Yr 11 Computer Class
We had just received an up-to-date model. After working on Noah's old computer from the Ark, we took turns with this marvel of technology - The APPLE II. I remember trying to make our programs turn alphanumeric characters into Basic animation ... you know SEE SPOT RUN technology! Hang on, I'm still trying to do that!!
The Stork Man Cometh ... without his helicopter & tubs of margarine.
Does anyone else remember that cinematic classic that some of the students were lucky enough to perform in? It was called 'Enough Guts To Say No'. What made it memorable for me was kissing & cuddling up to Amanda Dole (a then Playboy Playmate). There was a scene where I had to look disappointed when she lit up a cigarette. This was easy to do as I had just spent 1 hr during setup trying to talk to her. She was very self-centred, hated her father, & her greatest ambition was to marry RICH. So if you or your children ever see that scene I wasn't acting, MY I.Q. had just dropped 60 points just trying to talk to her!
Muck-Up Night
On to Newport Arms ... Friends talking together in groups talking about life, liberty & sex ... someone buying me a Rusty Nail, a Blue Lagoon & something else I can't remember to see if I would drink them ... Seeing Maryanne & her new boyfriend arrive (ouch that hurt) & trying to avoid them all night ... Nerida coming up to me and complaining that the barman wouldn't serve her without I.D. ... piling into someone's car for the trip back to school ... spending the night in the sanctuary & not being able to sleep ... piling chairs & tables on top of the walkways and toilet paper everywhere ... water balloons & flour bombs to the ready ... attack!!! ... then fade out.
Formals etc
Harbour cruises were memorable ... I don't think that the Opera House will forget us ... who else hides when they here Time Warp again !
Year 9 - Old Sydney Town
I remember locking Mike Pickford & Peter Higgins in the stocks outside the gaol ... it was so much fun that we decided to lock Mr Williams & Mr Dockrill in them as well!
Year 12 - A.N.U. Canberra
We travelled by train. Everyone was bored until someone found out that I had a tape deck. Simon & Garfunkle was the only tape suitable for mixed company (I thought that Cheech & Chong or Monty Python might embarrass the teachers!). Some idiot from our school bounded down the stairs after the first lecture to get a couple of autographs from Prof Manning-Clarke (oops that was me! - He was rather startled!)Seeing the sights with Mike Ryan & Nick T-P. We got busted playing wargames in a display in the War Memorial ... Trying to find something to do after 9PM in Canberra ... spending the train ride back with some girls from Campbelltown. Great time had by all.
CRICKET...Watching the exploits of Shane Warne in Dubai etc recently reminded me of playing cricket with various people from school. Starting with Rob Glenister, Rod Henry & Grant Clay in U/13's Nth Turramurra to U/16's with Mark Shapcott, Richard Rowland &, my opening bowling partner, Jim Lucas, amongst others that time & memory does not serve justice to. One person who does come to mind was Mark Simpson. Mark was enthusiastic, an innovator and, much to the chagrin of us fast bowlers, he was a LEGGIE !! It will also be remembered that he was a meticulous field setter. If he was lucky he would be used as 3rd or 4th change and, much to the amusement of teammates & opponents alike, he would produce a piece of paper with a detailed diagram of his field placings! He was a man before his time!!
AUSSIE RULES...A few things spring to mind...
1)Mr Mattila was our coach. Now while I can remember many drills & practices that we did for my Sat morning Soccer team (St Ives), we must have been a super special school Aussie Rules team, because I can't remember much about our training (or Mattila's coaching).
2)Playing Chatswood High (I think) at Gore Hill Oval, Paul Williamson went for a great run up the wing - 10m - 20m - 40m - 55m - and kicked the ball into the forward pocket. For a moment he wondered why nobody had tackled him earlier and why everyone was laughing. Then it hit him - he had forgotten to bounce the ball every 10m!!
3)A different game ..a different player (can't think who - but will he own up to it?) gathers the ball in midfield, bumps off one player, spins round another, then kicks the ball into the forward pocket where one of our players takes a good mark. Unfortunately it was our backpocket player not our forward!!
4)Playing against the Ultimate Enemy - Pennant Hills High. We had to beat them to win the region (we were undefeated at that stage). Playing fullback I was against the PH captain - a very big, robust, ex-rugby player. He started shouting orders to his players but they couldn't understand him. He eventually took out his mouthguard but I could swear he was still wearing it - at least it looked that way!!
Wrestling - my main memories were the visit of a visiting team from Wellington NZ and being in the heaviest weight class I got to wrestle the BIGGEST boy in the team ... a 7ft Maori! I don't remember much except the crowd erupting when I finally tossed him! The other memory involved the trip to Wollongong with the team & Daryl Chaffer jogging around the streets wearing a garbage bag to sweat to try & make the weight!
General Sports memories - all the great fun at the Swimming & Athletics carnivals... Scoring a try in the u/15 rugby comp ... & of course the multi-square handball battles ... Lunchtime soccer/gaelic football behind the bini shell
There's too many memories to remember clearly & I've taken up too much space on this as it is .
Talk to everyone soon.
Our twentieth year school re-union - Mark Simpson’s thoughts
Let me start by saying that I had a fantastic time at our 20th year school re-union and I thank all those people involved that made the whole event so enjoyable:
To the organizing committee, absolutely stunning job. You put so much effort, energy and enthusiasm into your tasks and you delivered. I think Megan is in great danger of wanting to do this as a profession and will need to find something to do with her spare time or she will suffer from a massive event organizers hangover!!!
To the ex-students, thank you for the great memories and the great spirit generated in the re-union.
To all the male students, let this be a wake-up call. If we were standing around as a group of likely lads and that some group of ladies walked by, I do not think that many of us would be given a second glance. I think this may just trigger an early mid-life crisis for a lot of us, and lead to the onset of Male Men-o-Porsche, where we realize that our youth is a fading memory and we all go off and buy Sports Cars and Bloody Harley Davidsons’.
To the female students, the passing of twenty years has been much, much kinder to you. With a couple of you still needing to produce ID to get into your 20th year re-union, it made me feel like a dirty old man. Yes, I am unashamedly one of the guys asking how the hell Karen McMurdy could possibly be the same age as me.
Thank you to all the guys and gals that I had a good chat to and sorry to those who I did not get to talk too. I will definitely see you next time.
My highlights:
Marita Leuver for her great style in remembering those of our schoolmates that have not stayed around for the journey. I did not say hello to you on the night and I wish I had done. We all know of the great talents that Peter and Marita brought to KHS. I still remember a piece of art that Marita created in 5th Class at Pymble Public. I remember thinking that nobody I knew could possibly create such a thing. It puts it all in context when you remember that Marita was probably ten years old at the time.
And to one particular fabulous lady, who twenty something years ago, this previously shy, previously young guy was really fond of; it was just great to say hello.
To all concerned, please keep in touch and lets not have to wait another twenty bloody years.
One strong memory is Mr Bonnefin's metal work class. This brought together the most dangerous combination of devious students, sharp instruments, 240 volts and flammable gas. How we managed not to kill someone I'll never know. In fact we all emerged with the correct number of digits and limbs although some were slightly more singed than others. The rear of the class room was mostly a shroud of smoke that prevented the detection of anti social activity. Practical jokes were the order of the day, with little regard to one's fellow student or the general safety of the occupants of the industrial arts block. Vices wired to lawn mower spark leads, booby trapped lathes, oh, and yes the coke bucket at the rear of the room which always had a cup of sump oil tipped into it to produce that thick acrid smoke. We couldn't work unless we got the air just right. Of course the finishing touch was 25 boys all shouting absurd animal noises at the top of their lungs. Mr Bonnefin burst out one day in desperation and shouted for christ's sake shut up, it sounds like a bloody zoo in here. It was a zoo. Illicit projects were common and if the class had pulled together as a whole we would have finished that gas powered rocket launcher. In this modern day and age there would probably be an FBI file kept on the activities of Bonnefin's metal work class. A few students bumped into Mr Bonnefin some years later where upon he confessed to still having nightmares about 'THAT'class, although I suspect he was probably much the same when he was at school.
After reading Jenny Craig's story I am soooooooo embarressed and can't believe that I said that thing (about you know what) and it has stuck in Jenny's memories of Kuring-gai!!!
Wow - I think I was a different person back then to be so bold.
Anyway looking forward to seeing everyone at the reunion - Not long to go now!
I remember in the last week of school in Year 10 a bunch of us: Geoff McLean, Craig Mason, David Proctor? and John Newell went to the cricket. Australia was playing New Zealand and we were sitting on the hill to cheer on the Aussies. We got chatting to the Kiwis who were sitting behind us until one of the drunker ones picked a fight with some Aussies and it was all on. I got pushed over in the chaos only to get up and meet some guy's fist in my eye . . . and I went down again. I subsequently went to the Year 10 formal with a real shiner and have deemed cricket a violent game ever since!!
It wasn't until I started looking at this website with the pictures and the memories from other people that my own memories started coming back to me.(I don't know whether that is a good thing or not).
Anyway, apart from the usual fights that went on in the corridors between the blocks with everyone shouting, fight, fight, fight and the ensuing traffic jam from either side as more and more students were cramming into the corridor to see what was happening, one memory has resurfaced and is now permanently imprinted in the front of my brain.
I had just arrived at Kuringai High and found myself and another student(don't ask me his name, haven't got a bloody clue) in Lincoln block on the southwestern stairwell. At the time it seemed a good idea to have a bit of fun by sliding our GLOBITE suitcases (nerd alert) down the concrete stairs, unbeknown to us that it was making a hell of a racket, hey!! we were kids.
We were then SPRUNG by, you guessed it, Mr Collins, but we didn't know who he was then. Mr Collins took us down to his office and as we walked in, there were some older kids standing in there rubbing their hands on their trousers for some reason and the reason soon appeared. He then caned these kids in front of us (by this time we were sh...... ourselves), these kids then left the office and his attention turned to us. We thought we were next, he asked us our names, what year we were in, and said that if we were caught doing anything like that again he would have no hesitation in caning us and we left his office with our GLOBITES and hands intact.
I think now looking back, that was one of the most important lessons I ever got at school, thank you Mr Collins.
I remember well the dreadful feeling of Bob Collins' presence in the queue outside the lab... the cold heat of his stare as he stands behind me while everyone else falls silent, and the awful falling embarrassment of being the last to shut up. I also remember the metre rule he used to slam on the lab table inches from fingers, the cane to the back of the knees (thankfully not mine) and on one occasion, the use of a Van der Graff generator and a plastic garbage can lid to torment Derek Nathan... In reality this is probably a load of misremembered and apocryphal folklore, but please, readers, post your memories and perpetuate the legend of the Demon Science Master...
Does anyne have any photos of us all jumping into the mud hole on muckup day???? That was a memory that will stay with me for a long time!!!! Then proceeding to the Gates of KHS to wait for the buses to arrive with all the other forms.
That day was great fun!
Check out the photos of the school on Muck Up Day in the Photos section.
I've just remembered another event which stands out as a riot. Who remembers the party at Palm Beach at the end of fifth form? What a night that was. Several incidents stand out. 1)Borrowing my mother's car and turning it into a police car and chasing Garry Staniland and his girlfriend at the time (sorry can't remember who it was). Myself and Karen Jacksons boyfriend drove up behind them (Garry was giving her a driving lesson)and turned the blue flashing light on (which we had attached to the roof). We pulled up beside them and told them to pull over, screeched to a holt a way in front of them, then unfortunately Garry's girlfriend panicked and rolled straight into the side of Mum's car (no real damage luckily). We then proceeded back to the party, at speed and screeched to a holt at the party, (as there was alot of funny cigs being smoked). Everyone then quickly dropped their funny cigs, then called us names when realising it was us. The close call was that literally 5 mins later the real Police pulled up. Now that was a hasty take fake highway patrol signs off the car.
The rest off the night was great fun and a vision of waking up the next mornig and seeing Mike Ryan fast asleep standing up, leaning against a car dissolved all of us into histerical laughter.
Just had to remind people of that.
Lunchtime at Bobo was a treat. Driving around in Karen Jackson’s boyfriend (James Burnett) Mini with the front seats out and controlling the vehicle from under the steering wheel, scared the living daylights out of most old ditties having tea and scones. And then, scaring the gang one day, by striping down to my undies to recover a boat made in shop.
It was a pain when you had to return to school at the same time the teachers were on their way back from the Hospital, that’s why I was always in a hurry.
Do you think that Mr Bonafin (Bono) eventually found the anvil in the metal workshop? It was extremely difficult to hide a 50kg plus lump of wood and steel under someone’s nose. Can any one remember what happens when you mix cotton waste, sump-oil, blueing torch and the extractor fan in reverse?
Burnie was a pussy, who was the Science Teacher (he knew how to give the cane) in our early years that taught us fire safety by lighting the gas at the tap? Who was the unexpected student on the other side of the table? Wasn’t it great how we could get pencil cases to blow up and Bunsen burners could travel around the room lit.
I must have been one of those pyromaniacs!
Nick, I only wagged school to obtain a certificate at the Helen Keller School of Driving and Parking.
I remember driving down to North Turramurra shops one lunch time with Neridah Lomas, Karen Jackson and Barry Thompson (driving). We had all enjoyed some nice greasy chips and chicken followed by a good cup of coffee at Neridah's (to wash down the grease) when we realised it was time to get back to school. Being a little late Bazza did what he loved doing best and drove a break neck speed up Bobbin Head Road. On reaching Lady Davidson Hospital, he decided to park the car on the gravel over the road from school, without slowing down much - the hand brake was much more fun.
Unfortunately he slightly misjudged his braking distance and sideways momentum of the car and ploughed into the side of one of the canteen womens cars. Luckily noone was hurt, except for Barry's pride and wallet.
A few nights ago I saw Mental as Anything play at the Powerhouse museum and it brought back a memory I have from Year 8 or 9.
It was in the Binny shell and for some reason we were being entertained by a very young 'Mentals' singing 'The Nips are getting bigger' (hardly appropriate lyrics for us young and impressionables) at lunch time.
Lyn McAlphine was close to hysteria at being in the same room with Martin Plaza (band member).
I wondered if the nearing middle age women yelling from the front row of the gig from the Powerhouse was named Lyn too !
Stephen, I remember doing that play in the Bini Shell and also another one that we wrote ourselves, comparing what we have now and what we didn't have in Roman Times. I think the latter was with Miss Langlands. I recall we also spent a lot of class time getting it JUST right.
Why oh why did any of us take Latin? I can't even remember what year that was in, but I do remember convincing Ms Bilbe? that we could do Wayne & Schuster's radioplay Rinse the Blood off my Toga as a class for a school show. Apart from some appalling puns, it had bugger all to do with Latin, but we still managed to avoid real work for weeks as we converted and rehearsed it, and had a ball putting it on. My name is Flavius Maximus, I'm a private Roman eye, my license number is IXIVLLCCDIXMV. Also comes in handy as an eye chart.
We remember making many inedible delights in Home Science, more often than not they were more like science experiments and we wouldn't dare eat them!
However, we remember in Year 10 looking forward to the last Home Science class of the year. We all put in a lot of time to make great food and punch for the class party - or so we thought!
As we prepared the food, Mrs Gilmore announced that in fact the food would be going to the staffroom for the teachers' party and we wouldn't be getting any of it.
The group of four at our cooking bench were so angry about it that we thought that we'd get the teachers back by adding half a bottle of dishwashing liquid to the punch. Not long after this the punch began to froth due to the combination of chemicals. We then had to add other things to make it look normal and were eventually satisfied that the job was well done.
It was absolutely amazing that the staff drank all the punch and we never heard another thing about it except that about five teachers were missing from school the next day!! I'm sure they never suspected that we would have done it and probably put it down to bad cooking!
Who didn't look forward to classes in the science labs? Especially with the deep porcelain sinks and running taps on those hot summer days. Then there was the watching of strange growths on petrie dishes and of course for all those pyromaniacs amongst us....lighting up the bunsen burners!
I remember one particular class with Mr Keith Burney...he was trying to explain, to our somewhat distracted class, the importance of safety when a bunsen burner was alight (he had just lit the burner on his bench preceding an experiment).
He had a wad of lecture papers in his hand and was waving them about like the conductor of an orchestra, possibly trying to add emphasis to his argument.
He became particularly frustrated when a few of the group to his right were just not paying attention, so he stopped to question them on what he'd just said about fire safety.
Moments later the papers in his hand turned into an unfurled Olympic torch, sending smoke and a few flames up toward the low ceiling of the lab.
The entire class applauded. Thankfully, Mr Burney did not become Mr Burning. Just a little red with embarassment!
I'll never forget the day Wendy Wright made her major work for her 3 unit art sculpture. It was on the grass outside the art cottages one lunchtime.
Wendy's concept was See no evil, Hear no evil, Speak no Evil. It was a series of 3 face masks and the volunteer for the mask was Cindy McDermott. Cindy's face was plastered with Vasoline ( So it would not stick) , a straw up each nose and then the plaster was smeared all over her face.We all rolled around with laughter uncontrollably for the lunch period as Cindy lay there with 2 straws coming out of the plaster. Finally the time came for the mask to be removed. And you guessed it - it was stuck!
We were all laughing so hard at the sight of Wendy leading Cindy across the road to Lady Davidson Hospital to have the mask removed. Amazingly it came off intact and was later used as Wendy's major work , which I am sure she got great marks for!!!
