Ted, Barney. We had a kid at the Central who took a swing at McMinn with a cane whilst in the Principal's office and then took off out the door with both adults after him they didn't catch him for a couple of days and then only after his Dad brought him in. Mauri

Ted, Is the Ronnie Watkins the kid who lived in the bungalow beside Lavery's Land opposite Lismara and Belfoir Terrace's. If I remembr correctly he was quite a handful for his parents at an early age and the last I heard about him was he was in the Crumlin Road gaol. Mind you I'm talking about a long time ago. Mauri

Brendan, Pardon my igorance but who are the "Micks" ?? Mauri

Ronnie lived in Donard drive had a sister 2 brothers,he spent years in reform schools and prison,and had a holiday in Ashford Castle no less

Quite correct Mauri! Frank

Donald,When Fr. Macnamara came to the Boys School,it was a really big Deal.One upstairs classroom had all the desks stacked in one corner,the floor was scrubbed,and a roaring fire in the Hearth,a semi-circular line was chalked on the floor so that a full class faced the Priest,A Prize of 2/6 was given to the boy who got the most correct answers.No excuses were accepted for missing school that day!!....Frank

Yes Mauri
His family were customers in our grocers shop I think they lived next door to the Muldoon's just across from your house. The houses were knocked down to build the shops that are there now. Every time we had a break-in in the shops the police always said Ronnie Watkins is out again. He only broke in to get something to eat and was never prosecuted for entering our premises.
Jim

Hi Mauri, I would say we were talking about the same person, Ronnie just couldn't stay out of trouble the story was told one Monday morning Mr Chittick's son opened the shop and Ronnie walked out and bid him Good Morning with a parcel under his arm and walked on up Bow St, he also had a sister called Bernadett I think she went to London, Regarding Mc Minn I would admire the kid that had the gall to take a swipe at him, reading Barney you realize there were real cruel people we came into contact with in our youth, How things have changed though not all for the better,
Regards Ted

Barney Donald & Frank
Frank you discribe Brendan Fitspatricks room exactly on the morning of the exam, however on the morning in question I was in line with the rest of class and if you remember along the back wall there was a large long picture that ran along the wall depicting great icons of history and of course I am gaping at this and didnt hear Mc Namara call my name or the question , well what I got after that I still remember, I thought sure I was for excomunacation I was told I had let the school down etc Memories!
Regards Ted

Hi!Barney,I never called you Barney when I lived in Lisburn,Barney was your father.Eddie McCavana was a vicious man with the cane,but he was great at Music,Playimg the organ in the Chapel and trying to get us poor sods to sing in tune,a hopeless task.We had a Mr.fitzmaurice for a while,and I think the ladies name was Miss McAleese,I was very young but thought she was gorgeus,she let us get away with murder,not like Miss O'Boyle If I remember there were about 240 Boys at the School,you will recall behind Mr.Fitzsimmons desk was a little Blackboard where he chalked up the Daily numbers for the school,I liked it there,not that I was in the bad books too often.You will recall putting the 1/3 pint bottles around the heating pipes to thaw by Midmorning,our treat!Hubert Blakely,Tom Smylie,Brendan Hodges,Brian Fitzsimmons Tough being the Headnasters Son,I was one of his few Friends.Why don't you throw up a few a names for us to chew over.....Frank

Mauri,Mr Mc Minn was a former Police Sergeant,who left the Police Force in dubious circumstances,He put the fear of God into many Children in Lisburn. I thought I saw him smile once,but later realised I was mistaken.When I was A student at St.Malachy's College in Belfast,a similar incident arose,Gerry Curran(son of Curran Cinemas)was up on a desk changing a light bulb when an unpopular teacher came in and with out any enquiries started belting Gerry with a cane,Gerry jumped down and flattened this Phys-ed guy who was taken to the Mater Hospital,he survived.Gerry was a hero ever after....Frank

Low roader,there was never a Catholic Sunday School,anywhere in Ireland I suppose they figured we didn't need it...Frank

Frank
In St Patrick,s on Sunday afternoon about once a month there was the Crusaders. That was a type of Sunday school. I think it was only boys, divided acorrding to which school you went to . Right was Hilden, in the middle was the Boys, I,m not sure after that. Either in that service or during the annual mission we all had to sing " Faith of our Fathers" and the priest scolded us for not singing passionate enough by commenting " You are all singing like a lot of Protestants". A reply came from the Boys school side " Shall we sing the Sash then"? I,ll not mention the person,s name.


Do you remember the Pioneer pin? I wore one for a couple of years until I found out what I was missing.
Donald

Hi Frank you asked a few names to mull over my cousins alfie brian shamus(gene autry)woods, the smiths gerald jimmy hugh john mary,joe speers, leo phillips mccurrys brendan gerald harry,mullhollands brendan fergus leo adrian,jackie close, pat lavery, joe and jim o,hagen
patsy and adrian whitby brendan bush the monaghans hugh shamus was 2 younger brothers names escapes me now,noel hugh and patrick kearney,pat sheridan pat mccoy and his older brother the taggarts paddy john richard jim,tommy docherty the mcgurnaghans gerald francis and dennis,
the mcclintons rip is only name i can recall maybe gerald,gerald murray the kerrs on chapel hill and down the lane, bush family also jimmy was the grave digger he told many an old yarn about that, need the memory recharged now

Yiz'll all know that I got a laugh reading this stuff. Pleas do not be offended, but I wonder why the hell I never got the half crown for the catechism answers, because, honestly, I knew it from front to back. I still know most of it, though I no longer believe a word.
Ronnie Watkins may have broken into Jim's place for food, but he also broke into the chapel for the candlesticks.
Miss McAleese left the year I started, followed shortly by Miss O'Boyle. Not my fault. As far as I know. Miss O'Boyle gave me a picture that was hanging on the wall. My ma was delighted that I was teacher's pet. Jaze!
Brendan (Barney) must be the same age, or maybe a year older than I am. I knew the boys and teachers, but, as I said previously, I started school late. In fact, I was never taught by Bertie, as I didn't even get that far up the ladder in school.
Some other priest, or it may have been macNamara, came to question us on the Irish language.

Ted, Is the Ronnie Watkins you mention the kid who lived in the bungalow beside lavery's lane opposite Lismara and Belfoir terrace's. If I remember correctly he was quite a handful for his parents and the last time I heard of him he was in the Crumlin road gaol though that was many many years ago. Mauri

Frank, Dominic mentions Russell Bell, Seamy Reynolds, Jimmy McMillen (Rimmel), Dessie Douglas, Ignatius Brown, Niall and Gerry Murray, Hugh Bradley, Geordie and Jackie Frazer, Francie, Denis and Gerald McGurnaghan, Gerald Stewart.

There's a few names from the past, but maybe younger than yourself - some of them anyhow.

I also remember Mr McMinn. He was a very tall, thin man and when he entered our classroom we all had to stand up and say, "Good Morning, Mr McMinn". In fact, when anyone from outside came into the classroom we had to stand up and greet them like this.

I particularly hated to see the nit nurse. I just forget her name at the minute. We were sent up to her singly; she had a jar of water with dettol added and two ice cream sticks. After dipping the sticks into the dettol mix, she would part our hair into sections, in front of the whole class, gurn up her nose and look for nits. God help the girl or girls who were found to have nits as the whole class would know. Mind you, I don't envy her job now.

I also remember Fr McNamara, but have no bad vibes about him. Then there was Dr Burns, the school doctor. We were sent over to the clinic in Seymour Street to be examined by him. He also was a tall thin man but his hair was black. He was nice.

Hated going to the dentist in the clinic. No injection to freeze your gums, no anaesthetic, just a bloody big drill that hurt like made. AND, no mammy with you - you faced it alone.

See the young ones now - we could show them!!!!!!!

Bernadette Watkins was in my class at school & was always laughing. I remember being in her house in Tonagh once & we went down past the watering trough to it.

Her Mother was a quiet woman & kept a nice home for them. I know Bernadette Watkins & Chrissie Cunningham & Lily mc Conville all went to England later, maybe not together, but we heard they went to London. Lily is dead but don't know what happened to the others, who were all classmates & all good laughs. Always had a smile on their faces. Devil may care girls.

Pat

Fr. Mc Namara came to examine us in our religious instruction before Holy Communion, Confirmation etc

Once he asked some nervous child, "What is Matrimony?

Being nervous the child got mixed up with Pugatory & answered "A place or state of punishment where some souls suffer for a time before they can go to Heaven"

No answer to that one, passed with flying colours.!

Ann, some great stories on here at the moment, keep it up. You mentioned Dettol for nits. Well good old Dettol it was used for everything years ago. I remember going to boyds the jeweller to have my ears pierced at the age of 5. Mum got me a bottle of good old Dettol for the offending piercings which had to be washed twice a day..................DID IT STING!!!!ouch. We must have smelt so clean Ann after using it!

Sarah

Donald, re the Crusaders. You must have been VERY young to forget, because we girls were there too. It was called "The Young Crusaders", and I think it began at 2 pm on a Sunday.

MAURI. These names were said to have origenated on the building sites of G.B. If you starteb work and gave your name as Malachy,Sheamus,Anthony,Brendan or what have you, then you pigeon holed as being a MICK. Likewise if your name happened to be Edward,Billy,Gorden, you were pigeon holed as being a Billy BOY. It was an automated form of identification. Hopefully, those days have gone now and won't return and as they say, what's in a name, a rose ,by any other name would smell as sweet. Nice to hear from you again. Cheers. Brendan.

Brendan
In Mackies you were given a nickname which was your home town. I was known as Lisburn, others were known as Carrick Ballymena, Larne etc
donald

Brendan,



I always heard that all the Irish in England were

called "Paddies". You must be thinking of your

old school song "Billy Boy" [:

Pat

Barney,at the age of 74 ,I must confess. I did win the Half-Crown on a couple of occasions.Little good that it did me,Brendan Gillen, Haslems Lane,Gerald,Jimmie,Hughie,and all the Smiths,Alfie,Brian.Vincent and all the Woods of Mill View.I'llet you know about all of them!..Frank

Donald,you should tell us about the Elise Milne Barbour Hall .I actually had a connection to the club there through a workmate at Altona,Ronnie Stevenson,though I have no connection to Hilden, they sent me on an adventure course in the Mournes,which was my forte at the time,great fun!......Frank

Quite a while ago, when trying to drum up a bit of interest on this forum, I believe that I wrote about the 'break-in' at The Boys' school, led by Tommy Stevenson. Now that there are people around who see to know a bit about the school, does anybody remember the incident, during which stuff was hurled about, and canes hidden in the chimney breast?

Frank, I wonder what happened to Ronnie Stevenson. I remember him as a nice looking blonde boy from Leamington.

Of course he was FAR FAR older than me.

Nurse Anderson was the nit nurse's name.