Burnley Grammar School

Well I know both my friends and I always looked forward to seeing which boys would be made to drop their PE vests, and whether the teacher would choose between skins and vests teams or full skins with all the boys having to strip down, indoors or out regardless of the time of year. A vest or bare chest is far more practical and cheaper alternative. I'm willing to bet both my son's and their friends wouldn't object either.

The comments prior to this latest one seem to have diappeared into thin air. I was agreeing with the previous writer than fellows in Britain do seem more prudish. I compared this to the fact then when abroad men wear speedo type swimming trunks and think nothing of it, whilst us English seem to try and cover our bodies whith ridicously long swimming shorts. In my school days it was brief style trunks and that was all that was available.

Why the change?

I meant to add, I used to go to a local swimmimg pool whre there was sperate all male & female changing. The male did not have cubicles and as some did try the same as the beach dance change under a towel. Most did not bother and even carried on conversations rather like the advert.
Now whereever I go I have to be careful because all pools seem to have mixed "Changing Villages" and I have to rmemeber that any moment a female (either swimmer or attendant) could walk in and I must change in a very confined cubicle.

When I was young we thought nothing of the bare chest & barefoot requirement! Guys casually went naked in changing and group shower rooms. Now lads either don't bother showering (yuck) or do a ridiculous towel dance until they're in cubicle showers.

However, guys on mainland Europe haven't changed their attitude towards communal showering?

Why is it that American & British guys are so prudish nowadays?

Below is a link to an 1965 Advertisement for the water saving Bradley Group Showers. Imagine the shock if these were installed routinely today, as they once were!

http://s15.postimg.org/rftf9vimj/zz_tumblr_o0ekcm3_IAr1txny1lo1_500.jpg

Absolutely right. Our cross country course took us over a local golf course and public footpaths in some woods. hence the footwear.
When we got back to school our plimsolls had to come off before we went into the school. This was to keep mud off the floors. Also our gym floors had just been relaid so The PE teacher was very strict about footwear in there. If we were excused PE due to a sick note we had to watch from the side. We had to remove shoes and socks before we went in. He said socks were slippery and a health risk.
Mr Anderson always wore foorware in the gym!!!!

Mark - our course was mainly in open country along muddy paths and around 2 sides of a field though we had to run along a rough track and pavements to get there and back. The sides of the field were probably most challenging when it had just been ploughed and stones brought to the surface. I don't remember there being any broken glass around - there was much less anyway in the 60s. I'm sure if there had been any injuries the school would have made us wear plimsolls - no trainers in those days, of course.

We were always barefoot in the gym and barechested, gym was a double session on Fridays, Mondays was cross country day and Wednesdays was football in winter and cricket in summer, not shirtless in cross country but on hot days most boys were,this was 1959-1963 in a Midlands Secondary Modern school.

Happy Days !!

We always did PE barefoot indoors but outdoors we wore trainers etc. Surely there were health and safety issues with doing things like cross country in bare feet. wouldn't there be a possibility of broken glass etc on the course?

Reading through the comments brings back many memories - mostly good. My all boys grammar school back in the 60s used black and white shorts to distinguish teams so, like John and Jono, a pair of shorts was all we wore for p.e. Cross country was also done barefoot and shirtless. I don't think any-one ever complained about being cold - we just got on with it.

Dave, thanks for the link to the Belgian PE pictures. I wonder if maybe the boys are required to take their shirts off for using certain apparatus? Although it would make more sense for them to be shirtless throughout.

To Matthew,
No, as far as I know no one changed their minds. Most people who were shirts never wanted to take them off ever and some of hem change in the toilets because they were that shy. Also, most skins were perfectly fine with being skins.

Here is the link for the shirtless PE lesson of a Belgian school posted some months ago. I wonder why the boys have shirts on in some pictures and shirtless in others.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/hildecrevits/albums/72157642678186554

I'm 22.

In PE we were offered two choices, have clean underpants for after the lesson or take them off for the lesson. For a couple of weeks at the very beginning most lads had a second pair but then you and everyone else forgets so you take them off as who wants to sit for the rest of the day in underpants you've rolled around the rugby pitch in? It's just common sense really.

After a couple of weeks no one was shy but then we also had communal showers that were still going when I left school four years ago and AFAIK still are. Showers were compulsory and again, who doesn't want one? My view is it's life, get on with it, changing rooms don't bother me in the slightest but I do see guys who feel they have things to hide which I don't understand. If the sight of a bare bottom offends you then you probably shouldn't be there in the first place.

Evan in comparison to my days at school, has the rules for Pe changed? Were you allowed to wear underwear? or has the ban on pants becomea thing of the past?

Like Benny we always went topless for indoor PE and again we thought nothing of it.
Also when we did cross country most of again went stripped to the waist and again thought nothing of it.

During my time at secondary school (all boys school) we were always no tops when indoors and we never thought anything about it. Also in keeping with the times we did not wear any underwear even when outside.I do not remember any embarrasment.

When we went outside for sport we wore a football shirt, and short shorts.

To Evan,
In time, did any of those who were initially reluctant to be "skins" come to change their minds?

I left school just wo years ago and I can say that we did have optional shirts vs skins in our school due to the awful quality of bibs. Basically, what happened was the teacher would ask if anyone objected to taking off their shirt. Usually, around a quarter of boys (who tend to be less good at sports in general) would put their hands up to be selected for the shirts team along with a few really good players to balance the teams better. Then, the rest of us would take our tops off and join the skins team. The teams were always slightly different to ensure good competition.

It was pretty embarrassing at first to see the other team fully clothed while i was in just a pair of shorts (it did give the less able shirts guys a bit of a confidence boost though) it was something I learnt to accept and in the summer it was definitely an advantage

At my school the teacher sometimes put us in teams of 5 then picked 2 boys to drop their vests and we played 3 against 2 basketball. We also did the full skins and shirts teams like Chris2 mentioned but indoors in the summer we all did athletics as skins.

Ouch!! Who says girls aren't devious?

I readily admit to enjoying being a skin, though I have absolutely no idea why I was picked so often. We did skins and vests both indoors and outside. The teacher always had a skins team regardless so for me and a couple of others it meant a lot of time being made to strip off outside too.
One thing I wondered about was why he just didn't make us strip off before we went outside instead of waiting until we were either on the yard or the field.

John and Jack - well I haven't come across that before. I did get into a fight outside of school, the only one I ever had! The girls egged us both to strip to the waist, which we did. I didn't realise it was a trap and after we'd been fighting a few minutes one of the girls who had soaked my vest in water, hit it hard across my bare back four times and it killed. Strangely the PE teacher made no mention of the marks during PE though other lads did.

Hi Chris2,
Looking back, do you feel it was a good thing to be picked as a skin so frequently? My feeling is that it probably was as ultimately I felt more confident about my body.
Did you ever have shirts against skins outdoors, by the way, or only in the gym?

Chris2

Hello, Jack beat me to it, describing 'Running the Gauntlet', it was exactly the same at our School, which was a Co-ed Independent Grammar, I attended 1963-68. Gym was single-sex.
We loooked one in Awe at the first "Running the Gauntlet" on our First Gym Session in our First Year.
The Gym Teacher selected a Couple of the 2nd-Year Lads to "Demonstrate Running" with the rest of the Second Years doing the "Gauntletting".
If you were a slow Runner you just got more Slaps and Hits. It was as simple as that!

Hi Chris2

Running the gauntlet was a great piece of old-fashioned schooling. In my PE lessins the two last boys entering the gym after having got changed into proper kit (which was always bare tops, bare feet and just white shorts btw)had to run the gauntlet. The other boys formed two lines and those two had to run in between them getting slapped on their bare backs and chests. As you can imagine, we got always got changed at the speed of lightning.

Hi John and Simon, thanks, it's interesting you both had different experiences. Our teachers didn't bother with any kind of rotation and like you I was picked for skins more often than not throughout school.

John, what on earth was "run the guantlet" and what happened if you didn't survive?

Hi John and Simon, thanks, it's interesting you both had different experiences. Our teachers didn't bother with any kind of rotation and like you I was picked for skins more often than not throughout school.

John, what on earth was "run the guantlet" and what happened if you didn't survive?

Hi Jack, One has a mole on their right forearm and no parting while the other had no mole and no parting. I know they had a great deal of fun. I thought they'd be put in different classes at High School but academically they were virtually the same too. Being on the skins team would be tough for anyone to pick them apart - even mum and dad got them confused at times but it didn't stop them from stripping off.

Hi Claire, were there any physical characteristics with which you could distinguish your twin brothers from each other?
There were two sets of identical twins in my neighbourhood when I was at school and there was no way anyone could distinguish between them. It always amazed me how their parents could easily distinguish between them on sight, and called each distinctly by name.

Hi Simon, My twin brothers were exactly the same. From the age of 9 to 18 they were both nearly always made to strip off. My friend's brother who was the same age and in the same class was rarely picked to strip. It's strange how skins teams were picked.

To Chris2
Hi Chris, an interesting Question , but actually No, Our PE Teacher tended to alternate Skins Teams each Week - we only had 1 x 1.5Hr PE Session p/w so generally Lads didn't have to strip off more than that unless of course they were slow in getting changed at the start of Lesson in which case the Last 2 Lads from each (2 of ) House had to 'Tops Off' and "run the Gauntlet" before we started the Session, in which case assuming they survived that, they stayed Topless for the rest of the Lesson , only putting tops On again if they were in the Shirts Team for Team Games eg Killerball, at the end of the Lesson.
Hope this Clarifies.
John