october 2013 - Canford School

OC
magazine
OCTOBER 2013
BEN VESSEY
AN INTERVIEW WITH THE NEW HEADMASTER
CHURCH AND CHAPEL
CANFORD MAGNA’S PARISH CHURCH
FIRST NOVEL
AN OC’S LITERARY BREAKTHROUGH
OC
magazine
THE OLD CANFORDIAN SOCIETY
President
Magazine Editor
Robin Wright (SH69)
3 Watersmeet Road, Harnham, Salisbury, Wiltshire SP2 8JH
tel: 01722 321146 email: presidentoc@live.co.uk
John Newth
18 Morden Road, Wareham, Dorset BH20 7AA
email: ocmag@canford.com
Honorary Secretary
Simon de Halpert (F64)
Nutbourne Lodge, Main Road, Nutbourne, nr Chichester, West Sussex PO18 8RR
tel: 01243 572289 or 07931 579095 email: simonandkay@dehalpert.com
Honorary Treasurer
Colin Chalkly-Maber (S73)
28 Sandringham Road, Lower Parkstone, Poole, Dorset BH14 8TH
email: chalkly-maber@gmx.com
UK & Overseas
Representatives’ Co-ordinator
Committee
Mike Lerwill (SH62)
Elm Tree Cottage, Woolston, North Cadbury, Yeovil, Somerset BA22 7BJ
tel: 01963 440478 email: mike@thelerwills.net
Colin Patrick DL (F52), Barry Coupe (F70), Steve Ives (S78), Sheila Way (B86), Rachel Holland
(née Thwaites W88), Matt Keats (S89), Jonathan Gollings (W00), Matthew Coupe (F00), Mark Burley
UK OCS REPRESENTATIVES
Somerset & Bath
Cornwall
Vaughan Ives (S76)
Orchard House, East Compton,
Shepton Mallet, Somerset BA4 4NR
tel: 01749 345566 email: revives@hotmail.com
The North
Nigel Milliner (W62) Carveth House, Tregony, Truro
Cornwall TR2 5SE
tel: 01872 530250 email: legincarveth@gmail.com Wales
Mike Blunt (C55)
Birdforth, Mowthorpe Lane,
Terrington, York, N. Yorks YO60 6PZ
tel: 01653 648295 email: mikeblunt@btinternet.com
Johnathan Beagley (B59)
Pantgwyn, Hundred House,
Builth Wells, Powys LD2 3TE
tel: 01982 570476 email: johnathan.beagley@talk21.com
4
october 2013
contents
16
Features
4
16
21
25
An interview with Ben Vessey
Publishing a first novel
John Lever on having his portrait painted
Church and chapel
OCS information and reports
10
Reunions and events
11
Dates for your diary
32
Careers symposium 2013
33Memorabilia
34Sport
39
Overseas representatives
21
Regular items
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28
Whatever happened to…?
You write
From the Archive
School news
News from the Canford Campaign
Requiescant in pace
Frank Ahern has as usual been an indispensable support, not
only correcting my errors but making a valuable contribution
to shaping the content of this issue. JN
25
32
3
The new Head
a school’s cachet, but I did want somewhere that had
solid foundations and the resources with which to
build on those foundations. And because leading a
boarding school (and I wanted boarding to be part
of it) is an all-encompassing job for the Head and his
family, I also wanted a place where it felt right for us
to make the school a way of life and our home.
OCM: Like many Heads these days, you had some
commercial experience before going into teaching. Is this
an advantage and if so, in what ways?
BV: Probably not in terms of precise technical skills,
and it was some time ago. But that experience does
give you a perspective on the outside world and
it helps with clarity of vision and decision-making.
I think my MBA with an emphasis on educational
management, which I started when I was at Millfield,
is more relevant: it was a very dynamic and practical
course.
OCM: What do you regard as the best moment or
greatest achievement of your teaching career to date?
BV: Actually there are lots of moments, because
education is an evolutionary process and the true
satisfaction comes from watching the students and
how they develop over time. So although it’s a copout, I’m not going to choose one particular moment
or one specific achievement.
In the Library at Canford
The new Head
By the time this magazine appears, Ben Vessey will have been in the Head’s chair at
Canford for some weeks. Before the end of the summer term, the OC Magazine
went to talk to him at Christ’s Hospital, where he was Senior Deputy Head.
OC Magazine: What will be going through your mind as
you get up to address your first whole-school assembly at
Canford?
Ben Vessey: I’ll be hoping I can remember the details
of what I plan to say! Less flippantly, you only get one
chance to make a first impression, and it will be a
question of getting across two or three key points. I
will be particularly keen to establish what I think of
as the three Rs. First, to re-affirm that Canford is in a
great place, with a deserved reputation as a down-toearth yet vibrant school, and I’m not about to disrupt
that. Second, to re-assure people that what they know
and love and are part of is in safe hands. But third, if
you want to stay at the top of the curve and to keep
moving up, you have to review things, which is what I
shall be doing in due course.
OCM: What guiding principles should someone taking
over at the top of an organisation like Canford follow for
their first few weeks and months?
BV: If things are obviously wrong, one has a much
4
more directed task. Where things are in good shape,
as at Canford, it’s a matter of evolution rather
than revolution. Everyone has their own way of
doing things, and I want to clarify and refine the
ways decisions are taken at senior leadership and
management level, for example, but it should be a
‘stop, look and listen’ approach. It is important to get
out and meet everyone involved. Lots of people –
staff, pupils, parents, governors, OCs, other members
of the Canford community – know the school much
better than I do, and I want to get a feel for what they
think before crystallising my ideas.
OCM: As Deputy Head of a major public school for four
years, you no doubt saw a Headship as your next career
step, but what made you look at Canford in particular?
BV: I knew it a little from when I taught at Millfield, and
on the circuit people looked forward to going there
because it was such a warm and welcoming place.
When I was looking for a Headship, I didn’t apply for
anything and everything; I wasn’t too worried about
OCM: What is your greatest regret in your teaching
career to date?
BV: I genuinely and truly don’t have one. Obviously
you respond to situations and sometimes think
afterwards, ‘I could have done that better’, but I
wouldn’t call those regrets because everything in life
you learn from.
OCM: What do you see as the ideal role for the Old
Canfordian Society?
BV: Like any institution, the School is the sum of its
parts and I see every OC as an extremely valuable
source of experience and knowledge. OCs have
gathered insights that can be incredibly useful to
students, and form a resource that needs to be
appealed to and welcomed on an ongoing basis;
‘development’ is not about tapping people up for
money, although when such generosity is shown it
is hugely appreciated. The Society is a platform for
engaging OCs with the school on many levels so
they can understand and get involved with what it is
achieving now and hopes to achieve in the future. I’m
looking forward to exploring the possibilities with the
Old Canfordian Society in due course.
OCM: You are an old boy of Magdalen College School,
whose former pupils are known as Old Waynfletes. Are
you an active Old Waynflete?
BV: In the light of what I just said, there’s a
contradiction. For reasons I needn’t go into, I don’t
remember my time at MCS with great fondness,
although it’s a very different school now. So no, I’m
not an active Old Waynflete, but perhaps it’s time for
me to re-engage with MCS. At least my reticence to
date helps me to understand why some former pupils
don’t want to have much to do with their old school.
OCM: Discipline at Canford is more relaxed and less
formal than it was when many OCs were at the school.
How do you decide where the boundaries are to be
drawn and how do you ensure that they are observed?
BV: There has to be a disciplinary system based on
fundamental principles that are as true now as they
were in the past: respect, tolerance, recognition that
at times individual desires must be put to one side in
the interests of the community. Once you’ve got that
fundamental ethos, you can grow your disciplinary
structures from there. Part of the process is for
the student to recognise that the boundaries set
by the school – even in practical things like dress
and punctuality – reflect those in the outside world,
or are intended to help them make that world a
better place to live in. And the staff have to work
to those boundaries as well. At Christ’s Hospital we
have put in place a very successful system called
Positive Behaviour Management, which isn’t just
about detentions or other punishments. It is about
the staff clearly addressing a misdemeanour, but also
about the student reflecting on why it happened
and on its wider consequences. Of course, I can only
speak from my own experience. I know what works
at Christ’s Hospital, but as part of the looking and
listening process I have already mentioned, I need to
get a clear insight into what the current boundaries
and expectations are at Canford and how they are
administered.
Art is one of the ‘cocurricular’ activities that
the new Head regards as
of crucial importance
OCM: What was the most difficult situation you have faced
in your teaching career, and how did you deal with it?
BV: It would be inappropriate to talk about any one
incident in detail, but I have been nose to nose with
a drunken parent screaming in my face while his child
stood beside him. I have had parents asking me to tell
their child that they are divorcing. Those were perhaps
untypical, but every Head or Deputy Head has
difficult conversations quite often. All you can do is try
to listen and to understand, but there are occasions
5
The new Head
Whatever happened to…?
Above: Ben Vessey with
his father and a family
dog on Ringstead Beach
Above right: With middle son
George at Worcestershire
CCC’s home ground at
New Road, Worcester
when the right decision is a hard one and the one
that the other person does not necessarily want to
hear. Few things are more difficult than a decision to
exclude a student permanently, because you wonder if
you could have done more; even when you know that
the time has come for a line to be drawn in the sand,
that thought stays with you.
OCM: How do you deal with parents who increasingly
see themselves as ‘customers’ and expect the school to
dance to their individual tune?
BV: I heard an engaging analogy the other day: it is as
if the school were saying to the parent, ‘Your child is
like your Ferrari. You’re trusting my ability, training and
experience to drive it. While you’ve got to have input
into how I drive it, if you actually impede me while
I’m doing so, there’ll be a crash, which is in no-one’s
interest.’ From the start, you emphasise to parents that
your relationship with them must be built on mutual
respect and trust. A good school will do all it can for a
child, but it will also have parameters and expectations
which it must communicate to parents as well as the
pupils clearly, sensitively and regularly. If it gets to the
point where a parent nevertheless decides that what
the school is doing is not what they want, it may be
necessary to say, ‘This is what we are, this is what we
do, and if you can’t engage with it, maybe we should
consider whether our partnership is the right one.’
On a practical level, your policies, processes and
communication must be spot-on.
OCM: How do you guard against the danger of a
slippage in academic standards in a school like Canford,
where there are so many extra-curricular activities?
BV: Those activities are not extra-curricular, they’re
co-curricular because, with the academic and the
pastoral, they form one of the three key educational
pillars of an excellent school. You can’t deal with any
one of the three in isolation because they are all vital
to a student’s development and they all interact with
each other. For example, although the academic side
is of course crucial, co-curricular activities develop
6
skills and experiences that have a beneficial effect
on academic performance. Having said that, careful
monitoring is needed to ensure that a student is
striking the right balance between his or her different
activities.
OCM: What are the factors that will carry most weight
when you are deciding whether to send your own sons to
Canford?
BV: What suits each one as an individual – that is the
only consideration. Ned, who is 13, has enjoyed his
contacts with the school, and I was pleased when
John Lever said to me, ‘I think Ned will suit Canford
and Canford will suit Ned’; he starts at the school in
September at the same time as I do. As for George,
who is 9, and William (6), we’ll decide what is right for
each of them when the time comes.
OCM: Should Canford prepare its pupils for the world as
the school would like it to be, or for the world as it is?
BV: I don’t see a conflict between the two concepts.
As a historian I’m very aware of the difference
between ideology and reality, and the aim is a blend
of the two. So students should leave with an acute
awareness of the realities of the world in which they
are going to live, but also with a desire to help shape
what that world is going to become, according to the
principles that have been instilled in them during their
upbringing and education.
OCM: Finally, what three adjectives do you hope will best
describe the young people who become OCs during your
Headship?
BV: I am not fond of stereotypes, and I would balk at
putting three adjectives on the typical OC, because
that smacks of something that is almost a production
line. It’s back to the question of individuality, and the
analogy I prefer is that Canford is a dictionary from
which the right adjectives – hopefully positive and
constructive ones – can be drawn for each individual
Canfordian as he or she moves on to become an
OC.
Colin Narbeth (F45): After school I became a
reporter, then joined the Royal Navy for seven years.
Because I could do shorthand I was transferred from
being an Able Seaman gunner to a new branch –
stenographer. In those days Wrens were not allowed
to go to sea or cover buggery and sodomy cases,
so I became an expert! I spent 3½ years in HMS
Illustrious, which was a trials and training aircraft
carrier, so attended many Boards of Inquiry following
crashes. When I left the Navy I rejoined the East
Essex Gazette at Clacton, became chief reporter and
then went to Link House, Croydon, and launched a
full-colour tabloid newspaper, Stamp Weekly. Then I
went to Stanley Gibbons, stamp dealers, and became
a director. After that I opened my own business,
which still goes on under my son and daughter: Colin
Narbeth and Son Ltd in Cecil Court, London. I’m
chairman, which means they kicked me upstairs out of
the way! We deal in banknotes and paper money for
collectors.
I have written a number of books and founded
the International Bank Note Society in 1961. I am a
Fellow of the Royal Philatelic Society and am still an
addicted collector. Of the Buddhist persuasion, I have
supported Tibetan children for over 30 years now and
I support the Gurkhas. I also collect bonsai and cacti. I
just don’t have time to die!
Peter Stevens (C51): After Cambridge and National
Service as a gunner officer at a guided missile trials
establishment in Anglesey, I became a solicitor and
took over my father’s practice in Plymouth, where I
was senior partner for twenty years until merger with
a larger practice. I retired in 2001 and continue to
live on the edge of Dartmoor enjoying gardening and
choral singing (which includes running a touring choir,
just back from Italy).
I have had great pleasure from watching two
godsons go through Canford, Simon Laslett (F81)
and Tom Walmsley (B90). What a transformation
their school experience was from my experience of
a harsh and culturally impoverished Canford of the
immediate post-war era! I was a choral scholar at that
time, and we felt the lack of arts facilities generally.
Mercifully, life was brightened by the arrival of a young
Robin Noscoe in his ancient Rolls Royce to court
the dazzlingly pretty matron at Court House, which
led to two happy dynasties, both of progeny and
the arts. Apart from Robin, Michael Rathbone was
undoubtedly the most iconic teacher I encountered,
and I owe him a great deal for his wisdom and
enthusiasms. What a pleasure that his son is now such
a contributor to Canford life.
Jeremy Friend (B53): In 1964 I started Grumbles
restaurant in Pimlico and then Daisy, Nose Wine Bar
and the Alibi Club, all in Kings Road, Chelsea. Only
Grumbles survives and has its fiftieth birthday next
year. Starting a restaurant in the ’60s was all great fun,
and it was long before one had to start thinking of
such things as bottom lines. I have been spending a lot
of time in Thailand, which is a country one never visits
once. In London, my favourite haunt is the Chelsea
Arts Club, where I have been a member for forty
years and now my young daughter, Daniella, is hoping
to become a member. The only OCs I occasionally
see are Rory Macleod (B51), Peter Hampson (C51)
and Edward Nelson (B52) and of course my brother,
Rod Friend (B57), who lives in Spain.
David Reeks (W53): On return from National
Service with the Royal Engineers, I joined UK Atomic
Energy Authority, designing, installing and operating
in-reactor experimental rigs. When the nuclear power
station at Hunterston B near Glasgow was under
construction, I joined the South of Scotland Electricity
Board and was responsible for plant and fuel
performance on the station. I then went to Scottish
Nuclear during construction of Torness nuclear power
station near Dunbar and was again responsible for
plant and fuel safety and performance, together with
analysis of fluid flow and heat transfer problems at
both Hunterston and Torness until retirement in 1994.
I served in the TA for 28 years, retiring as a major.
In 1989 I was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant of
Lanarkshire and, in 2001, Vice-Lord Lieutenant until
retirement in 2010. In 1994 I joined Edinburgh
Direct Aid as a volunteer convoy leader and started
by taking convoys of aid during the war to the
devastated areas of Bosnia Herzegovina and Croatia.
Since then, I have continued to take aid to Bosnia
Herzegovina as well as Albania, Kosovo and Palestine.
In my spare time I conduct groups on rail holidays
around the world. Perhaps I will have to really retire
some time – but not yet!
Jeremy Brown (S55) went from Canford into the
RAF. He spent his RAF career as a pilot in the air
defence role with a few inevitable ground tours,
the last of which was as Air Attaché in the British
Embassy, Brasilia. His three years there included the
Falklands War. He left the service for a second career
Emma Hattersley, the
new Head of Godolphin
School (see page 8)
7
Whatever happened to...?
Whatever happened to...?
pong balls would it take to fill your school hall?’ At
home I’m enjoying accompanying daughter Anastasia
on the violin – and starting to dread next year’s 40th
birthday!
Lee Chapman (F95) is now a partner at JA Kemp.
His work focuses on biotechnology patents. He is
currently living in Oxford and splits his week between
Oxford and London.
Al Craig (SH95) is based in London, working at law
firm Baker & McKenzie and managing Unilever’s trade
mark portfolio.
Above: OCs unmasked –
Martin Staniforth (right) with
Neil and Carolyn Lindsay
after their fortuitous meeting
Above right: Barney
Maunder-Taylor, in character
as Barney Bay, with some
of the props he uses in
his maths presentations
to primary schools
in industry in1984 and for the next decade he found
himself again frequently visiting countries in South
America. He started researching and writing a book,
which is essentially a South American perspective
on the Falklands War, in 2006. A South American War
– Behind the Scenes in the Fight for the Falklands has
recently been published by Book Guild, Brighton.
Bobby Franklin (SH57) worked in the food industry,
primarily for Cadbury Schweppes and, for 21 years,
for Marks & Spencer. His speciality was packaging, a
field in which he was responsible for several significant
innovations. In retirement he has taken up painting,
and he is currently recovering from open-heart
surgery.
Tony Jewell (F68) read Natural Sciences at Christ’s,
Cambridge, and qualified as a doctor at the London
Hospital Medical College. He joined the first GP
Vocational Training Scheme in East London and was a
GP in Tower Hamlets for ten years. He developed an
interest in Chinese medicine, co-wrote a book on the
subject and practised acupuncture as part of his work
as a GP. Having acquired a postgraduate qualification
in public health, he became a consultant and was
Director of Public Health in several district health
authorities in East Anglia. In 2006 he was appointed
Chief Medical Officer for Wales, working for the
recently devolved Welsh Government. He helped
to manage the pandemic flu epidemic in 2009 and
retired last year.
Robert Upshall (S70): After graduating from UCH
Medical School, I was for 30 years a GP in Darlington,
County Durham. Apart from Darlington, where we
spend most of the year, and St Petersburg, Florida,
where we overwinter, my wife and I have visited
China, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Singapore,
8
Madeira, Morocco, Italy and Greece since I retired. We
intend to go on travelling, with an Alaskan cruise and
a trip to Hawaii coming up very shortly and a visit to
Russia next year.
Emma Hattersley (née Lovell W78) has recently been
appointed Head of Godolphin School in Salisbury
and takes up the position in January. She is currently
a Deputy Head at Sherborne Girls. Emma taught at
Canford from 1988 to 2009 and was housemistress
of Wimborne 2003-06 and Marriotts 2006-09. She
was also a valuable member of the OC Society
Committee, particularly in her role as a link between
the OCs and the school.
Rural Devon is renowned for its artistic and culinary
delights and there are many epicurean-related
events peppering the county. And that is how Martin
Staniforth (F84) bumped into Neil Lindsay (SH77)
and Carolyn Lindsay (née Lagnado SH77) at a ‘popup’ cooking event in East Devon. They had flown over
from Brazil and Neil led a workshop on the art of
sour-dough bread-making. On discovering the Canford
connection coincidence, Carolyn introduced some
of the spirit of the Brazilian carnival season with the
most beautifully created traditional headgear.
Still living in Stockholm, Jeremy Carpenter (C85) has
just made his Royal Opera House Covent Garden
debut, to critical acclaim, as Sir Robert Cecil in Richard
Jones’s new production of Britten’s Gloriana.
Barney Maunder-Taylor (S92): I enjoyed collecting
my MA in maths from Oxford University earlier in
the year. I’m currently concentrating on performing
a series of maths shows for primary schools (Barney
Bay’s House of Maths), including topics from ‘How
Archimedes invented the football’ to ‘How many ping-
Bill Packman (W96): I have lived in China since 2009
and am the Marketing Director for the Shenzhen
Furniture Association. In March I sent a generic,
spam-y email to foreigners who were working in the
Chinese furniture market. A few hours later, a reply
came through with the subject ‘Canford’. Matt Cole
(C95), once a year above me at Canford, was writing
to tell me that he was running a contemporary
furniture company selling internationally and to the
Chinese, and was interested in connecting for some
mutual benefit. My reply was that the next time he
was in Shenzhen we should have a beer, to which he
replied that he, his wife, Serena, and their new son,
William, had moved from the UK to Shenzhen barely
three days earlier. Matt and I are now collaborating on
a number of interesting projects out here and along
with my wife, Anna, our two families are regularly to
be found eating, drinking, sharing stories and generally
enjoying sunny South China.
Jane Batch reports that her daughter, Juliette Batch
(Ma97), is a housemistress at Kingswood School, Bath,
and plays hockey for Bath Ladies. Another daughter,
Jo Batch (B99), plays for Taw Valley Ladies; both the
Batch teams topped their respective leagues last
season. Jane’s father was Frank ‘Hoppy’ Hopkinson,
who was housemaster of School House and master
in charge of hockey for many years. She herself
taught English at Canford and was housemistress of
Marriotts from 1997 to 2003.
returned from operations in Afghanistan in April this
year and were the last primary Royal Marines unit to
deploy to that conflict. Some of the Royal Marines
training may be glamorous and involve stuff that
looks good on camera, but most of it is not like that.
The physical demands are unique, but the transition
is unbelievable and the end goal absolutely worth
staying for.
Newly passed-out Marine
Keene with Colonel K Oliver,
Deputy Brigade Commander,
3 Commando Brigade
Hesper Stratford (S07) has graduated from the Royal
Conservatoire of Scotland with a BA in acting. In her
final year she worked on several productions, both
in Scotland and London, including taking the role of
Cecily in The Importance of Being Earnest, of which
the Scottish Herald wrote in review, ‘A beguiling young
Cecily was played captivatingly by Hesper Stratford’.
She also took the role of Belle in the critically
acclaimed production of the pantomime Beauty and
the Beast.
Tom Montgomery (S98) married Alexandra Arikoglu
on 29th June this year. Andrew Morton (SH68)
conducted the service. Nick Hornby (M97) was an
usher, in which role he was going to be joined by
Nicholas Phillips (SH02), who however could not
attend for the best of reasons: his wife, Cara, had their
first child, Poppy Phillips, on the very day.
Brice Stratford (S05) is living in London and is
pursuing a career in theatre and film. He has acted in
and produced several productions, including Measure
for Measure at the Rose Theatre, London. He recently
won an Off West End Award for his role in Ondine.
Hamish Keene (L06): After Bath University, I recently
passed out of the Commando Training Centre at
Lympstone, Devon. I will now go to 40 Commando
Royal Marines based at Taunton. 40 Commando
Hesper Stratford in
Beauty and the Beast
9
Reunions and events
reunions AND EVENTS
Robin Wright, on behalf of all OCs, to bid farewell
officially to John and Alisoun after 21 years of service
to Canford and the Old Canfordian Society. John
was finally presented with his OC tie (amongst other
things). The evening finished with the cutting of a
specially made 90th birthday cake.
Dates for your diary
90th Bir thday Dinner
John o’Gaunts dressed up beautifully for Canford’s
90th Birthday Dinner, held on Sunday 26th May. The
black-tie affair began with drinks in Long Gallery.
Attendees included former Headmaster Martin
Marriott and his wife, Judith, OC President Robin
Wright (SH69), and distinguished and decorated OCs
from many decades including Michael Medwin OBE
(W41), David Lazenby CBE (B55), Adrian Scott DL
10
(B56) and Colin Patrick DL (F52). Present and past
Canford governors also came, including Sir Roger Palin
(SH57), Sir Jeremy de Halpert (F65) and Barry Coupe
(F70). The longest distance travelled by an OC for the
occasion was approximately 4500 miles from Muscat,
Oman, by Munir Makki (F71).
Retiring Headmaster John Lever was also in
attendance, and the dinner was a fitting time for
Thursday 17th October
Law Networking Reception
Wednesday 23rd October
OC Art Exhibition: ‘looking forward to
looking back’ (parents’ viewing)
Sunday 3rd November
Canford School Society (CSS)
Quiz Night, Assembly Hall
Sunday 10th November
Remembrance Sunday*
Wednesday 4th-Saturday 7th December
School Musical: The Hired Man,
Layard Theatre
Thursday 5th December
Shell Music Scholars: ‘Sounds of
Canford’, Music School
Thursday 12th December
Carol Service, Wimborne Minster
Sunday 15th December
CSS Noël Noël Concert, Great Hall
Sunday 9th February
Donors’ Reception, Poole Lighthouse
(by invitation only)
Sunday 9th February
Music Concert, Poole Lighthouse
Friday 14th February
CSS Spring Lunch, John o’Gaunts
Sunday 18th March
OC Sports Day & Stroll in the Park, Canford
Thursday 11th July
OC Shooting: Public Schools Veterans
match, Bisley Ranges, Surrey
* For the first time we invite all interested OCs to
join the current school and parents for part of the
Remembrance Services on Sunday 10th November.
The outdoor part of the ceremony will begin at
approximately 11.15 am around the Sunken Lawn
at Canford, and will be followed by coffee in John
o’Gaunts for all participating OCs. Space is tight and we
must know numbers for this event, so please contact
the Development Office (development@canford.
com / 01202 847471) if you would like to come.
11
Reunions and events
Reunions and events
Spain
The delayed October fiesta for OCs living in Spain,
transformed into a spring celebration, was held in a
restaurant in the Jalon Valley in Alicante Province. The
valley has been a rich source of fruit, cereals, almonds
and wine since Roman times.
Four OCs and their wives made up the party:
Jim Appleyard (W54) and Liz, Mike Clunes (M57)
and Chris, John Rowe (W57) and Mary, and Peter
Chapman (W63) and Tricia. All enjoyed the company,
the food and the wine, and tales of the ’50s were
many. Travellers’ stories were rife, too, as some of
those present winter in the southern hemisphere,
albeit oceans apart.
The years have been kind and all were hale and
hearty and looking forward to a repeat, perhaps in
the autumn.
Henley Royal Regatta
For the second year, OCs, parents and friends of
Canford rowing gathered on the Wednesday evening
of Henley Royal Regatta for bubbly and canapés.
The venue was the Canford Crocodiles marquee
pitched at the Henley Cricket Club, and the
occasion was to celebrate another year of Canford
qualifying for the Princess Elizabeth Cup at the
regatta.
The boys’ 1st VIII had earlier raced Monmouth
School, losing by 1½ lengths in one of the closer races
of the day. However, they were all in good spirits and
their presence was bolstered by the appearance of
most of the 2012 and 2011 First VIIIs, as well as many
older OCs and parents. It was good to see Canford
representation in other crews racing at Henley,
including Kathryn Hanna (B11), coxing in the Thames
Challenge Cup, and James Parris (C98) coaching
Thames Rowing Club.
We hope to repeat the Henley Drinks Party
annually in conjunction with the Canford Crocodiles,
so please do let the Development Office know if you
are a former rower and would like to come!
Were you at Canford School between 1955 and 1990?
O.C. Photos
canford school photos 1955 - 1990
w w w. o c - p h o t o s . c o m
log on to browse by year and order online
London Drinks Par ty
The 2013 London Drinks Party made a welcome
return to the Terrace Pavilion at the Houses of
Parliament. Kindly hosted by Annette Brooke MP, over
100 OCs and guests attended to celebrate Canford’s
90th birthday and catch up with fellow-OCs. The
weather didn’t co-operate as it did on our previous
visit in 2011, but the spirits of guests were good
nonetheless.
12
In attendance were several Honorary OCs, all longserving members of Canford staff retiring at the end
of the academic year, including Chaplain Chris Jervis,
David Dodwell and Headmaster John Lever. The final
venue and date of the 2014 London Drinks Party is
still to be confirmed, but will be circulated widely as
soon as it is finalised.
• Have you kept your old
photos?
• Visit our digitised archives
to see house, sports &
leavers photos
• Order online, delivery
within 4 days
• Discount prices for OCs
and their families
www.oc-photos.com
We have scanned from the original negatives and can produce very high
resolution reproductions in 3 different sizes. On the website you will see a
low resolution version of each picture with the magnifying glass; do not be
alarmed as the final print quality will be far superior.
Ideal for birthdays, anniversaries and Christmas presents!
13
You write
Fear
The article entitled ‘Fear’ by Michael Wainwright in
the April issue was incredibly sad. Although there
were Blue Papers and the like, I found life to be a
helter-skelter of activities, with lessons interrupting
everything. I was certainly no scholar, but I enjoyed
the sport, even though I was not a top-ranker, and the
CCF was a most useful experience.
Mike Frewer was a wily housemaster. He always
listened to his charges – not always agreeing with
them – and he managed to respect the seniors,
eliciting responsibility and mutual respect. That must
have used up great resources of courage on his
behalf! Every house contained the misdirected and
assertive type; that is certainly true out in the big
wide world, too, and it is interesting to see just where
those misdirected and assertive types have got to
today: not far, by and large.
No, my days were full of highs and lows, as were
those of most ‘inmates’, and I think most of us had a
pretty good time and carried something worthwhile
into a very large world.
Naturally one grows out of school, but I believe it
was an enormous help to me when I came to work
abroad, then with HM Forces and simultaneously as
an Anglican priest.
One small point: the article contained two
photographs showing me looking very studious. Who
says the camera never lies?!
Peter Crockett (W63)
The article by Michael Wainwright brought back
some vivid memories. I joined Canford after Rope
Hill School, where I was a boarder from the age
of 10. It seems that Michael had the same fear as I
did at Canford, but Rope Hill prepared me for that!
However, it was part of the way we did things in
those days, good or bad. Being 6000 miles from my
home in Kenya made my time at Canford pretty
tough, but I prefer to dwell on the good things,
including the care and empathy given to me by A D
Bovill, my housemaster, and his wife, not forgetting
Matron.
I have many happy memories of the way I was
treated by the teachers and staff and I enjoyed my
French lessons with Colonel Kilpatrick up in the
Tower. I also enjoyed the geography lessons from
Mr Hopkinson, and in the photo of ‘Hoppy’ in the
article, I am to be seen by the window, not paying
attention! I loved hockey and rowing, in fact all the
sports, and even had a turn at Royal tennis and fives.
Other memories included biology field trials on the
heath, shooting in the indoor range, the Grubber and
walking into Wimborne wearing a boater to buy ice
cream. So many happy memories, which far outweigh
the fear of the cane and the bullying.
In this photo above, which I took and entered into
the school photography competition, I can name six
of the seven: Graham Mumby, D Duff-Mitchell, Alan
S McKay, R Fitch, Jeffrey Blackburn, Roger Levy and
Barnaby J Lawrence. All in Beaufort, same dormitory
and in the same year.
John Glassford (B61)
Mike Frewer – ‘a wily
housemaster’
14
I felt that I was reading about Borstal or Auschwitz,
not about Canford. I loved my time there. The
hierarchy was strict and if we stepped out of line
we were punished and made to polish the wood
panelling in the corridor, but we were rarely beaten
by the head of house. Fagging was a part of junior life,
but it rarely involved punishment. Boxing was done
under proper supervision in the gymnasium. Michael
Wainwright would have done well to appreciate the
The Duke of Beaufort
presents prizes at Speech
Day in 1930, after opening
the Beaufort Building
enormous privilege of being a student at Canford.
I certainly did and loved it.
David Appleby (F54)
The Beaufort Building
There are a number of us of my vintage who were a
little saddened by the bottom photograph on page
25 of the April issue. It portrays ‘afternoon cricket
on Mountjoy with the splendid backdrop of the main
school and Monteacute’. The building referred to
as Monteacute is actually the Beaufort Building and
so it was named by the Duke of Beaufort on being
opened in the early 1930s.
For the benefit of youngsters, the Beaufort Building
housed Beaufort and some of Monteacute. Although
we had meals in the main building, the Beaufort
building was our home for five years, instilling in
us a feeling of independence from the rest of the
school. Whatever the disposition of houses today, the
Beaufort Building can only be the Beaufort Building,
or has it been renamed by a Duke of Monteacute?
Did the Duke of Beaufort mind? We former
Beaufortians mind a lot, or has our home been
airbrushed out of Canford’s history?
Stephen Weld (B58)
Mountjoy Medley
I read with interest the article in a fairly recent issue
about the Mountjoy Press, because I still have a copy
of Mountjoy Medley: a selection of Canford writings,
printed and published in June 1949. Then in the
October 2012 issue, Colin Akers (M50) reported
his first news for 62 years; by coincidence, Mountjoy
Medley includes a poem by Colin which begins: ‘When
I am old and can no longer take / A part in all the
pleasures I have known….’
I also have a copy of Mountjoy Medley no. 2,
The cover of the first
Mountjoy Medley
published in May 1952. By that time I was occupying
one of the School House lodges at the top of the
stairs adjacent to Gerald Brodribb’s room, where
the press was located in those days. Sadly, I see from
the foreword that most of this second issue was
duplicated, not printed on the press, because of the
many other printing jobs they had.
John Cucksey (SH52)
15
Out of the ruins
A panel at this year’s Hay
Festival, discussing war and
fiction. Left to right: Francesca
Rhydderch (author of The
Ricepaper Diaries), Alicia
Foster (author of Warpaint),
Jo Rossiter, and the event
chair, Lisa Dwan (actress).
New author
Joanna Rossiter
Out of the ruins
Joanna Rossiter (B04) has achieved the rare feat of having a novel accepted by
a major publisher. Here she explains the inspiration for The Sea Change.
My first book, The Sea Change, was published by
Penguin in May and interweaves the story of a
World War 2 ghost town with the aftermath of an
Indian tsunami. Why would I want to unite two such
seemingly disparate stories in the pages of a novel?
In 2011, a Canford parent who works in the armed
forces gave me the opportunity to watch the army
train on Salisbury Plain as part of their preparation
for combat in Afghanistan. I found myself travelling
with a handful of others and a military escort into
Imber village at five o’clock in the morning to watch
a dawn ambush. Having grown up nearby in Dorset,
I had heard the story of how Imber’s villagers had
been given a few weeks’ notice to evacuate their
homes before Christmas in 1943 to make way for
military training in the run-up to D-Day. As a novelist,
it intrigued me that this story was strangely absent
from both history books and fiction and remained
largely unknown outside Wiltshire. My grandfather
was posted as a colonel to Salisbury Plain after World
War 2 and lived in Bratton, one of the villages nearest
to Imber. I had often heard of how Imber’s villagers
had been given a verbal promise by the War Office
that they would be allowed back to their homes after
the war and yet, to their dismay, this promise was
never kept.
After the War, the villagers continued to hope for
16
a possible return. Some of the women even left cans
of tinned food in their larders, so convinced were
they that they would be coming back in six months. I
was fascinated by this sense of a community that had
been put on hold – a place that is still marked on the
map today and yet frozen in time, persevering against
nature and war games, hidden away in the base of an
unknown valley.
When I arrived in Imber to watch the training
exercise, the village seemed disconcertingly silent.
There was a thick mist in the valley and all I could
see was the tower of St Giles’s church reaching up
over the top of the fog. Gradually, as dawn broke,
more shapes emerged: old farmhouses with glassless
windows and ruined walls; the Bell Inn with its missing
sign; and the faded façade of Imber Court surrounded
by a barbed wire fence.
All of a sudden, after an hour of waiting, gunfire
began to sound from inside the ruined cottages and
flares bled into the fog. In the space of a few seconds,
the silence was transformed into a cacophony of rifle
fire and thunderflashes. As I watched a soldier fire
a gun from the window of the old school house, I
found my thoughts returning to the absent villagers; I
wondered how they would feel if they could see what
I was seeing – whether they would say that their quiet
sacrifice was worthwhile.
In 1943, the evacuation was reported in the
national newspapers but the name of the village
was kept anonymous. It is perhaps because of this
anonymity that the act of remembrance took on a
new resonance for residents after the war. Each year,
when the army permitted them, they would make
excursions back to the village for a Remembrance
Day service and a picnic on the Plain with other
ex-inhabitants. It was a very quiet sacrifice, one that
the villagers themselves had to keep alive. Part of the
appeal of the story for me as a writer is its reticence
– a small act of selflessness set against the backdrop
of a very well-worn piece of history; I wanted to bring
to life a place and a community that I felt should not
be forgotten.
Yet the more I explored Imber, the more I was
struck by the impossibility of re-creating a place
whose past identity I could never directly experience
myself. It was this feeling of being an outsider to the
story that led me to my second narrative – an Indian
beach town hit by a tsunami. What started off as
an intention to juxtapose war and natural disaster
soon became an examination of my own motives
for wanting to represent an experience that was
not my own. Violet’s daughter, Alice, finds herself in
a place with which she is not familiar, embroiled in a
disaster which does not feel as if it belongs to her but
to the people who inhabit Kanyakumari. All around
her people have lost their homes and livelihoods,
while she was simply a traveller who happened to be
passing through.
The modern-day fascination with travel – in
particular the notion that travelling is a way of finding
yourself – has its origins in the 1970s Hippie Trail
that my character, Alice, embarks on. The Hippie
Trail was pioneered in the 1970s amongst young
twenty-somethings who used to drive in buses all
the way from Istanbul to India, following a route
through Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan that would be
almost impossible to retrace today. As I researched
the Hippie Trail, I became interested in contrasting
my character, Violet, who finds her identity in one
particular place, with her daughter, Alice, who defines
herself through being constantly on the move. The
attitudes of both mother and daughter come under
the microscope during the course of the novel; whilst
Violet’s pre-occupation with the past prevents her
from embracing the present, Alice’s rejection of the
past – in particular, her mother’s story – stops her
from truly coming to terms with who she is.
In 2010 I spent six months living in Tamil Nadu,
Southern India, and I visited some of the places that
were hit by the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami. I was taken
aback by the lasting mark that this one-off disaster
had left on the coastal communities and landscape
– the way in which the sea could obliterate in a
few seconds places which would then take years to
rebuild. A parallel emerged in my mind between the
immediacy of the ruins caused by a tsunami and the
slow erosion of Imber; the more I wrote, the more
these two settings came to embody aspects of Violet
and Alice’s characters.
This year, I returned to Imber for the annual
Remembrance Day service in the village church. As
I uttered the words ‘We will remember them’ with
the rest of the congregation, I realised that my novel
had caused me to form a deeper affinity to the village
than I ever could have imagined. Now that it has been
published, it is my hope that the book brings back to
life in the minds of readers a place that has never fully
been laid to rest.
(The Sea Change was part of this year’s Richard
and Judy Summer Book Club and can be found in
Waterstones, WH Smiths and your local independent
bookshop.)
Alternative covers: the
trade paperback (left) and
the one produced for the
Richard & Judy Summer
Book Club (right)
17
From the Archive
From the Archive
More curiosities from the school’s history, selected by
Archivist Frank Ahern
Canford Manor, by
Hugh Rudby
A view across the Beaufort
Lawn, by Robin Noscoe
Adding to the collection
Frank Ahern describes some the recent additions to the school archive
and encourages more donors to come forward
While it may not feel like Christmas Day every day
of the year, it does sometimes seem that it comes
along quite often: occasional donations to the archive
can bring both surprise and pleasure. Much of the
job of archivist is routine, collecting the term-to-term
items that chronicle the life of the school, but the
18
real fun comes when one receives an unexpected
piece of memorabilia or a previously unseen item for
the picture library.
Earlier in the year Ian Fiander (SH84) donated
to the archive a Robin Noscoe painting that had
belonged to his parents. His father, James, was also
an OC (SH50) and his grandparents were friends
of head groundsman Arthur Wren, but he is unsure
exactly how the painting came to his family. It
certainly offers a very striking view, with the ancient
Spanish chestnut in the centre and, on the right, the
famous Wellingtonia, which still towers above the
grounds and is visible from the Canford Bottom
roundabout. It is, unsurprisingly, a view that no longer
exists. The perspective is from between Gisborough
Hall (just visible on the right of the painting) and
the old Art Shack. Much of the open space in the
foreground now contains the theatre and the music
school. In due course it is possible that the Beaufort
Lawn (in the foreground to the right) will also be
built upon.
Another painting acquired by the archive is a
watercolour by Hugh Rudby (1855-1954), an artist
who specialised in painting well-known Dorset
scenes. It would appear to have been painted from
below the steps south of what is now the Staff
Common Room (formerly Salisbury House and
originally a stable block). Its date of composition is
unknown, so it is not clear whether it was painted
before the building of the stable block or whether
the grand tree in the left of the picture is mere
artistic licence. Whichever, it offers an attractive view
of the manor house.
The visual record of Canford invites the most
immediate response and constitutes a vital part
of the archive. While it is always good to receive
paintings, photographs are the life-blood, and there
have been some valuable donations in the last year.
Robert Benians (C47) presented an album that
offers a fascinating glimpse into the mid-1940s.
Some formal photographs indicate how depleted
Court House (Nash’s) had become in the war years.
Interestingly, successive annual photographs show
the steady growth of the house, due in no small part
to the Herculean efforts of Tom Nash himself to
keep the school open during the war. Informal shots
show various parts of the grounds, and one grainy
photograph reveals the interior of a Nissen hut that
stood by Court House when an American army unit
was stationed at Canford in the build-up to D-Day
in 1944. Benians recalls that contact between the
troops and pupils was forbidden, but that the lure of
illicit cigarettes proved too much for some boys!
A further contribution to the record of the war
years has come from Brian Rose (S47). He was an
early member of Salisbury House (originally known
as Hankinson’s), which was created as the school’s
first day house in 1941. Rose joined the school in
1943, one of eight pupils to be sent on scholarships
to Canford by the Bournemouth Education
Committee. His house photographs record the
progress of these scholars through the school.
More recently, Charles Rawlinson (B52) lent a
varied series of photos for scanning. These included
a view of Magnolia Walk before the science
laboratories were built, the flag flying at half-mast
for the death of King George VI, and two photos of
the Beaufort Bruisers in 1951 – a decidedly suspect-
The interior of a Nissen hut
by Court House, 1944
19
From the Archive
Preserved
for posterity
John Lever shares the curious
experience of having his portrait
painted to commemorate his time as
Headmaster of Canford
Left: A sheet of stamps
produced to mark the 1977
Canford expedition to Nepal
Right: Canford car badge
looking group of senior pupils! Most recently Sandy
Grant (F55) has sent scans of photos he took of
Arthur Wren and of Peggy and Michael Rathbone.
All these donations are valuable additions to the
archive.
The visual record of the school also includes film
footage. Chris Holt (S72) took considerable trouble
to convert to DVD some ciné films that his father
took of his schooldays, including his final Speech
Day. These add to the small but significant video
record of the school, the earliest item of which
is the Barnes brothers’ film of the late 1930s. The
Barnes brothers would later become well-known
professional film-makers. Their early efforts at
school form a fascinating record of one school year
(1937/8), including a meeting of the Portman Hunt,
a Speech Day (showing, when contrasted with Holt’s
account, how little such events change over the
years!) and a serious fire in Gisborough Hall.
A different kind of item, but from the same era,
is a set of exam papers donated recently by Martin
Beckwith, whose father was at Canford in the 1930s.
While the pace of curricular change has not always
been as fast as it has in the last 30 years, syllabuses
and modes of examining have always been relatively
fluid, and it is always interesting to see where the
educational emphases lie at any given time.
20
Most archive acquisitions come from donors.
Occasionally, however, I have acquired items from
eBay. The Rudby painting is a case in point. Another
is the recently auctioned sheet of stamps marking
the 1977 school expedition to Nepal. I know various
things about the trip: that the only sickness resulted
from chicken tikka masala eaten at Heathrow airport;
that after arriving late in Kathmandu, pupils trekked
for two arduous weeks in the Himalayas; that the
trek was followed by two days of white-water rafting
and then a safari in a national park in Chitwan, where
pupils both rode and bathed with elephants. What I
don’t know is who arranged for the printing of the
stamps or what the intention was.
Another mystery surrounds a Canford car badge
that John Zeal (M53) received from the estate of
William Harrison (M50). He brought it in to me
to see if I could tell him anything about it or about
what was presumably a car club of some sort, for
which the badge was an emblem of membership.
I trawled copies of the OC Newsletter and could
find no reference to an OC car club. I also looked
at what OC merchandise was available in the 1950s
and could find no mention of the badge there.
Within the badge’s box there was a compliments
slip from Robert Old of Bournemouth. When I rang
them they told me that their records did not go
back far enough to be of any help. I then contacted
GK Beaulah & Co, who made the badge and who
continue in business. They confirmed that the order
number suggested that it was first made in the
1950s. However, their records did not reveal who
ordered it or how many were made.
So: if anyone can help with this or, indeed, with
more information about the Nepal Expedition stamps,
then I would be very interested to hear from them.
Also, as I think will be clear from what I have written
above, I would be keen to receive further items of
record and memorabilia from any era of Canford’s
history. My email address is fta@canford.com.
Finding the artist: that was up to the governors.
Finding the place: that was up to the artist.
Finding the clothes: that was my bit. I suppose it
is rather like going under the surgeon’s knife in
that you are the centre of attention and yet you
feel pretty helpless – if not quite a piece of flesh,
then certainly a figure to be dissected minutely.
Nick Bashall had eventually been chosen. He can
paint. He can tell a story, too. We had plenty of
both over the twenty hours it took. Brought up in
colonial Africa, he studied law at Cambridge and,
as a heavyweight boxer, won two Blues. He turned
to portrait painting after a disabling motor accident
and has had a colourful life plying his trade in war
zones and the quieter environments of Buckingham
Palace and London studios. Millais is his artistic
hero and Disraeli’s and Gladstone’s portraits his
guides, for the insight they give into character.
You can imagine how this worried me. He had
plenty of time to penetrate what there is of my
character. Top Tower was his chosen spot, where light
could be manipulated and disturbance minimised.
His victim stood on a plinth about a foot high so
our eyes could meet – yes he really had been a
heavyweight fighter – and a mirror was set up
behind him so I could glance at the developing
masterpiece in between looking directly at him or at
a tiny bit of the riverbank behind his left shoulder.
After a brief sizing up, the speed of the first fifteen
minutes was extraordinary. Rolf Harris could hardly
have matched Nick: head shape, face shape and two
big panda black eyes, as if I had been in the ring
with him. Then things began to slow up. Over half
the total time was spent on the eyes. ‘There are
only three bits that really matter in a portrait,’ he
said, ‘the eyes, the mouth and the hand’. It certainly
showed in the time each took. Miraculously, the
cuddly panda gave way and a cuddly headmaster
emerged. The cheerful grin gradually took on
a degree of ‘I mean what I say’ seriousness and
the hand ceased to be a rower’s claw. It all came
together. He asked me to wear my favourite tie but
was cross when he saw how elaborate it was. The
accuracy of the tie in the final picture is questionable:
he must have been exhausted by hour 19.
In the course of it all I learned plenty about the
Zimbabwean war of independence, the lives of
some of his previous sitters, his own colourful past,
the technique of portrait painting Bashall style, his
impressions of Canford and of me, his sense of
humour and his methods to keep me concentrating.
From early embarrassment about the exercise, to
relief that colleagues and pupils have since praised
the portrait as ‘getting’ the headmaster they know, it
has been an amusing journey. It has been fascinating,
too, to witness the magic of a man who told me
that when it is going well he is not really thinking
much at all. Rather he is letting the skill come in and
flow through mind and hand and onto the canvas,
as if he is simply the practical expression of a wider
creativity. Pondering that one took a good few
minutes. If I do look thoughtful, now you know why.
Above: The finished portrait
Below: John Lever and Nick
Bashall during one of the
sessions in Top Tower
21
School news
School news
Three members of the fifth
form at Tate Britain, with
Frederic Leighton’s ‘An
Athlete Wrestling with a
Python’ in the foreground
3 – 2 – 1 – zero!
As an experiment, this year we decided that the
school should use some of the time available after
GCSEs to do something educationally valuable that
had nothing to do with exams and might even prove
enjoyable. And so the idea for a four-day travelling
cultural feast emerged. The majority of the fifth form
took part, most of them found something to enjoy
The firing of the largest hybrid rocket motor ever
tested in an educational establishment took place on
Canford’s 1st XI cricket pitch in the summer, watched
by crowds of Canford pupils and staff and colleagues
and pupils from five local schools. The firing of the
rocket, with an exhaust velocity of 25,000 mph and
1000 lbs of thrust, was part of Canford’s first ‘It really
is rocket science!’ event combining physics, engineering
and chemistry.
Pupils from Poole High, Bournemouth School,
Oakmead, The Bourne Academy and West Moors
came along to enjoy the afternoon, which began
with a lecture by speed-racer Carolynne Knight
on rocket science, before moving out into the
school grounds for science displays, some explosive
physics and chemistry demonstrations, missilemaking competitions, and the chance to see some
and all of them will have learnt something. Every pupil
traced a different path through a series of visits, talks
and workshops and they all came together on the last
day to give group PowerPoint presentations designed
to say something about what had excited them the
most.
The umbrella theme was ‘Men and Women –
Private and Public’ and, through their encounters
with artworks and artefacts, the pupils were asked
to consider the way different cultures deal with the
conflicts set up between private and public lives. In
London, groups visited the British Museum, the British
Library, the Courtauld Gallery, Tate Britain, the Cabinet
War Rooms, the London Docklands Museum and
the Hayward Gallery. All had time to hang out on
the South Bank and consider the infinite variety of
London lives.
In Oxford, some went to the Pitt Rivers Museum,
others to the Ashmolean Museum, and all headed to
Blenheim to consider the public and private lives led
in Britain’s most lavish stately home. Back at school,
visiting speakers included Patience Agbabi, John-Paul
Flintoff, Professor Ray Monk and the flamboyant
Professor Hannah Dawson.
John James
Greenpower Formula 24 electric racing cars: one built
by the Canford School and another by the Bourne
Academy. The visiting schools had been busy building
their own model rocket cars in advance of the day
and the sparks literally flew as they raced down the
Canford track. Congratulations go to winners of the
rocket car races: Bournemouth School (KS3), the
Bourne Academy (GCSE), and Bournemouth School
(A level). The make-a-missile competition was won by
a girl from Poole High School.
The highlight was the exciting firing of the ‘militaryspec’ hybrid rocket motor. Sixth-form physics students
from Canford installed their home-built datalogging kit
and experiments onto the test rig of the rocket and
now plan to report their findings to all visiting schools
for teaching purposes.
Steve Excell
The main stairwell of the new teaching block –
the John Lever Building – is adorned with a large
ceramic work produced by pupils. The periodic
frieze contains 162 tiles created over the last year by
mixed-year groups as part of their weekly ‘Enterprise
and Activity’ sessions within the art department.
The intention was to create something beyond a
series of elemental letters, so a medieval Alchemical
image forms the bigger overall picture. The image
depicts the hermetic green lion consuming the sun.
In Alchemical terms the lion represents mercury
and the sun represents sulphur. With the ultimate
aim of producing gold by mixing combinations
of virtually anything that came to hand, these
early mystic chemists stumbled upon many of
the chemical characteristics or reactions that are
commonplace today.
After the background image had been divided
into the required number of squares, and pupils
When pupils from Canford first made links with the
inner city community of Northam in Southampton
in 2002, and particularly the Northam 521 Youth
Centre, little did anyone realise just how important a
facet of Canford life this partnership might become.
Many Canfordians have discovered the immensely
rewarding experience of working to support youth
work in the city.
In June, forty children and young people from the
City Reach project visited Canford for an activity
weekend, making use of Canford’s facilities and
grounds and taking part in some fun activities away
from city life. A particular highlight was the trip to
nearby Studland Bay on the Saturday. Although it
was windy, the sun shone and a close to deserted
beach allowed the children to really enjoy themselves.
For some, it was an entirely new environment.
The campfire that evening warmed weary limbs
and provided a relaxing finish to a long day. With
a varied itinerary involving swimming in the pool,
Towards the end of a short but intensive
examination term, 29 fifth-form pupils set out to
complete the expedition for their Silver Duke of
Edinburgh’s Award. This entailed three days in the
New Forest, navigating their way along routes they
had previously devised. After a little rain on day one,
they were lucky enough to have the first of the
summer’s good weather.
Over the three days they travelled an average of
54 km, seeing staff only to take on extra water and
briefly at the campsites each evening. Food varied
from what was considered nutritionally well-balanced
and light enough to carry for the three days to the
less desirable, but possibly more liked, sweets that
gave the extra boost when needed. The light and
warm evenings encouraged them to bond as a team,
playing games such as charades.
All five groups completed their expeditions
The new frieze in the
stairwell of the John
Lever Building
transcribed the detail onto the clay in low relief.
The tiles were then bisque fired and glazed before
being mounted onto three-ply boards to reduce the
weight during installation. Before being framed they
were grouted as one would a bathroom!
Andy Kirkby
Iona Wotton (Ma13) with
two of the guests from the
City Reach project about
to take to the water
trampolining, five-a-side tournaments and a range of
playground games, both the children and twenty or
so Canfordians kept each other well-entertained. The
ever-present smiles made it clear that the weekend
will be memorable to all involved for a long time.
Seb Rodrigues
Tired but triumphant
successfully and mostly in high spirits despite being
very tired on the last day. Now they will focus on
completing the volunteering section in the lower sixth
to complete the Awards.
Jonathan Martin
You can keep up to date with all the latest school news at www.canford.com/news. A copy of the latest edition
of Canford News is also available on the website at www.canford.com/canford-news. If you would like a hard
copy of this publication, please contact the OC office (ocs@canford.com), who will arrange to send you one.
22
23
Watched by Anthony
Cottam, Chairman of
Governors, the John
Lever Building is officially
opened by the eponymous
former Headmaster
News from the Canford Campaign
Hard at work on the
Telethon are Katherine
Pierce, Georgie Leach
and Victoria Stubbs
24
Although fully functioning for lessons since
January, the new teaching block was officially opened
and named at a short ceremony in June. Members
of the Nineveh Society and of the Campaign
Board, governors, teachers and some OCs were
there to witness the unveiling of the John Lever
Building, complete with plaque and newly-finished
Headmaster’s portrait. This was followed by an
informal tour of the new building and lunch in the
Great Hall.
Guests commented on the wide spaces and
hallways, intended to create spaces for study
and informal tutorials within departments. They
also liked the bright, airy classrooms with up-todate equipment and IT and pupil art adorning
the hallways. Each new classroom is named after
someone well-known in that subject and bears
a short biography and image of the person. The
upper storey is now home to Classics, Economics
& Business Studies, Maths, IT and some of Physics,
while Chemistry and Physics continue to occupy the
downstairs space.
With the completion of the John Lever Building,
the summer holidays was the time to start intensive
renovation of other teaching areas in order to
move departments around and have new teaching
facilities ready for September. Working at Canford
during the 2013 summer holidays meant sharing
space with dust, drills, hundreds of workmen, cranes,
delivery trucks, piles of bricks and stacks of new glass
windows, but it was all worth it when the first bells
rang for September lessons!
Summer was also the perfect opportunity to
stage the first fundraising Telethon that Canford has
held in five years. Fourteen young OCs (leavers of
2010-2013) were hired as callers, and they worked
tirelessly every evening and weekend during the
July heatwave. The aim was two-fold: to speak to
as many UK and Channel Islands-based OCs as
possible and find out about their lives since Canford,
and to ask OCs to give to the Canford Campaign.
Our huge thanks go to Dani Andrews (L12), Harry
Anstee (M11), Rachael Bridger (S11), Elly Chandler
(Ma12), Hamish Clifton (SH12), Jay Durham (S13),
Tom Hetherington (SH10), Georgia Leach (S12),
Charlotte Michelmore (W12), Kat Pierce (S13),
George Streeton (L12), Torie Stubbs (L12), Nic
Turner (L13), and Naomi Vides (S12) for all their
hard work.
We also warmly thank all those OCs who took
the time to talk to our young callers, exchange
Canford and life stories, and give to the Canford
Campaign. The statistics at the end of the Telethon
make for positive reading: we spoke to 650 OCs,
nearly half of whom updated us with their career
details and another half with email and new contact
details we didn’t have. Many asked for more
information on careers mentoring, events and other
ways of volunteering time, all of which is greatly
appreciated. Several even offered work experience
to our enthusiastic call team! And OCs gave £65,000
towards the Canford Campaign during the Telethon,
a great result. Thank you from everyone at Canford.
Church and chapel
Ever since Canford was founded, Canford Magna parish church has served as its
chapel. John Newth explores the history of the church and of the relationship
between school and parish.
All OCs will have memories of services in Canford
Magna parish church on the twice-weekly occasions
when it became the school’s chapel. Those with a
strong faith went joyfully, but in the 1960s and 1970s
particularly, they needed moral courage to stand
against the prevailing opinion that chapel was not
‘cool’ and against a more considered campaign to
dispense with compulsory attendance. If they are
honest, though, many OCs might agree that there
were times during their school careers when they
were pleased to have those quiet few minutes to
reflect and perhaps to discover something about
their own spirituality, whether or not it was based in
formal religion.
The church is, as the current Rector, Chris Tebbutt,
admits, ‘a bit of a hotch-potch’. The chancel was
the nave of the Saxon church, making it the oldest
building in the Borough of Poole. The chancel of that
church has disappeared, possibly destroyed by Danes
who sailed up the Stour, burning churches as they
went. The Normans added the present nave, where
three of the five arches survive from that period and
a fourth is a rare example of a Perpendicular arch
on Norman pillars. They also built the present tower,
strangely positioned on the north side; it has been
suggested that it was put there to stop the building
collapsing.
For 200 years after the Reformation, the
connection between the church and Canford Manor
was slight because the latter was owned by the
Webbs, a staunchly Roman Catholic family. When
the Guest family arrived in 1846, they took a much
closer interest and had their own family pews in
the chancel. Perhaps the most striking feature of
the church, the pair of angels either side of the
east window, were commissioned by them from
the renowned Venetian mosaicist, Antonio Salvati.
He had founded the Murano Glass Company
with Austen Henry Layard, whose archaeological
excavations were supported by the Guest family and
who is buried in the churchyard at Canford Magna.
Apparently the mosaics were originally the Virgin
Mary and Mary Magdalene, but Lady Wimborne
made Salvati add wings to turn them into angels
because she did not like anything that smacked of
High Church.
Lady Wimborne was one of the leading
evangelicals in the country and confirmed the strong
Above: The view of Canford
Magna parish church familiar
to all OCs, from the path
from the school. The Church
owns the building and its
immediate environs, but the
whole plot sits within the
grounds of Canford School.
25
Church and chapel
Parents, pupils and
staff assembling for
the Confirmation
service in 1989
This sketch of the church’s
west end was done by
William S Frevert, a
lieutenant with the US army
unit that was stationed at
Canford before D-Day
in the summer of 1944
26
evangelical tradition at Canford Magna. No doubt
she also influenced her son’s choice of purchaser
for the manor in 1923: the Martyrs Memorial Trust,
which had founded the Allied Schools (of which
Canford is one) in the evangelical tradition partly
to counteract the perceived High Anglicanism of
the Woodard Schools. Her legacy is that school
and parish share a common outlook on worship
and ministry that makes the sharing of the church
much easier than might otherwise be the case. The
arrangement has existed from the very start and in
fact for its first term, the school joined the village for
Sunday services.
The common outlook is of mutual benefit in areas
beyond the physical building. The school is joint
patron of the living with the Bishop of Salisbury,
so Chris Tebbutt was interviewed by a small panel
nominated by the school when he applied for the
incumbency four years ago. Conversely, when Chris
Jervis departed for Jersey this summer after 26
years as Chaplain at Canford, Chris Tebbutt joined
the process to find a successor, and only partly in
his capacity of Rural Dean. A representative of the
school is invited to all meetings of the Parochial
Church Council. The relationship is so close that
between 1933 and 1947 Jack Collins was both
Chaplain of the school and Rector of the parish
(with a break for war service), but with both parish
and school growing apace, it was felt that the dual
role was impractical.
There is another element, best described by Chris
Jervis: ‘The relationship between Church and Chapel
has always been mutually supportive: with prayer
and interest, with shared facilities and, occasionally,
personnel – all have benefited from this synergy. The
close relationship between Church and Chapel has
also been forged by the warm friendship between
a succession of Rectors and Chaplains – this was
certainly the case with the five incumbents who
served at the church throughout my 26 years at
Canford.’
Within the church there is surprisingly little
physical evidence of the link. Although the organ,
built on a bridge across an 1829 extension to the
nave, dominates the western end, only a small plate
up on the organ itself is a reminder that it was given
by the school in memory of Yvone Kirkpatrick, a
Canford master for 35 years. He taught languages
but his first love was perhaps the CCF, of which
he was CO; he was also an accomplished rowing
coach. In the south aisle is a book of remembrance
for those OCs who gave their lives in World War
2, and below the east window, above the altar, is a
silver cross inscribed: ‘In thankful remembrance of
the recovery from serious illness of R H Wheeler,
Head Prefect at Canford School, 1937’. What his
illness was and how he recovered from it is not
recorded but, now aged 94, he is not only still alive
but attending OC events!
When Chris Jervis arrived as the school’s new
Chaplain in September 1987, all school services
were held within the parish church. Parishioners
were very hospitable, but the arrangement was
never satisfactory and so he decided to hold Sunday
services in the Music School while remaining in
the church for midweek gatherings. Today, half the
houses have chapel at 8.30 on a Wednesday and half
on a Thursday, and there is a Communion service at
8.10 on Friday, none of which interferes with other
activities in the church. The church is also used for
the school’s Confirmation services and is a popular
venue for OCs to marry and to have their offspring
baptised. As Chris Jervis says, ‘Many OCs look back
with affection on their time in this ancient parish
church, so much so that there are regular requests
to return there for their wedding service. I probably
conducted up to five such weddings each year –
always a great joy for the Chaplain to continue one’s
friendship with former pupils.’
Both school and parish are going through a time
of change. A new Chaplain, Phil Jack, has started
this term, while the parish is putting into practice
Vision Refresh: a comprehensive review of its
mission, its worship and its relationship with the
wider community, including the school. Part of Vision
Refresh is the Kingfisher Project, a plan to make
all the area around the church more accessible to
disabled people, especially the riverbank, where it is
hoped to establish a nature trail and viewing points.
Chris Tebbutt would like to see the church itself
become a more flexible space: ‘It is a living building
and living buildings change, as this has through the
centuries,’ he says. Looking further ahead, perhaps
one day Canford will fill the long-felt want for its
own dedicated chapel in which the whole school
can worship together. That would inevitably weaken
the practical link between school and parish, but not
their ties as neighbours and friends.
Top: The plaque on
the organ to Yvone ‘the
Wump’ Kirkpatrick
Bottom: Chris Jervis, the
school Chaplain, conducts
an OC’s wedding in 2006
27
Requiescant in pace
requiescant in pace
JOHN FITZGERALD (B35)
JOHN DU CANE OBE (M38)
After Canford, where he was an enthusiastic rower, he
joined the Royal Marines and served in Norway, the
Mediterranean, Suez, Cyprus, Malaya and South Africa.
Retiring in 1963, he became successively Administrator
of the Physiological Laboratory at Cambridge University,
Clerk to the Dean of St George’s Chapel, Windsor, and
Bursar of Worksop College.
He was an active member of the John of Gaunt Society
and during one debate ‘almost reduced certain of the
School furniture to atoms, so burning was his fervour.’ He
flew with the Fleet Air Arm during the War, seeing action
in the Far East and during the landings in North Africa.
He then worked for De Beers in South Africa before
moving to Sierra Leone, where he was a popular and
effective influence during the transition to independence
– so much so that the first independent government
recommended him for an OBE, which he chose to
receive in Sierra Leone rather than at Buckingham
Palace. Returning to London, he became Chairman of
Mining Finance Company Selection Trust and then of BP
Minerals, a job that involved worldwide travel, including a
visit to New York every month for 25 years.
It was typical of him that when offered a more drastic
treatment for his cancer, but one that meant that he
would have an aversion to cold drinks, he turned it down
on the grounds that he was not going to ruin his quality
of life by having to drink warm champagne.
TED COOKE-YARBOROUGH (F37)
He was a committee member of the John of Gaunt
Society, where his speaking was described as ‘humorous
(sometimes extremely so) but he can usually be relied
upon to talk sense’. He was also secretary of the
Wireless Society. Wireless was then in its infancy, so the
society was particularly active. It designed a two-way
radio for use in the school; so effective was it that Yeovil
fire brigade bought two sets!
Having read physics at Christ Church, Oxford, he
joined the Telecommunications Research Establishment
that did vital work during the War on the development
of radar, first at Worth Matravers and later at Malvern.
Among the projects he led was the production of a
backward-looking radar to warn bomber crews of
enemy fighters approaching from the rear. After the
War, he worked for the UK Atomic Energy Authority at
Harwell, specifically on the development of computers
for the nuclear industry. He built one of the first digital
computers to use transistors throughout and in 1957
became head of Harwell’s electronic division, where he
established a reputation as one of the country’s leading
computer engineers. He retired in 1982.
His Daily Telegraph obituary said that he was
‘remembered with great affection for a series of
Heath Robinson style machines he made at home – in
particular his automatic, occasionally renegade, lawnmower. His wife finally drew the line at his automatic
bedroom window curtain-opening machine.’The
obituary also referred to ‘his evident relish for life’s
humiliations and inconveniences [which] stood him in
good stead in old age’.
Above right: John Du Cane
in the Fleet Air Arm (left)
and in his later years (right)
Right: Ted Cooke-Yarborough
at the reboot of the Harwell
Dekatron computer, which
he helped to design and
build, at the National
Museum of Computing
in November last year
gardening and fishing, both in Sussex and at his house in
Sutherland.
A house prefect and ATC sergeant at Canford, he
served in India with the Royal Signals. On his return
to England he worked in the family firm of O’Brien
Thomas, ironmongers on Upper Thames Street, London,
until the mid-1960s when he started his own business,
Transletters, providing signs and lettering to small
businesses all over the world. He was a member of the
Worshipful Company of Ironmongers. He and his whole
family always referred to chocolate as ‘Slater’, after Mr
Slater who ran the tuck shop at Canford.
TERRENCE COBDEN PIKE (M45)
Having been a school prefect, head of house and Janitor
of the John of Gaunt Society at Canford,Terry Cobden
Pike was instrumental in forming the Old Canfordian
Golfing Society in the early 1950s and, with Stanley Elliot
(SH25), for gaining entry for the Society into the Halford
Hewitt annual tournament. He and Stanley subsequently
founded the Cyril Gray tournament at Worplesdon GC
for senior golfers who had attended schools participating
in the Halford Hewitt competition.
After leaving Canford, he studied at Trinity College,
Oxford, before enlisting in the Royal Corps of Signals
and seeing service in Greece, Egypt, Palestine, and Jordan.
He completed his degree course externally at Birkbeck
College when he left the army and he subsequently
worked in London in the steel broking field. On
retirement he moved to Salcombe, where he was able
to indulge his love of sailing and golf. Those who had the
good fortune to play golf with Terry will remember his
unfailing kindness and humour. Almost single-handedly he
steered the OC Golfing Society through its early years
and the current members, who enjoy the benefit of
participating in this thriving organisation, are much in
his debt.
JOHN WILL (W47)
GEORGE YOUNG (SH43)
At Canford he was a house prefect and a sergeant in the
ATC. Completing his pilot training in Arizona in mid1945, he served in the RAF until 1963 at a number of
bases in the UK and Germany, mainly with 2 Squadron.
Afterwards he became responsible for apprentice
training at diesel engine manufacturer Ruston & Hornsby,
later Ruston Gas Turbines, in Lincoln. Retiring in 1990, he
was active in the local community and served as a parish
councillor.
J F GODMAN-DORINGTON (C44)
He was a school prefect at Canford, where his surname
was the single-barrelled Godman. After a spell in the
Scots Guards, he bought a farm in Graffham, West
Sussex. As well as running the farm, he served on the
local, district and county councils. He became a JP and
was very proud to take on the role of High Sheriff for
West Sussex for a year. He had a great passion for
28
DERMOT WILLIAMSON (SH44)
He was instrumental in helping with the revival of his
house after the War, and captained its cross-country
team. He spent ten years in the tea business in Ceylon
(as it then was), before returning to run a DiY business
in Uckfield, Sussex. He enjoyed gardening and fly-fishing
and in his long retirement was a regular at the County
Ground in Hove and a National Trust volunteer.
PETER HILL (C49)
He was in the rugby XV and a prominent performer on
the athletics track. Rugby remained an interest: he played
well into his thirties and he became a valued committee
member and president of Cullompton RFC. Cullompton
was where he returned after Canford to run the family
farm, and where he remained for the rest of his life,
specialising in egg production and mixed farming.
ANDREW TAYLOR (SH49)
He left Canford after contracting polio, was in hospital
for six months and had to learn to walk again. Advised
by the doctors to pursue an outdoor career, he
became a student at the Royal Agricultural College,
Terry Cobden Pike
helped to found the
OC Golfing Society
Cirencester. After qualifying, he joined Twyford Seeds in
Oxfordshire, giving advice to farmers in the surrounding
counties. After a spell with Bowater Scott, he decided
he preferred the seed trade and stayed in it for the
rest of his working life. He had been an accomplished
long-distance runner and cricketer at Canford, and he
became a good shot and loved fly-fishing.
JOHN ADAMS (C51)
He left Canford after O level and went to Bournemouth
Art School, then the Royal College of Art, studying
industrial ceramic design. He became chief designer
at a large tile company in Staffordshire, then moved
into teaching, first at Nottingham Art School, then at
Chelsea Art College. In retirement he managed Chiswick
Quay and became involved in boat building and repair.
Having done his national service in the Royal Navy, he
continued in the RNR for many years, reaching the rank
of Lieutenant Commander.
DAVID HOPKINS (B57)
He had a distinguished career at Canford, becoming
head of house and a school prefect. He was in the
cricket XI for two years and the rugby XV for one, as
well as representing the school at athletics and boxing.
After receiving his commission from the Army, he
moved to Shropshire and worked in the purchasing
department at a large multinational engineering firm. He
then joined Standard Life, where he enjoyed a lot of
success as an insurance broker before setting up his
own insurance brokerage. He always maintained a keen
interest in sport. Shortly after moving to Shropshire, he
was a founding member of Telford Hornets (formerly
Wellington Hornets) before moving on to the then
county champions, Shrewsbury. He soon became an
active member of the local rugby scene, where he
represented the county for a number of years in the
back row and then prop. He also received regional
honours and represented Northern Counties at prop.
He continued to live in Shropshire, where he took an
active involvement in local politics, enjoying lively debates
on local issues.
29
Requiescant in pace
Requiescant in pace
was urbane, the perfect companion or host in a house
party, and particularly discerning over the good things
in life. However, Philip was also quite a private person.
Although I knew he was an architect, with a particular
interest in the sympathetic conversion of old houses and
barns, I also learnt that he was a good skier and enjoyed
heli-skiing, but not until his funeral did I discover that he
was an Old Canfordian and that we even had the same
birthday!
NORMAN CROWDER
Left: Sir Henry Cecil and
wonder-horse Frankel
Right: Philip Lancashire
in his favourite milieu
30
SIR HENRY CECIL (F60)
The arc of Henry Cecil’s life could have been written
by one of the great tragedians. Having established a
successful racing stable, he allowed it all to slip away
before rebuilding his reputation, if anything to greater
heights than before.Then illness struck, but his last days
were illuminated by his association with perhaps the
greatest racehorse ever seen.
The main feature of his Canford career was that
his identical twin, David, was in the same house at the
same time, which must have been confusing. Leaving
after O level, he became assistant to his stepfather, the
racehorse trainer Cecil Boyd-Rochfort, before gaining his
own trainer’s licence and taking over the Boyd-Rochfort
stables at Newmarket. He had his first classic winner in
1975 and was unquestionably the leading trainer over
the next eighteen years, being champion trainer in ten
of them and winning another fifteen classics. As well as
the prestige of training for The Queen, he became in
1987 the first trainer whose horses won over £1m in a
season.
In the 1990s, it all began to go terribly wrong. He
divorced his wife of 24 years and contracted a brief but
disastrous marriage to a 22-year-old stable girl. Sheikh
Mohammed, the richest owner in racing, took away the
40 horses that Cecil had been training for him and other
owners followed. By 2005, the number of horses in his
stables had fallen from 209 at its peak to 56. He had
received a five-year driving ban and his twin brother had
died of cancer.
Not the least of Cecil’s achievements was the way he
fought back from seeming disaster. He was supported
by his secretary, Jane, who was to become his third
wife: ‘She put all the pieces together again,’ he said.The
winners began to return and so did the owners. Royal
Ascot had always been a favourite meeting, and he had
had at least one winner there every year except one
between 1974 and 2002.The revival of his career was
perhaps finally confirmed when, after an absence of
seven years, he was back in the Ascot winner’s enclosure
after the 2009 King Edward VII Stakes. In all, he had a
record 75 winners at Royal Ascot to put alongside his
lifetime total of 25 classics. He received a knighthood in
2011.
By now, though, he had been diagnosed with the
stomach cancer that was eventually to kill him.Yet his
extraordinary story was given one last twist with the
arrival in his yard of Frankel, whose win in the 2000
Guineas in 2011 has been described as ‘one of the
greatest displays on a British racecourse’. Frankel retired
unbeaten in his fourteen races and with the highest
score ever achieved in the authoritative Timeform ratings,
making him officially the best racehorse of all time.
Frankel brought deserved joy to the later years of Cecil,
who, not given to hyperbole, described him as ‘the best
horse I’ve ever seen’.
Cecil was a man of great charm, a dapper dresser and
a keen gardener and rose-grower. His popularity on the
racecourse, particularly after his comeback, was not just
because he so often allowed the punters to collect from
the bookies: he was genuinely liked and admired. Above
all though, he will be remembered as a superbly gifted
trainer – in the words of Peter O’Sullevan, ‘a man with
green fingers for horses’.
PHILIP LANCASHIRE (M62)
At Canford he was an accomplished artist, as well as a
house prefect and a sergeant in the CCF. He had the
distinction of appearing in the first of Robin Whicker’s
many productions at Canford, Love’s Labour’s Lost.
Graham Barnes (F59) writes: I came to know Philip at
Itchenor Sailing Club, where I sailed a 26-foot National
Swallow Class fixed-keel sailing boat in Chichester
Harbour. Philip was a member of a syndicate that then
owned the newest Swallow of the class called Svala that,
under Philip’s directions, was equipped with the latest
and most sophisticated gear. Philip was a spinnaker man,
preferring not to helm, and he was undoubtedly the
best spinnaker man in the fleet. I was fortunate enough
to persuade Philip to join me in my Swallow for three
Cowes Weeks and for many club races over a fourteenyear period. He exuded competitiveness combined with
exhilaration in racing a boat in extreme conditions with
little regard for any personal comfort.Yet ashore he
Robin Wright (SH69) writes: In 1967, in his address to
the AGM of the Salisbury Diocesan Welfare Council,
Norman stated that ‘A revolution is taking place in the
public school. No longer are boys prepared blindly to
accept the authoritarianism, and teachers and prefects
are questioning the need for some of the petty rules
for which boys were automatically punished.’ Norman
added that the old adage that boys should be seen and
not heard may have produced peace and quiet, but
that there was a tendency to overlook that boys were
people with feelings and individuality.The part played
by Norman as Chaplain in these difficult years is a
true testament to Norman, the man. In Canford School:
1923-1983, Michael Rathbone wrote of him: ‘While
remaining universally trusted and without any duplicity,
he succeeded in justifying the claims of authority to
those who were discontented and in representing the
complaints of the discontented to those who were in
authority.’
Norman came to Canford in 1959 and served the
school for 13 years, first as Assistant Chaplain, and then
as Chaplain from 1964. In addition to his many duties
as Chaplain, he taught Divinity and Latin, was House
Tutor to several generations of Monteacutians, coached
games, especially cricket, administered the School
Roll, supervised Auxiliaries and was a Treasurer of the
Common Room.
For most of us, it will be the man that we remember.
Our recollections will be many and varied: always
impeccably turned out, not a hair out of place; at
the wheel of a succession of Triumph Heralds, pipe
sometimes in mouth; or perhaps bowling leg-breaks in
the nets, or batting in the middle – his love of cricket
cannot be over-emphasised! For some OCs their
memory will be of the gourmet entertaining a party of
leavers to good food and wine at the Old Beams or the
Brace of Pheasants, while others will recall him singing
among the basses at a Choral Society concert.
Norman’s greatest gift was his interest in and
understanding of people. He was an exceedingly efficient
organiser and administrator, but his most significant
contribution to Canford was in the field of human
relationships. He was a marvellous listener, and many
boys and staff found in him a ready confidant and wise
counsellor who would stay up half the night if necessary
to help sort out someone’s problems or let them just
unwind. His uncanny ability to remember small details
about people, including boys’ birthdays, stemmed from
his prayerful concern for his whole ‘flock’, which began
before breakfast every morning in Chapel.
In 1971, Norman married Pauleen Styles, the
Headmaster’s secretary, and they moved to the Isle of
Norman Crowder
Wight, where Norman became Vicar of St John’s, Ryde.
After three years he became Portsmouth Diocesan
Director of Education and then Archdeacon of
Portsmouth.They retired to Salisbury, and Norman’s
funeral was held at Salisbury Cathedral, the eulogy being
given by the Rt Rev. David Stancliffe, former Bishop of
Salisbury.
Here indeed was a true inspiration and a man full of
compassion and understanding for his fellow humans.
Thank you, Norman, for what you did for so many of us.
MICHAEL DUNNE (B67)
He was active in the Canford community, being
treasurer of the Film Society, the Mountjoy Press and the
Community Service Scheme, as well as a house prefect
and a petty officer in the Naval section of the CCF.
He went on to Warwick University where he initially
studied engineering before switching to economics. He
then moved to London to pursue his love of live music,
working with many musicians including The Beat and
Yes, with whom he went on tours of the USA as well as
Europe. He qualified as a teacher and spent his career in
Norfolk. He was a member of the Norwich Samba Band
and loved vintage motorbikes and cars. In latter years
he developed a passion for bee-keeping, establishing
upwards of twenty hives.
NOEL PAUL (SH72)
He left Canford after O level and went on to become
a chartered accountant. In the 1980s, however, he took
over responsibility for the family farm at Woodsford, near
Dorchester.
CLIVE MERIFIELD (B73)
He lived in the Far East, where he was for a time the
OCS representative in Singapore.
CORRECTION
The name of the subject of the first obituary in the April
2013 issue was given as Michael Wilmot. It should have
been Peter Wilmot. We apologise for the error.
31
canford Memorabilia
careers
Merchandise Details
1
1. OCS ties in black with green, blue and white stripes. 140cm long, up to 9cm wide. Silk tie presented in a Canford embossed gift box, wrapped in Canford printed tissue paper £21. Polyester £10.50
2
2. OCS overseas ties in navy with flag set within tree emblem. USA, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. Polyester £10.50
3. Presentation silk tie and cloth cufflinks in OC gift box. £28
4. Canford umbrella, navy, in six panel design. £27.50
Small groups of sudents
benefited from the advice
of experts in their fields
Careers Symposium 2013
Simon Brazier (B93), who is the Head of UK Equities
at Threadneedle Investments, was the keynote speaker
at the 10th Careers Symposium run by the OC Society.
He started by emphasising the need for passion in
whatever career the students followed. He showed a
photo of his contemporaries in his final year at Canford
to illustrate the variety of careers they followed and
how successful some had become following a less-thanstellar time at Canford and University. Whilst there was
no substitute for hard work, research and qualifications,
real enthusiasm always shines through and often reaps
a better reward than high pay.
In a change from previous years Simon de Halpert
(F64) then introduced Mark Somers, who runs an
executive search firm. Mark gave a general overview
of the job market looking several years ahead and the
sort of qualities that employers were most looking for
in candidates. Finally, Karen Hartshorn launched the
careers mentoring programme.
The three group sessions in the afternoon gave
the students the chance to explore in some depth
some of the careers in which they had expressed
interest. Business Management, Law, Medicine and City
and Finance are the most popular, but Engineering,
Biology and Natural Sciences, Computer Games,
Journalism, Architecture, Armed Forces, Art, Charity,
HR, Design, Property, Marketing, Teaching, International
Left: There was time for
contributors and staff to
chat during the breaks
Right: Simon Brazier
Development and Psychology all had experts to advise
the students. Finally, Interview Preparation, Changing
Careers & Transferable Skills, Life at University, Starting
& Running your own Business, Unsure of Career
Choice and Not Going to University were more
general options available.
We are most grateful to the following OCs and
Parents (P) who contributed to the day : Barry Coupe
(OC), David Cotterell (OC), Gordon Fulcher (OC),
Alice Chapple (P), Mike Lerwill (OC), Richard Blacker
(OC), Adam Key (OC), Alex Bellars (OC), Sarah Elmer
(OC), Theresa Thurston (OC), John Owen (OC), Lloyd
Shepherd (OC), Simon Birchenough (P), Jonathan
Simm (P), Nick Andrews (P), Mark Brooks (P), Mark
Foden (P), Nicola Monks (OC), David Owen (OC),
John Fulford (OC), Ben Hebb (OC), Kit Walder (OC),
Chris Hewitt (P), Iain Rawlinson (P), Hayley Griffiths
(P), Sarah Fletcher (P), James Massey-Collier (P), Rob
Cooper (P), Lara Morgan (P), Wayne Moore (P), Paula
Jordan (P), Irene Broadley (P), and Mark Somers (P).
3
4
Black nylon performance socks with cotton terry foot in white, blue and green hoops and OC on the back. Available in men’s size 6-11. £6
6. Cornflower blue scarf in a pashmina and silk blend, 180cm long x 45cm wide with embroidered blue OCS motif. £30
7. Cufflinks, 17mm long x 14mm wide in a black presentation box. £24
5
6
8
7
8.
Prints from watercolours of Canford by Dennis Roxby Bott, in a limited edition of 250 copies: ‘John O’Gaunt’s Kitchen’ and ‘View from Mountjoy’.
£22.50 each or £40 the pair
Also available:
A Portrait of Canford. Hardback,
104 pages. £7.50
A tied bow, in black with green, blue and white stripes. Polyester £15
Please note, if an item is not in stock you may need
to allow 6-8 weeks for delivery.
8
✁
item
QUANTITY
OCS Silk Tie
OCS Polyester Tie
CA,
Overseas OC Ties (USA,
AUS, NZ)*
Umbrella
Pashmina
Silk Tie & Cufflink set
Cufflinks
Performance Socks
A Portrait of Canford
Tied Bow
John of Gaunt’s Kitchen
View from Mountjoy
Pair of Prints
PRICE EACH
TOTAL PRICE
£21.00
£10.50
£10.50
£27.50
£30.00
£28.00
£24.00
£6.00
£7.50
£15.00
£22.50
£22.50
£40.00
* delete as appropriate
TOTAL
for postage overseas, please contact the OC Office
TOTAL
32
5.
Please return this form to The Old Canfordian Office, Canford School, Wimborne, Dorset, BH21 3AD
Prices include postage, packaging and VAT. For postage
overseas please contact the OC Office.
Payments can be made:
• over the phone, please call 01202 847506
• by PayPal, please email ocs@canford.com with your order
• by cheque, made payable to Canford School and sent to OC Office, Canford School, Wimborne, Dorset BH21 3AD
Name
(CAPITALS please)
Address
Contact Number
Email Address
Merchandise can also be purchased online at
www.canfordconnect.com
25
Sport
SPORT
Averages
Batting
T Darby (M10)
S Ridley (W04)
B Upton (F10)
A Harms (L02)
T Blackburn (L08)
G Gillard (SH10)
B Boon (S13)
B Rogers (SH13)
W Gabb (C11)
O Downey (L12)
J Hadley (W09)
B Pearce (SH01)
A Major (B96)
C Palmer (C80)
H Anstee (M11)
G Hayward (L11)
G Shepherd (SH99)
R Graham (F10)
J Marsh (W09)
W Connor (L10)
G Chippendale (L13)
N Chapman (B76)
J Hardy (B79)
A Lindsay-Wood (C11)
A Richards (C04)
A Maher (M13)
T Waite (C99)
T Hayward (SH07)
J Taylor (M11)
M Mitchener (B93)
N Lawrence (M96)
Cygnets Week action
Cricket
In contrast to the rain-drenched summer of 2012,
this year’s Cygnets extravaganza took place in the
middle of a heatwave, with the weather never
threatening to disturb an action-packed week of old
boys’ cricket. As well as welcoming back the usual
selection of Old Canfordians of varying vintages,
we were also bolstered by a strong contingent of
players who have just left the school and will hopefully
form the backbone of the side for years to come.
After agreeing that the school should bat first on
John Lever’s valedictory Speech Day, the Cygnets’
veneer of professionalism soon fell away as their
intended opening bowler missed the first over as he
was still applying sun cream in the pavilion, and the
old boys were soon under the cosh as Ben Rogers
warmed up for a week in Cygnets colours with a
rapid 39 while his opening partner Roberts stroked
his way to a century before graciously retiring. The lack
of variety in the Cygnets’ bowling attack – five rightarm seamers of a similar pace, backed up by Andy
Major’s idiosyncratic blend of leg-breaks and head-high
beamers – was cruelly exposed as only Jon ‘Swampy’
Marsh bowled with any degree of economy. Although
an uncharacteristically lengthy pre-match fielding
practice session paid off as a number of high catches
were held, the School breezed their way to 218-7 from
their 30 overs. The Cygnets’ reply started with a bang as
pinch-hitter Ben Pearce hit two of the first three balls
of the innings for six, but it went downhill after that as
the required run rate began to spiral upwards. Once
Ben Upton (54) and Will ‘Bresnan’ Gabb (34) departed,
the game was pretty much over as a contest and the
Cygnets finished well short on 179-8 as the school
completed their second successive Speech Day win.
Cygnets Week began with Canford looking to retain
the Twenty20 Stour Cup at Bryanston, and as usual we
were paired with Sherborne in the semi-final. Veteran
wicketkeeper-batsman Cleeves Palmer celebrated
34
his first Cygnets appearance since 1990 by hitting
his first ball for four, but the side were struggling at
75-7 before Simon Ridley (30) steered us towards
respectability in a crucial eighth-wicket stand of 57
with Tom Hayward, who revealed hitherto unheralded
batting skill by launching three massive sixes, leaving the
Pilgrims chasing 133 to win. Tight bowling – especially
by ‘Iron Man’ Pearce, whose four overs yielded only
nine runs – and good fielding, including a couple of
slick run-outs, kept Sherborne on the back foot but
some clean hitting left their last pair needing 11 from
the last over, to be bowled by George Hayward.
Sherborne’s number 11 lofted the first ball for four,
but the next demolished his stumps – earning him
a send-off ’ from the bowler, which in turn earned
‘Gorgeous George’ the Champagne Moment of the
Week award once more. More importantly, it earned
Canford a place in the final against Bryanston.
The hosts batted first but although Southern
League regular Simon Ridley (easily our best player
of the day) took an impressive 4-17, the Butterflies
racked up a formidable total of 149-8. Although
Ben Boon smashed 29 (mainly in boundaries),
the Cygnets were soon tied down by Bryanston’s
spinners and while Andy Harms and Ridley led a
late rally, they were perhaps batting too low in the
order as Canford finished 26 runs adrift, surrendering
the T20 trophy for the first time since 2009.
Back at Canford on Monday, Clayesmore won the
toss and forced the Cygnets to chase leather across
Mountjoy for 55 overs in the sunshine, eventually
declaring on 275-6 while indefatigable opening bowler
Nick Lawrence finished with 4-57 for his efforts.
The Cygnets lost new father George Shepherd
early, but a century stand between debutants Olly
Downey (40) and Ben Rogers (76) set the platform
for the Canford reply. A mid-innings wobble saw four
wickets fall for 11 runs but another debutant, George
Bowling
S Ridley
N Lawrence
G Hayward
A Maher
J Marsh
A Major
R Graham
B Pearce
A Harms
J Taylor
G Chippendale
T Darby
M I NO Runs HS Av’ge100 50 Ct/St
3
3
1
196
134*
98.00
1
1
2
2
1
59
30
59.00
-
-
3
3
1
115
54
57.50
-
2
1
4
4
2
95
39*
47.50
-
-
4
1
1
-
46
46
46.00
-
-
3
3
1
85
45*
42.50
-
-
1
4
4
-
164
104
41.00
1
-
3
3
-
114
76
38.00
-
1
2/1
1
1
-
34
34
34.00
-
-
4
4
1
78
40
26.00
-
-
1
1
1
-
18
18
18.00
-
-
1
4
3
-
49
24
16.33
-
-
1
1
1
-
15
15
15.00
-
-
2
2
-
24
14
12.00
-
-
4
2
2
-
23
22
11.50
-
-
1
5
4
-
40
31
10.00
-
-
1
1
-
6
6
6.00
-
-
1
1
1
-
5
5
5.00
-
-
7
4
-
19
7
4.75
-
-
3
4
4
-
14
7
3.50
-
-
1
2
2
-
6
5
3.00
-
-
1
1
-
2
2
2.00
-
-
1
1
-
2
2
2.00
-
-
1
1
-
2
2
2.00
-
-
1/1
1
1
-
2
2
2.00
-
-
3
2
-
0
0
0.00
-
-
1
1 - 0 0
0.00--
2
1
1
28
28*
----
-
-
1
1
1
1
5
5*
----
-
-
5
1
1
0
0*
----
-
-
3
-
-
-
-
----
-
-
OM R
8
0
37
30
5
133
25.2
1
169
22
2
115
50
4
231
3
0
34
5
0
38
25
1
129
4.2
0
48
6
0
48
8
0
56
31
3
122
WAv’ge
6
6.17
6
22.17
7
24.14
4
28.75
7
33.00
1
34.00
1
38.00
3
43.00
1
48.00
1
48.00
1
56.00
2
61.00
BB
4/17
4/57
3/42
3/43
3/32
1/34
1/38
1/29
1/11
1/48
1/30
2/71
Also bowled: B Rogers 15-1-70-0, O Downey 5-1-15-0, G Gillard 3-0-26-0, B Boon 2-0-17-0,
B Upton 1-0-13-0, A Richards 1-0-5-0, M Mitchener 0.3-0-6-0.
Gillard (45), and skipper Andy Harms (39) shared an
unbroken stand of 93 to see the Cygnets home and
ensured that the Max Biles Memorial Plate – which
is competed for in memory of much-missed Cygnets
all-rounder Max – remained in Canfordian hands.
When the touring Jesters pitched up on Tuesday with
only nine players, we generously lent them George
Gillard, but a strong Cygnets XI won the toss and put
on one of our most impressive batting performances of
recent years. Will Connor joined the ‘Hornby club’ (two
noughts in a row) in the first over, but Ben ‘Hollywood’
Rogers kick-started the innings with a rapid 38 before
centurions Ben Boon (104) and Tom ‘The Don’ Darby
(134 not out) added a mammoth 218 – a new Cygnets
record partnership for any wicket. We then had the
rare sight (by our standards) of two genuine firstclass cricketers in opposition as the Jesters’ Sri Lankan
professional Carman Mapatuna bowled to the Cygnets’
ex-Hampshire, Somerset and Gloucestershire batsman
Jon Hardy, now the Masuri helmet supremo (look
them both up on Cricinfo). Darby, captain for the day,
declared with the score at 303-5 when he erroneously
– and somewhat comically – believed he had been
stumped off a no-ball, but it left the visitors plenty of
overs to bat. Jon Marsh struck early, leaving notorious
Jesters opener ‘Wolfie’ chuntering about yet another
lbw decision, but any potential run-chase already
looked to have been called off by the time Mapatuna
fell for a fluent 107, and the remaining Jesters dug in
to finish on 221-6. Whatever your definition of what
qualifies as a ‘winning draw’, the Cygnets most definitely
had the upper hand – and celebrated by winning the
traditional post-match ‘boat race’ with consummate
ease outside the Coach and Horses, and rewarding
themselves with a night on the town in Bournemouth.
With no game on Wednesday, certain Cygnets
proceeded to spend most of it in the pub watching
the opening day of the Ashes, but another titanic
cricketing battle was rejoined the following day when
we headed to Bryanston. Skipper Ben Upton anchored
the Cygnets’ middle order with an unbeaten 50 and
enjoyed big stands with Tom Blackburn (46) and
Tom Darby (55), which allowed what turned out to
be a perfectly timed declaration to come at 252-9.
Bryanston made steady progress in reply until a century
stand for the fifth wicket threatened to take the game
away from Canford. Seamer Alan Maher (3-43), whose
bowling action does not appear in the MCC coaching
manual, made a vital breakthrough and set up a thrilling
finish, with Bryanston needing six to win from the
35
Sport
final over. But the runs dried up as the Butterflies only
managed four singles from the first five balls – and
needing two off the last, wicketkeeper Brunner (who
had scored 72) played and missed at Maher and
was stumped, ensuring that the match was drawn.
Unfortunately, it was an under-strength Cygnets
side which took to the field against Sherborne on the
Friday. Some late call-offs left us with only ten players,
and increasingly frantic late pleas to just about anyone
(including Bryanston skipper and former Cygnets guest
player Nick Marshall, Jon Marsh’s girlfriend Anna, and
even a waiter from the Wimborne Tandoori) over the
preceding 24 hours to make up our numbers fell on
deaf ears. There was momentary relief when Sherborne
could only muster ten, too, but it proved to be a game
too far for some of the Cygnets batsmen as they soon
slumped to 36-5 in good batting conditions. Whether
or not the modern obsession with Twenty20 cricket has
hampered the skills used to build a patient innings, some
injudicious shot selection was certainly to blame and
although Andy Harms (35) and George Gillard (13)
spared the hosts from utter humiliation, being bowled
out for 90 in a 40-over game on a flat wicket meant
the result was a foregone conclusion. Sherborne’s
openers made swift work of the target, which they
reached within 12 overs without losing a wicket, and
the match was decided even before the tea van had
arrived to end another enjoyable old boys’ cricket week.
Tom Darby made sure he retained the ‘Cygnet
of the Week’ trophy after averaging 98 with the bat,
while Tom Blackburn saw off his only serious rival,
Tom ‘Crime’ Aiken, to be awarded the accolade
of ‘COW’ for the fourth successive year.
Once again, our thanks go to everyone who
supported us this year, particularly Ben Edgell, Mark
Burley and the Canford groundstaff and caterers,
without whom the week would not be possible – and
to team organiser Andy Harms, who coped manfully
to juggle the ever-changing availability of players and
get us out on the field. We’re always keen to attract
new players – and I stress that we welcome players
of all levels of ability (or lack of it – my continued
presence in the team after two decades surely proves
this), with enjoyment and enthusiasm for the game
being the most important factors. If you want to play
next year, email Andy at cygnetscricket@yahoo.co.uk
or contact us via the Canford Cygnets XI Facebook
group. (NB Anyone who bowls anything other
than right-arm seam is particularly encouraged!)
Mark Mitchener
Netball
Left to right: 3 honorary
OCs, Emma Ward,
honorary OC, Marie-Louise
Sharp, Annie Kilpatrick
and Rosie Moffat
36
It was the Old Canfordian ladies’ debut appearance
at the Bournemouth 7s netball tournament. The old
girls’ netball team consisted of those who perhaps
play quite a lot of netball socially, some who hadn’t
played in a while and one or two honorary Canford
ringers to whom we were grateful as pulling together
an old girls’ netball team was a victory in itself with
people away or injured or otherwise unavailable.
The team had rather optimistically been
entered in the National Cup tournament, where
national teams who regularly train and compete
together flock to Bournemouth to play in one
of the best tournaments of the summer.
The tournament consisted of round robin matches
on the first day, then the best teams competed for
the cup the next day while the slightly less proficient
teams played for the plate. The standard was as
high as many of the other teams were ridiculously
tall, and the Canford team ended up in the plate
competition. The team played some surprisingly good
netball in the heat of the sun that weekend, despite
being a slightly DIY outfit, and managed to win three
of their matches against national teams, but it was
not quite enough to reach the final of the plate.
However, we had a fantastic weekend together,
reviving our love of netball and re-kindling and
beginning new friendships across all the ages past
of ladies who went to Canford and play netball. I
thank Canford for entering us into such an excellent
tournament and for the fun it allowed us to have
representing Canford again, and perhaps ask that
next year we are entered in one of the fancy dress
or social tournaments, where we could be just as
competitive but perhaps win a few more matches!
Thanks to Rosie Moffat (W04), Emma Ward (Ma04),
Annie Kilpatrick (L12), Gina Huxstep, Emily Parry,
Nathalie Guinamard and Abby Howard (all honorary
OCs) for all putting in excellent netball performances.
I am sad to say that after ten years of fun, I am
handing on the mantle of OC netball representative
to a younger ‘old girl’ – yet to be assigned! I will still be
very much involved and keen to play, but it is always
good to have new blood at the helm. Thank you again
to Canford and Mark Burley for all their support
in keeping OC netball alive and kicking. For Old
Canfordian ladies interested in playing in the yearly old
girls’ netball tournament at Canford, and hopefully in
the newly instituted appearance at the Bournemouth
7s, there is a Facebook group with information
throughout the year: ‘Old Canfordian Netballers’
https://www.facebook.com/groups/363270506777/
Marie-Louise Sharp (S03)
Hockey
Springtime this year again saw the OCs return to
Canford for their annual hockey match against the
school 1st XI. As we won last year’s encounter, it was
well received by many turning out that we might be in
for a bit more of a challenge in 2013 than in previous
years. Rick Raumann, ex-hockey coach to many who
were nowadays pulling on the black, green and blue
shirts of the OCs, took great delight in telling us that
Canford’s current coaching staff were all agreed that
this year’s 1st XI was ‘probably as good a side as
Canford have ever had’, with the team having won the
West of England tournament en route to the National
Finals which were taking place after the OC match.
After the disappointment of not retaining the
Haileybury 6s cup at their last outing, the OCs were
keen to turn things around at the first possible
opportunity and the ragged band of players
amassed for this fixture was, one hoped, the exact
mix of youth and experience needed for such a
challenge. Lining up in goal the OCs had Andrew
Isaacs (S05) making his OC debut, as well as Nick
Batho (F66), Gerard Chalkly-Maber (S10), Nathan
Riddell (S10) and Ben Upton (F10), who all pulled
on the OC hockey shirt for the first of what we
hope will be many appearances to come.
A fast-paced game ensued and before long,
under the marshalling of some wise old heads like
Matt Collison (F97) and Ben Major (M98), we had
taken the lead – a lead that would ultimately not
be overcome by the young pups of Canford. The
OCs ended up putting 5 goals past the 1st XI to
claim another solid victory in what has now become
an extremely entertaining annual match, with Matt
Collison bagging a hat-trick and Tom Myatt (M04)
and Ben Major also each making the score sheet.
There were some notable performances also from
Ben Upton, Andy Smith (W04) and Nick Batho; the
latter became one of the most experienced OCs to
turn out for the hockey team for quite some time,
and we look forward to him playing again next year!
Also in the squad were Tom Darby (M10), Andy
Harms (L02) and Jimmy Thomasson (W04). For the
record, Canford 1st XI did go on the win the Boarding
Schools Cup soon after our game and we are reliably
informed that the only team the school lost to in the
course of that year was on a pre-season tour to India
when they lost to an U18 hockey academy team
who trained for four to five hours a day. It must also
be said that the team we faced was a mixture of 1st
XI regulars and development players, with Canford
management adopting a rotation policy that most
Premiership football managers would have been proud
of. It was a superb effort and result nonetheless.
Looking ahead, we have the annual 6-a-side
tournament at Haileybury in October. As ever,
we are always keen to have new players turning
out for the OCs whatever the age or experience,
so please do get in touch! Our email address
is oldcanfordianhockey@googlemail.com.
Nick Scott (M01)
The OCs on the attack in
the game against the school
Rugby
As the Bournemouth 7s festival gets bigger and better,
the standard of the tournament increases greatly and
the 2013 competition certainly reflected this. For this
year’s OC team the limited numbers available put paid
to their chances of achieving huge success, but the guys
involved deserve huge credit for putting their bodies
on the line in gloriously hot conditions. Although the
Bournemouth 7s is a fantastic opportunity for OCs
of different generations to meet up, the competitive
nature of the event means that we would love to give
a strong account of ourselves, so if anyone is interested
in playing next year, make sure you get in touch.
This year’s competition saw the boys go down to
a controversial and narrow defeat in the first match,
losing 7-12. An unsurprisingly sloppy first half saw
the team go two tries down but a stirring secondhalf comeback reduced the deficit and after Ben
Stevenson put Aidan Lindsay Wood away for the
equalising try in the dying seconds of the game, it
appeared the points had been shared. Unfortunately
the referee disallowed the try for a forward pass,
much to the dismay of the players and supporters.
The second match of the group saw the OCs
compete against last year’s winners of the Cider
Cup and a much improved performance saw the
guys come out on top. The match saw some big
hits flying in from James Stephenson and Matt
Donnelly and the ‘hot stepping’ of Tom Jenvey was
very much to the fore as the team’s playmaker.
Bruce Fulton and Albert Bridges ran in some great
tries and the team came out on top by 35-20.
The final match of the group saw the OCs up against
a team consisting of several Welsh premiership players
and, despite a strong start, the players ran out of steam.
When Jack Tredrea limped out with a knee injury
and Ben Stevenson’s hamstring injury prevented him
from joining the fray, the squad was down to a bare 7
players. The team were bolstered by 1st XV player of
37
Sport
the year Niall Brown but the fatigue factor played its
part as the Welsh side ran in three unanswered tries.
Nevertheless, the OCs had qualified for the
semi-finals of the plate competition the next day,
although the significant bumps and bruises incurred
by the squad meant hopes weren’t too high for
the team’s progress in the competition! As one
would expect, the players used the evening well
to rest and recuperate, with significant amount of
ice used to soothe the aches and sprains – the
cider would have been a bit warm otherwise!
Stalwart OC rugby representative Bruce Fulton
unfortunately could not play in the semi-final as
he had to catch the bus back up to Durham and,
considering he had taken an overnight bus on the
Friday night to make the tournament, his efforts in
representing the team were pretty heroic. However,
this allowed perennial Bournemouth 7s super sub
Callum Kellas to step into the breach for the semifinal but despite his guile and gas (not speed, I
should add) the OCs came undone against a strong
Wimborne RFC team masquerading as the Colehill
Library who had OC Mike Pride (S09) in their ranks.
OC Squad: James Stephenson (S10), Matt Donnelly
(S06), Jack Tredrea (SH10), Callum Kellas (M10), Niall
Brown (S13), Bruce Fulton (SH10), Tom Jenvey (C10),
Albert Bridges (F10), Ben Stevenson (L05), Aidan
Lindsay Wood (C11), Ollie Marshall (guest). I would
like to thank all the guys for their efforts in coming
back to represent the OCs and I do hope we can
continue to field a team in this major tournament. It
might well be of interest to some of the older OC
rugby players that the tournament also runs a touch
rugby competition, so if there is interest in entering
this event then please let me or Alex Richards know.
Mark Burley (msb@canford.com)
Golf
Shooting
Canford arrived at the 2013 Halford Hewitt in
high spirits after a quarter-final display in 2013, only
to fall at the first fence to Bedford. But the team will
deliver next year and great fun was had by all: the
evening before the Bedford match, there was a great
gathering of 23 OC golfers, down to support the
team and then offering their services as caddies the
next morning, at Chequers restaurant. The highlight
was our captain, Stephen Goodwin, being locked
out of his B&B after participating in a nightcap too
many and having to sleep in his car! It was a huge
effort by Nick Pomeroy to fly in from Dubai and
by David Restall from France to make the event.
The OCs shooting team met again at Bisley to take
part in the Schools Veterans shoot. This shoot is
part of the annual Imperial meeting and consists of
two sighters and then ten rounds to be shot from
the 500-yard firing point on Century range. The
weather was sunny and warm with a steady wind
running at about 2 minutes of angle from the righthand side of range. The shooters were coached by
Richard Dyball (S82) and Rod Philpott (M80), and
John Smith (W53) provided welcomed support.
Their scores (out of a possible 50.10) were: Richard
Dyball 37.1; Rod Philpott 36.2; Miles Halton (B91) 34;
Jerry King (W50) 32; Charlie Richards (W90) 25.
Richard Dyball
v. Bedford in the 1st round: Matt Suggett (L03) &
Jon Putman (S06) won 5&4; Nick Pomeroy (S94)
& Phil Steen(F06) won 2&1; Ben Tice (M01) &
Chris Kerr (SH01) lost 4&2; James Lovett (W98)
& Christian Hayward (W11) lost 3&2; David
Restall (C83) & Jeff Archer (SH69) lost 5&4.
In the Plate: beat Forest 2/1, beat Glenalmond 2/1,
lost to Bradfield ½. The Plate team was Suggett
& Putman, Pomeroy & Steen, Lovett & Kerr.
Ben Richards (B84)
OC Sport Organisers
Cricket
Andrew Harms (L02)
07968 506423
cygnetscricket@yahoo.co.uk
Rowing
James Parris (C98)
07855 480303
jamesarparris@gmail.com
Sailing
Tom Montgomery (S98)
07517 469312
montgomeryt@jettailors.com
Left to right: Charlie Richards, John Smith, Miles Halton, Richard Dyball.
Jerry King was absent and Rod Philpott was taking the picture.
Golf
Ben Richards (B84)
023 8076 9117
ben.richards@officeteam.co.uk
Royal Tennis, Squash & Lawn Tennis
David Harms (L99)
07973 924767
daveharms@hotmail.com
Shooting
Rod Philpott (M80)
020 8549 9334
rod@hamiltonknight.com
Clay Pigeon Shooting
Hockey
Nick Scott (M01)
07919 622024
oldcanfordianhockey@
googlemail.com
Rugby
Alex Richards (C04)
07796 957771
cygnetsrugby@yahoo.co.uk
and
Netball
Marie-Louise Sharp (S03)
marielouise.sharp@googlemail.com
38
Running
Chris Beaven (S08)
07887 937 237
christopher_e_beaven@ymail.com
Richard Dyball (S82)
07971 973342
richard.dyball@btinternet.com
For dates of OC sports fixtures
see page 11
Mark Blackden (B51) is organising a clay pigeon shoot
at West Kent Shooting Ground in April 2014. The event
will take place during the week and will cost £35 for
100 clays and tea or coffee. If you are interested in taking part please contact
Mark on markblackden@btinternet.com.
OVERSEAS REPRESENTATIVES
Australia
Alan Wilson (S48) 179/33-93 Spinifex Avenue, Tea Gardens,
NSW 2324, Australia
tel: 00 61 24997 0310
email: awilsona@bigpond.net.au
Netherlands
Frans Glazener (F78)
Elzenlaan 19,
1214 KJ Hilversum
tel: 00 31 35 6237415
email: fransglazener@gmail.com
David Combe (C45)
64 Ardross Street,
Applecross,
Perth WA 6153
tel: 00 61 8 9364 5731
email: davecombe@yahoo.com.au
New Zealand
Rob Morton (SH56)
P O Box 37520,
Parnell, Auckland, 1151
tel: 00 64 9 3790679
email: rsmorton@xtra.co.nz
Canada
Mike Petre (F63)
#201, 223 Tuscany Springs Blvd NW,
Calgary, AB T3L 2M2
tel: 00 1 403 239 8076
email: mickeypm@telus.net
NORWAY
Ian Spink (C57)
Andersdammen 27,
1389 Heggedal
tel: 00 47 6678 9109
email: IanRSpink@gmail.com
Caribbean
Martin Dalgleish (SH63)
Dunbar Mill, Nevis,
St Kitts and Nevis
tel: 00 869 469 2764
email: dalgleishj72@alum.darden.edu
SINGAPORE & MALAYSIA
Tom Tizard (M04)
B-2-7 Dua Residency, 211 Jalan Tun Razak,
Kuala Lumpur, 50450 Malaysia
tel: 0060 12395 7114
email: tom_tizard@yahoo.co.uk
China
Henry Gill (F01)
1603 OOCL Plaza, 841 Yanan Middle Road,
Jing An District, Shanghai 200040
tel: 00 86 21 6289 7588
email: henry.gill@demonchy.cn
South Africa
David Ralph (SH67)
PO Box 55159, Northlands,
Johannesburg 2116
tel: 00 27 11 326 6533 mob: 00 27 83 455 7555
email: ralphad@iafrica.com
GERMANY
Tatjana König (SH84)
Rotherstrasse 1,
10245 Berlin
tel: 00 49 711594284
email: tatjanakoenig@gmx.de
Benjamin Ewbank (B94)
c/o Michael Page International,
1st floor, Convention Tower,
Foreshore, Cape Town 8001
tel: 00 27 72250 2816
email: benewbank@michaelpage.co.za
Ireland
John McFarlane (S67)
Ballyhue, Mount Lucas, Daingean,
Tullamore, Co Offaly
tel: 00 353 579 353552
email: jmcfarlane1@iolfree.ie
SPAIN
John Rowe (W57)
Urb les Fonts 10,
03726 Benitachell
tel: 00 63 723 7883
email: johnhr2003@yahoo.com
Israel
Nathan Ginsbury (F59)
PO Box 317, 42 102
Netanya
tel: 00 972 9 882 7489
email: nathan@nr-ginsbury.com
Italy
Jessima Timberlake (S91)
Via Pietro Risso 27/5
16032 Camogli (GE)
tel: 00 39 185 773543
email: jessimatimberlake@alice.it
SWITZERLAND
Jonny Rea (W86)
Laverstrasse 51,
8002 Zurich
tel: 043 542 4173
email: reajonathan@hotmail.com
USA
Jeremy Fergusson (F64)
223 Walnut Avenue, Wayne,
PA 19087
tel: 00 1 610 687 8036
email: ferguss@earthlink.net
KENYA
Natasha Di Cangio, née Tundo (Ma97)
P.O.Box 9712, Lanet 20112, Nakuru
tel: 00 254 0202064126
mob: 00 254 734748332
email: tashtundo@hotmail.com
Richard Gowar (C73)
24940 Fairwinds Lane,
Bonita Springs,
FL 34135
tel: 00 1 239 676 9751
email: rjgowar@gmail.com
MIDDLE EAST & UAE
Nick Pomeroy (S94) c/o DMG, PO Box 33817, Dubai,
United Arab Emirates
tel: 00 971 50 7084844
email: nickpomeroydxb@gmail.com
Tom Coombes (B88) 7421 Cervantes Place,
Los Angeles,
CA 90046
tel: 00 1 310 467 5644
email: Tom.Coombes@cognitomedia.com
39