Boarding School realities

[Historicalroad]

Just wondering if anyone who attended Boarding Schools between the 60s and 90s would be willing to share their experiences?

So as to not drip feed, I'm attempting, though failing miserably so far, to write a novel. Purely fictional. I have my characters and a storyline but it works best set in a boarding school.

I've never stepped foot inside a boarding school. I've no idea what they're like but I want to keep it as realistic as possible. I've trawled the internet to try and get an insight into what life is like at boarding schools but I'm struggling. I don't think the plot would fair as well if it was set today, hence why I'm looking at some time between the 60s and the 90s.

I remember the sinbin! I’d totally forgot it till someone mentioned it up thread! My trunk is still in use too. And I still have knickers and a t shirt with my name sewn in too.... My parents lived locally but I didn’t want to go home for exeat weekends as I was being abused by a family member. My house mistress was incredibly straight laced and stand offish, but she always made sure i had an excuse to go somewhere else in a very no nonsense way. She just organised it and presented it to my parents in a way they couldn’t argue with, and I was incredibly grateful to her for this. For over seas pupils we would all gather at friends houses for the exeats or just stay at school en Masse. It was only at half terms that the whole school had to be emptied.

My trunk was my dad’s, he painted over the initials on the top and hey presto, a new trunk.....

You could tell the really rich girls by their trunks, we were old money so had a battered ancient trunk. I think then my brother had it after me, initials repainted again. I’m sure my parents still have it somewhere. I don’t think I’d remember it, it was possibly blue ish... I only saw it a few times a year. It lived in the cellars I think, they arrived ready for us to fill, in the main entrance hall. We had to carry all our possessions through the school to pack at the end of term. It was a strange feeling.

We didn’t have a tuck box. I think we kept any food in with our clothes. Pot noodles mostly.

Trunks were abolished at my school shortly before I started, as you were expected to get your belongings up the stairs yourself. My dad was unimpressed I was on the fourth floor but after the first time it was down to me. We did have tuck boxes, mostly for keeping valuables in, as the tuck allowed was 2 lb per term and git into a cupboard in the assembly hall. I used my tuck box as a bedside table and now my son has it in his bedroom.

Apparently only 2% as many Brits send their kids boarding as in the 80s, half the decline bring from many fewer expats and more overseas schools, and half from it not being the default for a certain class any more.

My trunk and my brothers tuck box (we didn't have tuck boxes) ended up in my stables as a rug trunk and grooming box respectively. I think I let them go when I sold my last horse many years ago. Very useful they were too.

I still have my school trunk and some labelled clothing (I’m 45). Both my parents still have theirs too. You became curiously attached to them. Mine had both Hindi and English script painted on it to ensure it wasn’t lost and I found it mortifying because it wasn’t nicely stencilled like the English girls’ trunks! Also, tuck boxes were not an Indian thing and I didn’t have one 😢

Remembering so many tiny details here. In India a trunk is a “buxxa” (corruption of “box”) and a dormitory is a “hostel”. My mother would never refer to them in English because they were, as far as she was concerned, already English words. It mortified me every time. There were a few British Indian and Anglo Indian girls with very sophisticated cosmopolitan mothers but mine insisted on wearing a sari, bindi and sindur whenever she came to school. It’s a very high-born way of dressing but I just wanted a mother in jeans 😳

I'm in my sixties and had my truck up till last year when it went in a skip when we moved.

I was great for storage in the garage / coffee table in the garden but I'm glad it's finally gone. Pity the memories aren't so easily discarded.

There was much greater financial diversity than there is now. My father was a mid-level employee of an international company and school fees were just a natural part of the compensation package. Many girls were the daughters of doctors and computer programmers working in the Middle East - well paid but certainly not rich. Lots of clergymen’s daughters, and the daughters of Scottish and Irish farmers living too remotely to go to a day school. Lots of junior/mid level diplomats’ kids whose parents had never boarded themselves and who led a very double life - princeling at the High Commission, but exeats at granny’s tiny semi in some grotty town. Naturally loads of Forces kids. Now few organisations pay school fees, everyone has big City money, or the grandparents pay the fees.

I think school fees were probably proportionately lower than they are now, just because expectations of what would be provided were much lower. The school I was at had an antiquated and inadequate heating system, furniture was pretty basic, food was awful, there was a smallish outdoor swimming pool, and the assembly hall doubled as the place where concerts and school plays happened. It now has a new library, theatre/concert/music block, art studio, gym and swimming pool, and the bedrooms are way more comfortable and homely than they were in my day. But the fees are over £30K.

Trunks arriving en masse from the cellar was pure joy. I had nightmares for years that I hadn't started packing on the last day of term, and my wardrobe and drawers were endlessly overflowing. Also had my mum driving off without saying goodbye nightmares for years. And that sunday night back to school feeling after a school holiday is the worst.

1978 - aged 12. The senior girls had to patrol the dorms and supervise the younger girls while we were unpacking our trunks. My DM had packed some antiquated device from the 1950s which was used to hold in enormous sanpro pads, like a form of suspender in your pants. Everyone else had Lillets. Obviously my DM’s device was paraded around the boarding house. I threw it in the bin and fortunately didn’t start my periods for another year during which time I’d bought my own tampons.

We used to have a report about how we behaved in the boarding house in our report. One term the house mistress said "spends too much time alone" so I made an effort the next term and she wrote "spent too much time in the TV room"

By age 11 I was happily negotiating 3 trains to get to and from school.

We used to say 'rustle rustle' as we were rummaging through drawers to find San pro bought from matron.

We used to get £17 a term pocket money to go to the local town to buy stuff. In younger years you would be walked down in a crocodile. But some of that money was doled out each Sunday as you had to donate to the church collection 10p each I think.

In 1St year (year 7) you were on a rota to load and unload the conveyor belt dishwasher after meals.
Another year group had to collect all the waste food to go to the pigs.
All clothes washing was done by hand in sinks and duvet covers went to a launderette until year 3 when they bought commercial washing machines then we went on a rota to do everyone's washing. Each year group had a set day to use then.

If you were hungry in the evening you could make toast but it cost 3p a slice. Sometimes we used the marge and sugar to make fudge instead.

We had a rota to clear the tables and help with drying up - no dishwashers in those days. Sometimes it was pretty disgusting, inevitably washing up for those numbers tended to be a bit slapdash.

Which century was this Tiggles?

These tales of washing by hand are just We used to think we were hard-done-by because our clean laundry was set out on an open shelf near our dorms ... We had to strip our beds once a week but they were made up for us. Never saw a duvet till the German exchange trip.

Sick room was nice, it had a radio. (I was there regularly the night before my birthday - anticipation of the arrival of the cake ordered by my parents was too much for my fragile teenage heart.)

Our laundry was sent away to be done. When it returned it was put in a very large cupboard, almost a small room, awaiting distribution by the maids. They (the maids) also used this space to smoke in. All our clean clothes always stunk of stale smoke - we must all have smelt like 40 a day smokers, 50 girls reeking of fags. Vile. However, our house mistress used to smoke about 40 a day as well, but only in her flat. I went back to visit her (I liked her even though I hated the school) and we had sherry and cigarettes together, as by then I smoked as well.

at my first school aged 9, we washed all our personal stuff by hand, ie all our clothes.
I don't know if you have ever tried to wash jeans with little 9 year old hands, it was bloody awful.
We did have a spin dryer, so they did eventually dry, having been spun.

Cannot remember what we did at school 2. I have no idea! I think it all got sent away, so you filled in a form with how many knickers etc and sent it off.

I remember that every single little thing had to be labelled, every sock, every knicker. My mum spent hours sewing on labels.

and PE knickers. Thick heavy green knicks worn over your M and S cotton undies.
Then white T shirt and green knicks for gym and dance lessons, and very short hockey skirts and green knicks for outdoor pe. no tracksuits ever, but our pe sweaters were warm.

In 1982 I started a diary. I was 12.It was a little Collins one,hard cover,probably a Xmas present? It lasted through the whole month of January, so pick a day, any day, and I'll tell you what was on the menu and how I rhated it
Doing the Rubix cube was the 'thing' back then. When I wasn't eating I was 'cubing' or so it seemed.
For minor infringements we were given Stripes, which could be issued by the GLs(group leaders) as well as the mistresses.Stripes were given in increments of 1/4. Three whole Stripes warranted a visit to the Head,dunno what punishment was meted out then. I've still got a Stripe Sheet for the time I was caught "hammering on the upper notes of the Grand Piano". I can only presume some partner in crime was hammering the lower keys. Got 1/4 Stripe for that, issued by a GL. The snitch.

One of my happiest memories is when I was 14 and starting to rebel I talked someone in the kitchen into letting me use an enormous cooking pot (it was vast, more like a vat) to boil up my corduroy flares with packets of Dylon powder. It worked a treat and I still dye things now, (loose covers, not so much my clothes. Oh how my priorities have changed.)

It was the first time I realised I didn't have to be controlled any longer. I left shortly after that, after my best friend was expelled.

Ah, Cash's name tapes! I've still got a couple of heavy cotton white sheets (now used as dust sheets I put down when I'm messing around with clay and paint,etc) which still have name tapes on them.

Me too, name tapes. My name then a number. One for prep school then a different number for the secondary school so they all had to be done again. By then I had to do the sewing. I have towels mainly now, relegated to the dog. Also my shoe bag and laundry bag. My shoe bag is tiny! But I was only 8. My laundry bag is made from a beautiful design linen union, I keep meaning to convert it into a cushion.

@Handsofmysweets bloody hell, that is absolutely horrific and harrowing. What an absolutely horrendous thing to have to go through with no one to turn to for help or support. That poor boy.

When a child is brought up at home ...

Very happy to assure you that, both in my generation and in the current generation of my family, children who board were and are brought up at home.

I have absolutely no intention of arguing about this.