Burnley Grammar School

Hi Gary,
Your PE kit rule was the same that I had in the 1970s. Would you have preferred to have been able to wear a vest or t shirt for indoor PE and cross country or did you get used to wearing only shorts and come to like it?

My school was normal for the time (early 70's), indoor PE in shorts only, cross country shorts/plimsolls, stripped to the waist. We had 2 PE lessons a week, one inside, one cross country, so we ran all year around.

At the start of the 2nd year we had a lad move to the school, because his parents moved jobs. He was used to wearing much more kit, and was shocked on a frezzing cold day to be told he had to run minus his rugby shirt or vest, and in only his shorts.

Further to earlier comments I recollect swimming without trunks at a boy's private school in the 1950s. I was reticent at first and wore trunks. I was soon ordered to strip off. I never dared wear them again swimming naked thereafter taking only my towel to the pool.

Stuart was bang on the money by stating that our parents were aware of the no trunks rule at the prep school mine from 8 to 13 just a clean towel to pack each week.Agreed the maturing issue could be problematic for some especially if they were self-conscious of their physique .

Toby P, Just as John said, we boys were worked hard and always sweated profusely. I used to enjoy feeling the sweat running down my whole body and glad that I was only wearing PE shorts. We all used to look forward to taking our shorts off and getting under the showers to freshen up afterwards and had no problem about being in the nude together either.

Ben
I agree with all that you have written and as you state about showering at swimming pools, I to notice that youngsters shower in their swimwear. It is the modern society we have to blame. Sadly, the time has now come when I also keep my trunks on when showering at the swimming pool (certainly if there are younger people in the area) for fear of comments from other people about being naked in a male changing area.

Ivor, Pipin,

At my all boys prep school we had an indoor heated pool and we all swam naked from age 9. Most boys were perfectly happy with it certainly early on. Once puberty kicked in for some it was more awkward as they developed ealrier, but I found it probably more embarssing by the fact that I dveleoped late and by the time we left the prep school I was still a "boy" and most of my classmates were not. Havings aid all that back then we never thought of questioning what was a given - you swam naked, you shwoered naked afte pe and games and did as you were told. this was the early to mid 70s in the UK. Our parnets knew and accepted it as they snet us to school with just a towel.
The only times I recall females being present was when the Head was showing prospective parents around and ther annual house swim gala when the very few female members of staff were there.

Toby P,
That never happened to myself or other lads because we always sweated profusely as we were worked hard. Shorts only for PE made total sense and was healthy, such a well thought out PE rule should still be the order of the day. As other people have commented there’s no problem as a lad doing PE shirtless even if PE sessions are mixed sex.

My last post should have read,I felt ludicrous wearing short trousers when most of my contemporaries"were" wearing long trousers.

I don't know about others but if we weren't sweating freely down our bare tops at the end of the lesson you went back to the gym after school and do the whole lesson again.

Hi Fiona, Indeed! We do come out of things well. Fashion has benefited us a lot more than men. Buying something straightforward for boys can be difficult and most shops cater for females.

I also don't see what the fuss is all about with boys doing PE topless in just shorts, even if it is a mixed PE class.
After all that is the way all boys and men are on public beaches and swimminhg pools and no one seems to be bothered about it.
Unfortunately our liberal 'politically correct' modern society imposed on us this ridiculous mentality among other things.
Many schools, including the primary one in my town, make both boys and girls do PE in tracksuit long pants so as not to even show their legs, which is pure insanity if you ask me.
Many schools, probably most, have also done away with showers after PE, for the same reasons.
I have also noticed in the last 15 years or so that boys and youths shower in their swimsuits at my local public swimming pool. Gone are the days when we had more freedom and less to worry about when I was a boy growing up.

Fiona, I agree with you as I have posted previously ladies can wear thong bikinis by the pool or on the beach but "speedo" type swim briefs are a no no for men especially in the UK. Although abroad the local men are not so inhibited.

Fiona and John, I'm certainly glad that since retiring I no longer have to wear a suit and tie especially in the hot weather which we experienced last summer.As one who was encouraged by my parents when I was young to get the sun and fresh air to my body and always had to strip to the waist for PE both in the gym and outside, including running cross country, I agree that it is wrong to prevent males from doing what comes naturally because of some ridiculous equality campaign. Little wonder nowadays in the summer that men prefer to wear shorts all the time whenever they can; lets hope they don't start a campaign against the wearing of them or there will be nothing men can do! In the meantime I will continue to take my shirt off when I am working in the garden, which meets with my wife's approval, or washing the car on the drive, which does not, because she says I am too old!

Whatever anyone says, men and women should be able to feel comfortable about their bodies and this begins when they are young through encouragement from parents showing their children that there is nothing wrong in allowing the fresh air to get their bodies, and continues at school including the stripped to the waist rule for lads PE which made complete sense and should never have been stopped.

Pipin,"there was no regulation"at the school that I attended as to whether boys should wear short trousers or longs.
My parents also took the decision to keep me in shorts into my late teens and I felt ludicrous wearing shorts when most of my contemporaries wear wearing long trousers.

Rachael- yes, there are things that males can do, eg go topless in certain, generally sporting, situations, that we females can't, but there is also a lot more that we can do that they can't. Think formal dress, we can be bare-shouldered while our partners need to wear suits and ties. Or more informally in the Summer, a strappy vest or crop top is acceptable almost anywhere for us, but there is no equivalent for the boys, and full topless is usually taboo except at the beach/pool. And what about thong bikinis?

Hi Rachael and John, Boys at my school wore vests from the changing rooms to the gym or onto the field or yard. Once they lined up then they stripped off. I'm pretty sure their teachers were ex Army.

Rachael,
I totally agree with you. Men and women are different, both sexes deserve to be treated with respect and fairness. It’s wrong to prevent males from doing what comes naturally, most lads on a hot day would feel more comfortable playing sports shirtless but are being prevented from taking off their shirts because of some ridiculous ‘equality’ campaign.

The stripped to the waist rule for lads PE made complete sense, if you’re going to get too hot and sweaty exercising there’s no point in putting on a shirt in the first place. I feel sorry for lads growing up now.

My last posting should have read "there was no regulation" regarding whether shorts or longs were worn as uniform. It was for the parents to decide.

NickK, Sadly we are the cause a lot of the problems. There is a culture of if females cannot do something, it's banned. There are some things females just cannot do and stripping to the waist is one... well we can but. Boys should be encouraged to strip it's just natural.

I do not how I would have coped with nude swimming. although as Ivor says parents would be aware of the school rules so I suppose I would have just got on with it. Like all the other schools at the time for p.e. we only wore shorts (no pants) plimsolls with no socks and we were shirtless. Our parents new about these rules because we were told when we attended an open evening with them before we joined the school, when we were advise on the full uniform, including p.e. and swimwear.

There was regulation on whether to wear long or short trousers and so my family took the opportunity to keep me in shorts until I was in my late teens.

NickK,
The School in Madrid looks like it is making boys strip to the waist for PE just as was common practice until quite recently in the UK. It didn’t do my brother and I any harm. This seems to be another sensible policy from a European country. I cannot understand why the UK ever changed this practice. There never was any big deal, it was nice after being in a hot stuffy classroom to get shirtless and put on shorts and pumps and enjoy doing PE without a hot and sweaty vest or shirt stuck to your back. It seems to me that this Spanish school has thought about what is best for boys when deciding on this rule.

Further to Kevin's post (30 Dec)- there are a couple more pics of mixed PE class with most boys stripped to the waist here: https://colegio-estudio.es/instalaciones/

Scroll down to Instalaciones Deportivas

Amazing that today PE kit can just be shorts!

Just catching up with entries made since mine. To answer a couple of questions, firstly the school was boys only and all staff were men, so there were never any women/girls around the swimming pool when nude swimming was compulsory.
Secondly, although there were no swimming matches with other local schools, once a year at the end of the summer term, there was an inter-house swimming competition in front of the whole school, and school policy was followed in this: first three years, compulsory to swim naked, older boys trunks optional, but many still chose nudity. Given the thinking about this sort of thing nowadays, it seems unbelievable that we spent two lessons each week in the summmer term naked for swimming. We and our parents well knew that would be the case when we entered the school.

Tobias,Did you wear short trousers till you were 14 because it was a compulsory school uniform or were they imposed on you by your parents?
I wore them at that age because it was strictly enforced by my parents.

In the mid 60s, we started having to dress down for PE and shower communally afterwards from 5th grade on into HS, so you had to strip twice per day in the locker room, and for swimming, you had to strip and shower before and after getting out of the pool.
Shirts were optional during PE, and most chose not to wear them unless it was cold, or when split up into shirts and skins teams for games.
I guess nudity was not such big deal among kids back then, in fact we had no qualms about skinny dipping at the river in the summer, even if girls present or joining in.

Shirtless PE for boys in a coed school. Seems fairly recent!

[URL=https://s1053.photobucket.com/user/hagi52156/media/Gimnasia2.png.html][IMG]https://i1053.photobucket.com/albums/s463/hagi52156/Gimnasia2.png[/IMG][/URL]

Ben, we were fortunate to have had a pool in our school grounds, this was a boys only school and we were required to strip nude and walk to the pool. Like you say this was the rule in the junior years and at age 14 we were given the choice to stay nude or wear trunks. We all stayed nude.

Our swim team practiced in the nude but were allowed trunks for events but these were not compulsory and I do remember a few boys swimming nude. I also remember one time a visiting school swim team that came to compete and the entire team was nude.

Tobias
Did you have a swimming pool at school or were you taken somewhere for lessons and practice?
Did you have swim teams that also competed in the nude?

It seems from other posters that in most cases only junior boys up to about 13 took swimming lessons in the nude. I guess it was not considered as proper for boys older than that to be nude for swimming lessons, even at the same school. This arrangement was probably accepted by everyone, including parents, at the time, though I can't see it happen today.
I wonder when this practice of making boys swim nude at school stopped in the UK.
I also assume that this happened only in boys only schools. I can't imagine boys being made to swim naked in mixed schools since I never heard of girls being made to swim nude at school, though there could have been some exceptions.

With regards to swimwear at my all boys school circa 1961 the speedo style trunks (although I do not think speedo was actually a brand then) were worn for swimming. I prefer them much more than the long board shorts etc. which seem to be the style these days. I suppose the brief style trunks are considered to revealing. But I do not think they are any worse than some of the swimwear worn by females. Some of the bikinis with the thongs leave very little to the imagination.