Tuckshop tawsing

I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I pleaded with her since I was not interested in bending over a chair for 6 of the best. She agreed to forget about the incident if I would accept 12 of the best from her with one of the licorice tawses that were very popular with the students.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
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larry1951
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May 03, 2009#2
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Welcome back, Esmerelda!
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Emily
May 03, 2009#3
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I also attended a private girls school in Aberdeen and will admit that the licorice tawse was sometimes used for disciplinary purposes.

It was an open secret amongst most of the girls that any tawse that was heavily discounted at the tuckshop was very suspect. However most of the licorice tawses that were sold at the tuck shop were of the Lochgelly variety and were very robust.

The McRostie, which were of course a lot cheaper were not really considered tough enough for a very effective tawsing and were used mainly for very minor infringements.

I also worked in the tuck shop occasionally and received the occasional taste of the McRostie. However in most cases I was allowed to keep my knickers up.

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thirsty
May 03, 2009#4
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Emily we is not stupid and we do not want none of your nonsence. Don’t ask me to tell you want school I went to. I’m on FR but I’m not telling you where in North London.
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Emily
May 03, 2009#5
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Could you please translate your message into English?
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Another_Lurker
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May 03, 2009#6
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
To misquote Percy Bysshe Shelley’s immortal line from ‘Ode to the West Wind’, if Esmerelda (aka HRH) and Emily come, can Leanne, Cynthia, Anthea, Christine, Sally, Emma, Evelyn, Cassandra, Angelena, Asquith, Eric and Observer be far behind?
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Alan Turing
May 03, 2009#7
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I must apologise for the abysmal quality of my prediction. It seems that the Spring Term has been missed out completely, and that we are restarting only with the advent of the Summer Term. Perhaps some sort of sandwich course is involved?

(By the way, whose behind are you talking about? )
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Another_Lurker
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May 03, 2009#8
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
And as the fun posting hordes once again assemble to lay siege to this estimable Forum, may I please make a heartfelt request?

Gentlemen, try liquorice tawses, candy canes, instant whip, but please, no more Scottish Boarding Houses! Anything you like really, but definitely no Scottish Boarding Houses!

Hi Alan, yes, it looks as if we were both wrong. I hope your suggestion regarding some sort of sandwich course being involved is indeed correct. At least then we’d have the satisfaction of knowing that they’d been doing some honest graft for a few weeks!

You say:

By the way, whose behind are you talking about?

Dunno really, you’d have to ask Mr Shelley! All I’ll say is if the behind involved belongs to a fun poster I hope someone lays several hard strokes of a J Dick ROSLA Lochgelly across it asap!
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Steveinplymouth
May 03, 2009#9
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

At least the exclusive private schools have moved into somewhere less exotic than the Cayman Islands. Not any more believeable for it, but it’s a little less strain on the credibility of it all.

Mind you, the idea of such frivolity as a tuck shop en suite in Aberdeen, in the heart of eat-salt-or-volcanic gravel-with-your-porridge country. All this, too, a mere 50 miles from Peterhead Prison, where the officers were still armed with cutlasses until 1965!

Now, tickling the behind of the t-rolls with one of those-yes!!

Steve M
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Another_Lurker
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May 03, 2009#10
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Hey, lads, be grateful.

Yes, I guess you are right really, at least it has got us all posting!

You also say:

Mind you, the idea of such frivolity as a tuck shop en suite in Aberdeen, in the heart of eat-salt-or-volcanic gravel-with-your-porridge country.

Aberdeen seems to loom large in the imagination of a section of our fun posters. If you recall it was there that the B***ding H***es wherein (never seen, but often overheard) the female proprietors wielded a variety of tawses on their young lady lodgers tended to be situated. I can’t imagine that our fun posters actually hail from Aberdeen, since, as is well known, Aberdonians don’t indulge in anything as frivolous as humour. I should know, I worked for one for a few years! Perhaps our fun posters find Aberdeen easier to spell than Edinburgh – who knows?

Fascinating snippet about the cutlasses at Peterhaven. Where on earth did you pick that one up? A little Googling confirms that officers at Peterhead did indeed wear a scabbard and cutlass, although there seems to be fairly general agreement that this ceased in 1939. Amazingly some sources suggest that rifles were then carried up to 1959, when officers ceased to carry weapons!
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Steveinplymouth
May 03, 2009#11
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Came out of a book called Bible John & Such Bad Company.

The author was a Glasgow crime journalist for some many years in Glasgow. Scotland’s worst confirmed mass murderer, Peter Manuel, had a chapter to himself & it was there I read this.

Cutlasses were almost certainly purely ceremonial after 1939, but they were most definitely worn, as that is also mentioned in the chapter about Jim Griffiths or Jimmy Boyle, who were up the Quarry(granite is Peterhead’s big trade asset)some while later.

Peter Manuel was sent up to Peterhead from Barlinnie in the early 1950’s because he was so violent in the nick. He was actually almost certainly innocent of the rape for which he was at that time imprisoned, though he was a career housebreaker and thief before this conviction.

Unfortunately, doing 8 years for it removed what little restraint his psychopathic personality had. He set out to make the Lanarkshire police’s life hell.

So, two teenage girls were battered to death & two families of 3 all shot dead in 2 separate burglaries between late 1956 and early 1958. He also almost certainly also murdered a taxi-driver in Northumberland, who took a wrong turning with him in the back & he further confessed in the condemned cell to 4 other unsolved murders, all of which fitted his profile, and then looked like dry runs for his Lanarkshire campaign!

And yet, he went back to the scene of his 2nd family killing 5 days in a row to feed the family cat twice a day.

Might, of course, be all those fumes from the oil industry that’s causing these hallocugenic effects re BH’s and Tuck Shops up Granite City way.

Steve M

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Another_Lurker
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May 03, 2009#12
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Hi Steve, ‘Bible John & Such Bad Company’ sounds a good read. What a pity I only read mountaineering books, computer manuals and the Daily Torygraph or I’d look around for it!

You say:

And yet, he went back to the scene of his 2nd family killing 5 days in a row to feed the family cat twice a day.

I normally hold that anyone who loves animals can’t be all bad. It has to be said though that some people do try very hard to disprove this, and it sounds as though Peter Manuel was one of them.

You also say:

Might, of course, be all those fumes from the oil industry that’s causing these hallocugenic effects re BH’s and Tuck Shops up Granite City way.

Yes, it may even be that rather than students with two lectures a week and too much time on their hands our fun posters are actually roustabouts whiling away the long hours and hard manual work on a North Sea oil rig by dreaming of young ladies being chastised with tawses, liquorice or otherwise. Sadly, I guess we’ll never know!
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Declan
May 04, 2009#13
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
The Aberdeen angle is an interesting. I have an internet friend who is a teacher from Aberdeen. I did ask her what the tag was, which is mentioned on her Friends Reunited site, and she seemed to confirm that she had had the belt. This would obviously have been on the hand though!

She told me recently that she had taken her pupils om a trip to Peterhead prison, and complained that the prisoners had it too easy. She is probably quite strict, and I am thinking of ways of how to get the subject of punishment into our conversations. Bit of a tricky one, I don’t want to come across as obsessed with the subect, even though I am.
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Bridgette
May 04, 2009#14
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Having attended a variety of private boarding schools in and around Aberdeen during the late 1970s and early 1980s I am more familiar with the licorice tawse than Hansel was with Gretel.

However I have a few concerns regarding the very interesting posting by HRH.

1. Although during my school days prefects were allowed to administer very mild forms of cp such as a good old fashioned leg smacking, the use of the tawse, even a licorice one, was not permitted under any circumstances.

2. Even if it was permitted she exceeded her authority by administering more than the maximum 6 strokes.

3. The only teacher who was allowed to lower a girl’s knickers would have been the senior mistress.

Admittedly HRH was in an untenable position being caught with her fingers in the till, but I still feel she should not have accepted that type of punishment from a prefect. What say you?
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HRH
May 04, 2009#15
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Yes you are quite right. She exceeded her authority on many levels, but as you say I was in an untenable situation. If I went and spoke to the senior mistress, then the head prefect would have got into some trouble, but I would have received a certain 6 stroke caning.

The senior mistress at our school did not cane the prefects. The worst she could have expected was a good leg smacking if that. More than likely nothing would have been done about it.

But having said that I was pleased that I only received 8 with the licorice since she was quite keen on giving me 12 when I first pleaded with her.
As it turned out we became quite good friends after that, and she was willing to look the other way if by some chance the odd fiver or two happened to find itself in my pocket while I served in the tuck shop.

Thanks for your interest. Hope to hear from you again soon.
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Emily
May 04, 2009#16
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
While it is quite clear that tawsing was a very popular form of attitude correction in some parts of the UK up until even the early 1990s it is equally uncertain if the use of the licorice tawse did in fact contravene the ban on cp which I believe came into effect in the UK in the mid 1980s.

Having said that I think it would be remiss of me not to question the wisdom of allowing prefects to administer any form of cp to other students. While I will admit this was common practice in some private all girls schools in both Scotland and Ireland I understood that it was phased out by the early 1970s and was surprised to read of the account given by HRH in her very eloquent posting.

I attended a quite strict girls boarding school in Yorkshire in the late 1980s and there were always rumors about certain shenanigans taking place in the head prefect’s study, but in those days it was very hard to separate fact from fiction. This was an era in which cp was very common and it was unclear if the head prefect did have any authority to administer same.
I myself did receive a good seeing to by the head prefect on one occasion but prefer not to go into too much detail for obvious reasons. I am wondering if there are any women out there who could provide some useful information on this topic? Thank you for your time and patience.
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Another_Lurker
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May 04, 2009#17
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Got around a bit did you Emily?
I attended a private girls school in Aberdeen – Emily 12:29 on 3 May 2009.</li>
I attended a quite strict girls boarding school in Yorkshire – Emily 10:45 on 4 May 2009.</li>
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Alan Turing
May 04, 2009#18
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Of course, the message recording a move from Yorkshire to Aberdeen – or possibly from Aberdeen to Yorkshire – could be on its way to the thread, even as I write! I could probably compose it myself …..
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Another_Lurker
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May 04, 2009#19
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Hi Alan Turing. Glad to see that you are on the alert as well. You’d think that with the formidable intellects ranged against them these people would just give up and go away!

You say:

I could probably compose it myself …..

I do hope that doesn’t constitute a hint at a confession! On reflection I can quite imagine you coming up with liquorice tawses and punitive uses therefor.
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May 04, 2009#20
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

She told me recently that she had taken her pupils om a trip to Peterhead prison, and complained that the prisoners had it too easy. She is probably quite strict

I believe Peterhead is still regarded as one of the hardest nicks in the UK, so yes, I think you are right, she probably is quite strict!

If you can do so without blowing your cover (and I know how difficult this is) I think you should have another try at getting information from this lady, especially as you mentioned in an earlier thread that not only might she have received the tawse at school, she might have been in teaching long enough to have wielded one herself.

We could do with some genuine school CP stories. As I’m sure you’ve realised HRH, Emily and Bridgette in this thread are about as genuine as the 12 strokes of the candy cane on the bare buttocks that I received from the head prefect of the Girls High School in front of the entire assembly of the two schools on that momentous morning in May 1959. Ah happy days!
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Alan Turing
May 04, 2009#21
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Hmph! I feel most put out!
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Another_Lurker
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May 04, 2009#22
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Hi Alan. I trust that I don’t need to assure you that I was only joking!
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Declan
May 05, 2009#23
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

The lady from Aberdeen had a problem that prisoners from Peterhead were able to watch TV, go to the gym and have free dental treatment. When I mentioned my time in Immigration, she said she would love this job as she would be able to deport people! No wishy washy liberal then!

I think she would be too young to have wielded the tawse, but not too young to have recieved it, and more or less confirmed this. Her exact words were ” the tag is when we got the belt”

She has sent me another mildly abusive message, in fun, but on the open forum.I will try to get some more information about her, maybe just about school punishmente today, and whether she would like to bring the tawse back.
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Alan Turing
May 05, 2009#24
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

(Incidentally, a good strategy for smothering weeds is to introduce your own ground-cover plants.)
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Another_Lurker
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May 05, 2009#25
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

No wishy washy liberal then!

Indeed not, she sounds like a lady after my own heart! Pity about the age difference or I’d be seeking an introduction!

Hi Alan Turing. You say:

Incidentally, a good strategy for smothering weeds is to introduce your own ground-cover plants.

Since I upset you last time I shall totally refrain from any further remarks about confessional hints! Instead I’ll say a very relevant observation about ground-cover plants. I can strongly recommend Aegopodium Podagraria, works a treat!

Seriously, I hadn’t thought of it that way before, but we seem to have used the technique quite successfully so far in this thread. I have to say though that things are so thin at the moment that if our fun posters were posting anything even vaguely resembling a possibly feasible school corporal punishment story even I would be cheering them on. It’s getting so bad I may have to consider recycling my limited repertoire yet again!
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Steveinplymouth
May 05, 2009#26
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Ours at MGS was a definite cholesterol-builder. Several exceptionally non-PC cakes.

My own favourite was the Russian slice variation. Heavy and dark cake mix, just a shade darker and crumblier than bread pudding, with a slightly spongy pastry slice on top and bottom.

And white icing on top for the coup de grace.

I managed three once. If that’s not corporal punishment, I don’t know what is!

Steve M
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Another_Lurker
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May 06, 2009#27
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Did you guys have a tuck shop at school?

We certainly did at NHS, although after 50 odd years I don’t remember too much about it other than that apart from a few chocolate bars which occasionally appeared it mainly sold potted meat cobs1 made on the premises. This was the 1950s and potted meat cobs were a real treat – we were all half starved in those days as post war austerity was still rampant. We did get free milk though, distributed via a chaotic operation in one of the quads.

If I remember rightly the tuckshop only opened for morning break. The queues were massive and as reports were passed back down the line of how fast stocks were diminishing panic could set in. However riots were very rare as the tuckshop serving hatch was next door to the indoor rifle range, and the indoor rifle range was the domain of Sargeant Major Fell BEM. Even if you weren’t a member of the school CCF upsetting Sargeant Major Fell BEM was not a wise idea!

It’s a good job cakes such as those described by Steve were not sold in the NHS tuckshop, or I’d have been an even bigger lad than I already was! I have to say, Steve, that three of those at one sitting is disgusting!

Note 1: I am aware that outside the confines of Nottingham and district the word ‘cob’ can lead to some confusion. Think small round bread rolls with a crusty top!
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Alan Turing
May 06, 2009#28
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

But there were certainly a couple of real shops just fifty yards along the road, where you could buy bars of chocolate, things called “penny chews” and big bottles of harmless fizzy pop. One breaktime the music master gave me half a crown and asked me to get him a packet of cigarettes, and to say to the shopkeeper, explicitly, that they were “for Mr ***** “.

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Steveinplymouth
May 06, 2009#29
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I got sent down the road a few times to buy pipe tobacco for a couple of our teachers, too. As late as the 3rd year, for our form master, Killer Kemp, who smoked it teaching, too!!

And, our main entrance was a mock-castle gateway, 4 storeys. Wherein lived the caretaker, ex-CSM Chiefy Gude!

Up the top storey of the left-hand wing was OUR CCF rifle range. On the bottom floor of that was-the tuck shop; run by- CHIEFY!!

Quite astounding. And Chiefy, because yours truly always picked up the dirtiest job in detentions, was not averse to leaving the rifle range key in position on the odd lunchtime.

The tuckshop was open until halfway through lunch as well. Chiefy usually left the range key in situ after closing the tuck shop, proving that one good turn deserves another, as it was an excellent place for a quiet fag.

At least it was as long as the school’s Action Men weren’t honing their sharp-shooting skills at the same time. Even then, the cordite smell covered anything, including that disgusting grease you had to use on the ex-WWI Lee Enfields after firing.

Steve M
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Declan
May 06, 2009#30
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I’m afraid I do not have many memories of our school tuckshop. It was a modest affair which only sold buscuits. We certainly did not have a rifle range though, very strange to get boys shooting at school.

It does remind me of a story about tuckshops involving the Sunday Times journalist Rachel Johnson, the sister of the London Mayor , Boris. When Rachel was about 12 , and at boarding school , her and another girl broke into the tuckshop at night. They were found out and had to see the Headmaster.

He gave them the option of missing a weekend’s leave or taking a slippering. She hadn’t seen her parents or brother for ages, and didn’t think that the Headmaster would slipper a girl very hard. Therefore she chose a slippering.

She recently told this tale in her Sunday Times column, when her daughter noticed this story on the main SF&R site, and retold it with relish, claiming that the site was for celebrities who enjoyed being slippered.

It was retold a few weeks ago in a gossip column in The Telegraph which stated that there was a picture of her stating ” Rachel Johnson, she chose the slipper” There is indeed such a caption.

Clearly , Rachel enjoys recounting her punishments as do most of us.
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Another_Lurker
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May 07, 2009#31
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Wherein lived the caretaker, ex-CSM Chiefy Gude!

I guess every school with a CCF had one. Give the lads a taste of real military disciple etc. etc. I did actually once did see ours put on the act beloved of all sargeant majors. Stands close up behind unfortunate cadet who has caught his eye on parade and bellows in his ear

“Am I hurting you lad?”

“No Sir”

“Well I should be, I’m standing on your hair!”

And now Steve, make sure you are sitting down for the next bit, ‘cos I don’t want to give you too much of a shock!

I never had to deal with what you call:

that disgusting grease you had to use on the ex-WWI Lee Enfields after firing.

At that time I was an out and out anti-war, anti-militarist left winger! So much so that my nick-name at school was Red …., and it had absolutely nothing to do with the colour of my hair! I refused to join the CCF and so had to do Civil Defence instead. There was actually a national Civil Defence organisation at that time and on Wednesday afternoons those few of us who’d refused the call to the colours trained with them instead. Fascinating stuff like how to make a nuclear shelter for a family of four out of a dismounted internal door and some sticky-back plastic, and what to do if the Ruskies dropped an H-bomb in your back garden. Well, actually I lied about the sticky-back plastic, it hadn’t been invented then, but the rest is true!

The whole thing could be summed up in the ‘Beyond the Fringe” quote from a year or two later spoken by Peter Cooke:

Now, we shall receive four minutes warning of any impending nuclear attack. Some people have said, “Oh my goodness me four minutes? that is not a very long time!” Well, I would remind those doubters that some people in this great country of ours can run a mile in four minutes.”

Still, we enjoyed ourselves practicing ‘rescues’ in the artifical ‘nuked town’ ruins the CD had for training purposes, and some of the ropework and rigging came in handy when I got into climbing.

Hi Declan. As you’ve probably gathered if you’ve read this far the reason for the rifle ranges and lads shooting at school was because NHS, and Steve’s MGS were schools which had CCFs (Combined Cadet Forces). These were Army, Navy and Air Force contingents drawn from a school and operated under the auspices of the Armed Forces. Usually they were officered by teachers with NCOs and WOs being promoted pupils.

You say:

Corpun.com quotes an article here (scroll to the end of the page) by Rachel Johnson in ‘The Spectator’, London, 29 May 2004 where she says her partner in crime in this episode was actually a lad called Savile and the booty was Mars Bars. She refers to ‘Prep School’, so she may have been a bit younger than 12. She also says that in addition to the slipper the Headmaster’s armoury included a jokari bat and a golf club. A jokari bat looks ideal for the purpose, a sort of curvaceous wooden paddle, but I hope that she was joking about the golf club!

You also say:

Clearly , Rachel enjoys recounting her punishments as do most of us.

Yes indeed, otherwise this estimable Forum would be in a sorry state. I wish though that a few new candidates would step forward and recount said punishments. Come on folks, you must be out there somewhere!
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Doctor Dominum
May 07, 2009#32
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I just somehow lost a longish message I’d written about my tuckshop experiences. Most annoying. It just vanished in the middle of typing. I shall try to reconstruct it, but it is odd.

When I was a boy at school, we did have a tuckshop which we called the cally, but it was a fairly limited arrangement, that really only sold a range of lollies. I suspect the primary reason it existed was just that if it hadn’t been available, some of the day boys would have established a black market and taken advantage of the boarders, as they frequently did with cigarettes. There was a public shop just outside the school gates, but we were forbidden to use it and if we tried to, they’d phone the school and if you got caught, you’d likely get a caning. But we came up with a cunning plan. We concealed a ratty old raincoat under a dead tree near the gates and if you wore the raincoat thus concealing your school clothes, they would sell you meat pies and sausage rolls and similar fare. Looking back on it, obviously our plan wasn’t all that cunning and I suspect it simply provided an excuse for the shop to take our money and our custom – which was probably a fairly significant part of their patronage – while still telling the school they were honouring its requests not to serve us.

At the school I teach at, we’ve always had much more developed tuckshop arrangements (we are currently fighting what I suspect is a losing battle to preserve that terminology within the school, under the onslaught of the term ‘canteen’ which is used in most schools here). We have three tuckshops at the moment – Junior, Middle, and Senior – and it’s been that way most of the time I’ve been here, although I do have a rather amusing story to tell about a period where this was not the case – at least I think it’s a rather amusing story.

Back in the mid 1970s, when I was Form Master for Form III, a group of boys came to me with a complaint about the tuckshop. Up until a few weeks before they made this complaint, we’d had three tuckshops as I mentioned – Junior which served Forms I and II, Middle serving Forms III and IV, and Senior serving Forms V and VI, but for some reason the Middle tuckshop had now been shut down – building works might have been the cause – and as a result Form III boys were told to use the junior tuckshop, while Form IV boys were directed to use the senior tuckshop. These boys came to me to complain that they weren’t always being served what they asked for. They handed over their money and didn’t always get what they’d paid for. This wasn’t new – it had happened to them in Form I and II as well but they hadn’t complained at that point. I really wonder if some of them just thought that’s how tuckshops worked, and now they knew differently. In any event, I decided to investigate.

And I went and watched the junior tuckshop in action. Most of the people working in the tuckshop were Mums – who volunteered and worked there on a roster basis. But each of the tuckshops had one lady employed to run them who was there every day and for the junior tuckshop this was a lady of mature years who was, to be honest, a bit dragon-like in her demeanour.

Boys used to crush up to the counter, hand over their money and request the items they wanted (if they didn’t say please and thankyou, it was straight to the back of the queue again – these were their Mothers and manners mattered!). Most of the time they did get exactly what they asked for and paid for, but when the Dragon lady was serving a boy, this was not always the case. It seemed to me that if she believed a boy looked fat, on unwell, or spotty, or if he seemed greedy, or possibly just because she knew he came everyday and always ordered lollies, then rather than give him what he asked for, sometimes she gave him what she believed he should have. It really was quite amusing to watch – I have this vivid memory of a very puzzled looking 12 year old walking away from the counter looking at the apple he’d been given instead of the six redskins he’d asked for. Very much a look of “How did this happen?”

The boys didn’t complain to her – she had the power of the ban, and nobody wanted that to happen to them. And, besides, a lot of the first and second formers may well have not really understood that this wasn’t meant to happen. Back then they routinely had to deal with the fact that adults in their life were sometimes capricious and were quite likely to do what they thought was best for a boy, rather than he thought was. That was how life worked. The third forrmers had experienced something different and they knew this wasn’t meant to be. That’s why they complained. Younger boys either accepted it as the way things were meant to be, or at least as the way things were – you couldn’t fight grownups. They had the power. I think, perhaps, third formers had reached the stage of realising that even if you didn’t have many rights, that’s not the same as having none at all. Maybe they didn’t have to give you your redskins, but you certainly shouldn’t have to pay for an apple you didn’t want!

The tuckshop has remained reasonably constant over the years until very recently. The traditional fare – lollies, meat pies, sausage rolls, soft drinks, doughnuts, and similar, haven’t changed all that much really. Until very recently.

Over recent years, there has been considerable agitation in the media about the unhealthy nature of food in school canteens (I don’t mind using that term generically – it is much more common – I just want us to maintain traditional terminology), Most of the consternation has revolved around concerns such as childhood obesity and similar.

The state government, in its infinite wisdom, decided to address these problems in its state schools by banning ‘unhealthy’ food from school canteens (as opposed to other potential solutions like meaningfully increasing the amount of exercise and sport their pupils are meant to do, and perhaps suggesting that children spend far less time playing computer games and far more time playing active outdoor games (although, I admit, the WiiFit seems a wonderful invention, that would require some ongoing effort on the part of adults and perhaps acknowledging that previous policies cutting these things back might not have been perfect). These bans only really apply in state schools, although the media in their typical manner of reporting have often given the impression that they are universal (it’s one of my pet peeves, I’m afraid – private schools now educate close to a third of all children in this state yet newspapers and TV news constantly present state school policies as if they are universally applicable causing independent schools all sorts of issues when parents find out they are not (“No, your son does not have the right to wear earrings no matter what you read in the paper.”) but the focus on the issue has lead us – and a lot of other independent schools – to review our own menus.

We decided not to ban most existing things (though sugar laden carbonated drinks are gone – Coke replaced by Coke Zero, for example – as these are probably the single worst problem, there’s virtually no food value in them, and the sugar free varieties are a reasonable alternative), but we also decided we’d add a lot more options including a lot more healthier options – there’s nothing wrong with a boy having a meat pie occasionally, but there’s also nothing wrong with him having healthier choices available to him when he wants something hot. Most lollies have vanished (Natural Confectionary Company products replaced them, no artificial colours or flavours – but have not proved as popular as the new non-lolly healthy snacks).

Where the big changes have been though is in the choices offered for more substantial food. Australian schools have never gone in for the ‘school dinners’ of the UK system, and school cafeterias of America. For some reason, the idea never gained currency here. Boarding schools obviously provide at least one full meal a day for their boarders, but day students and day schools have rarely benefitted from any type of meal program. Kids normally bring packed lunches from home, with an occasional treat from the schools tuckshop or canteen (‘lunch order!’).

These occasional lunches purchased have long tended to be something like a meat pie, a pastie, or a sausage roll, covered in tomato sauce. Or a salad roll. Or a ham and cheese sandwich. Something on those lines. Our new tuckshop menu retains these choices, but have introduced a much wider variety of choices.

(It helps that the old days of relying on ‘tuckshop Mums’ are pretty much behind us. With more and more mothers working full time, the numbers dried up. A lot of schools have completely abandoned tuckshops/canteens in light of this trend – others, like ours, have become much more professional operations, often contracted out to private companies.

Vegetarian options. Lasagne. Risotto. Sushi.

To give some idea for those who are interested – take a look at this menu. It’s a sample menu from one of the largest companies providing this service to schools. Our menu is pretty similar to this one actually – with just a few additions and omissions.

One final comment – liquorice straps have long been sold here, and still are. I’ve never heard of one actually been used as a punishment strap, though they do look quite similar to some of the straps I recall. I really wonder how many of todays kids have any idea of what they are buying beyond it just being a piece of liquorice.
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Another_Lurker
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May 07, 2009#33
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I just somehow lost a longish message I’d written about my tuckshop experiences. Most annoying. It just vanished in the middle of typing. I shall try to reconstruct it, but it is odd.

I find this most interesting. I have had a couple of similar experiences recently and I have been trying to decide if the problem is down to the Another_Lurker system or something to do with Network54. There is a possible connection in that you and I both post rather longer messages than average. Can I trouble you to try to recall briefly what happened please? For instance did you switch to another window and then return to find the message gone, or did the Message Text box simply clear while you were typing into it?
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Steveinplymouth
May 07, 2009#34
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Sometime back, I lost a long post. It was around this time of night & after a couple of messages saying I wasn’t logged in or put a name to my post(both of which I had done), it apparently took it, but never upped the total number of posts on that thread in apparently posting it.

And, indeed, when I looked a few seconds later, it wasn’t there. There was also nothing in it to worry the censors at all, so it wasn’t one of those RA2 deleted.

Might simply be the length of post & the time of day; I’ve noticed the bandwidth restrictions on other Network54 sites can shut you out from viewing for a long time, or posting long posts.

Anyway, Doc, you were right about Coke neat-just this morning, I was belatedly washing-up last night’s cappucino cup. I absently-mindedly washed my Pepsi tin out in it first-bingo, stain gone in one!!

We actually had a small general grocery shop just outside the back door as well. Afraid the sausage rolls were cold, long before microwaves, too. But they were a decent lunch up the alley alongside it, with high hedges and a couple of indents in these-perfect place for roll-eating and the smokoe!

The great thing about that shop-it sold cigarettes in 5’s, which was getting rarer by 1967/8. They were either untipped Weights or Park Drive, and rough as rats, but at ten-pence ha’penny, plus one penny for the book of matches, that kept three of us happy for a whole dinner hour-he whose cash had purchased the cigs having the 4th to himself, the other 2 sharing the 5th.

Oh, and it also did meat pies-but no self-respecting Oz lad like you would have even offered one of those to a wombat-the pastry looked & tasted like concrete rejects, the “meat” like industrial slurry. The rolls were 9d if I remember, and 3d for a bag of crisps, so anyone with half-a-crown would have had mates for life!!

Our shopkeeper was too busy trying to make a living to worry about raincoat disguises-as long as we didn’t ask him for booze, it was fine.

I have to say sausage rolls & cigarettes remain pleasures, though the latter is now Marlboro & has been since 1972;Pepsi only became a bad habit from about 1975/6 & my early 20’s.

Good memories-if we’d had your menu, I might never had graduated to any of the above-perhaps!!

Steve M
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Sheena
May 09, 2009#35
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I was surfing the net recently and came across this very interesting forum quite by chance. I was head prefect at one of the most prestigious private girls schools in the UK in the early 1990s just before the ban on cp came in.

Our tuck shop was quite well stocked, but alas no licorice tawses but there were licorice straps which rumour has it, were often used for purposes other than originally intended. However be that as it may, my main concern here is the rather fallacious arguments put forward by some of our very erudite friends concerning prefects exceeding their authority.

Let me set the record straight on this score:

1. As head prefect I was authorised to administer discipline to any cheeky possums who warranted it. Although I was never provide with a taws or strap, either licorice or leather, I was provided with a slipper and a punishment book.

2. All correction took place in the privacy of my study. There was no set maximum for the number of strokes that could be administered but 6 of the best was usually sufficient to improve the behavior of most girls. I will not go into too much detail as to knickers etc.,since this is probably against the rules of the forum.

3. Prefects other than the head prefect could only administer open hand smacks, either to the bottom or upper thighs. As far as I can remember their were no restrictions on the maximum number permitted. most probably 6 across each leg or 12 across the bottom.

4. The senior mistress did not have to be consulted beforehand but all slipperings had to be recorded in the punishment book. Smackings did not have to be recorded.

I was very fair and responsible in administering discipline as were most of the prefects under my supervision. Any prefect who exceeded her authority had to answer to me but this hardly ever occurred.
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HRH
May 09, 2009#36
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Thank you for that very interesting and well written posting. You have made quite a few very important points and have certainly addressed some very important issues. However while I agree that there was certainly no regulations concerning the maximum number of open handed smacks that could be administered by either teachers or prefects, I am equally certain that there were very strict regulations when it came to implements such as the cane and or slipper.

At the school I attended in Aberdeen the cane could only be given by the senior mistress, and was used for more serious punishments.
The maximum number of strokes allowed was 6. Most classroom punishment consisted of open handed smacks across the bottom and or legs and the occasional slippering. I agree that there was no maximum set for open handed smacking. I spent a lot of time over the front desk and can remember receiving more than the usual 6 across each leg on quite a few occasions.
However on the few occasion that I received the slipper or cane the maximum 6 was strictly observed. I am quite sure this rule was observed in all parts of the UK at the time.
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Another_Lurker
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May 09, 2009#37
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I will not go into too much detail as to knickers etc.,since this is probably against the rules of the forum.

Feel free to invent anything you like about knickers, old chap. You’d be amazed at some of the knicker stories we’ve had on this estimable Forum!
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Emily
May 09, 2009#38
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
As I mentioned in my original posting I attended quite a few different private schools in the UK. The two that I spent the most time at were located in Aberdeen and Yorkshire respectively.

Both these schools had very elaborate tucks hops which were very well set up by the standards of the day and even possibly by today’s standards. In Aberdeen a very popular form of confectionery was the licorice tawse, while in Yorkshire there was of course the famous licorice strap. Both of course had dual purpose and this feature was not missed by either teacher or prefect alike. However I will freely admit that the licorice tawse especially the Lochgelly variety was more effective when it came to adjusting the attitudes of some very wayward individuals.

However it is not the purpose of this posting to wax lyrical about the many advantages of having a well stocked tuck shop but instead to encourage more women, especially those around my age (very early forties) to come forward with their experiences. Please do not be discouraged by the many cynics out there, most of whom would not know if they were walking barefoot or riding a horse. Thank you all for your time and patience.
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Doctor Dominum
May 09, 2009#39
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
You definitely know it if you try walking barefoot in a field where there’s been a lot of horses…
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Yvette
May 09, 2009#40
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Whilst the existence of the licorice tawse in most private Scottish girl’s schools is not in dispute it is very unlikely that a prefect would have been able to get away with using it in the manner described, although I am not necessarily disputing the account given by HRH.

Having done most of my schooling in the Scottish highlands, it was quite rare to have a well stocked tuck shop. The licorice tawse therefore was a very rare commodity indeed and as such was highly prized by most students. As I understand it, the going price for the Lochgelly variety was around 14p, which was considered a rather tidy sum in those days.

While it is quite true that the head prefect was acting “locum parentas” or to be more precise “locum senior mistress” there were plenty of options available to her without resorting to the licorice.

No matter how robust this item of confectionery was supposed to be, a sound 8 stroke bb thrashing would have certainly taken the shine off it. Merely returning it to its original plastic wrapper would have only fooled the most gullible of impish scallywags at the time. However I am willing to give HRH the benefit of the doubt even though I suspect that she may have gilded the lily somewhat. A lot of wags out there might disagree but going on past form they would more than likely be eating humble pie at the end of the day.

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Alan Turing
May 09, 2009#41
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

<em>As I mentioned in my original posting I attended quite a few different private schools in the UK. The two that I spent the most time at were located in Aberdeen and Yorkshire respectively.
</em>

As Michael Gambon once said in a wonderful performance of a certain Denis Potter work: “Was I right, or was I right?”

(Please note, standard quotes used here.)
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Bridgette
May 09, 2009#42
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Yes Emily, I agree with you that all the doubting Thomases out there will soon be dining on a meal of humble pie. It is very refreshing to read a posting from a modern woman rather than the ridiculous fantasies being served up by a lot of “wanna bes” and “never weres”.

Honestly do some of these people think we came in on the last load of turnips.
Trying to convince us that a non-female prefect could get away with smacking a senior girl. Please give us a break.
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Alan Turing
May 09, 2009#43
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I once had a dictionary which helpfully said that a turnip was a kind of swede, whereas a swede was a kind of turnip. Does anyone remember the newspaper headline after a really useless England football team lost again — it was something like “Swedes 1, Turnips 0” (I might have got the score wrong).
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mimi
May 09, 2009#44
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
The amount of fantasy this thread has started must be some kind of bizzare record.
Head prefects with studies etc I ask you…….
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Another_Lurker
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May 09, 2009#45
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Trying to convince us that a non-female prefect could get away with smacking a senior girl.

What a very strange term to use, non-female!

An analysis of the usage of this term during my time on this estimable Forum indicates that with one exception, which I’ll come to later, it has only been used by fun posters, and what is more by fun posters with a known association with Asquith and his cohorts of female cousins from all over the world who somehow managed to squeeze into the flat along with Asquith and his girlfriend, and who all miraculously had an interest in school corporal punishment!

Here are the usage statistics. I’m sure some of the names on this list will bring back happy memories to those who recall the last round of fun posting!
Heidi 9 times.</li>
Asquith 3 times.</li>
Emily twice.</li>
Miss Antimony once.</li>
Nancy once.</li>
Celine once</li>
EM once.</li>
Brianne once.</li>
And most recently Bridgette 3 times.</li>
So, Asquith/Heidi/Emily/Nancy/Celine/Brianne/Bridgette, to say nothing of EM and Miss Antimony, I can only echo the words of the sadly missed Lotta Nonsense, the only other poster to use the term, in the course of writing about you the last time you infested this Forum:

In this age of energy conservation, may I suggest that the absurd term ‘non-female teacher’ be replaced by ‘male teacher’?

And can we please apply the same principle to ‘non-female’ prefects!
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May 09, 2009#46
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

“Was I right, or was I right?”

You were right, but then I’d expect nothing less of a Mathematician!

Hi Mimi, you say:

The amount of fantasy this thread has started must be some kind of bizzare record.

I think one or two threads came close during the last fun poster infestation, but even I have to admire the invention of the liquorice tawse!

I say invention, but strangely Google does deliver up exactly one reference for “liquorice tawse” (though there are none at all for “locorice tawse”, the preferred spelling of our fun posters).

Here, if anyone is interested, is the URL of the sole “liquorice tawse” reference on the web outside this estimable Forum. Contrary to my normal practise I am simply giving the URL so that its nature is clearly visible before anyone clicks on it! The PDF file involved is 2·5 Mb.

www.islamicbulletin.org/free_downloads/ … e_nile.pdf
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May 09, 2009#47
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Emily (she of the widely distributed schooling) says of her schools in Aberdeen and Yorkshire:

Both these schools had very elaborate tucks hops

Presumably tucks hops was the little dance performed by girls after being beaten with a liquorice tawse in an effort to alleviate the pain.
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Yvette
May 09, 2009#48
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Most of the so called “pundits” out there are about as convincing as a lecture on posture by Quasimodo. It is very strange that most of the posters who have been around since the Earth cooled are willing to accept without question the posting by Declan where he claims to have smacked the bottoms of some senior girls in his capacity as a “prefect”, while casting very snide remarks about the existence of the liquorice tawse which was a historical fact that has since been confirmed by one of the more astute researchers.

Where is the level playing field? It is as obvious as the Golden Gate bridge on a very clear day that in a mixed school no prefect would even contemplate administering even a light slap to any other student let alone one of the opposite gender. The only schools where prefects could administer relatively light c.p were certain very exclusive private schools such as the one I attended and that were attended by some of my fellow female posters.

It is time some of the cynics out there woke up to themselves and stopped fantasising about smacking the bottoms of some girl they might have fancied during the reign of King George the sixth. Thank you all for your time and patience.

Yvette
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Another_Lurker
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May 10, 2009#49
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I shouldn’t worry though. The balance of probability is that they are all a male who may be called Asquith and who may live in an imaginary flat in Germany with his imaginary girlfriend Celine (who is some years older than him). Asquith imagines that he once worked as a researcher for BMW, but frequently betrays a lamentable lack of research skills when dealing with anything to do with CP.

Asquith (or it may possibly be the imaginary Celine) has lots of imaginary female cousins with unlikely names from even more unlikely parts of the world who visit in droves and use Asquith’s computer to post on this Forum. There are also several imaginary female nieghbours who like posting here and who also enjoy free use of Asquith’s computer.

Sometimes, embarassed at the huge number of imaginary people using his computer, Asquith introduces a bit of variety into his IP addresses by using a well known proxy server which makes him appear to be posting from the US.

Of course, all this may be a figment of my imagination, brought about by excessive exposure to liquorice tawses, in which case please accept my apologies Asquith!
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HRH
May 10, 2009#50
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I think we are being a bit harsh on young Declan. When I first read his posting about smacking those girls I also assumed he had been having a wee sip of the Johnny Walker, but on closer examination it turns out that they were playful slaps not intended as punishment of any type since it was quite clear from his subsequent explanation that he had no authority to smack senior girls or any girls for that matter.

However, be that as it may, it was very lucky for him that the girls in question did accept it in a light-hearted way, although the jury is still out on whether the incident actually occurred or not. But since I am not assuming the role of Sherlock Holmes or more precisely Ms. Sherlock Holmes I have no convincing evidence to conclude otherwise.

As I have mentioned in my original posting the prefects at my very exclusive private girl’s school were permitted to improve the behavior of some impish scallywags by applying a number of well placed slaps to either the bottom or legs and most did not need any encouragement to do so. However I think some of the “non-female” members of this very dignified forum are taking liberties and trying to extrapolate this scenario to include the application of c.p by “non-females” to females, and in doing so are trying to invent “realistic” situations where this might occurr.

Well these fantasy postings are about as convincing as an aerobics video featuring Quasimodo. Please give it a rest. Thank you for your time and patience.

HRH

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Emily
May 10, 2009#51
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Great to hear from you all again. Yes I will admit that I also did not read Declan’s original posting carefully enough and initially thought that he had punished those girls in his capacity as a prefect. As it turns out he was not even a prefect, but this would have not made any difference since it was only in some very exclusive private girl’s schools like the one I was fortunate enough to attend, where the prefects were allowed to administer a variety of very effective and well deserved smackings to any girl that needed it and most did.

Be that as it may, Declan should not have even contemplated smacking the girls himself but should have reported them directly to the senior mistress who I am quite sure would have sorted those cheeky possums out very quickly. I think he was a wuss not to do so.

Although he may have thought that reporting those girls would have made him look very petty, at least he would not be shirking his duty and would have gained some gold stars from the higher echelons of the school, albeit at the expense of his rather dubious appeal to certain impish tarts who needed a sound thrashing.

However since we can only assume that Declan was very young and inexperienced at the time, I am sure the more understanding members of this forum are willing to cut him a little slack. I am sure he now regrets his rather impulsive decision to impose a rather ad hoc and completely ineffectual punishment on those impish scallywags.
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Sheena
May 10, 2009#52
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Yes Emily you are quite right to question Declan’s rather suspect judgment in that situation.

It is beyond dispute that he lacked the necessary courage to do the right thing by immediately reporting those scallywags to the senior mistress. I am quite sure that a good session over her lap would have improved their attitude very quickly. But let us not be too harsh on our young friend. Keep in mind at the time he was possibly suffering from delusions of adequacy in the sense that he probably thought that some of those imps actually liked him.

As it turned out they were simply using his lack of fortitude to exploit the situation and most likely pretended to enjoy a rather mild slap on the derriere as an alternative to a very good seeing to from Miss. This situation really exposes the dilemma that Declan would have experience at the time.

Do I do my duty as a responsible member of the school community and report the girls, knowing full well that they will be seen to very thoroughly, or do I take it upon myself to deliver a token slap to their respective bottoms and try to be a “good fellow”?

In choosing the latter option I am afraid he has revealed his inner character for all of us to judge. However the old adage “judge not lest ye be judged” is well worth considering in this case. Personally I am not yet prepared to cast my vote until our young friend comes forward with a more detailed explanation as to the thinking that shaped his decision on that day which was a turning point in his personal history.

Thank you all for your time and patience.

SHEENA
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HRH
May 10, 2009#53
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I think young Declan is receiving quite a tawsing, figuratively speaking of course. I think the situation can be summed up very concisely if we examine the pros and cons of the situation with respect to the decisions he was faced with at the time.

1. Do nothing.

PROS: NO RISK. CONS: SHIRKING HIS DUTY TO THE SCHOOL AND THE COMMUNITY.

2. Marching the girls involved straight to see the senior mistress.

PROS: DOING THE RIGHT THING. CONS: POSSIBLE ALIENATION OF GIRL’S AFFECTION

3. Taking decisive action himself in the form of a serious thigh smacking or a very sound otk spanking.

PROS: GUARANTEED IMPROVEMENT IN ATTITUDE. CONS: COULD BE ON THIN ICE LEGALLY

4. Administering token slap across respective derrieres

PROS: NONE CONS: ACHIEVES NOTHING BUT STILL RISKY

It is now up to the good members of the forum to decide if Declan made the correct decision or if in fact he is a very low form of life with regard to character.
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Bridgette
May 10, 2009#54
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Congratulations HRH. You have lived up to your title and have delivered a very eloquent summing up of the situation. It is doubtful if even the legendary Clarence Darrow could have done a better job.

However, without trying to rain on your parade,I feel that the option of giving each girl a thorough seeing to himself would have been a tad unrealistic.

I doubt if he would have had the technical skill to deliver either an effective leg smacking or a sound otk spanking, since these skills are not learned overnight buy are acquired over time with lots of practice. As you probably know from personal experience there were some teachers who were a lot better at dealing out this type of correction than others. I suspect that Declan would have been quite useless in this respect.

I think I can safely speak on behalf of the overwhelming majority of forum members in stating that his best option would be to have marched the girls straight to the office of the senior mistress. I am quite sure that she would have taken care of business and adjusted the attitudes of those young upstarts in a very effective manner.

Bridgette
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Declan
May 10, 2009#55
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I must say I am rather surprised that what I thought was a quite innocent posting has attracted so much attention. Had I simply said I had smacked a couple of girls at school without giving the context of it, I imagine it would have been ignored. The main point of the posting was that I smacked a couple of girls on their tight summer dresses.

I suppose I was in a position of authority and in that sense it was a risk to smack the girls, but as I have said I did know both of them fairly well.

Corporal punishment on girls in my school was very rare indeed, so had I marched them to the Headmistress I’m sure that a detention would have been the most likely outcome.

As for HRH’s suggestion that I should have given them a proper spanking, this does lead me to speculate what they would have said had I given them the choice of a slippering from me or a visit to the Headmistress. They would probably have told me to get lost.

As for Bridgette saying I would be quite useless at handing out a spanking, I accept that my spanking activities at that age were very limited, but have improved since.

And HRH gives the PRO of the action I took as none, whereas in fact it gave me huge pleasure, and as I have said I think the girls enjoyed it as well.
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mimi
May 10, 2009#56
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Judging by the amount of posts today I can only assume it is raining in Blightyland?
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HRH
May 10, 2009#57
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Well I must say that Declan has emerged from this controversial issue with both his dignity and credibility both in tact. I did not realise that your school hardly ever applied c.p to girls. Since a visit to the senior mistress for these impish young girls would have only resulted in a detention if that, a very weak option in my opinion, it would have been a complete waste of your valuable time to have involved the senior mistress at all. So it seems that Declan has come up roses and to quote a well used phrase “he had his cake and was also able to eat it too”.

It is obvious that both my good self and the other equally delightful girls thar frequent this rather exclusive forum missed the very important point that would have been as obvious as the Golden Gate Bridge on a very clear day to any 18 year old boy at the time. I speak of course of the obvious pleasure young men seem to enjoy if there is only the remotest chance of sampling a derriere of the fair sex, albeit only a fleeting one in the form of a very light smack. I hope I have not overstepped the mark here in terms of propriety.

Well I suppose there is nothing more worth saying on this subject unless some of the more cynical members of this prestigious forum are willing to throw their two penneth worth into the discussion. And going on past form it is London to a brick on that they will attempt to find something humorous to say about the situation.

Goodbuy for now

HRH

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Another_Lurker
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May 10, 2009#58
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Hi Declan, my advice is don’t encourage him, it’s like feeding pigeons in Slab Square, he’ll just keep coming back for more.
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Melton Mowbray
May 10, 2009#59
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Just thought I’d mention that you <em>still</em> can’t see the Golden Gate Bridge from here in Melton Mowbray, whether the day is clear or not. I’ve mentioned this before, but some of our posters seem to be very forgetful.
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Another_Lurker
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May 10, 2009#60
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Are you absolutely sure? I thought that from the top of the church tower ………
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Another_Lurker
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May 10, 2009#61
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Come to think of it, Alan Turing could probably work it out for us, if we knew the height of the church tower, although I guess it’s probably complicated by the refractive index at different levels in the atmosphere.
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Steveinplymouth
May 10, 2009#62
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Especially if we built the platform out of all the licorice straps mentioned in this thread. Laid end-to-end and hoisted aloft, they should go up quite a way.

I’m sure one of our trolls could look through it, too, as they all seem to be on another planet.

Mind you, they’d probably be looking for San Franciscan exclusive non-male academies, rather than famous landmarks!

Steve M
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Alan Turing
May 11, 2009#63
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Thank you, <strong>Another_Lurker</strong>, for requesting my services in the matter of the visibility of the Golden Gate Bridge. As you know, my fees are very reasonable.

I shall describe the technique to be used in the case where the deviation of light due to atmospheric refraction may be neglected. In other words, we assume that light travels in a straight line.

We start by taking the height of the Golden Gate bridge above mean sea level; call this height h. Letting the radius of the earth be r, we see that the angle subtended by the line joining the Bridge to points of furthest visibility at sea level is A, where cos A = r/(r+h). Assuming that the angle A is expressed in in radians (rather than in degrees), this tells us that the surface distance from the base of the Bridge to points of furthest visibility is rA, in the units of length we are using. Of course these units must be the same for both variables r and h.

Now let the surface distance from the Bridge to Melton Mowbray be d. This will be much greater than rA of course, and that is the observation I have made on many occasions. But suppose one were to build a tower of height capital H (perhaps made of pork pies) in that quintissentially English market town? How high would the tower have to be for the bridge to be visible (perhaps with the aid of a telescope)? Well, we can use the same argument. From the top of the tower, one would be able to see points at sea level a distance rB away, where B, the angle (in radians) subtended by the line joining the tower to points of furthest visibility at sea level, satisfies cos B = r/(r+H). We simply require H to be sufficiently large that rA + rB > d.

I do hope you’ve all been paying attention. There will be a test on this tomorrow.

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HRH
May 11, 2009#64
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Although the situation involving Declan has more or less been resolved I inadvertently forgot to ask him if he ever considered the option of requesting a female prefect to sort those imps out.

It is quite obvious that Declan was quite the ladies man in those days so I can only assume he was on very good terms with most of the senior prefects.
I was just wondering if they agreed to help him and give those two scallywags a good old fashioed seeing to, would the prefects have been in trouble or was it okay for them to impose discipline as long as no implements were involved.

HRH

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SHEENA
May 11, 2009#65
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I think HRH has brought up an excellent point. It is quite obvious that Declan was the Rudolph Valentino of his time and I am quite sure that most of the female prefects would have been putty in his hands.

So it is highly likely that at least one of the more courageous and athletic female prefects would have succumbed to Declan’s charm and sophistication and
would have gladly have offered her services so to speak.

I do not know what the reaction of those insolent rascals would have been, but I assume that they would have accepted their punishment and not have reported it. In any case I do not think the female prefects in question would have got into too much trouble as long as they did not go overboard. What say you?
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Emily
May 11, 2009#66
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Yes that could have been a viable option but by the time Declan had gone to find those female prefects those rascals would have probably made themselves very scarce.

I think he made the correct decision by trying to impose some form of discipline himself, but it was a rather insipid effort. I am not saying he should have gone for the slipper but he could have given them each more than one smack and he should have smacked them a lot harder than he said he did.

If Declan is reading this posting can he remember if he considered giving each of those cheeky young possums a more severe punishment or was he too scared of the possible repercussions. If they accepted one smack, surely they would have accepted at least another 3. Was this a viable option in his opinion?

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mimi
May 11, 2009#67
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Would not PIE (3.142) be more usefull in calculating anything to do with Melton Mobrey ?
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Alan Turing
May 11, 2009#68
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Mimi, you brought a smile to my face in a difficult week! Thanks.
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Another_Lurker
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May 11, 2009#69
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Alan Turing, I hope that whatever is contributing to your difficult week will soon be resolved.

I thank you for your most excellent guide to the necessary calculations to be made regarding this vexing issue of the Golden Gate bridge and its visibility from Melton Mowbray.

I will now try to determine the height of the highest point of the bridge and the distance from said bridge to Melton Mowbray and complete the calculation of the height of the column of pork pies to be erected (subject to planning permission of course) on a suitable site within the town with a view to resolving this perennial question of the visibilty (subject to weather condition) of said bridge from said town.

If I am sucessful in this I hope that you will be prepared to run a quick eye over my calculations before I set the necessary processes in train.
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Alan Turing
May 11, 2009#70
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Thanks for the good wishes, A_L. In return, here’s a clue that our Junior Members won’t be able to remember, together with a hint.

The clue refers to a song recorded in 1966 by a popular music ensemble, <strong>The Byrds</strong>. It was called “Eight Miles High”. The hint is that the clue is out by a factor of a thousand.

I shall be most interested to see your planning application!
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Steveinplymouth
May 11, 2009#71
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Which of course, it didn’t-just the height a 727 got when flying this popular combo to GB for a tour.

Their next single, 5-D, was not banned and of couse DID refer to taking LSD.

And for the benefit of our multifarious young missies, taking LSD is not a euphimism for nicking pre-decimal coinage from the tuckshop till;it is imbibing of hallucogenic substances.

Or so reliable sources told me.

Steve M
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Another_Lurker
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May 12, 2009#72
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Mr Turing, I have to throw myself on your mercy here. Maths was never my strongest subject, and it’s a long time since I did any anyway! I don’t get quite the same answer as your clue and hint, which I take to indicate 8000 miles. I get 19922 km, 12379 miles! Both heights seem equally absurd, given that the distance from the bridge to Melton Mowbray is only somewhere around 5300 miles! Does the formula break down in some way for extreme distances?

Anyway, here’s my shot at it. I’m not going to put that planning application in for the time being!

There is a very useful world distance look-up site here. While this does not make it possible to readily calculate the distance from San Francisco to Melton Mowbray, it does include the nearby town of Oakham. Oakham has the advantage of being slightly further east than Melton Mowbray, which thus builds a safety margin into the calculation. Using the terminology of your excellent ‘how to’ post above:

San Francisco to Oakham (d) = 5288 miles = 8510211 metres.
Highest point of Golden Gate Bridge (h) = 227 metres above sea level.
Mean radius of earth (r) = 6378144·5 metres.

Thus for the Golden Gate Bridge:

cos A = 6378144·5/(6378144·5 + 227) = 0·999964411

so A = 0·483388º = 0·00843671216463035 radians

and rA = 6378144·5 * 0·00843671216463035 metres = 53810·56929 metres.

Eminently reasonable thus far. From the very highest point of the Golden Gate bridge on a clear day we should be able to see nearly 54 kilometres. Not quite far enough to see Melton Mowbray, or indeed Oakham, but a goodly distance all the same!

However, that leaves us 8510211 – 53810·56929 metres short of d, leaving 8456400·431 metres of visibility to be contributed by the Pork Pie tower in Melton Mowbray.

So rB must be 8456400·431 metres (bearing in mind that by using the distance to Oakham we have already built in a safety margin)

Therefore B = 8456400·431/r = 8456400·431/6378144·5 = 1·325840208 radians = 75·96504822714721º

So cos B = 0·24251375376012171

Thus r/(r+H) = 0·24251375376012171

so 6378144·5/(6378144·5 + H) = 0·2425137537601217

and 6378144·5 = (6378144·5 + H)*0·2425137537601217

so 6378144·5 = (6378144·5*0·2425137537601217) + (0·2425137537601217*H)

so H = (6378144·5-(6378144·5*0·2425137537601217))/0·2425137537601217 metres.

Giving H = 19921990·66 metres, the height of the necessary Pork Pie tower.

That’s a lot of Pork Pies!
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Alan Turing
May 12, 2009#73
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I hereby announce that the Golden Biscuit Award for calculating the minimum height of a pork pie tower in Melton Mowbray from which the Golden Gate Bridge would be visible is awarded to:

<strong>Another_Lurker</strong>

We congratulate him most sincerely.

The tower would, indeed, need to be enormous, as my hint suggested (the hint was meant only to be approximate). You can see why by imagining a tower millions of miles high — it would still give a view only a quarter of the way round the earth’s circumference. You could never build a tower tall enough to see the Sydney Opera House from Melton Mowbray.

In approximate terms, the radius of the earth is around 4000 miles, so its circumference is 2 pi times 4000, and a quarter of its circumference is 2000 pi, or about 6284 miles (as <strong>Mimi</strong> will confirm!). As the distance to San Francisco is 5288 miles, this is getting close to the limit of visibility and so you’d expect the tower to be pretty tall.
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SHEENA
May 12, 2009#74
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I seem to remember you posting a message in a different thread about a situation you observed in the classroom where some rather immodest behavior from a naughty young girl resulted in a quite effective leg smacking from one of her class mates.

It was unclear if the class mate concerned was indeed a prefect but never the less it seems that you were very impressed by the outcome as the recipient seemed to be sorted to your satisfaction. I will assume for the sake of brevity that the girl who did the sorting was indeed a prefect.

Since your reputation as quite the ladies man at the time rivalled that of the legendary Errol Flynn I am willing to assume that you and the prefect in question may have been at least acquainted if not as close as Hansel was to Gretel.

Be that as it may did you ever consider the possibility of exploiting the obvious talents of this presumably athletic vixen in helping you sort out those insolent young layabouts who ignored your request to vacate the classroom during the luncheon break. If she would have agreed then your role would have been that of a facilitator and supervisor, putting you in a much safer position legally if per chance some of these young scallywags objected to a well deserved and thorough leg smacking. could you please advise?
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Declan
May 12, 2009#75
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I’m not sure where to begin. But before I respond perhaps A_L and Steve M could advise me. Are, in your opinion, Sheena, HRH, Emily and Bridgette the same person? And are ” they” a middle aged man?

“They” are doing a good job of winding me up I must admit, but at the risk of repeating myself we did NOT have prefects at my school. Sixth formers just had to do certain tasks and had no disciplinary powers.

I am , however, seeing the head girl at my school of my year next week, so I will ask her about any canings and slipperings that I might not have been aware of.

Think more of Lee Majors or Burt Reynolds rather than Rudolf Valentino or Errol Flynn.
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Alan Turing
May 12, 2009#76
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Looking at the previous infestation of “fun posters”, it seems clear that they all write in much the same style. We have also been informed, by the Forum’s management, that they often use computers with the same outward-facing IP number. You might consider this evidence that all the posts are the work of a single individual.

I also have two professional observations. One is that the knowledge of mathematics shown by the fun posters is approximately higher secondary school level. The other is that, like overgrown schoolboys, they think they know it all!
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Ketta
May 12, 2009#77
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
What an education our fun posters provide, to say nothing of the efforts of the more regular sane contributors to this forum who willingly share their vast knowledge of mathematical calculations, music, towers, bridges and pork pies.

A_L might be on my case for encouraging the B..H., private girls school, liquorice tawse posters, but they really should have been introduced to Spanish Wood, it appeared in, my prestige boarding school’s tuck shop for a very short period, until it disappeared overnight, deemed unsightly for girls to be seen in the dorm, chewing bits of wood.

It was rumoured that the disappearance was more to do with prefects being given the task of binding the strips of fibrous liquorice wood into implements of correction, those that got a taste, vowing never to repeat the experience.

My first introduction to one of these liquorice birches was not at boarding school, but at the good old ABC Regal Saturday morning flicks, I have to report they were not very effective in quietening the jeering hoards of children that inhabited such establishments, some became quite partial to the distinctive taste, not something I would wish to repeat. .

Ketta
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mimi
May 12, 2009#78
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Would a “Great Circle” be of any benifit in the calculations?
As for liquorice strands they make an ideal martinet which can be eaten after use if one can find all the bits.
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Alan Turing
May 12, 2009#79
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Indeed, a great circle has been used implicitly. The earth is approximately a sphere, and if a sphere has radius r then only the great circles have circumference 2 pi times r.
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Another_Lurker
10K
256
May 12, 2009#80
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Hi Alan Turing. I have to say that I am deeply touched by the award of the Golden Biscuit, which my humble efforts certainly do not merit but which represents the absolute apogee of my lifetime aspirations and hopes. I’d like to thank the the awards panel, the management of this estimable Forum, the contributors to this estimable Forum, the people who set up the various websites I nicked the data off, the mechanic who services my car, the man who cleans my bicycle, the inventor of the Petzl zoom headlamp, the staff in my local corner shop, the ……….. bursts into tears and exits stage left!

Seriously, I do hope you didn’t bother to check the calculations, as on reflection I realise that even if they were correct (and my trusty ancient Sharp PC-1500A Pocket Computer seldom lets me down) the layout of the workings was a total disgrace after your very concise and neat summary of the necessary method. I was genuinely surprised at the size of the answer. If I could find my geometry set I’d draw it to scale just to totally convince myself!

Hi Declan. As I’m sure you are aware one of the great joys of Forums like this is that one can never be totally certain about anything. One simply has to judge by what people post. On that basis I’m as certain as I can be that with the exception of Ketta, who has been a regular here much longer than me and who really did attend a prestige boarding school with a tendancy to CP, all the ‘females’ who have posted here recently are not what they seem. In this view I suspect that I would be supported by the majority of regular posters. My own view is that most, if not all, of the ‘ladies’ concerned are one and the same person, and that that person is male.

At the time of our last infestation by what is clearly the same person the then Subscriptions Manager went so far as to publish some IP addresses, as Alan Turing mentions. One of these linked a whole raft of the ‘females’ then posting to someone calling himself Asquith. The others were all owned by a company providing proxy server facilities. Proxy servers, as you probably know, are a way of attempting to disguise IP addresses. I rest my case m’lud!

I look forward to any new information regarding CP which may emerge at your meeting with your former head girl next week.

Hi Ketta. I think you should definitely tell us more about your experiences with Spanish Wood birches! I think I can remember Spanish Wood, but at that time my CP interests were fairly dormant and I certainly didn’t envisage its other potential uses. I guess the same goes for liquorice straps!

Hi Mimi. The liquorice martinet! Now there’s a concept! We don’t hear nearly enough about martinets (preferably the genuine variety) on this estimable Forum.
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mimi
May 13, 2009#81
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Err a great circle is not strictly a circle, more a curve!
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Alan Turing
May 13, 2009#82
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Actually it is. A circle is the set of points equidistant from a fixed point (its centre), and a great circle is a circle of maximum radius which can be drawn on a sphere. The radius of a great circle is equal to the radius of the sphere.

I know people talk about the “great circle route from London to New York”, and so on, but then the route is only part of a great circle. The complete great circle goes all the way round the back and returns to its starting point!
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Alan Turing
May 13, 2009#83
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

In a plane, that is. Taking <em>all</em> the points equidistant from the fixed point gives you a sphere.
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Alan Turing
May 13, 2009#84
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Or you could be measuring “curved distance” on the surface of a sphere. Then, once again, a circle is the set of points on the surface of the sphere “equidistant”, in this sense, from a fixed point.

Technically speaking this is the realm of <em>Riemannian Geometry</em>, which my good friend Einstein used for his General Theory of Relativity.
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Emily
May 13, 2009#85
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
After graduating from teacher’s college in Aberdeen I was lucky enough to secure a position teaching English at a UN senior girls boarding school in the Solomon Islands. The school catered mostly for the children of the very large UN peace keeping force stationed there and consequently had a very elaborate tuck shop which also doubled as a commissary for the UN troops. It was basically an emporium with all types of confectionery from all over the world, including liquorice straps but not tawses. (Incidentally I have never heard of Spanish wood)

One of my fellow female teachers also from the UK used to buy lots of the liquorice straps. I once asked her about this and she commented that they were very useful in sorting out some of the girls. I thought that she was joking but found out later that she use to strap girls across the hands with them in front of the class if they misbehaved. I also learned that she would use it across their bottoms and legs privately in the dormitory. I was surprised at this since she about my age at the time (early twenties) and seemed to get along well with all the girls. Apparently they were very effective because it seemed her girls were the highest achievers in the school.
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Alan Turing
May 13, 2009#86
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
It’s not hard to find out that the “very large UN peace keeping force” established after the peace agreement of October 2000 comprised 50 armed police and civilians from Australia, New Zealand and Pacific Island Countries. So I don’t think our fun poster is much good at history, either.

(I might also point out that the Solomon Islands are not visible at all from Melton Mowbray, however many pork pies you stand upon to give yourself a height advantage.)
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Steveinplymouth
May 13, 2009#87
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Amazingly enough, they MIGHT once have been visible from the Pork Pie capital.

Wasn’t there some rich Midland eccentric in the early 1800’s who landscaped a world map of islands & continents into his ornamental lake to give his farm labourers paid employment? And then didn’t he row them round the islands in floating geography lessons?

And whilst we are on pork pies, does anyone have a recipe for Welsh Eggs? I only had them once, in 1971, and they were effectively battered hard-boiled eggs, but have never seen a recipe.

No doubt Aberdonian tuckshops were cudgelled up to the gunwhales with the dinner-time reject versions of them-probably for hockey rather than CP. The more exotic locations may have had to make do woth coconet shells, but I’m sure we’ll soon be told.

Steve M
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Alan Turing
May 13, 2009#88
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

That’s a bit like Spike Milligan (or maybe it was Harry Secombe) going into a shop in the Goon Show with a photograph of a five pound note! It’s not quite the real thing!
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SGT Dean Clarke 8/7 RVR
May 13, 2009#89
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I am rather surprised to see this particular subject being discussed here because it is completely off topic for the forum (something that we all know never happens) but I must protest. Peace keeping operations in the Solomon Islands comprised considerably more than fifty armed police and civilians. I know because I was over there as an Australian soldier. RAMSI (The Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands) actually involved more than 2000 troops from Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, and Tonga at its peak.

Having said that, there were certainly no boarding schools established for children of troops. The reason there was such a large force there at times is because conditions bordered on those of a warzone and people didn’t take their children with them. And army canteens were actually pretty pathetic – priority (rightly) being given to providing such services to soldiers in the far more dangerous theatres in Iraq, Afghanistan, and at times, East Timor.

To be slightly on topic, RAMSI was actually criticised on a number of occasions for allegedly supporting local villages to set up their own courts which imposed sentences of corporal punishment on misbehaving teenaged boys, in the absence of a breakdown in the normal justice processes of the Solomon Islands.
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Alan Turing
May 13, 2009#90
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Thank you, Sgt Clarke! My data came from <strong>this</strong> United Nations report. I see you are referring to a later intervention in 2003, whereas my reference was to the small peacekeeping force established at the end of 2000.

I was, however, being generous to the Fun Poster, who claimed to have gone to the Solomon Islands “after graduating from teacher’s college in Aberdeen” while at the same time being in “her” forties. Of course you’re quite right to cast scorn on the notion that there would be family accommodation in the middle of a war zone.
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mimi
May 13, 2009#91
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
My point about great circles was in an aeronautical sense is that they are usually used as a curve. It is rather pointless to navigate the whole great circle as it would be easier to just turn back after arrival to get back the fastest way rather than continue on. Wind permiting of course.
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Steveinplymouth
May 13, 2009#92
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

It’s a lie, I tell you! How dare you come on here and offer me money for that liquorice-coated matchstick model of Melton Mowbray Town Centre & church tower over there that isn’t here!

Major Denis Bloodnokk, ex-Roper’s Light Horse.
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HRH
May 15, 2009#93
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I think we are straying from the topic. What has golden biscuits got to do with tuckshop tawsing?
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Another_Lurker
10K
256
May 15, 2009#94
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

What has golden biscuits got to do with tuckshop tawsing?

As much as liquorice tawses have to do with School Corporal Punishment. No more, no less.
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May 15, 2009#95
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
In view of Alan Turing’s excellent work in identifying vocabulary peculiarities in postings and my own research into the subject, I will repeat here a claim I made in the ‘Idiots on Forums’ thread. Unless any of our excellent and hardworking Management Team who post occasionally are female only one genuine female has posted in this estimable Forum since the beginning of May and that’s Ketta.

I will also repeat something I said at the time of the last fun poster infestation:

Fun posters have many similarities to joy riders. Joy riders aren’t joyous and fun posters aren’t fun.
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HRH
May 16, 2009#96
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
And your comments are about as funny as a Dutch sitcom.
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Another_Lurker
10K
256
May 16, 2009#97
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I am afraid that my tastes do not extend to sitcoms, Dutch or otherwise, so I am unable to comment on the validity of your chosen index of comparison. However your reference is anyway irrelevant, since my remark concerning fun posters was not meant to be funny. Fun posters are not funny, they are pathetic, especially so when like yourself they find it necessary to pretend to be the opposite sex.
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May 17, 2009#98
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I wasn’t going to post this, as I would normally require just a couple of additional items of verification. However, strike while the iron is hot! I hope that those contributors to this estimable Forum who, like me, object to fun posters and take an interest in debunking and confounding them will agree with me about the significance of HRH’s reference to ‘Dutch Sitcom’.

Our one-time fun poster Asquith (he of the computer used by his ‘girlfriend’ and a veritable army of ‘female’ cousins and neighbours, lived in Germany. A German resident might well watch Dutch sitcoms, whereas it is unlikely that anyone resident is the UK or US would do so.

I have already said that I believe that HRH and the various other ‘female’ fun posters who have recently infested this Forum are in fact Asquith (or at least the person who called himself Asquith). I regard this latest item as additional proof.

I presume the fact that you are back here Asquith means that the web site venture you were supposedly embarking on at the time of your last infestation has failed. I didn’t want that to happen, as I anticipated what the consequence might be for this Forum if you were once again to find yourself at a loose end. This motivated the offer of assistance with the website that I made at that time. You really should have taken advantage of that offer, it might have saved the rest of us here a lot of annoyance!
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Gemma
May 19, 2009#99
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I remember my tuckshop as being very well stocked particularly with boiled lollies. These were very popular at the time and some girls would go to great lengths to get their hands on some of these “golden nuggets” which was one very popular variety at the time.

In fact this particular variety became so popular that they soon sold out and any girl that had managed to purchase any before this was sitting on a goldmine so to speak. Eventually this led to all sorts of disputes which often spilled over into the classroom and the senior mistress had to step in. Well there are no prizes for guessing that Miss was no Jenny come lately when it came to dealing with naughty girls.

It was later discovered that some of the senior girls including the head prefect had organised a very effective black market network dealing with this confectionery.

Needless to say that the senior mistress was having none of it and the culprits were duly sorted out in her office. Luckily I managed to escape the dragnet and quietly went about my business with nobody any the wiser.
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Sally
May 23, 2009#100
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Yes that reminds me of a similar situation involving chocolates instead of boiled lollies. It was rumored that the senior mistress was in collusion with some prefects involving a scam the details of which are still sketchy.
Apparently the senior mistress had to give some of the prefects involved a token tawsing to save her own derriere.
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Alan Turing
May 23, 2009#101
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
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As this is the hundredth post in this thread, I have followed the example of <strong>Another_Lurker</strong> and given it a nice decorative background.

It’s a shame, though, that I was only given the opportunity to do this by the fun post above. “To save her own derriere”? Oh, do me a favour!

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Another_Lurker
10K
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May 23, 2009#102
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
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Your HTML is improving by leaps and bounds, Mr Turing! Any chance you might be able to sort out why background images don’t work anymore?

Well done to catch the 100th post in the thread. However, I had prepared a special tribute for HRH, the originator of this thread, in anticipation of his thread reaching its century. As I consider his efforts have more than merited proper recognition I feel justified in posting it in addition to your own most excellent effort.

I am sure that HRH fully appreciates the close connection that the most famous products of Melton Mowbray have to his own literary efforts and it seems only right to bring the two together here!
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Amanda
May 23, 2009#103
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Any girl who was educated in the UK during the late 1970s and early 1980s will be very familiar with the school tuckshop.

During my senior year the Defense department decided to try and recruit more women into their ranks and set up displays at various schools around the UK. One such display involved a fully operational British Leopard tank which was situated on the oval about 200 m from our tuckshop.

Some of the young female recruiters permitted a few of the senior girls to drive the tank under their supervision but gave strict instructions not to operate the firing mechanism of the 120 mm cannon. Well as it happened one of the prefects decided to ignore this advice and managed to fire off a high explosive round which took out the tuckshop.

Luckily nobody was injured but the confectionery was scattered everywhere and scavengers had a field day. Strangely enough the prefect involved was not even punished since the senior mistress decided it was an honest mistake and could have happened to anybody. Can any of the members of the forum recount any similar incidents involving their own tuckshop?

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HRH
May 23, 2009#104
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Well I cannot say that I can come up with any incident that will top that, but some girls used to bring pea shooters to school and use them to project small grains of rice into the back of the necks of the girls sitting in front of them.

Naturally in the context of a strict girls school, this type of behavior went over like a diver’s boot and the culprits soon found themselves over the front desk for a very well deserved seeing to. Since I was considered quite mature for my age I refused to participate in such childish behavior and would often secretly inform on my class mates. They never found out and they often wondered why they were seen to even before they had a chance to use the pea shooters.

I do remember some army recruiters coming to my school but the display only involved a Bren gun carrier and none of the girls were permitted to go near it. I also remember the senior mistress trying to make some sort of a joke about it but the only reaction was some very faint giggles which could hardly be heard above the crescendo of chirping crickets.

Good bye for now.

HRH

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kostkalad
335
1
Jul 03, 2010#105
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
I’ve resurrected this thread as it seems an appropriate place to inform you all that I’m in the process of once again, deploying to the Solomon Islands as part of RAMSI. It’s been rather short notice – I wasn’t meant to be going this time but somebody else couldn’t go suddenly and as I’m largely self employed it came down to me.

It’s probably going to delay my book I’m afraid, as I won’t be able to head to the UK until either late this year or early next year but that’s the way it is. I’ve got to do my duty.

I’ll keep a look out for boarding schools servicing the children of troops with licorice strap wielding teachers – there seems to be a pattern in modern warfare that we go searching for installations that don’t actually turn out to exist, so why should I be any different?

I should have some degree of internet access, so I’ll still be reading the forum at times. I might post. Hopefully I’m going to be bored (peacekeeping is that rare type of job where you want to be boring).
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dominum
1,407
Jul 03, 2010#106
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Speaking as an old soldier to a younger one – keep yourself safe. Keep your head down. Look after your people, and let them look after you. Don’t be a hero unless it’s worth it.

And get the bloody job done, Digger.
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Another_Lurker
10K
256
Jul 11, 2010#107
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Hi SGT Dean Clarke 8/7 RVR. I hope that the deployment is going well, and that the mission is indeed proving very boring as regards any peril to life or limb. If you find any of those liquorice tawse wielding teachers I trust you’ll ensure that all the necessary UN resolutions are in place before you move in to seize their fearful implements of mass chastisement and escort their poor oppressed pupils to a place of safety!

I’m sorry that the book will be delayed, but hopefully it won’t be too much of a setback, and doubtless you’ll get at least some thinking and review time, which always has its uses. I hope that you’ll get a chance to update us on how things are going out there before too long.

And finally, I’ll echo the excellent military advice given by Colonel Dominum above!
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JennyBr
1,776
2
Jul 12, 2010#108
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

If I might add to Col. Dominum’s excellent advice. If you think dying for your country is heroic, be magnanimous – let the enemy die for theirs.

Take care!

Jenny.
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holyfamilypenguin
4,559
3
Jul 07, 2011#109
I’m afraid I do not have many memories of our school tuckshop. It was a modest affair which only sold buscuits. We certainly did not have a rifle range though, very strange to get boys shooting at school.

It was retold a few weeks ago in a gossip column in The Telegraph which stated that there was a picture of her stating ” Rachel Johnson, she chose the slipper” There is indeed such a caption.

Clearly , Rachel enjoys recounting her punishments as do most of us.
Click to expand…
Declan: This is a follow up that may have escaped your attention or maybe not. . Only glad to help.

CLICK

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/84 … de-me.html

School Reaction by Dominic Floyd Headmaster letter Ashdown. He sidesteps the cane. Many of the alumni have children in that school that were born after the abolition. She must have been a handful not at all unlike Jenny.

CLICK

Finally, I trust you all saw and read the article in Saturdays Telegraph by Rachel Johnson, a former OA. Although much has changed (no maggots in the shepherds pie here), the ethos certainly has not. The freedom she enjoyed whilst being at Ashdown continues today and we truly celebrate that. I also wholeheartedly agree with her when she says that the job of educating ones children is too important to undertake oneself. We must trust those in education to assist with the right choices and direction for our children.
It did not escape the adult content site with an interesting cartoon.

For an adult fantasy cartoon based on her latest revelations simply Google.

SEXUELLE: Rachel Johnson

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JennyBr
1,776
2
Jul 07, 2011#110
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Thank you for linking to the article by Rachel Johnson, about herself, in The Telegraph. It was very interesting.

I think your suggestion that she must have been a bit like me is probably right. I’m not sure I would have fared as well as she in a boarding school though. I get the impression that she was better suited for a boys’ school than she was for a girls’ school. That could be seen as an example of appropriate “gender differentiation” rather than the more usual “sex discrimination” that goes under that term.

It’s also notable that she opted for the cane when given as choice of that or forgoing a visit from her parents. Another report claims she had the choice the slipper or forgoing an exeat and states that she “choose the slipper with glee”. That seems to refer to the same incident but, as she wrote it, the Telegraph article is probably the more accurate. Either way, it’s clear she didn’t resent CP as girls are supposed to.

It’s amusing that, because of this, CP was abolished at the school (Ashdown House). Clearly it wasn’t abolished for the the benefit of the girls: quite the contrary in fact because she preferred it. It was abolished for the benefit of the then Headmaster (Clive Williams) who, for whatever reason, didn’t want to use CP on a girl. At least he was fair minded and abolished it for both sexes rather than introduce a discriminatory disciplinary policy.

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neilfrommanc
276
2
Jul 07, 2011#111
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Yes, the Telegraph article was interesting, i’s not often you’d find a modern mainstream newspaper in the UK including an article about school caning from a female correspondent. However I notice that she didn’t actually GET caned, just that it was an option which she chose and the headmaster subsequently bottled out of administering – so she won!

If Dr Dominum had come along and said that he remembered a girl who actually attended his boys’ private school in Australia some years ago and chose caning as a punishment option, I think everyone would be quick to deride it as fantasy, just shows what was “out there” at one time!
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Another_Lurker
10K
256
Jul 07, 2011#112
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

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ChrisV
May 17, 2014#113
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
The thread regarding tuckshop tawsing (At a Scottish Public School – as I understood it) –
We never had any Sweet Canes ….. apart from the 9inch sticks.
Chris
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Guest
May 24, 2014#114
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
Well didn’t`t you all have a jolly time back in 2009 This thread has made me chuckle always a bonus on a wet and miserable day, but alas I am also saddened by the realisation my school days were woefully lacking!

I did not attend a very exclusive, prestigious girls school in Scotland or any other country. Had I been able to attend my bog standard Secondary Modern a few years earlier I could have claimed to gone to an all girl school but by my time it had gone all new fangled and co-ed

My bog standard Secondary Modern did not, unsurprisingly, have a very elaborate tuck-shop. We did have a tuck-shop we were not THAT deprived but there was nothing very elaborate about it, no chandeliers, grand pianos or works of art could be found inside, just a few boxes of crisps and a couple of bars of chocolate. I have no idea if they sold liquorice straps/tawse I have my doubts. I don`t believe I have ever seen a piece of liquorice that could lead a double life as a cp implement although those horse cake things are utterly vile so perhaps force feeding a few of those could be classed as punishment! No I am afraid my only experience of liquorice is buying a little stick of it to dip into my bag of kali. I have never been lashed with a piece of liquorice or indeed any other sort of confectionery in my life, my sister did once throw a bag of Revels at me with intent but not sure that counts.

Now had my school gone in for a bit of liquorice lashing I am quite certain it would not have been at the hands of a head prefect. I am not sure we even had head prefects we had a head boy and girl so maybe that is the same thing. I can say with a fair amount of confidence the bog standard Secondary Modern did not run to providing the head girl or boy with a study, slipper or punishment book in order to give impish rogues a jolly good seeing to. I can be confident on this matter due to my boyfriend being appointed head boy while I was in the fifth form. Had he been given a study along with his post I am sure I would have been invited in for a jolly good chat.

It is probably wise the prefects or head girl did not attempt to give the girls at the bog standard Secondary Modern a jolly good seeing to. I am ashamed to say some of these girls, being not as well bred as those attending a very exclusive prestigious all girls school, were a little rough. I fear any prefect believing they have a scallywag on their hands who could be much improved by having their drawers lowered and a few well delivered smacks placed on the derriere may have found themselves minus a few clumps of hair and probably several teeth!

It was far better to let the senior mistressess sort out the hooligans they had plenty of practise and were given danger money for doing so. Senior mistress is a bit posh for the bog standard Secondary Modern we called the senior mistressess Head of Girls now I know I really should refer to them as Head of the None -Boys but I am common so will stick with Head of Girls. We had two HoGs because just like the police they knew there was safely in numbers. These HoGs were capable of giving a jolly good seeing to but sadly this did not consist of having our skirts raised and legs given a good slapping rather we were `whacked by the old bat with a stick`

So I am now thoroughly down spirited. By a simple accident of birth I have been deprived of going to very exclusive girls school where I could have been lashed in the elaborate tuck shop by a liquorice touting prefect. I have been deprived of going to the prefects study for knicker adjustment and a dose of a specially supplied slipper and instead of those nasty common canings I could have been given a jolly good seeing to by a posh sounding senior mistress via a throughly good leg slapping.

To cap my misery the memory of my none elaborate tuck shop has sparked a craving for a bag of Bones and a can of Peardrex both I believe no longer in production. And it`s still dam persisting it down

Oh how odd just checking that the post has come out ok before hitting respond and stap/tawse had been changed to stamps/tease. Not as bad I have to say as the suggestion I seemed to make the other day on a different forum for a stout pair of willies!!

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hcsj44
1,211
May 24, 2014#115
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

That you used the word “kali” for sherbet suggests you are from the North of England. Why not visit the Pontefract Liquorice Festival on July 13th – who knows what you might find?
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Another_Lurker
10K
256
May 25, 2014#116
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

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Guest
May 30, 2014#117
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Thank you for your comments. Glad I was able to cheer up what proved to a very wet couple of days. Still raining here I`m afraid

I am not from the North but I have been asked on a number of occasions if that is where I originate from. I am a born and bred midlander (west region) I have never lived anywhere further than a 15 minute car journey from my childhood town. Where I get some of my apparent northern expressions from is a mystery!

Thank you for the links I would say you have to give them credit for invention but judging by the potentially lethal underwear and the surely road hazardous motorised tawse stool maybe not!

I am using a Hp machine but I haven`t noticed it changing words before. I hope this is just a little blip it`s going through and it gets over its bout of `helpfulness` very soon

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ChrisV
Jun 01, 2014#118
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

I talked her down to 8, but she insisted on no knickers. I agreed and accepted the punishment. After the tawsing she returned the licorice to its original plastic wrapper and nobody was any the wiser. I was a lot more careful next time.
It was talking to a Northern Woman – that I realised that men used to Cane Girls. Usually the Cane on her Hands – or on her Bottom. Oddly enough; She seemed to have accepted that (albeit not Happily, of course) –
as the School was quite High Placed (Not certain now, of the exact term She used).
The Woman was from Newcastle.
However – the Girls at School (In the South East) – probably just hated the Caning (on Hands) – whoever it was from. It was from a Woman on Girls at school.
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Guest
Jun 04, 2014#119
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

By your statement

Oddly enough; She seemed to have accepted that (albeit not Happily, of course) as the School was quite High Placed (Not certain now, of the exact term She used).

Do you mean you find it odd she accepted being caned by a male or she accepted it because the school was `High placed`? If she was aware her school did not have a same sex policy regarding CP she would have know, should she be unfortunate to receive a caning, that caning could be carried out by a male. She would have accepted that regardless if her school was high placed or as rough as a Bear`s Behind!

We tend to accept what we consider normal. My secondary school as far I am aware adhered to a same sex cp policy, no one to my knowledge was ever caned by the opposite sex, at least during my time there. Had I been caned by a male, although I probably would have just accepted it at the time, I would be wondering why he was making an exception to rule. I would consider it to be not the norm for a male to cane a female, or indeed for a female to cane a male, at that school.

At my primary school only the Headmaster or Deputy Headmaster used the cane and on both sexes. Had I been given the cane here I would have not considered it odd at all to be caned by a male.

I don`t think anyone male or female was overly happy to be getting the cane, it was a pretty painful experience for a Northern, Southern and even for us dead `ard Midlander`s

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ChrisV
Jun 05, 2014#120
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

Thank you very much for your reaction. I don’t think I expressed myself very well in that part of
the Thread.

Just to Clarify –

A. I think the Woman was implying that the School was “High Placed” – So (She Understood)
– Caning of Girls was more or less expected.

B. I think the Woman was also accepting of a Man Caning Girls – because (as you have said) –
we tend to accept the “norm”.

ChrisV
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ChrisV
Jun 05, 2014#121
I attended a very exclusive and prestigious private girls boarding school in Aberdeen in the late 1970s. Being a very popular and outgoing girl I was often asked to help out in the school tuck shop.

One day I decided to help myself to some coin of the realm but was caught by the head prefect She suggested that I visit the senior mistress.

There is a Site … Selling old brands of sweets (Not “old” sweets!) – So maybe we can

trace Sweet Tawses!

ChrisV
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Another_Lurker
10K
256
Mar 17, 2019#122
Further evidence that I was severely disadvantaged by not being caned at school. It is clearly once again something to be proud of, at least to judge by by a conversation in a program on BBC Radio 4 this morning. And of course there is no more reliable indicator of social trends than BBC Radio 4! ????

I was only half listening to discussion about the Friday demonstrations by schoolchildren protesting about lack of action on global warming. A male panel member was asked something about participation in the demonstration and said he’d have been caned at school if he’d absented himself like that. A female participant called Rachel then immediately chipped in with ‘I was at a school where we had beating you know, and it was a boarding school so we couldn’t run away’. Or words to that effect .

There then followed some comment by a second female participant and the male participant about fierce teaching nuns which would have delighted American Way, who is extremely appreciative of the part the Sisters of No Mercy played in his education. Eventually it emerged that ‘Rachel’ was Rachel Johnson, younger sister of Boris.

Now American Way previously linked an article by Ms Johnson concerning her beating at boarding school in this thread. Second link down in his Jul 07, 2011 contribution #109 in this thread (a couple of contributions back), She was apprehended after raiding the tuck cupboard with a boy she had inveigled into assisting her by hints at a kiss.

The headmaster offered the choice of being beaten or missing a forthcoming parental visit and she opted to be caned. She was, she says, hardened to physical chastisement as her parents were firm believers in smacking. However the head clearly hadn’t expected that choice, had scruples about caning a girl, and in the interests of fairness decided this meant he could no longer cane boys either.

So Ms Johnson wasn’t beaten at boarding school, at least not according to her own writing. She went to a string of other schools but doesn’t mention SCP in connection with any of the others. Nonetheless she was only too eager to give the impression that she had been beaten at school on UK national prime time radio. Well, Radio 4 on Sunday morning anyway. ????

Having been whacked at school is back in vogue folks. Get your stories ready for dinner parties, casual conversation in the pub, and everything in between!
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Mar 17, 2019#123
I don’t know how that happened. I appear to have temporarily misplaced a chunk of this thread somewhere in cyberspace and American Way’s contribution #109 that I reference above is far further back than I indicated.
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How common was bare bottom discipline?

Is a Caning Well Deserved for this?

1897 Flogging Apparatus

School Play or Production

Punishment or Correction?

Schoolgirl Bits

PE Detentions & Discipline

Ruler on the hand

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