KEEP TROTH
Reunions
From time to time reunions for ex pupils and staff are organised, any details will be published here.
80th Reunion
The 80th Anniversary Reunion of the Percy Jackson Grammar School
1956ers REUNION 2016
Wed 27 July 2016
The reunion of Almost 50 ex pupils from the 1959 intake which was organised by Bernard Warner at the Three Horse Shoes in Doncaster was a great success made even better by the glorious weather.
Many thanks to Bernard Warner for organising the event and to Jim and Sue of the Three Horse Shoes for the food and hospitality. Although unwell I managed to pop along with my partner Rosy and I’m glad I did for it was lovely to meet up with some old friends and to hopefully make some new ones. It was nice to catch up with Janet & John Kitson Roberts who had also brought along a couple of the original school bells which they had rescued from the demolition and which they intended to sell to raise funds for the website which was very kind of them. Janet and John are great supporters working alongside me to try to save the school and later to help me salvage what we could from the wreckage. I also met up with Gary Goodlad again and had a very enjoyable chat.
Below is a group photo of some of those who attended.
Group Photograph Copyright Gerald Sables 2016
John Kitson Roberts took this rare photograph of Rosy and myself at the reunion, I’m sat down because I wasn’t well enough to stand. We avoid being photographed together like the plague, Rosy isn’t mentioned on the site until now, but she really is an unsung hero. Although she didn't go to Percy Jackson, (far too young) she fought hard to save the school, going to meetings and berating councillors, she has often had to take on my workload whilst I have dedicated myself to the Percy Jackson website and archives, so I want to take this opportunity to thank her for all her efforts, for without her I assure you there would have been to website, as everybody with sense knows behind every successful man is a woman, well ok…I’m not successful but I must have done something right to deserve her.
Anglo-German Exchanges and Reunions
The Percy Jackson Grammar School was one of the first schools to organise exchanges with a German school after the end of World War Two. The first was in 1953 and the second in 1954. The pattern was a three-week visit by the Germans at Easter, returned by a three-week visit by the English at the end of July. Pupils stayed in the family homes of their exchange partners.
The first week was spent attending the respective host schools in the last week of term and in the ensuing fortnight of school holidays several excursions were undertaken.
A reunion held in 2000 was such a success that we went on to hold them nearly every year until 2013: the Jackson-Stein Reunions, alternating between the UK and Germany. The base model was a four-night stay with two major excursions and a formal reunion dinner. We usually had fifty plus participants.
Organisation was by a small committee on each side chaired by 1954 exchange partners Ken Cooke and Heinz (‘Heiner’) Wartenberg, enthusiastically supported by his wife Eva.
OTHER REUNION TRIPS
Janet Kitson Roberts liased with Outwood Academy to organise a series of tours around the school for ex pupils. One of the last of these took place at the beginning of December 2012. The photos below are from that trip.
Headmaster's Office
Meeting held in the headmaster's office before the trip
The group outside the main entrance, one of the last photo opportunities
70th Reunion
70th Anniversary Reunion photographs courtesy of Ken Cooke
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