The Twelfth Annual Trinity Tower Reunion

Who Came

The Reunion took place on Saturday 15th November at The Old Bank, opposite the Northampton Guildhall.

This was our largest reunion yet with 112 people attending, 3 more than last year and the room was pretty full. 

Peter Austen again ran the event on the day, and everyone enjoyed it. 

This was a very successful reunion.  There were some more new faces this year.  Last year had only 3 less people attending, but there was one very large group, my year, 1963, as a lot of people had worked hard to get new people to come along.  This year there were a lot more people from a number of years, and there was a good spread. While the 1963 group was still the largest, there were almost as many from 1966 and 1964.  Pete Chillingsworth finally persuaded his sister, Rosalie, who was in the Class of 1957 to come along, and we continue to get more people coming along from the 50's. 

David Baker came again.  He has always been a very popular former member of staff.  People enjoy meeting David and he enjoys the reunion each year.  He always gets there for the start and stays late.  We hope that we will see him for many more years yet.

As Peter Austen mentioned in his short address, we had a number of years celebrating special anniversaries.  For 1964 it was 50 years since they finished the fifth form, 1969 were 50 years since they started at the school and for Peter's own year (1970) they had reached the grand old age of 60.  Peter said he was was already enjoying his Senior Citizen's Railcard. 

Our senior member this year was Christopher Burrows from the class of 1950.  He came along with his wife Margaret.  Margaret did not live in Northampton when at school, but they met on a School Holiday in 1948, when she was staying at the same holiday centre with her own school.  They kept in touch and then married. We had hoped that Norman French would come to the Reunion again this year.  He has been several times, and came last year.  Having looked at the photos of the 1948 trip we realised that both Norman and Christopher had been on that same trip.  I wrote to Norman to tell him that Christopher was coming, but did not hear back.  If you have not seen the articles on that trip then you can read more here [go go].

All of the usual suspects were there from my year (1963) plus we had a first visit from Gordon Brommage.  Everyone had wanted to see Gordon as he was the brains of our year.  He spent the whole of his time at the reunion talking to many different people.  Also coming for the first time was Freda Baker (now Skelton).  She wrote an article a long time ago in Where Are They Now?, when she was living in Turkey.  She is now back in Northampton. 

This year we had the material from the old school archives on display. It was not a total success!  Despite the best efforts of the Borough Council, closing all of the roads, we finally managed to get the crates in to the pub almost an hour after the start, but by then, we had such an excellent turnout, there was no room to set out the material. Despite that, some people enjoyed looking at the old photos and articles, especially in the large scrapbook.

If you have a story to add about your time at this year's reunion, then please send it to me and I will add it.  If you have some good photos, then please send them too (I forgot to take my camera and only had mobile phone pictures).  The e-mail address as usual is ian.dow@trinityhigh.co.uk 

Finally, not everyone was happy with our return to the Old Bank. We are still struggling to find a suitable venue.  The venue needs to be large enough to accommodate over 100 people in a room or area separate from the public.  It needs to be in central Northampton, as a lot of people like to come without a car, and the venue needs to be able to take orders for food from people during the event and supply it in a reasonable time period.  People want to eat at all sorts of different times, and it is not possible to pre-book and pre-pay for food, which some venues demand.  If you know of a suitable venue, then please let me know as soon as possible.

Ian Dow

Conversations from the Reunion from Bill Rich

First of all many thanks to you, Ian, and Peter for organising this year's reunion.   It must have taken up a lot of time, but the number of people that attended show that it was worth doing.
 
The last reunion that I came to was in 2008 and I do not know what has happened to the time.  This year there were people from my year that I had not seen or spoken to for over 45 years.  It was nice to see so many faces. 
 
Many of us had the same memories of Trinity and it seemed that some of us now regret, just a little bit, how we treated some of the staff.
 
Poor old Ned Bennett was talked about.  There was mention of his time in a POW camp and how he once told our class that a prisoner had a little monkey as a pet.  A Japanese officer cut it in half with his sword.  
 
In one lesson a cannon, which had been used in a school play, was pulled across the classroom behind him.
 
Rick Campbell said that he came 2nd in Latin and Ned said "If I had a penny, I'd give it to you boy."
 
Ricky Summers described being caned by Gunner for not wearing his school cap.  It was his third warning.  He said that there was a lot of eye balling, bending of cane for effect and show before the actual caning. 
 
PE came up and we joked about Health and Safety.  Today would a school let a whole year group leave, cross main roads and 'run' around unsupervised?
 
As I listened I actually wonder now how many used to run the full distance.  It seemed that most of us either walked a bit, went into someone's house for a cup of tea, played football or went on the swings. Peter Verity said that he mistimed his run one day and came in second, I think.  He set off back to school too early!!
 
We used to take money and buy sweets.  One day one lad, who was very over weight, bought a bag of apples.  Peter got one and I got thumped on the nose when I demanded one.
 
Rick Campbell said that he always got paired with this same lad for boxing.  While he was very slow, if he actually made contact, his punch he would send Rick across the gym.
 
Someone mentioned the backward relay, which really upset Gary Grimshaw. As the whistle went, one lad set off in reverse.
 
What did shock me was being told about lads from my class who had died or been seriously ill.  You just assume everyone is around and healthy.
 
David Baker joined us for about an hour and reminisced.  Peter Verity reminded him of a trip to a concert in Birmingham.  They wanted to get to the Town Hall and were lost.  When David got out of his car to ask for directions, he was informed that a) there was no Town Hall and b) he was not in Birmingham.  He was actually in Coventry.
 
David then told us that he took a trip to another event and went on the wrong day.  All the doors were locked and he only found out when he looked at the date on the tickets. Then he went to London and got out in the Edgware Road to ask for directions to London.
 
He mentioned the staffroom and said that you could hardly see across it for all of the cigarette smoke.
 
Graham Harding said that, although he was not made a prefect, he was put in charge of the record player that was used in assembly.  It was his job to make sure that there would be no repeat of the Goodbye incident. 
 
Someone mentioned the venue for the reunion and wondered if there was somewhere better.  Looking at the site, I see this was raised by others too.
 Thanks again Peter and Ian and hopefully, there will another reunion in 2015.

Bill Rich