The wonderfully accurate timetable produced by Wills here goes something towards showing what a 'Quantock boy' - or should I say 'Quantock Person' given the situation post-1986 - is really like. To remember everything in that detail takes some doing!

One thing needs clarification, though - although it was an assembly in a general sense, none of us should forget that the period much of us spent being bored senseless was called 'chapel'.

Why this was the case I will never really know. Perhaps one of those from an earlier era could enlighten us?

Rick

The assmbly was called 'chapel' after the venue that used to house the ridiculous practice of numbing the minds of a hundred or so inmates for an hour.

Go to Blue or Yellow dorm, stick head out of window, look right, and there it is. A gothic temple that housed the wibblings of one Gerry Warriner for an hour every morning. There was a stage were Gerry would sit, in his slightly effete cross legged manner and read 'uplifting' tales of christians attempting to escape from the former USSR and cripples who had been blessed. 

Pupils were made to sit on hard bare benches for this arse numbing madness while the 'heating system', provided by Fridgedair, slowly froze the body.

Contrary to the allegations of the school prospectus there was never any element of religious ceremony during the hour. The only 'audience participation' during the process was the opportunity to say 'it was me sir' when questioned over who had performed the latest misdemenour that required the whole school to be gated that weekend.

Chapel was occasionally used as a venue for school plays or backdrop to 2 years of school photographs before they reverted to the more usual front of the school. Chapel (the building) slowly fell into neglect in the late seventies, the tedious 'service' of course continued until your times.

Does anybody remember .... the corrider above warriners was i believe called 'top corridor' were there names for the dorms up there ? I spent my fourth year in the very last room on the corrider, the one before the 'trunk room' at the end.

Yes, I recall the 'Spiral Staircase' - 5th years were given the priviledge, though I do recall when I was in the 4th year I used to get to my dorm that way and noboby seemed to mind. I cannot remember the name of the dorm I was in during the best part of the 4th year (1986) - or even if it had a name - but it was the same one Wills was domiciled with Paddy Wyman (lucky Wills, considering the fact that Wyman was to join the ranks of the Marmite Motorway brigade...) I think Wills was there in the 5th year for a while - I was there in the 4th with Brendan Wood until the Summer Term when I moved across to the Sports Hall block. The dorm had a small ensuite washbasin (ha!) and it overlooked the courtyard and the all-weather pitch and golf course.

My dorm during the 5th year was No. 52, one of those described by Wills as being up the little set of stairs. On this corridor, the four-man dorm was on your left as you entered - occupied during my 5th year by Jace Guillory, Matthew Urmston, Olu JInadu (for a while at least) and Spuddy Williams. The next dorm I think was No. 51 (?) and I can't remember who lived there - Paul Bugler and Lee Manley (?) Next door was No. 52 (mine and Murray Crane's dorm), previously a single-man dorm occupied by Guy Sawyer. It also, like most of those on Warriner's corridor, had an ensuite washbasin. There were two further dorms, the end one of which housed Michael Burrows, Darren Weeks and Nigel McAlwane (and Simon Henderson?)

At the end of this corridor was the 'secret' and verboten flight of stairs, which led to Duncan's then residence - previously occupied by Craig Keast (the snooker-playing gardener). Later when I visited the school 'Fat Matt' was living in this room.

I suggest that everyone should scour their memories and forward me what they remember about the position, location and layout of the dorms - if there is sufficient and worthwhile information there I will draw up a master plan of all the residences and place it on the website. As if I don't have better things to do...(!)

Rick

'Tear dorm' was actually Teare Dorm and named after an old history (i believe) teacher called Lionel Teare who had two spells at Quantock during the early seventies. There is a bit of a sad tale involved with Lionel which, to be honest, i don't think anybody really knew the truth behind. He was an earlier incarnation of bender bill and the hot gossip at the time was that his departure was not unlinked to unrequited love between himself and a certain deputy who received 2 digestives and coffee at 8.30 each morning at the hands of any poor unsuspecting jub who happened to be walking past the kitchens. The truth behind these allegations probably never to be uncovered !

I remember the stairs that led down to the kitchens from top corridor. They were banned from use when i was there. Interestingly there was access to the roof through an aperture in the ceiling on the first bend in the stairs. There was an old ladder in the trunk room and i remember sneaking up there a few times. On the first occasion we went through into an old bell tower, the walls were covered with full page spreads from 'left handed reading material' , the floor was covered with 'crunchy balls of kleenex' ! patently a safe beating haven for some creative former pupil !

Does anyone remember the little attic room next to the kitchens? Was this the infamous throughway littered with the remnants of ritual self-abusers?

I recall this room in 1986, when Michael Burrows, Darren Weeks, Murray Crane and myself used to play computer games (on a Speccy lol) - and where we witnessed 'handball Maradona'

Rick

Yes, I recall the dining room having moved when we visited in the 1990s. The number of pupils must have been pretty small by then - there cannot have been much space as I recall the snooker table had also been moved into the old dining room as well.

The tennis courts were built sometime during my era - though the crap gravel surface meant that it was not as popular as it could have been, particularly given that the main man in the game at the time, Boris Becker - whom most people would have liked to emulate in their own humble way - like to throw himself about the court, something that would have been very painful if one tried it at Quantock.

When was the all-weather pitch built? Although I am aware that was meant to be used for hockey, not a single stick was raised in anger during my three years at the school. I remember using in to play 'singles' cricket from time to time...

And yes, I am pissed off at the fact that my parents were among those who shelled out for the swimming pool - but my anger is not directed at those pupils who were at the school after me - so don't worry Blakey - its more the fact that the pool is now being used by some thieving little swine from the slums of Bucharest.

Rick

Blakey -

you seem to have summed up Gerry Warriner to a tee - and everything you said made me cry with laughter!

I do recall the time when Gerry led my Mum and Dad around, and I still vaguely recall the feeling of confusion as he led us around, his speech interspersed with short 'Gordon Brown' breaths. To my dying day I will remember his plugging for Gordano services on the M5, and the merits of the cuisine served up by the Little Chef there. It was like 'Gordano services (breath) Gordano services... its very good, very goooood'. I don't really know what my Dad made of him, but my Mum did think he was quite pleasant.

Gerry was certainly an oddity, someone who could only have ever have been at Quantock. I remember him always rolling the 'R' and using a crap Spanish twang when pronouncing my name, calling Brendan Wood 'Birmingham' (who was at the time living in Stafford!), and at every turn turning round suddenly, with this maniacal grin on his face, shouting, 'book him! (breath intake) book him!' Once I was consigned to trolley duty by this method. I had no right of appeal (cf. the old prospectus) in the face of this insanity.

I remember the posters very well - thanks for pulling out that old chestnut! - and the parables were pure classics. I recall in particular the one about 'the man from Switzerland - Stockholm actually' who found a novel way of rolling down a hill (we all know Stockholm is in Sweden but who was one to correct Gerry, who would grin and give you that psychopathic stare...), and another story about a rather unfortunate individual who while in a truck on military duty happened to fall out of the back and get run over by a tank. The story - like many of Gerry's tales - was centred around death, and many of us did not know whether to laugh or remain stone-faced at the sadness of the tale (!)

I may also have mentioned it before, but when Michael Burrows and I went to the school in the mid-1990s, Gerry recalled this tale of an inquisitive squirrel who was taking advantage of Gerry's leaving tiny morsels for the birds on his window sill. Mikey and I were anticipating a heart-warming tale, but instead were presented with the gory tale of how Gerry assaulted the squirrel - ultimately killing it - with a long-handled hairbrush. He reenacted the movements, swiping at thin air with this brush - it was certainly surreal, both funny and terrifying at the same time.

Was anyone there when Gerry committed this heinous crime? Did he tell anyone else about it?

Rick 

I have sufficiently recovered enough to contribute to this rich vein of discussion  I have spent the last 5 minutes bent double in my chair, spastic with suppressed laughter in full view of my nonplussed colleagues ! Gerry was a complete enigma. The posters were around pre 75 and were 'explained' in chapel each morning.

I do recall one particular occasion in Teare dorm, early one saturday afternoon Andy Allen and myself were playing subbuteo on the floor in mid second half in a vital bottom of the table crunch match in the dorm league. I was putting in an England euro2000 like performance on the day and was mentally begging divine intervention to the match when ......  In burst Gerry, wide eyed with glee at catching two supine young boys... he proceeds to run around all over the 'pitch'  rendering 50% of the players rootless from the 'half-spheres; that they are attached too. All of this destruction in preference to gerrys favourity sport of tickling boys to death.

Andy's bitterness at this experience can still be felt when after a 'match cancelled due to crowd violence' verdict and the inevitable delay whilst glue dried I pasted him 1-0 in the rematch !