King Henry VIII Grammar School

My recollection is: there were free places, no idea how many, but a mate of mine was a free place. There were one or two governors' scholarships, but like gold bullion, very rare and for the swats, one of whom I know had private paid-for coaching as his parents were well off. I don't recall ever doing the 11 plus - it was the entrance exam for KHVIII. I always associated the 11 plus with state schools. Fee payers - that was me that was. My dad had to stump up £30 odd or more every term, a huge sum in those days. And all because I told the truth in the exam. There was a passage about James Brindley, followed by a load of silly questions, one of which was "do you think..." I'd never heard of the bloke, knew nothing about the history of the canals, or history for that matter, so truthfully said I thought he had never existed and that the passage was a work of fiction. Well, some of the stuff was hard to believe. My answer obviously didn't impress the examiner. The class system manifested itself early on, and so did the unfairness of it all, e.g. being an only child, my parents never got one penny of family allowance, whereas the rich family down the road (the boy who was coached and got a governors') copped for a stack of family allowance they didn't need. His mother used to brag that she felt guilty, letting it build up for months then collecting a tidy sum in one go. Kept it all to herself, she did. After I left KHVIII, they changed the law so that even families with one child got family allowance. Too late for our family. Politicians... huh. The irony is that after the fuzzers, I was promoted to the A/alpha stream, so ended up two grades above my free place mate. But my dad still had to pay the fees. I often wonder if I'd have fared better at comprehensive school, as many of my friends/colleagues have done.

I doubt you missed much Kaga.

A question I often ask myself, Slim. But we can't change what was, can we?

Slim. You said, "James Brindley... never heard of the bloke". Well, he was the only bloke in Coventry that became famous and had a statue because he got sacked!

I agree as well. My intake was 1955 and myself and everyone I knew was 11-plus although there were a few fee payers.

I've not been on here for a while and most of the comments now are after my time (1955-1961). I am responding to post #1310 etc about Tramp Edwards. I thought he was a brilliant maths teacher who made the subject interesting and enjoyable. Our homework once was to determine the number of L's in "parallel"!!! Well he got me top grades in both O and A levels so maybe I'm biased. The new maths stuff like matrices and boolean algebra were maybe not in the syllabus but became useful later for technical bods when computing started to take off. I don't think the above was ever true but it still makes me laugh.

I joined in 1967 via the 11+. It was my understanding that KHVIII had something like 90 LEA (free) places whereas Bablake had about 60. This is born out by the fact that I placed Bablake as my first choice and KHVIII second. As the 11+ tests placed pupils in rank order it's my understanding that I was placed outside the top 120 but inside the next 30 boys so got a place at KHVIII. Both schools awarded about 5 governors scholarships, so the remaining intake numbers would be fee payers. Unfortunately I had sat the entrance exam for Bablake so had to sit the exam for KHVIII at a later date. Somehow I managed to mess up the exam and unfortunately started in 2D. This motivated me to work hard and I secured annual promotions to 3C, 4B and LVSc in successive years!

Apologies for an error in my last post. I should have said I joined the school in 1960. 1967 was in fact the year I left. Senior moment I fear!

You've heard the quote: there are 10 types of people: those who understand binary, and those who don't.

Amazing how the human brain works. I have just had a flashback. Fred Perry's Traveller number plate was NUE 5F. At the time, UE meant Warwickshire (Dudley after 1974).

IIRC, Fred lived at Napton? 'F' reg would be 67/8

He certainly did. Windmill Cottage, Napton on the Hill to be precise.

To return to the topic of teachers' cars, I am astonished that no one has mentioned the two most prominent cars of my time - Wog Kolisch's red Volkswagen beetle (the same colour as the Oxo tin in which he kept his chalk) and Pope Harris's Ford Popular with the lollipop direction indicators.

Hello Classicist Dr Kolisch's red Beetle - was that before or after his red Skoda? I only remember his Skoda. Pope Harris never taught me; he was only there in my last year or two. I seem to recall a black car...? Lollipop indicators... do you mean trafficators, the ones that popped out from the side of the car?

I remember Dr K's Skoda, didn't remember it being red though. Pope had a Triumph Herald IIRC? I seem to remember an incident with him 'chasing' pupils around the playground in it.