Discipline and Detention: Looking Back at School in the 1950s
My husband and I had an unusual experience this week. We visited his old school, along with about 60 other men in their 60s and above. There were also a few other wives. Let me explain why we were there, and the impact of the visit.
New Use of School Premises
In the early 1950s, he went to a boys’ grammar school. In the UK, this is a state high school for boys aged 11 and over. It was located in the extensive docks area near Tower Bridge in the East End of London. Most of the boys were from local working class families, but the school had a good reputation and they studied hard.
In the late 1960s, the school re-located to another part of London and the premises were used for various other educational purposes. It eventually fell into dereliction. The area, in the meantime, changed beyond all recognition and is now full of restaurants and office buildings spilling over from the business district in the City of London.
A few years ago, the school building was bought by an Indian luxury hotel chain called the Lalit. It was given a complete makeover and is opening for business shortly. As part of the hotel opening, all alumni of the school and their wives were invited to a reception to see how it had changed. We were feted with champagne and taken around the building.
The old assembly hall had become an elegant dining room and the ordinary school rooms had become well appointed guest rooms. There were also the usual places associated with a hotel, including reception rooms, a bar and so forth. Everyone agreed that the renovation had been an excellent job. It was splendid to see.
Read My Awkward Aging Story: How Denial Played a Trick on Me.
Memories
While we trooped around the premises, the men exclaimed about the changes of use. They said things like “This used to be the physics lab!” and exchanged memories of being there.
There were memories of sports events, exams, the way assembly was run, particular teachers and eccentric classmates. Conversations started with “Do you remember…?”
But by far the most common memory was of having been caned by the headmaster. This is known in England as “six of the best.” One man remembered a stool he had to hold onto while he bent over to be thrashed. Another, presumably a bit of a tear-away, proudly claimed to have had over 150 lashings over his time at the school.
My husband said that he had had only one caning, for admitting that he had taken a second pudding, or dessert in American English, at lunch. He had not been the only boy to do so – just the only one to admit it.
Nobody remembered the head with any affection.
Read The Golden Years: Embracing Old Age.
Women’s Memories
An equivalent group of women of a similar age, wherever they are in the world, are likely to have very different memories of school. Punishments might still be a strong component. Indeed, it brought back my own memories. I was generally a very well behaved little girl, but I still remember being called in to a head teacher when I was about eight for loudly singing the well-known Christmas carol about three kings in its inappropriate form. The words included something about a rubber cigar.
We girls were beaten much less frequently than boys, I am sure. However, we were told off, given detention and generally forced to undergo some unpleasant activity in an effort to make us behave. And corporal punishment continued in some places for a long time, as my daughter-in-law, who left her school in a small town in Louisiana in the 1980s, informs me.
These memories sit in the back of our heads, rarely aired. But when they come out, they are very strong.
Read Ageism vs. Wisdom of the Elders.
Also, read Are You Old Enough to Know Better?
Let’s Have a Conversation:
What are your memories of school? Were you ever punished? What form did it take? How do you think this shaped your attitudes toward discipline in schools? Please join the conversation.
Tags Nostalgia
I was spanked a few times in grammar school. I think the worst part was the embarrassment. “Eddie, come to the front of the class!’ Then I’d go over her knees; she’d pull down my pants and start spanking on my underpants. If it was the second time in the week, my briefs got pulled down too, Very embarrassing…and LOUD! Spanks and tears! but I still loved that teacher!
After I wrote my last comment I realised that I had not really answered your questions. So I have added my thoughts below.
My school was an old fashioned grammar school in England and the teachers were very strict. I attended there in the 1960’s for seven years.
For very minor offences impositions such as lines or writing out pages of text books were used. These were rare with detentions being much more favoured. A detention or DT as it was commonly called by pupils, consisted of an hour after school lesson with copying out pages of text or similar in silence. A note was sent home to the parents in advance with detentions being served on the first Tuesday or Thursday after the note. Any infringement during a detention, or failing to attend, resulted in a visit to the Headmaster the next morning for six strokes of his cane. Girls were sent to the Senior Mistress for a caning. Also, three detentions in a term resulted in a caning.
All teachers had the right to use the cane although most preferred the slipper or ruler which was not recorded. These were administered in front of the class at the time. If a teacher decided to cane a pupil, the pupil had to collect the cane and punishment book from the school secretary, a lady in her forties, who always smiled and told us to be brave. The caning was carried out at the end of the lesson and the pupil returned the cane afterwards. Girls were caned over their skirt or dress, while boys were caned over trousers up to a maximum of six strokes. The cane used on girls was shorter and thinner than the one used on the boys. My experience was that the younger lady teachers used to use the slipper and cane most with the experienced teachers using it least.
For more serious offences. or where teachers did not wish to use the slipper or cane, a form was completed and the pupil was sent to the school secretary. She then contacted the Headmaster, Deputy Headmaster or Senior Mistress who would decide on a suitable punishment. In practice this was usually the cane on the bottom. Canings were given with trousers down for the boys except for serious offences or repeat offenders which would be bare bottom. Girls told me they got caned with dress or skirt up.
The other form of discipline used was to send the pupil outside for a set period of time. If you were unlucky, as I was in my first weeks, you got caught by the Deputy or Senior Mistress on their patrols. This resulted in a visit to their office for a caning.
One other thing worth mentioning is that we felt embarrassed when called for a slippering or caning. There was no cult hero status in getting whacked. If we were late getting to a lesson because of a caning the teacher would quiz us and ensure the whole class knew that we had been caned. Other pupils would frequently tease anyone who had been caned.
This structured system resulted in a good learning environment with little bullying. Most teachers were respected rather than feared. There were a few teachers who used CP to instil respect but they were not liked by the pupils.
During my first five years at the school I got slippered about once a term, usually for talking in class or not doing my homework. I averaged one detention a term during my first five years. I got caned on several occasions, usually for being cheeky or impertinent to teachers.
I only visited the Headmaster once and got six strokes on my bare bottom for fighting. Needless to say, the fight was between my best friend and me over a girl. We soon forgot about her after our caning and resumed our friendship.
The culture changed in the sixth form and the cane was the only deterrent used. This was generally given by the Head, Deputy or Senior Mistress for serious offences such as visiting the local pub or smoking. I got caned once in the sixth form for inappropriate behaviour with a sixth form girl and was caned by the Senior Mistress.
My most memorable punishments were in my fourth and fifth years. I was in a group of three boys who were spying on the girls doing PE in the gym after we had completed our cross country run. We were spotted by the PE mistress who grabbed us and marched us into the gym in front of the girls. We were lined up and given six whacks with her slipper on our bottoms in front of the girls, wearing only white shorts. The memorable caning was for wolf whistling a young lady teacher as part of a dare. I got caught by the Senior Mistress and taken to her office with the teacher. She offered me a choice of her caning or a visit to the Headmaster. As there was a risk of expulsion I took her caning. She administered six strokes on my bottom and made me apologise to her before standing in the corner for the rest of the day.
I never resented any of my punishments except one. I fully deserved all of them and the teachers were fully justified in dishing them out. The only one I objected to was given to me by a young lady for failing to achieve a pass mark in a History test. I missed by two marks in a subject I hated so she gave me four strokes of the cane.
Overall, I felt I got a good education, even though it was occasionally painful, and it set me up for my working life which followed. I was less cheeky and more polite and respectful.
Thanks for such a very detailed response. Sounds like you had it harder than my husband, who went to a boys grammar school in the 1950s.
I certainly did but it was my own fault. Thank you for the reply.
The cane was regularly used when I was at school. At primary school I got one stroke on each hand for talking in class from the deputy headmistress. But grammar school was much stricter. In my second week there I was cheeky to a trainee teacher and got sent outside. I got caught by the senior mistress on her patrol and sent to wait outside her office. I joined a girl who was waiting there. After a long wait the senior mistress appeared and ushered the girl in. I heard six swishing sounds from within before the girl rushed out rubbing her bottom, I was summoned in and given a long lecture before being ordered to remove my blazer and short trousers. I was bent over a stool and told to hold the legs while she gave me six hard strokes on my bottom. It was unbelievably painful and I was crying at the end. Then she told me to get dressed and walked me back to my classroom. I was told to apologise to the teacher after the senior mistress had told her that I had been caned in front of the whole class. Sadly I didn’t learn as I got caned by her and many other teachers many times for my cheek.
I was a 6th grader when I got my first spanking in school. There were 11 boys Ih our class, when our teacher called into the restroom telling us to quiet down, however we failed to heed her warning, When we returned to class she told us to lineup single file, we lined up and one at a time she called us to where she was sitting, and turned all 11 of us over her knee, and administered 10 spanks to all of us boys. Four years later she had become school librariarian and I had borrowed a book that was 3 months past the due date to return. She came to my locker, told me to come with her to her office and again put me her knee and gave me another spanking.
I went to a mixed grammar school where there was corporal punishment, which was mainly the slipper, although the cane was sometimes used on both boys and (very occasionally) girls. It was boys who usually got the slipper in class (to the amusement of the girls) but on this particular occasion the teacher was away sick (I think) and the class was running riot, having been left to our own devices. There was a lot of noise and several of us were standing up and talking.
I was talking to my girlfriend at the time, a pretty girl called Rosie. We weren’t honestly contributing to the noise level more than anybody else but we were caught when Miss Bowden came in and read the riot act.
This was unlucky for us because Miss Bowden was the games and gym teacher for the girls and was certainly not adverse to using the slipper. In fact Rosie had told me of how she and other girls had suffered under Miss Bowden’s ministrations. The class was silent as the teacher ordered each of us who was standing up to face the blackboard while she told everyone else to get a book out and study. I glanced sideways and there were four boys and three girls standing. We were obviously going to be made an example of.
After what seemed an age there was a stirred of interest in the class as Miss Bowden reached into her bag and brought out a gym slipper. She quickly quieted the class by saying anyone who talked would be out the front as well. Anyway she pointed to the first boy, who’s name I think was Tom, and told him to bend over the front desk. Tom did so and received four almighty whacks on his behind. Miss Bowden was a very athletic lady!
Tom went back to his place fighting back tears and it was the turn of the first girl, Sally. If we thought Miss B might be soft on girls we were mistaken as she let fly with four equally hard whacks which made Sally squeal. By the time she got up she was in tears but Miss B had no sympathy but merely pointed her to her seat, which she sat in very gingerly and covered her face.
Another boy was whacked and he obviously had a job getting through it without tears and I was getting worried, as Miss B was getting a head of steam up! Poor Rosie was next and her bum made a perfect target which the teacher exploited with four expert and well delivered whacks which made Rosie yell. She actually kicked her legs in the air at the last one and was in floods of tears as she returned to her seat. I wanted to put my arms round her but unfortunately it was my turn!
I bent over the desk and boy, did Miss B know how to whack! I caught my breath for the first one and had to grit my teeth as the sweat poured off me. I did manage to avoid crying out loud but my eyes were full of tears by the time she finished and my bottom resembled a volcano. I tried to get back to my seat, resisting the temptation to rub, but it was difficult and sitting down was agony.
We watched the other two kids get their punishment – roughly the same as before – to the amusement of the class, but not us who had actually felt it. Afterwards the girls were all crying softly and the boys trying to be brave but we had all felt it big time. Miss Bowden then put the slipper on the table and said she was quite prepared to use it again if there was a squeak out of any of us.
As can be imagined there was no squeak! Rosie and I consoled each other afterwards, feeling somewhat hard done by. We did have a date that evening which had been pre-arranged, but we felt it was better to go for a walk than anything which involved sitting down!