Your Caretaker and
Groundsman Memories
School
Caretaker between 1949 and 1956 was Mr
Fred Yates. The groundsman until about
1954 was Mr Gurney when he left to work
for Everton at Goodison Park. He was a
tyrant to anyone trespassing/damaging his
/beloved grass. His daily ritual after
first dinner was to stroll very slowly
from his hut to remove the rope which he
had stretched across the gap between the
dining room and the sshool. Anyone
crossing the line before the ritual was
completed usually ended up "on the
roller" for half an hour. His
replacement, sadly, was by no means as
competent or knowledgable about
"matters horticultural". In the
easter break of 1956 he covered the whole
of the cricket square with a neat weed
killer "because it was raining at
the time". When we returned there
was not a blade of grass to be seen. It
is no wonder we didn't have a very good
season that year. [Norman Bridge]
Groundsman
at Prescot Grammar School during my spell
there was a Mr.Gurney, who was rather
unpleasant- well, he got a few of us into
hot water with the Head, R.S.Briggs,
culminating in a caning for all of us
-myself, Keith Tattersall, Brian
Speakman, Peter Berry and perhaps one or
two more. We were in the bottom field
playing `javelins` with spikes from an
old railing when he turned up to stop our
impromptu Olympics and reported us. I
suppose it was an early example of the
current `Health & Safety`
preoccupation... [Gordon
Williams]
I
remember Ted the groundsman shouting
about his cricket wicket at anyone who
dared to trespass over it - what a shame
we no longer have these secondary
authoritative figures to be afraid of ;
station masters (eggy Joe at Huyton
station ) park keepers, cockey watchmen ,
hitler , I suppose the youth of today
have no fear of authority ,safe in the
knowledge they wont be called up to
defend their country. [Anon]
I
can not remember Ted but I do remember
his hut where he kept all his gear. I
also remember the cricket areas (lovely
grass by the way) being vandalised and
dug up before the start of the new season
so he must have been going mental about
that. Obviously a man who was kept busy
because our playing fields were HUGE.
"All Round The Fields (of St Helens
Rd)", doesn't sound quite so good as
the Kop version! [Anon]
The No 2
"groundsman" was Mr Beesley,
the caretaker. He must have been there
for ages for he retired in about 1946. He
was replaced by someone whose name I
cannot remember.
However, when in
the 6th Form 50-53, a pal and I went
moleing, ie exploring the passageways
beneath the school. On one occasion, we
got almost to the washrooms when we
discovered a flood of hot water from a
leaking pipe. We told the caretaker and
he promised not to tell RSB. He told RSB
that he had located the flood himself on
a "routine inspection".
Thereafter, we had much hotter water to
wash our hands. [Dr. John
Wilmott].
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