Charney Hall School, Grange-over-Sands

 Sir Timothy Kitson 1931-2019 The former Conservative MP for Richmond, North Yorkshire 1959-83 and PPS to Prime Minister Edward Heath died on May 18 2019. He must have attended Charney Hall between 1939-44.  The publication of Timothy Kitson’s marriage to Diana Fattorini in the Charney Hall Notes of November 1960 Here are some more references and photographs.    credit GettyImages https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwin5MCg2L7tAhU1olwKHRJ3CVAQFjAFegQIBhAC&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thetimes.co.uk%2Farticle%2Fsir-timothy-kitson-obituary-f6knq6xj8&usg=AOvVaw0DJHe_RIImgxbBd8pqzFRZ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Kitson https://members.parliament.uk/member/1070/career https://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/22192/timothy_kitson/richmond_%28yorks%29

Whilst tidying up my iPad this unpublished draft appeared without notice on the screen.....it refers to Life’s googlies.....Iittle did I know that one was just about to be bowled at the planet...      Grange-over-Sands “ I’ve lived the life of a teenager for more than 60yrs, by-passed middle age and suddenly I have realised that I am an old man and have run out of time.....how do I know? People no longer look at me on the street. It is as though I no longer exist. I’ve survived 4 economic recessions and at the end of my working life my income, allowing for inflation, was little more than when I first embarked on the career of my choice. I’ve had 2 wives, 2 children, 2 step-children, 4 jobs, 10 cars, bought 3 homes, had numerous holidays and at times worked all the hours in a day. When I retired the back-up files of the most productive part of my life fitted on a few dvds......for me that put it all into rude perspective - what was all that about?  I have no...

Post Updated 30-04-2024 : Earlier photo of JRH added at end of post On the first page of the 1960 edition of Charney Hall Notes published in the November of that year, Maxwell Duncan announced the retirement of Raymond Hirst, the joint headmaster since April 1937. Here is the article, headed with a photo of JRH, kindly supplied by Alison Lebègue, his granddaughter.

I would like to thank Stephen and Anthony for making these photographs available for the blog. I have digitised, de-spotted and improved them wherever possible. Please also see more photographs published under ‘School Year/Team Photographs’ from their collection. 1 Stephen Halstead in school uniform 1954 2 Family Group 1957/58  3 The Cricket Match 1960 This photograph was severely underexposed but once digitised, de-spotted and improved has turned out to be a really beautiful snap bringing out the atmosphere of a school cricket match on a hot summer’s day 4 That’s Stephen walking in front of the Jaguar 5 Charney Hall School 1960 6 Mr McCullagh  1960/61 Correction :The Lodge not Grove House! 7 A Walk to Cartmel 1960/61

Post updated Aug 2021 Here is what I believe may be the first prospectus published by the new owners of Charney Hall ,  Maxwell Duncan and Raymond Hirst. They acquired the school in 1937 from Conrad Podmore, the founder’s son who died before completion of the sale. The prospectus refers to the ‘modern open-air sea-water swimming-pool’ and the school fees of 45 guineas a term, a bargain today, equates to £9700 a year at current costs. Some may say ‘excellent value for money’ especially when the fees for a public school education are now in the order of 30K a year . There is a subtle reminder that the cricket and football pavilions had been donated by a parent, perhaps sowing the seed of future bequests. The photograph of the Memorial Hall may trigger memories of what actually was displayed on those walls! I can honestly say that I do not remember vases of daffodils in season and carefully folded napkins, artfully set against glasses on dining tables - well before my ti...

The name Windscale probably doesn’t mean much to the children of today but in the October of 1957 the newspapers were full of an incident which took place just around the Cumberland coast near the small village of Seascale. We knew all about Seascale because we played football and cricket against its preparatory school. Fully exposed to the Irish Sea its location was forbidding, cold and wind swept, not at all like the more gentile, protected shores of Morecambe Bay. Now reinvented as Sellafield, Windscale was Britain’s first nuclear power plant. It was originally built to produce the ominously named plutonium, a radioactive chemical element used in the hydrogen bomb, and a constituent of ‘Fat Man’ the atomic bomb which was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan and hastened the end of World War II. Plutonium was a product of the Manhattan Project, a top secret American venture during World War II that worked exclusively to develop an atomic bomb. Los Alamos Laboratory tested t...

The Injection I can’t recall  when  and I can’t remember  how  I found myself one ill fated day, standing at the end of a queue outside Matron’s office, located mid-way down the first floor corridor.  My fear of needles has never really left me to this day and in the 1950s the sugar lump had not been invented and so, to my horror, we were to be given our first shot of anti-polio vaccine by injection into the upper arm. With the cold steel of needles came the smell of cotton wool soaked in antiseptic spirits and kidney shaped stainless steel trays. Dr Jonas Salk, an American, was responsible for developing the vaccine and the torture that went with it but we were told that he was an eminent scientist and the procedure was perfectly safe. What we did know was that it was better than catching that terrible disease in the local swimming pool*.  The government of the day were also culpable as they had decreed that all children should be vaccinated in a...