Fulwood County Secondary School

This was female pupils from classes 3a and 3b, a posed photo for a Lancashire Life article on a fabulous school. I was there from 1954 to 1960.

It is disgusting that boys are not allowed to cover their legs for sport but girls are.

School uniform is compulsory, and we ask for the full co-operation of every parent in ... Items of uniform for boys and girls: ... (Boys do not wear tracksuit bottoms).
Salesian School Uniform Policy.

I am glad PE ended for me in May 1989.

I remember this picture appearing in a feature on the school in Lancashire Life. Some of the girls were my classmates. The one nearest the camera eventually became Head Girl in 1963/4.

Although my own secondary school days started almost a decade and a half later, in the early 1970's, the photo doesn't look too dissimilar to how I remember our first year PE lessons. Possibly my gym knickers weren't quite as large as some of those on the photo, but otherwise one of the tall girls with thin legs and a flat chest could be me!

Picking up on a few of Gillian's comments, our PE teacher didn't stand any messing about in her lessons and enforced the uniform rules strictly (the girl with the black plimsolls would have been in trouble at our school - they had to be white and kept clean). I also remember her having a word with a few of my classmates about asking their mums to buy them bras when she thought they needed one (I avoided that particular indignity as my mum had already had that conversation with me prior to the start of my second year - following a growth spurt over the summer holidays). Showers were compulsory, although we all tried to get away with a quick splash particularly in winter when the changing rooms were cold!

On the whole I rather enjoyed PE and was always quite active out of school too.

Just came across this by accident. I was 14 in 1958, not at this school though. The amazing thing is that I could have been. We looked just like this. We did a lot of PE and then there were games on Wednesday afternoons, and, if you were in a school team, Saturdays as well. Just a thought, but I cannot remember a single overweight girl. We all looked quite fit and slim. How times have changed. Of course I realise that I might be a little selective but I cannot honestly remember weight being an issue for anyone I knew then. Now, of course it is different, sadly.

I think that our PE teacher was pretty hard on us all. She had very high standards. Before we left the changing rooms we had to stand still with our kit bags and be properly dismissed. Any messing about was dealt with harshly, a detention or horrible cross country run after school. Would that happen now?
Everything was quite regimented when you were younger but as girls developed she was very understanding and had some good advice about the 1950's version of sports bras! We were never forced to shower but she would always explain why it was such a good idea, in particular when you got through puberty.

Looking back she obviously cared about what she did. I do have fond memories of those times. We were lucky to have people of that calibre teaching us about sport and life.

Fab phoos