parade before the judges. ‘Look at the clown!’ someone shouted, when it was my turn to bow to Miss Winter the Head Mistress and TV personality Leslie Crowther. Like everybody else, Leslie Crowther laughed and smiled as I clomped toward him, as did classmate William Hollands, watching in the crowd with his mum. 

William Hollands

Paul Parker: “I remember Leslie Crowther visiting as I danced around a Maypole.”

Cassius Clay won the boys’ prize – a coffee coloured kid in shorts and boxing gloves, with ‘I am the greatest’ emblazoned on the back of a red cape. A worthy winner, he looked the part. Almost as good were two kids covered head to toe in plant pots – Bill and Ben. The girls’ prize was harder to judge. Eliza Doolittle was an obvious winner, but picking the best of seven Eliza Doolittles couldn’t have been easy.

Time has robbed me of much of our day out at London Zoo, though I know my brothers and I had a marvellous time seeing Guy the gorilla, Chi Chi the Panda, and having our photo taken with an elephant. 

Michael, David, Me

Thus my short but eventful time at Twydall Infants came to an end, though that isn’t quite the end of my Infants’ story. Getting my legs thrashed by Miss Winter was as shocking as it was inexplicable… but it’d be ten years before I’d learn why.