Girls grammars in the 60s (and beyond)

BlueBelle

By the way I loved getting wolf whistles and felt very hard done by if I didn’t get one and I didn’t see it as an insult I saw it as appreciation 🙄sorry if I m so wrong

You are not wrong, Wolf whistles were a compliment, So was the remark made by a railway worker to me, aged 16, at Glasgow Central Station, "you do look nice our of school uniform, hen" Made my day.

What dreary lives the present young generation lead, now regarding such remarks as sexists or derogatory

I went to a brilliant Grammar school that backed onto a large Park. We had a lovely dual heritage maths teacher who we had a free period with once a week if we had worked hard. He told us all about apartheid in South Africa in one session and we could all ask questions and join in the discussion.
The park was open to us during break times but one member of my tutor group got expelled for drinking cider and coming back to class drunk!
I loved school but left at 15 due to home life and left home at 16.

The summer I was 14, the playing field at our school was being re-seeded, so we had our athletics lessons at the collage across the road. We had to walk across the road and up the path to the playing field in aertex shirts and navy blue knickers. The path was always lined by students at the college, leering, whistling and cat-calling.

It was a police cadet college.

All Girls school for me, with a very strict headmistress.
The all boys school was not far away, and they finished their day 15 mins before us, plenty of time to get to the gates of my school to watch all the girls come out and flirt. 😄

The first grammar school I went to was in East London, it had extensive playing fields with ‘red grav’ tennis courts at the furthest point from the school buildings.
The path to the courts ran down between the playing fields and the boundary fence, the other side of which were shrubs and trees, part of a park.
You can guess the rest, men ‘lurking’ watching us walk to the courts. I distinctly remember one games mistress shouting to us ‘eyes front girls’ as we walked, and then bellowing ‘put that away you horrible man I’ll call the police’
We all thought it was very funny.

I wrote a post early in this thread asking if those of us who didn’t go to girl’s grammars are excluded. Somehow it disappeared / that’ll teach me to get ideas above my station .

Wellbeck and Tenko - shall we bunk off, go smoking with the apprentices from the FE college 😇

Never had any of those warnings. School was about 100 yards from a town park and beach. Used to congregate on either after school on way home. Last years allowed out at lunch time, guess where we all went?
Nearest cafe was 1.5 miles away through narrow streets with factories, tenements. The workers mainly men were often out for a break during daytime and never had any issues. Same at night usually walking home about 8 - 9 pm. Can't recall parents or school issuing any warnings to avoid specific types of people.

I went to a small East London grammar school we were not allowed to eat from leaving school to arriving home even on a long tube journey. We were not even allowed to take our berets off. We also shared some lessons with the local boys school the subjects we chose had nothing to do with future plans just which ones had boys in as for those mixed sixth form discos!

Our pockets not or pockets of course

Lizzies, we lined or blazer pockets with plastic so that ice lollies could quickly be hidden if prefects were spotted in the vicinity.

Witzend

The only warnings we ever had were about not eating in the street on our uniform. Plus of course failing to wear our hats!

You went to the same school as me!

I went to a mixed grammar school and there was enough 'excitement' in the school without venturing outside.
This thread has reminded me that when in the 6th form there were a couple of girls going out with the two of the teachers. It was widely known amongst us girls but presumably not amongst the teachers. Just shows how much things have changed, this would have been in '67/8.

Silvershadow

I remember asking my mother what undesirables were and not getting any kind of answer!

Same here but with us it was ‘strangers’ 😱 It took me a long time to understand what the word meant. It terrified me

Witzend

The only warnings we ever had were about not eating in the street on our uniform. Plus of course failing to wear our hats!

Same here. The sweet shop near the bus station was a terrible temptation. In the summer they sold ice lollies that they made themselves and of course we bought them. I remember one girl got her tongue stuck to her lolly. Also the boys on the bus loved to pinch your beret and throw it around the bus, hopefully giving you it back before your stop.

I went to a girls grammar after two co ed grammars. (My Dad’s work meant we moved a lot). I couldn’t believe how silly the girls were towards the boys attending the boys grammar next door. This was late 1960’s.

My school was next to a very busy arterial road and the PE staff thought it entirely appropriate to have a group of 15 year old girls in very short shorts running along the pavement which was OUTSIDE the school boundary. I'm gobsmacked there were not some very serious accidents.

I went to an all girls convent school.

We used to have a sixth year prom with the boys from the Academy across the road and the nuns used to walk about, either kicking the ankles of any boy, who got too close or squeezing between couples, to make sure there were no shenanigans! 🤣

After school, we also walked the length of the main road into town, boys on one side and girls on the other, until we got out of sight of the school.

One of my friends was called into the Headmistress' office because she had been seen talking to a coal man! Her mother came in to explain that she was an ice skater and the coal man was her partner!

When the weather was good we were always getting into trouble for sunbathing on the grass. We thought it was a fuss about nothing but, looking back, I realise that we were lying around with our skirts pulled up next to a low fence and a busy bus stop!

I went to a mixed comprehensive, so I’m probably excluded from this convo

Strangely we weren’t warned about undesirables at my convent school where the nuns were mainly concerned with how we behaved in uniform out of school. Certainly no eating in the street, and hats always had to be worn. We were told not to “loiter”. As I cycled I didn’t really have a chance to do that anyway. The only male to cross the convent threshold was the parish priest who was treated with great reverence.

I was responsible for getting a playground perv into court.
I was walking back to work. That walk took me past a junior school. There was a lorry parked on my side of the road.
Movement in his wing mirror caught my eye. There was no doubt what he was doing outside a children’s playground.

I walked round to the front of his lorry, looked at him and took his license plate number. Back to my office I phoned the police who came round for a full statement.

According to my Headmistress, “undesirables” referred any males.

'Gairls' were supposed to be young ladies in those days!

The only warnings we ever had were about not eating in the street on our uniform. Plus of course failing to wear our hats!

We were not allowed out at lunchtime. The teachers said we would be attacked by the "lunatics" from the nearby mental hospital.
The only issue we actually had was being watched by the grammar school boys when they were on their playing field and we were walking to our field - we had to wear the traditional navy blue knickers for athletics and were embarrassed!