School days  St Sebastian's Primary School 1958 -1966.

1. Nursery. I don't remember a great deal from my Nursery Days but when I was 21 my Mum gave me a memory pack which had a School Concert Programme listing me as the Conductor of The Nursery Orchestra. I do remember waving my arms around in front of the rattles and shakers. I'm not sure if I got the job because I couldn't play anything in time or because they thought I looked cute with a bow tie on. Ironic that I became a Music Teacher and ended up conducting School Orchestras and Bands for many years.

The Garden in the Nursery was adjacent to the Dominican Monks Friary which may have given me a start in religious leanings. I took a message over one day and I remember being given a custard cream. Thinking back that was a sign of the times as I'm sure children of nursery age don't go on errands anymore. I even remember going to buy my Dad's Woodbines when I was probably only six or seven or even younger.

I also remember the afternoon sleep although I rarely opted for that as I liked playing and when I did go to the little wooden framed beds I tended to look round at everyone else rather than snooze.

2. Infants.One memory of being in the Infants was the big jar of Dolly Mixtures that was kept in the Headteachers Office.It was used for bribery to get goods for the Christmas Fair and other deeds seemed fit to earn rewards. Nice as it was it would be seen as appalling now with Healthy Eating campaigns. 

In May there was a procession Church culminating in the Crowning of the May Queen. I found out years later that the hat full of names was full of duplicates of a select few.. Every year a Cutie came out of the hat, quite a scandal looking back. 

St.Charles' Hall was a local venue on Whit Lane where the annual Fancy Dress party was held. My Mum was very resourceful and pulled off a good one. I was dressed in a Nappy and carried a bar of Fairy Soap. Another I did a double act with my Brother where he was given a bucket of fish.and they dressed me as a Penguin. 

The Venue was also used for school concerts and one year I sang Adeste Fidelis in Latin dressed as an angel. I opened the show another year singing 76 Trombones from The Music Man. Another Irony as years later I became known as The Music Man in several circles.

3. Juniors - Moving up to Juniors was exciting but filled with trepidation.My brother was a School Football star so there was an expectation for me and I was asked to train with the school team who were three years older. I got my first game aged 8 but if I'm being honest was not ready for that. The following year I got a regular place and scored two goals in one game. The following year I was top scorer with five which doesn't say a lot about how good we were. 

The team sheet was normally posted on a Friday which meant going to the toilets in lessons was designed to see the team. One day I went out and the team had 10 players on it and a ? Mine was missing and it turned out I was the question mark as we had an outstanding 8 year old who was being considered to replace me. Fortunately he couldn't play that day and I learnt a lot from that shock. Never take anything for granted, look at yourself, bounce back and prove them wrong. I tried really hard and was complimented for my performance and ended up playing alongside the rising star .

Although the Football team was not the best in the area we did win a trophy with our Road Safety team. We were knocked out in the Semi Final in year 5 but got to the Final in 1966. Our speciality were the new continental road signs introduced in 1965. The Final against St.Thomas of Canterbury was very exciting. The quiz run by The Police in conjunction with Salford Education Committee involved two rounds, the first on The Highway Code and the second on the road signs. 

After round one St.Thomas had a big lead so with only limited points to go we had to pull out all the stops.The final had buzzers on the open questions and we were red hot. At one point we had got every question and St Thomas asked for a buzzer check but there was no issue. We went on to win by one point. The next morning in assembly the Headteacher, Mr Blackely presented us with a trophy as he had been at the school for many years without ever winning anything.The Official trophy went back after a year but we got engraved trophies to keep. When I reached the age of 65 I was looking throught my trophies and decided to donate it to the school where hopefully it resides in a prominent place.

Back in 1966 the 11 plus was the order of the day and I passed which gave me the opportunity to go to De la Salle. That involved an entrance exam which would have put me into a posh uniformed and Rugby playing School. I had to miss a school football game to sit the entrance exam on a Saturday morning. The night before I woke up and heard my Mum crying downstairs. I sneaked down and she was worried about the cost of the uniform which has a monopolised supplier along with other costs. I was brought up in a house with Love and never really saw ourselves as poor. The next day I went to the entrance exam and answered all the questions with stupid answers such as the square root of 9 was an elephant. When the results came out Mr.Blakely was clearly shocked that I'd not passed and asked me what went wrong. " I don't know " was my response. God looked after me as a few months later it was announced that a new Grammar School was opening and I would be given a place there. It turned out to be a great move and helped me to be a bigger fish in the pool.

Secondary School St.Peter' Grammar Technical School 1966 -1974