In a first form English lesson ‘Buggy’ Mayers told us about a book entitled ODTAA, written by the Poet Laureate of the time, John Masefield. Apparently it stood for ‘One damned thing after another’. I don’t who or what Masefield had in mind when he was writing it, but it could so easily have been King Edward’s, Aston.

No sooner was one event over in the school calendar before another was either upon us or, at most, on the horizon.

I have written elsewhere about particular events which have stuck in my memory, but there are many more of which I have only vaguer recollections, and they must be described here.

Though they never interested me directly the biggest single group of these were sporting events. Brian Hill (Aston 1946) tells the story of the class of first formers being addressed by the Headmaster of my time, L G Brandon. "At Aston" he said "We take sport very seriously" then paused and added "... we take work even more seriously"!

With that caveat out of the way he then facilitated every activity known to man, sporting or otherwise. Of this Harry Tyson used to grumble "We have a society for everything except hard work"!

Until near the end of my time sport meant Rugby football in the winter and cricket in the summer. Only the arrival of a tennis playing Maths. master (G T H Wheatley 1955-7) brought any expansion of this pattern. The sporting highlight of my year was the annual Boys v. Masters cricket match.

A glance at any notice board around the school would show you the huge range of interests that were pursued extramurally: the Railway Club, Scientific Society, Historical Society, Junior Scientific Society, Chess Club, ‘Magpie and Chatter’ Society (debating, if you didn’t realise!). The society notice boards ran the full length of one wall.

We used to laugh at the Railway enthusiasts because they only had a ‘club’, whereas everybody else had a ‘Society’! But that didn’t stop anyone from joining. Its founder and driving force was John Tidmarsh (Aston 1946) abetted by Theo Fox, the woodwork master. The main strategy here was that you only got to go on the outings (which often involved a day off school) if you could show a healthy attendance at the after school meetings! But such was the enthusiasm for society outings that even those held at weekends were equally well supported.

Even I played my part - a talk on ‘Swiss Railways’ even though it was to be another 30+ years before ever I set foot in Switzerland! But my greatest moment came when I addressed the Junior Scientific Society (the first boy to do so and acknowledged as such by LGB when announcing it during morning assembly!). I was to give a talk on ‘Astronomy’ and the ‘world and his wife’ turned up to watch Perkins make a fool of himself. By the end of my allotted time I had used about half my material and established my burgeoning reputation for the ‘gift of the gab’, if little else!

There were other activities that never appeared on the notice boards. The best established of these were the annual overseas ‘language’ trips - most often to Paris. Though I never went on these I did join the first to go to Germany at Easter, 1956.

Paris trip, 1952	Civic Reception, Fulda
(Photo by kind permission of Jos Swingler)	L. to R.: Dr Neubauer, Burgomeister, Joe Entwistle, ?, interpreter

Unlike the Paris visits this was a school exchange. The previous year’s German assistant, Dr Walther Neubauer, had become an admired part of the Aston scene, and we visited the school in Fulda (then Western sector of Germany) at which he taught English. Six weeks later we hosted the boys from Fulda.

To this day I remain friendly with, and occasionally visit, Professor Lothar Heyne - the lad whom I met during that exchange. At that time his home - in Hettenhausen in the Rhön mountains - was only one kilometer from the 'Iron Curtain'. He told me how agents used to slip across at night and start arguments about politics in the local pub, and then disappear whence they had come.

If there weren’t operettas there would be plays, all of which tended to overshadow the activities of the Marionette Club, of which I have only the dimmest of memories.

The Hobbies Exhibition was a biennial event in which again I played a minor role. My contemporary Graham Williams baked a cake which barely lasted out the judging phase. By the time our parents arrived all he had to show for his efforts was a plateful of crumbs and a ‘Merit’ certificate!

Hobbies Exhibition, 1954

(Cutting, from Birmingham Mail, provided by Chris Garrett)

Another biennial event was the ‘whole school’ photograph. They were taken every two years, and I appeared on them in May 1952 and March 1957. They were of the ‘battalion’ type - long and narrow. Modern whole school photographs are only taken every four years, but they have the advantage of improvements in photography (wide angle lenses, colour photography), thus denying today's generation the opportunity to appear twice by running round the back!

1951 saw the Festival of Britain on the South Bank of the Thames in London. We all went in small groups on different days, under the watchful eye of the masters. Alec Pearson the Art Master earned himself a place in the school’s folk lore by taking his group the wrong way on the tube! Whenever, in later life, I found myself in the 'tube' system agonising over which direction I required I have thought of Alec with a rueful smile.

Every week small sums of money were extracted from us for something called the Cot Fund. This was garnered by Harry Tyson and found its way eventually to Birmingham Children’s Hospital where every year Sixth Formers would be the backbone of a Garden Fete in the hospital grounds. Again, Harry Tyson led the project.

National disasters earned a charitable response too. The Lynton and Lynmouth flood disaster of 1952 produced an appeal for funds. The Government of the day promised to match the public’s giving pound for pound, so we made a special effort to collect a large amount.

Even General Elections didn't go by unnoticed. In those far off times the results trickled in from all over the country on the following day. Updates were posted outside the staff room and, on one occasion, I can see Harry Tyson shaking his head with sorrow as the numbers he was required to post showed a Conservative government in the offing!

In the summer holidays it was not unknown for those hardy Northerners, Stan Calvert (Latin) and Harry Tyson (Maths.) to take groups walking in their home counties, respectively Yorkshire and Lancashire. Brian Roberts (1945) tells the story of marching along Hadrian's Wall calling out 'Sinister - Dexter - Sinister'!

Right at the end of my time a youthful Harold Jessop joined the staff and introduced camping to those boys not already familiar with its rigours through membership of local Boy Scout troops.