Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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down south
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Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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A New Year, and it's time to move on to a new session. So here we begin with the rugby and hockey teams for 1970-71.

The rugby team were retaining the James Murray trophy for the third year in a row. Meanwhile,it would be the last time the hockey girls appeared in gymslips; a garment which had already long gone out of fashion for everyday wear.
Ardrossan Academy rugby team session 1970-71.jpg

Ardrossan Academy hockey team session 1970-71.jpg


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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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By this year there was a senior football team at the Academy:

Ardrossan Academy senior football team session 1970-71.jpg
Ardrossan Academy U-15 football team session 1970-71.jpg


Tom Black, the captain here, later played cricket for Scotland.

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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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There were no team pictures this year for cricket, golf, netball or tennis, but we do have one for badminton:

Ardrossan Academy badminton team session 1970-71.jpg

And we also this session have volleyball teams for both sexes :

Ardrossan Academy boys' volleyball team session 1970-71.jpg
Ardrossan Academy girls' volleyball team session 1970-71.jpg



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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

Post by Hughie »

I never knew it but it seems when Eglinton School closed, Mr Millar (gym) and Mr Kirk (woodwork) moved on to Ardrossan Academy. Did any others? I remember Mr Kirk's brother playing as a defender for Hearts.
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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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Think it was actually when the Academy took over the secondary part of Stanley School that all the teachers transferred, Hughie. Mrs Skelly I believe would be another one from your era who went.

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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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Hughie wrote:I remember Mr Kirk's brother playing as a defender for Hearts.
Hughie,

This, I think, is a myth that’s been innocently handed down over a long number of years.

I was at a funeral service in Fairlie Parish Church about 18 months ago at which Mr. Kirk’s sister also attended and to whom I was introduced. She told me at that time that Mr. Kirk was “well” but generally confined to home. When I then asked her about her brother who played for Hearts she told that Mr. Kirk, our woodwork teacher, was her only brother.

The man who played full-back for Heart of Midlothian was ROBERT KIRK, born in Arniston, Midlothian, and member of the teams that won the Scottish League Titles in the 1957/58 and 1959/60 seasons; the Scottish Cup in the 1955/56 season; and the League Cup in the 1958/59 and 1959/60 seasons.
Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it.
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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

Post by Hughie »

Thanks for that, Penny. I do remember going to see a Rangers Vs Hearts game at Hampden with a couple of mates around 1959, and one mentioned that Robert was a brother our woodwork teacher. Obviously he was wrong going by your encounter with the sister.
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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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Some orchestral photos now, and here first is the complete orchestra.

Ardrossan Academy orchestra session 1970-71.jpg

A group of the strings also played as a chamber orchestra, and were winners at the Ayrshire Music Festival.

Ardrossan Academy chamber orchestra session 1970-71.jpg

From left to right: Maxine Kitching; Alexis Millar; Josephine Drake; Susan Broadfoot; Catherine Brooks; Winnie Sloan; Janice Millar; Joy Kirkwood; Alison Miller.

And the Academy this year even boasted a string quartet: Alison Miller, Susan Broadfoot, Janice Millar and Alexis Millar.

Ardrossan Academy string quartet session 1970-71.jpg

They too won at the Festival, if rather by default, as described in the article below by our very own Lorna Campbell, which appeared in the A&S Herald along with the two latter photographs.

THEY DON'T JUST STRING ALONG

Maybe it would be unfair to say that Ardrossan Academy String Quartet easily won their section at the Music Festival last week - but in fact they were the only string quartet entered.

I spoke to them earlier this week and Alison Miller, aged 18, put forward her theory for the lack of competition in this section. " Many schools probably didn't have the combination of cello, two violins and a viola player. "

Alison plays the cello, Susan Broadfoot plays the violin and sisters Janice and Alexis Millar play violin and viola respectively. Janice has been playing the violin for 5 years and her sister also played the violin for years before taking up the viola in September.

The string quartet was only formed four weeks before the festival and the girls had not played together before, although they are all members of the school orchestra and have been ever since they started at the Academy. They had four practices in their lunch hours but Alexis said : " We entered more for fun than anything else and we were very surprised to get such high marks. " They won in several other sections where they entered individually.

All things considered the girls have been quite busy and on top of all the preparation for the music festival they are all preparing for SCE examinations. Susan, aged 14 and Janice, aged 15, are both studying for seven O levels while Alexis is sitting seven this year , and Alison is sitting Highers.

All four of them would like to keep on with music and all are considering a career in music, except Alexis who is still undecided. Alison would like to work possibly in administration with the BBC. She hopes to go to Glasgow University at the end of the year to take an Arts degree in English and Music. The other two were slightly more vague, although they wanted to have a career in music. They were quite fervent, however, when they said they did not want to teach music.

The piece they played at the festival was a modern work by David Stone who is director of studies at the Royal Academy of Music in Glasgow. Susan and Alison attend the Royal Academy on Saturday mornings. Susan said : " I came to the Academy from Largs and when I started to learn the violin in Largs I had my own teacher but she left and I now get lessons at the Royal Academy. " Alison has been going to the Royal Academy for about two years and said : " You work quite hard there and they consider you a part-time student of the Academy. "

All the girls have a wide range of tastes in music. Susan said : " I like all kinds of music as long as it is good in its field . I especially like the modern composers. "

The girls all have their own instruments although the county council supply a lot of the orchestra's instruments. Alison commented : " Ardrossan Academy is short of woodwind instruments . "

The idea of having a string quartet was not the girls' own, it was due to music teachers Mr Hetherington and My Lyle that the quartet was formed. The girls were full of praise for the efforts of these teachers in helping the orchestra and promoting an interest in music among the pupils. " It is not a case of giving up your time, because we enjoy it, " said Alison, but she added that it was appreciated that the music teachers were willing to do this too.

By LORNA CAMPBELL Ardrossan and Saltcoats Herald, 2nd April 1971


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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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The Academy's success in another contest also received some publicity this year : the Classical Verse Speaking contest held annually at Glasgow University. This was an activity ardently promoted by our redoubtable Head of Classics, Dr Nisbet, who devoted much time and effort to coaching the participants. Greek was very much more of a minority subject than Latin; the three juniors featured here represented the entire Third year Greek class.

Once again we have an article by Lorna Campbell, accompanied by a photo ( and once again Janice Millar features, though that coincidence isn't mentioned ). I can tell you the girls weren't too thrilled to be described as dolly birds !; but we'll let that pass...

Ardrossan Academy classics team session 1970-71.jpg

Left to right: Rae Livingstone, June McCallum, John Johnston, Elizabeth Hendry , Janice Millar.

IT'S ALL GREEK TO ME .....

" Naturally I am biased in favour of boys learning English; and then I would let the clever ones learn Latin as an honour and Greek as a treat. " It was Winston Churchill who said it, not me.

This week I went to Ardrossan Academy to talk to five pupils who were recently successful in the Classical Verse Speaking and Prose Reading Competition at Glasgow University. Expecting to see a group of very scholastic looking students hanging on to massive volumes of Greek script and dusty Latin tomes, I was pleasantly surprised when I met four modern dolly girls and one boy, all of whom looked more like sports champions than pedants.

They were Rae Livinstone, who gained second prize in the Senior Greek section; June McCallum, who was first in Intermediate Greek; John A Johnson, who was first in Beginners' Greek, and Janice Millar and Elizabeth Hendry, who were second and third in Beginners' Greek respectively.

The competition is open to all schools in Glasgow, Central and South West Scotland, and began in 1953. It owed its inception to Mr A R Mundy, then principal teachers of classics in Glasgow Academy. It lapsed for a year in 1956 but was revived in 1957 to continue annually until 1962 under the auspices of the Classical Association of Scotland.

The competition was in abeyance when the SCE dates were changed but it started up again through the efforts of a small ad hoc committee of the Association of Teachers of Classics, thanks largely to the efforts of Mr L I Lennox, now principal teachers of classics in Kilwinning.The competition is adjudicated by members of Glasgow University staff, of HM Inspectorate and by former teachers of classics.

Elizabeth said she had been very nervous at the competition. She explained that they had to recite a set piece which they received about eight weeks before the competition.

June said that going to the competition annually meant meeting a great many friends from other schools. " You find people who are going to it are often in their school orchestra and go to inter-school debates, so you get to know the faces and make friends you would not otherwise. And you get your dinner there, " she added.

John commented : " You don't have to pay your fare either. " The five of them were not too sure who did have to fork out for this, but assumed it was school funds.

Latin is often termed a " dead " language and there cannot be many occasions when there is any need to use some well-chosen phrases of classical Greek and so I asked them what use the subjects were to them.

Janice said : " It is useful really because it can be a big help with English, it helps you understand the meanings of words by recognising the Greek root. " Elizabeth thought it was interesting and June agreed with Janice. She said : " It helps with interpretation. If you don't know the meaning of a word, you can make a good guess - it is sometimes wrong, of course, but it helps . "

All of them agreed, however, that there were not a great many people taking classics. John said : " Science is all the craze, " and June said : " People normally take Greek if they are taking Latin as their main course, intending to stick to classics through university. "

Ardrossan Academy has an unbroken record of successful entries in all sections of this competition and it now has custody of the Senior Cup for its successes over four consecutive years. Dispersal of classes in three buildings and shortage of staff made entry to the Latin sections impossible this year so the Academy did not compete for the Junior Cup. It was thanks to the heroic efforts of the five who entered in the Greek sections that the Senior Cup was retained by the Academy.

I wondered if you had to be very clever to study classics and if it was such a terrible disgrace that I had never taken either subject ; but after assuring me that it was no trouble, John said : " It is different from French because there are declensions for a noun in its different cases like genitive, accusative, vocative, ablative, et cetera. " Now I know.

June stressed :" Dr Nisbet, the head of the classics department, does a lot of work to help us with the competition. "

By LORNA CAMPBELL Ardrossan and Saltcoats Herald, 18th June 1971


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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

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The magazine committee now, and this year in tribute to all the building work going on at the school they're posed on one of the diggers being used.

Ardrossan Academy magazine committee session 1970-71.jpg

The list of names doesn't identify who's who in the picture, but fortunately I can put most, though not all, of the names to the faces.

Starting with the two boys at front left, I don't know the one on the left but I think the other one is Philip Derbyshire.

Then going left to right along the top of the digger, we have unknown; Christopher Lyon; Jennifer Beard; Arthur Rodman; Jennifer Reid; June McCallum; Catherine Brooks; Joyce Wilson; and Winnie Sloan.

By a process of elimination the unknown two must come out of Peter Nellany, Samuel McMurran, John Blair and Stephen Dowds. But the latter I don't think is there because he was named in one of the sports photos and I don't recognise him here.

Another photo with names from this year, dated February 1971 to be exact, is this one, showing a group gathered round a new savings stamp machine that had been installed in the school by the Ardrossan branch of the RBS. Interesting that there was thought to be a market then for such a service in schools . Back then of course it was very much a parentally encouraged habit to invest in National Savings by purchasing these stamps and sticking them in books to accumulate; I did it myself from an early age. But how many given half a chance would have resisted the temptation to blow the money at the tuckshop instead ?

Ardrossan Academy savings stamp machine  1971.jpg

As always with publicising a venture, the presence of some attractive young ladies is considered an advantage; and here along with the rector Mr Partridge and Mr Fergus Wightman, manager of the bank ( and himself a former pupil of the Academy ) we have from left to right prefects Mary Wardrop, Sheila Davidson, Catherine Gilchrist and Jennifer Jack.

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Re: Ardrossan Academy sports and other group photos session 1970-71

Post by down south »

Last but not least for this session, we come to the Academy's production of Gilbert and Sullivan's " Iolanthe ". We already have a separate topic of long standing for this, and I've included the picture I'm adding today in that. So all that remains is to direct you to it:

http://www.threetowners.net/forum/viewt ... 54#p150954

PS Just remembered there's also another picture from session 1970-71 in a separate topic, featuring choir members in a concert at St Cuthbert's Church: see here.

Susan
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