Burnley Grammar School

Mike on 12th February 2023 at 17:41

I don't want to be unduly controversial, but it seems clear that some men who took up the role of PE teachers were, or had, homosexual tendencies, just as teachers in other disciplines did, and until the 1970s when society's views changed they would have to be very discreet (it was illegal until 1967 anyway). With the permissive society, people were encouraged to "come out" and nowadays, when you have an alleged entertainer donning make up, womens schmutter and even fake breasts to try to become an MP -and his party CONDONES it - despite the protests of real women in that party, then clearly anything goes.

Of course the more discreet or crafty teacher manages to instill fear into the pupils he is "interested" in - how many times a schoolmate of mine told me that if he said anything "they will believe me - not you" - he had even threatened to say that the lad made advances to him.

In the recent case of Quinlan, and the two teachers (one of whom remains unnamed) who are fighting extradition from South Africa on the grounds that they are now in their 80s and it is "all in the past" - what a pathetic excuse, for the misery they inflicted on young boys forty or fifty years ago, who are still bothered by the treatment they received. I am sure in most cases these men got away with it, simply because their colleagues either knew about their proclivities or strongly suspected it, and chose to say nothing thus condoning what was a very serious crime. Perhaps the PE teacher threatened other staff just as they did pupils. Most of the men guilty of these offences were not "obvious", because society through the media tended to think of homosexuals as mincing harmless men (think Larry Grayson or "Mr. Humphries" who were around in my day) - they forgot that they come in all sorts and conditions. For the body building sporty gay man, such a job was like encouraging an alcoholic to work in a brewery.The onus was on them not to take a job where they knew they would be tempted - I have no sympathy for them and certainly Quinlan should have been imprisoned - I am sure if he had worked in a supermarket or been a dustman he would have been , it is just another case of the law taking a sympathetic view of "professionals"

Oh my, this is weird. I think there are only two types of men and boys, those who are happy to take their shirts off, and those who are not. Come down to our allotments on a hot summers day and you will see who is which.

The story placed on here by Derek is sadly far too familiar isn't it. What I find disturbing about so many of these convictions is how many of the men behaved like they did in plain sight and fairly openly. Did many of these people really think none of their boys in school would go home and say a few things to their families, or was it the arrogance of thinking these children would not be believed over a pillar of the community teacher as we once thought of these people. I don't know the answer to that.

Did PE teachers suddenly become far worse during the 1970's and 80's or something, or is it that the one's in decades previously have simply got away with some of their behaviour in ways that latter years they have not because of greater awareness from current 40/50/60 years olds.

Re: Derek on 11th February 2023 at 02:30


This sort of case doesn't surprise me in the least. It is amazing that, not that many years ago, this man's behaviour was known about, probably gossiped and sniggered about by both fellow staff members as well as pupils, it must have reached the ears of the headmaster, but they chose to ignore it, and, when he finally gets caught, he avoids prison, because he is now old and retired (and probably gets his jollies on the internet). Had that been females he had been abusing I have little doubt that he would now be looking at a nice long stretch at His Majesties pleasure, but with politicians of all parties making excuses and even condoning personal perversions and practices (this pathetic individual even admits he got sexual pleasure from "looking" at naked boys - and I suspect more than just looking), things will probably get worse.

I also agree with you about the "Stockholm syndrome" of a lot of the men who have contributed to this site - yes our old teacher used to hit us, demean us, picked on certain pupils, but it was all just good clean fun - but was it?. Just because these men outside school went to church on Sundays, did the football pools and grew Lobelia in their front gardens, does not excuse their behaviour in their jobs. It wouldn't be tolerated (when discovered) by the medical profession or the police force, so why should it be excused in pederists working in the teaching profession? - and why were they not weeded out and dealt with by the courts when it was first discovered?. Boys were too naive and parents too accepting of questionable behaviour. I do agree that perhaps the pendulum has now swung too far in the opposite direction (the mother complaining that her daughter was not allowed to keep her coat on, a man complaining in a gym because another adult had chosen to remove his top), but basic minimum standards should have always been taken as lines not to be crossed.

I was a senior age grammar schoolboy in the 1950's and so you can imagine how old I now am. The memories remain clear however. I was highly academic and quite successful in my life, but at school in the fifties if you did not show good all round fitness you were treated as if you were a failure, irrespective of your academic record. I was not a natural sporting youth. You had to be both intelligent and motivated to do sports well to be considered an achiever. Of course this was ultimately completely false but put a train of thought into many young minds that was far from the positive attitude they claimed to be about.

My academic education was top class but my physical education was gruelling and very demanding with elements of outright cruelty institutionally build in. Under achievers would receive ice cold showers which were also used as a general punishment aid for non PE troublemakers often under direct watch by the Headmaster himself. Beatings with a leather belt were commonplace, including during PE.

What a disgraceful story. The teacher didn't even get a custodial sentence. Good on Andre Tyndall for courageously coming forward.

A number of people on these pages in the past have made excuses for the kind of behaviour described in this article by this PE teacher. There is no point denying it, time to face facts that there have obviously been one or two Michael Quinlan types who have written up on here over the years.

https://www.mylondon.news/news/east-london-news/my-pe-teacher-shower-naked-26118707

The words in the above article are below;

A former teacher at a school in Romford, East London, abused male pupils by checking that they 'weren’t wearing underwear' and 'playing naked games' in the showers. Michael Quinlan had used his position as a PE teacher at The Royal Liberty School to look at young boys while naked.

He taught at the school throughout the 1980s and 1990s and was not suspended until he was charged with sex offences in 2003. In 2004, Quinlan was found guilty of previous sexual offences at the school and served 15 months behind bars.

Nearly two decades later on May 25, 2022, he appeared at Snaresbrook Crown Court charged with three counts of indecent assault on a boy under the age of 14 and two counts of indecent assault on Andre Tyndall who was aged 11 at the time. He was found guilty of all the charges bar one count of indecent assault and was handed a 22-month suspended sentence.

Quinlan was suspended from The Royal Liberty School after he was arrested in 2003
Quinlan was suspended from The Royal Liberty School after he was arrested in 2003.

Andre Tyndall has now waived his anonymity in order to encourage other victims to come forward to assist in the investigation and expose his abuse. He said: “Quinlan worked as a PE teacher and used to look at the boys naked for his own sexual gratification, claiming he needed to check that they were not wearing underwear underneath their shorts before a games lesson.

“I also remember him playing around with boys in the school swimming pool which would involve a lot of inappropriate touching of children’s private parts. However, when he was questioned about this in court, he said that any touching of a penis was accidental, although he did acknowledge that he did get sexual pleasure from the touching.

“The last time I went to a PE or games lesson was when I entered the school showers after a lesson and saw Quinlan naked, surrounded by naked boys who were playing another game that involved more inappropriate touching. Quinlan said he only had hold of the boys by their wrists and ankles when questioned in court, but I clearly remember that Quinlan’s hands were in their groin area.”

Speaking to MyLondon, Andre said that he eventually reported Quinlan to the police in 2019 and had to wait three years before the matter went to trial due to the Covid-19 pandemic. He had begun to acknowledge that he had been abused after seeing wall-to-wall media coverage of Jimmy Saville's crimes in 2011, and decided to "face up to what had happened".

One of the incidents with Quinlan had occurred after he was knocked unconscious during a PE lesson, after he was hit in the face with a basketball. He woke in the changing rooms to find the teacher groping his genitals. "As a child, an 11-year-old, I seemed to think the fact I was woken up by being groped was akin to the 'magic sponge' you get in football.

Andre decided to report Quinlan to the police in 2019 after several years of coming to terms with what had happened
Andre decided to report Quinlan to the police in 2019 after several years of coming to terms with what had happened (Image: Andre Tyndall)
"I thought they were trying to help me. I thought I was mistaken, I thought that was a way to wake me up and that’s how I understood it as a child. Then I became an adult and it was in the past but I didn’t quite understand it," he said. During his time at The Royal Liberty School, he said that it was an "open secret" that Quinlan was a paedophile, and that it had been written on desks and shouted down the corridors.

"I thought it was normal," he said. "I believed that an authority figure putting a finger down the elastic of my underwear to look at my naked genitals to see I wasn’t wearing underwear because those were the PE rules - I just thought that was normal. I thought it was normal to be woken up from being unconscious by having someone rub my genitals."

He described the experience of attending the trial as nothing short than traumatic, with Quinlan admitting sexual activity with another victim but denying the allegations from Andre. "In police interviews when Quinlan was showed a picture of me as a child, he said ‘well I don’t find him very attractive anyways’," Andre said.

"The defence barrister doesn’t need to prove anything, he just needs to plant a seed of doubt in the jury’s mind. He brought up the fact I got an A in Drama and the implication of that was that I was acting. The fact I got an A in Drama when I was 11 and now that makes me acting?

"He tried to imply that I was somehow unemployed when I run a business with my wife. He suggested that I was unemployed and my wife was working two jobs to support me, suggesting that I had nothing better to do than make up stories. In summing up his evidence, he said of my testimony that it was “bollocks” - the fact he would just say it’s “bollocks”, is that even a legal term?"

The jury however, believed Andre's testimony and Quinlan was convicted. Despite this, he didn't receive a custodial sentence and was allowed to walk from the courtroom with a 22-month suspended sentence. "I just couldn’t believe it. I accepted the justice system but when you’ve convicted the paedophile and you let them go free, the social contract is just gone," he said.

"If I was asked to do jury service now, I would rather go to prison because it is just a joke. I wouldn’t do it, it drives me to pieces. I went to the justice system and it’s just a ridiculous parlour game."

Andre is now hoping to help other victims to come forward by waiving his anonymity, and is hoping for an acknowledgment from the school. He continued: "I don’t want an apology from the local education authority, I just want an acknowledgement that this man had looked and possibly groped hundreds of kids."

Several of his victims, who he had abused during the course of his teacher from 1982 to 2003, are now considering legal action in the civil courts against the London Borough of Havering Council. Andrew Grove and Co Solicitors in Cambridgeshire, who are acting on behalf of the survivors, are appealing for anyone who suffered or witnessed abuse at the school to get in touch.

Solicitor Katherine Yates said: “Quinlan was abusing pupils at Royal Liberty School for over 20 years. Apparently, Quinlan’s behaviour was common knowledge at the school in the 1980s and 1990s and derogatory comments about him were written on school desks and shouted along corridors in the school.


“I know that there are more witnesses and former pupils out there who suffered abuse at his hands and I would urge anyone who attended or worked at the school with any relevant information, no matter how insignificant they think it might be, to please make contact.

“There is still time to join the civil lawsuit. We are here to get justice for all those who were assaulted by Quinlan. All claims are being funded on a no win, no fee basis so there’s no cost involved.”

Speaking from Canada tonight I don't think the boys at the school doing PE in pants were being humiliated Alan. I just think the teacher was making an effort to get them to do something rather than nothing on the day.

Robbie. I think it is for the best that teachers are not allowed to get away with humiliating pupils these days, and as you point out yourself, the underwear of 40/50 years ago is noting like that of today's. I always feel that most people start as they mean to go on,and if that includes demeaning young boys on their first day in a new school, they are not going to change much. One man's fear is another man's terror so I think the two words are interchangeable.

I don't think the teacher was that bad Alan, he did bring a box of old shorts along for them to try on at least - what a thoughtful teacher he was that man!

I think what makes that situation a bit rough on the guys involved was it being a first day set up. Nobody familiar with each other, the teachers, the building and all the nerves that already come with starting at a new place, so in that context that feels a bit rough on them yes. But if it had been a bit further into term with everything a bit more familiar I can't see that it should have been seen that bad. What's a pair of pants or a pair of shorts between school guys anyway. I'd have declined rummaging about for some manky old lost shorts of someone else's and stayed stuck in my pants. Boys nowadays would probably look quite good doing PE in their pants only compared to boys 40 or 50 years ago who had to. It would be all trunks or boxers, neat fitting and designer names across the waist band, looking like nice shorts and in nice colours and patterns too, far removed from a succession of basic drab Y-fronts probably out of British Home Stores or C & A of the time.

I know some people like Jonathan use the word 'fear' on here but you Alan translated that into the word 'terror' which I think is a bit strong and emotive. When people use the word fear I think they just mean worry more than being terrified don't you think.

Replying to Tanya,
I’ve asked at several unisex gyms why when it’s been really warm in the gym that I wasn’t allowed to take my t shirt or vest off and was told “it would upset female members of the gym”.

I don’t think that women are so fragile that they would be offended by seeing guys exercising shirtless.

Jonathan W on 6th February 2023 at 03:24



I can fully understand the terror that terrible introduction had for you and your classmates - I would have felt exactly the same, even our old soak wasn't quite that bad to 11 year olds. Just imagine those boys forced to perform in underwear if if was tatty, or if as some boys do, they suffered still from minor incontinence (this didn't apply to me, so this isn't special pleading). Just imagine the outrage if a PE teacher behaved in this manner today.Even an 11 year old, in my opinion, deserves some sort of dignity and privacy, even more so when they are 15/16 and they certainly didn't get it at your school.

I well understand, and sympathise with that article - they pose the problem but do not provide answers - individual showers should be available for those who want to use them, and if schools had not herded all sorts and conditions into this ritual they might well have had a better outcome.

John - Who says women have a problem like the one you describe? I certainly would never have any such problem at all. Even at school as girls we weren't considered so fragile that the sight of a few members of the opposite sex might corrupt us and I did a few classes alongside boys my age like that, and this isn't the 1970's but the late 90's!

From everything I've read here in the months since I discovered this history site it seems it was the boys who were more worried, not girls. As for adult women having issues in an adult gym setting, how many of them then fly off to a foreign beach and are surrounded by men without a care in the world about that.

Replying to Will & Mark,
I totally agree with both of you, I can’t see why any normal person should have a problem with guys who prefer to exercise shirtless in a gym. With unisex gyms it’s frequently said that males must wear a top because women would feel uncomfortable. The women that I’ve discussed this issue with have no problem with seeing guys exercising shirtless.

I like the first line in the article placed in the last post on here.

"It is the secret fear behind every PE class – the communal shower."

Yes, truth spoken at last. I had that fear. Who would dare to mention that fear out loud in school for fear of ridicule just saying it. So that's why there was silence and probably why there are now so many grown ups letting off a bit of steam in places like this where they can finally release some pent up feelings. I don't blame anyone for doing that. I think the fear could also apply to topless boys PE too, which I did many times, including day one afternoon at secondary school.

I remember my introduction to PE and secondary school showering on my first day at school in 1973. We spent the morning writing up timetables and meeting new faces and the first proper timetable lesson we had to go to after lunch was to my dread a PE one, but as we were new and had no PE kit on us I thought that was fine we wouldn't be doing anything meaningful. When we showed up after lunch we first went to the gym fully clothed with our bags and coats and were met with the quite intimidating sight of three quite big PE teachers, one looked a bit rough. One of them, Mr Lucas was the top bloke in charge. They did the intros and two cleared off and left us with Lucas who said we didn't have kit but could still have a useful hour or so doing something on our first day. He led us to our changing room and we had to get down to our pants for PE, just pants. My God that was an awful experience straight out the blocks. I remember the nervous laughter of thirty newbies at it. PE involved boys from two different classes joining up as one group. Lucas the PE teacher came back with a box of shorts and said anyone who wanted to could find some to fit and wear a pair out the lost property box which was filled with stuff, but most of us stayed in pants. He reminded us that there would always be something to wear if we turned up forgetting our kit. Lesson number one was learned there with that one quite fast, you're still doing PE if you show up without your stuff., so bring it.

So on my first day in secondary school I got to know a lot of new faces and also what kind of underwear everyone wore. Quite the introduction. I long remember, some of the basic gym equipment came out, nothing spectacular. I remember a trampoline, a horse, ropes, frames, benches and a large heavy medicine ball in particular getting chucked at our chests unexpectedly to catch and being surprised by the weight of the thing. We had to bring everything out and put it all away again as neat as possible. Like I said, in our pants for one day only.

Normal kit thereafter was white shorts, white vest, plimsolls were rarely worn although we had them, and vests were off a lot too, topless PE seemed the way they liked it best for us. You adapt very quickly even with things you don't like much. Definitely think many of us found a defensive coping mechanism to put up with this element of school life.

I had fallen off my bike during the summer holidays and bruised the side of my body a bit and got questioned about it and the resultant scratches on my arm and leg. I was believed without further questions, I think.

Back at the changing room we got introduced to our school's cleaning arrangements for PE, or "the showers" as we always think of them. Lucas invited anyone who wanted to have one to use them but I don't think anyone actually did, nobody came prepared for any PE that day, so no towels or anything on us. But he made it quite clear that we had the option that day if we wished to or not but next time would be different and we would all be using them, that is what you do in this school, and he didn't expect to have to tell us, he expected us to do so automatically after PE. I think he asked for any questions and there was silence. Many I think dealing with their "secret fear" in those moments one imagines.

Coming back from PE the showers in the changing room were always already on and waiting. I have no idea how they got put on most of the time as our teacher would come back with us so he hadn't done so, unless it was one of the others. Sharing that quite intimate and revealing experience at such a young age, I was still a couple of months away from being twelve, with a lot of people you don't know very well, at first, was nerve wracking. I'd never seen another boy naked, I had no brothers at home, and here I was among very many.

I think all I'm doing here is recounting a totally average school PE situation of the time, nothing special about it as such. Just the normality you met. I liked some teachers, and not some others, none were truly awful unlike the stereotypes sometimes painted. We just went through the state school production line all doing much the same thing and many of us thinking the same thoughts, a lot of them in secret.

This was published in the year I stopped teaching, 2015. It may be of interest to some here.

https://www.scotsman.com/news/uk-news/shower-shyness-after-pe-linked-lack-fitness-1515146

So the reason not to go shirtless in the gym nowadays is all down to hygiene and dripping your sweat over others and the equipment. That's a new one on me.

I wish I could have pulled that one on my PE teachers when they got the whole class stripped down to our waists. The answer back would have been swift and brutal I feel.

What sane person goes up to a random stranger in a gym, nowhere near them and creates a big deal of their dress choice, or lack of, and takes offence.

How's this for weird. Sorry to share yet another newspaper link but this one is worth it in the spirit of this discussion. It comes from the Daily Mail in 2021 where it was the younger 18 year old guy happily at the gym minding his own business working out shirtless, perfectly normal to most people even in 2021, when an older guy takes issue with him and confronts him about why he's gone shirtless in the gym, calling him weird for doing so. It's quite mad anyone would act like that.

I think the real weirdo was the one who confronted the shirtless gym guy. He was obviously some kind of neanderthal homophobic bigot who seemed to think that the simple act of daring to be in a public gym baring his chest meant the 18 year old was gay, having used a derogatory term to that effect.

The younger guy handled it very well. Not sure what goes through the mind of anyone who would confront someone for working out shirtless in a gym of all places. .


https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-10084287/Man-labels-18-year-old-weirdo-f-t-working-SHIRTLESS-gym.html

A different culture I know but I think I'd have given that a go at their ages. The important thing is that they did it voluntarily, nobody was forcing them outside in their underwear to throw cold water over themselves in minus 25 below.

How interesting to hear that they think doing that daily aids confidence.

One here for Damon!

Brrrrr.

https://siberiantimes.com/healthandlifestyle/others/features/f0211-this-is-how-little-siberians-learn-to-love-our-trademark-cold-and-stay-healthy/

Good point on the tonsils! They don't have them out anymore do they, yet when I was at school you were always hearing about people having their tonsils out in at school. I never did either. So what changed?

If you took a good look at my local primary school and what counts as teachers, even the head teacher nowadays, there is no way you'd look at any of them and think of them as professionals for a split second.

Had a similar thing in a primary school PE class when I was nine. A female teacher went absolutely nuts over nothing and began chasing around randomly at anyone she could catch and smacking and slapping as many boys as she could get hold of, ignoring the girls completely, many innocent boys ending up slapped, mainly the legs. That's 1978 for you and if you can lose control that easily you have no place near children, then or now.

Martin and Jim - these practices went on far too long, of course, parents even forty years ago seemed to be in awe of "professionals" - a doctor said you needed your tonsils out and mum or dad would have their Bic out to sign the form without question. I escaped that one!. Teachers were also regarded (quite unjustly and quite often) as "professionals" and they were never questioned.Britain's love of authority figures. Thank goodness the age of deference has long since passed. That must be quite upsetting for some of the little Hitlers that cluttered the profession.

Skipping was underused in school PE in my opinion. It was always something you saw girls doing on playgrounds together with each other. But actually it is a fantastic way to keep fit and it's maybe a bit surprising it wasn't used more in PE, cheap to buy the ropes and so easy to do, and fun.

Not much fun when a teacher decides to use it as a weapon of discipline like that however. You never said if it was for being late or anything else but that was abusing his remit as it was not any kind of officially sanctioned punishment at that time.

Teachers in the long gone past didn't seem to concern themselves with leaving visible marks on the skin that might last a while did they. They must have all felt very confident that if any of their boys (or girls) went home and showed their handiwork off that the parents would have the back of the teacher over their own child or something.

I had the misfortune to witness what amounted to quite a nasty beating someone in my gym class received from a teacher back in 1971 after we had spent some time with skipping ropes skipping on the spot as part of a warm up. This was something we always did shirtless and barefoot, standing on a mat each. A latecomer joined us very late and got beaten a number of times quite viciously by a skipping rope across his back and shoulders leaving one hell of a red mark. We tried to get him to tell his dad but he wouldn't. That teacher, one of my PE teachers, normally the okay type just flipped. I hated that he got away with it. Whenever I hear about a family dog that always behaved suddenly attacking somebody I think of that 1971 gym teacher of mine doing that to that boy in our class.

Ben, when we were told to strip off outside it was done quickly and without fuss Obviously with the whole class stripping off such as gym or cross country there wasn't any favouritism shown there. But we also had fitness lessons outside where the teachers would handpick those they wanted to strip off. There were a few in my class who showed ability in one or more sports and we were stripped off the majority of the time. Objecting was never an option.

Below I'm refreshing my comment I placed at new year a month back just to follow up on something I ended it with.

During this weekend after the Sunday roast at my parents I got the tech out and let my parents read what I wrote here. The reaction was not what I expected and I ended up getting a telling off like a naughty schoolboy over this account of my schooldays back in 1981. Both of my parents read this together at the same time at the dinner table before we cleared away. It led to a quite heated (no pun intended) few minutes exchange of views including why I had never felt able to say such things to them at the time and what else I might be hiding from them about my schooling. Nothing much really. But I wasn't expecting such a fired up reaction to something quite some time ago now, even from my father who called the teacher I described below "a bloody fool" who he'd liked to have had words with if he'd known, mother furiously nodding in agreement. I could tell neither was impressed with what they were reading because I saw this ever more serious expression and intensity in their eyes as they continued to read through to the end. As I told them both, it proved I made the right decision not to tell them at the time. The last thing anyone at school wants is their parents running to school showing them up over something, especially like this. Certainly that was the case with those of us at school years ago now. The recent coat story suggest some nowadays may think differently.

I think the wider point is that many of us in school in the past who had teachers doing things we didn't like or that seemed just wrong or silly might not have said anything further to our families and kept schtum. Out of interest, is my own story something any of those reading here would have gone home and told their parents about if it had happened to them in school at the time? I don't think there is really a right or wrong answer to it is there.

Repeating what I said below for anyone who missed it;





Comment by: Damon Sullaway on 30th December 2022 at 16:13

The wife saw this site and has encouraged me to tell this story of mine. So here goes, sorry if I babble on a bit with it and it's too long. 55 year old male who has plenty of crazy school PE memories, here is one of the belters.

I think there is a difference between what are described as sadistic PE teachers and abusive ones. There is also a grey area in the middle where those two merge somewhat. Many people who talk of their sadistic PE teachers for example are probably overdoing it just a bit when all they mean is they sent them outside in a bit of drizzle or shouted a bit at them in encouragement or such like.

I had a PE teacher at school who for me falls into that grey area and this draws together the shirtless debate and that old favourite of schools dividing those with and those without. In some ways wasn't skins against shirted a good case of PE teachers divide and rule.

I started a decent secondary in 1979 at 12 and just about every lesson in the gym seemed to end up as skins against shirts at some point because we would always end up doing some kind of team games following on from the individual disciplines. Isn't it funny how everyone who did this seems to think they were the ones on the side of the skins the majority of the time in these lessons. I'm the same too and I don't think it's my imagination either. If we got picked out by the PE teacher's own choice I was always one getting told to remove my shirt and we always had to do it quickly. The slightest hesitation in getting that top off and into your bare chest was seen as reluctance. Now I know lots of boys don't give a damn one way or another about such things but I also know in my own class there were lots who hated this constant ritual we did and it did foster some resentment. Me, I was averagely self conscious I suppose when I had no shirt on in school. Wouldn't have chosen it myself if presented with free choice but could live with it easily enough without feeling it was a full on traumatic experience like others. Just your physique at the end of the day, we all have it. I think school showers throwing everyone together naked was quietly hated by everyone wasn't it just because of the fact they always made us have to do it. Even at home at that age most boys probably had to be told to get a bath or shower, mostly baths back then or we wouldn't have had them as regular as we should have done. Although not a fair comparison as I never shared the bath at home with my friends or anyone else!

Bringing me back to my main point drawing the skins against shirts issue alongside the sadistic or abusive issue. We went out in all weathers, everybody used to, rain, shine, sun, wind, sleet or snow. You name it we went out in it. I'd been at secondary for a couple of years, was in my third year by the time and so knew the ropes and it was all now very familiar and didn't think there was anything left to surprise me by the age of 14. There was no high turnover of teachers, they were all the same regulars we had as always, but there was one who let's just say I was more wary of than the others, nothing more than that. It had snowed a few days previous and was lying on the ground, a decent fall, maybe 6 to 8 inches and a large part of the school field had been cleared by a small tractor a caretaker seemed to get hold of or arrange at some point with snow around some of the edges piled up by it. We're talking December 1981 if anyone knows that time. The clearance still left the pitch mainly white but at least usable to some degree. I'd seen the tractor clearing it one morning break as some of us looked on with interest. I lived in Northamptonshire at that time.

When my next PE lesson for outside came along on the timetable the snow was well and truly set in and covering the ground and the temperatures were not allowing any thaw even by day so must have been zero or below, quite similar to the recent spell earlier this month infact. The sky was mostly clear and sunny, despite all the snow and very low temperature. This was going to be our football PE lesson and we did go outside to the part of the field where the pitch had been cleared, our teacher bringing out a netted bag of bright orange balls, it must have contained a dozen or so and some poor chap had to drag them out. I'm sure we used to play with white balls or possibly a mixture of colours and someone always got the job of filling the net bag and taking them out with us, me included. We'd get into a bit of kickabout practice and instruction for a short time and then get stuck into a game for half an hour more often than not if it was a footy PE lesson.

Now skins and shirts wasn't exclusive to the gym, we did it outside too but not as much, mostly a good weather thing. We'd go out always in a single layer long sleeved top at that time of year (our autumn/winter kit) and any boys that came to school in undervests had to take them off before putting on the school PE shirt. The shirt was school issue and not especially thick material. It didn't offer much warmth on a freezing day but was good enough for more normal conditions for that period in the year.

This day we'd done our kickabouts with the balls and they'd been collected back in and the PE teacher was left with just the one ready for an actual game. I feel sure we had bigger teams than 11 a side as well, there must have been because the class size was 30 or so. We were already freezing cold after half hour outside when that PE teacher, this was the one I was wary of, cheerily asked the question - 'who fancies 15 minutes of shirts against skins?'. Naturally we thought he was joking and just having one of those cheap laughs with us and no hands went up unsurprisingly. Then he said 'come on' and I thought, no way, he's not joking is he and before you could blink he was removing his own pullover & other top, yes, he had a couple of layers himself. He said if he could do it, we could. For a few moments we had this ridiculous sight of a shirt free bare chested PE teacher in front of a fully shirted class of his on a snowy school field until he walked up to each of us and tapped our shoulders dividing us into two groups. We knew what was coming but neither side knew which side we would be on. When he'd split us into two groups he did the skins routine on us by asking our two groups to decide which was going to be which among ourselves, quite unusual that was. Of course no side was going to volunteer to be a skins team and a squabble broke out until he intervened after a few seconds and decided for us after all. I was on the skins team. He clapped his hands and told us to get on with it and take our shirts off. You just didn't argue with it, crazy as it seemed and must have looked. So for 15 minutes just like he promised, I was a shirtless skin with the others on my side, about 15 of us, on a school pitch, snow piled up at the edges, chasing a bright orange ball over a still white cleared pitch with the shirted side trying not to laugh at us and failing in a few cases. But although our PE teacher had been the first to go shirtless in front of us as some kind of encouragement, after about two minutes into our game he grabbed his own pullover and put it back on again, the right old fraud. Nobody said anything though, we carried on as we had been told, complaining only silently in our own heads in those moments. I know I was!

It was absolutely perishing. This day stays with me. The sight of our skin colour changing rapidly into a red/purple/bluish tint across our chests, arms and back of our hands. The temperature that day was not just freezing point but well below I'm certain of that. The usually soft grassy pitch was rock solid hard. I could not put my shirt back on quick enough after those few minutes of madness. That teacher told us it had done us, and I remember the exact words 'the power of good'. There was no need for a shower afterwards as there was no way any of us could have sweated a bead however hard we tried and worked out there, but we still had to do so all the same, and after all that, the water pipes had been frozen up or something and the shower water was much colder than normal, adding insult to injury. We must have been so cold there was very little to check out if you know what I mean.

A few of my good friends I saw out of school were half frozen to death on that skins team that day and that evening after school one of them came and called round for me and we sat in the bedroom listening to our tapes. He asked me if I'd said anything to my parents about it and I said no I hadn't even thought to do so. I only occasionally said much about things like PE to them anyway or other lessons unless they asked directly. Often it was 'okay in school today?' and yes would be the reply from me. Mum was in every day when I came home and I got that same question most days. I probably gave the same reply that day too. The friend in my bedroom didn't say anything to his parents either. Out of the 15 of us I find it hard to believe none of us mentioned that mad 15 minutes to anyone at home. I think if I had done myself it would have been a case of 'that's strange' and left at that. My wife knows this story, my parents still don't! Perhaps I should tell them and see the reaction to it for a bit of fun.

So can I claim my PE teacher as sadistic or abusive, or is he in that grey area of doubt based on that day's lesson.

Oh boy how I wished I could have had that kind of karma with one of my teachers!

Coming face-to-face with your old gym teacher a while after you've left school is great fun. Exactly 30 years ago in 1993 this happened to me.

A much disliked male ex-PE teacher of mine showed up in a job centre I was working in and pretended not to recognise me. He did though, very much so and did admit it. He'd made my a period of my time in school less than great during PE. He was looking for a position completely unconnected to education. I wondered why, never got a proper answer but had a few ideas myself why that might be. It was a pleasure to turn the tables on him and reverse the roles like that with him. Funny how diminished and insignificant he seemed out of school some seven years later compared to someone I worried about.

A good example of being careful how you treat people on the way up as you may meet them on the way down, and he did.

Comment by: Duane on 27th January 2023 at 21:19

The question in my mind is if you've got the kit with you then why are you not wearing it. All the cross country running I did at school was in our complete outdoors kit. I can't begin to imagine what the reaction would have been if one of our teachers had suddenly decided to relieve us of half of our kit and expected us to jog off around the school area without anything on top. It reeks of some PE teachers just exploiting their own personal preferences onto others just because they could do it, not because it furthered the cause of the PE class in any way. I actually don't know how some of these people had the nerve to ask it of others when they didn't act accordingly. Leading by example I think it's called.

I don't remember doing anything in PE outside other than wearing full kit. Inside was different and we regularly did PE shirtless but when we did so the two teachers that mostly took me also did the same, leading by example as I said, so you certainly wouldn't feel hard done by. That's the right way to approach it and I think it's quite important.

Many of the guys I was in school with were quite vocal and opinionated, I can't believe for a minute not one of them, or even me for that matter, would have questioned a teacher who asked us to run a cross country over winter full on shirtless.

While I totally agree that the parent running off to the newspapers to complain their children are not allowed to wear coats in PE lessons was otiose and completely over the top, it is encouraging to note that parents take their children's welfare more seriously these days.

I never had children, but had I have done, I would certainly not have been prepared to accept the old buck that teachers in my time got away with.

Again, I have to add the disclaimer that not all teachers are perverts, any more than because a couple of policemen have recently been charged with rape and murder, they are by no means all incipient rapist and killers, as some of the more hysterical MPs have tried to suggest.

Making boys run around the streets with no tops in the depths of winter was entirely unacceptable, especially when the teacher was well padded out with tracksuits etc., it was just as unacceptable in 1980 as it had been in 1950, or would be 1990. Happily today it would be unthinkable and seen to be unthinkable.

I think teachers now are , like every other employee, worried that overstepping the mark will result in dismissal, so the ego trips and sense of power they had, has been overturned - and that is a very good thing. As I know from personal experience, a few - a few which unfortunately the law are only just catching up with , had a more sinister reason for behaving as they did.

Teachers - like everyone else dealing with children - need to be like Caesers wife - and in the old days many fell far short. It is good to know parents take their responsibilities more seriously these days, and are not just passive secondhand consumers. . That newspaper case, however, was taking things too far.