The Westbourne Family Reunited Editorial Contents
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Number 10 Autumn 2009 EThe magazinet for forcmer pupilse and friendst eof Glasgorw Academay and Westbourne School The Westbourne family reunited Editorial Contents 3 In the footsteps of greatness 4 The war years 6 Canada crossing 7 The Western Club: A haven in the city 8 Westbourne Section 10 Academical Club news 13 Events 16 How to half-succeed at The Academy 18 Moreton Black remembered 23 Tributes to John Anthony 24 Announcements 30 From our own correspondents Cheers! - Carol Shaw (1961), Jennifer Burgoyne (1968) and Vivien Heilbron (1961) at the Westbourne Grand Reunion 32 Regular Giving Some coffee morning! In February of this year a small committee led by the redoubtable Miss Betty Henderson got together to arrange what many assumed would turn out to be a coffee morning. Eight months - and a huge amount of work - later, 420 ‘girls’ met at the Grosvenor Hilton on Saturday 24 October for the Westbourne Grand Reunion. The evening was a great success, as you can tell from letters like the one below: Dear Joanna, I just want to say a very big ‘thank you’ to you and to everyone who organised the wonderful event Do we have your e-mail address? on Saturday evening. It was tremendous fun; it was very inspiring; it was a nostalgia feast and I shall never forget the decibel level achieved at the drinks party before the dinner itself! I'd liked to It’s how we communicate best! have made a recording for the archives. Alison Kennedy made a valiant effort to exert control and to her credit, in the main, she succeeded. There was one corner of the room, however, where even she and her mike had to concede defeat. I suppose the culprits all found their tables in the end. Keeping in touch The food was delicious and it was so thoughtful to include a full roll-call of all the guests in the beautifully-printed programmes. There was such a feeling of being at a really special event and I’m The External Relations office is situated in so glad I made the journey from London. Next time (and I hope there is a next time), I'm going to Colebrooke Terrace. Former pupils are make sure that my sisters, Lorna and Lesley, are there too. always welcome to pop in and have a chat. Just give us a call to arrange a time. Our I went to sleep that night feeling very moved and very happy. address is Colebrooke Terrace, Glasgow G12 Please pass on my sincere thanks to all the members of the Westbourne Grand Reunion Committee 8HE and you can contact us on 0141 342 – perhaps special thanks should go to Jimmy McCulloch whose generous sponsorship of the drinks 5494 or at [email protected] reception got the evening off to such a fantastically lively start! The Glasgow Academical Club, 21 Helensburgh Drive, Glasgow G13 1RR Especial thanks to you also for making sure that I got a ticket, even though I was a bit late in President - Jimmy McCulloch applying. You did us all very proud indeed! E-mail: [email protected] Best wishes, Secretary – Kenneth Shand Tel: 0141 248 5011 Vivien Heilbron E-mail: [email protected] Yes, it was quite a ‘coffee morning’ - and one that will not quickly be forgotten by any of The Academical Club pavilion is available for the ‘Westbourne girls’ who attended it. functions. Please contact Ken Barron at [email protected] for details. And among that group I am delighted to include myself! Academical Club’s London Section With best wishes Secretary – David Hall, 20 Cadogan Place London SW1X 9SA Tel: 020 7235 9012 Malcolm E-mail: [email protected] 2 Etcetera In the footsteps of greatness... The Academy has a strong history of mountaineering and exploration going back to Sir James Wordie who was a member of Shackelton’s epic Antarctic Expedition and includes prominent figures like WH (Bill) Murray, the acclaimed Scottish mountaineer and writer. The first edition of Etcetera in November 2006 carried details of Glasgow Academy’s expedition to East Greenland. This year, twelve new recruits to that great Academy tradition found themselves in an even more remote part of Greenland as Head of Outdoor Activities, Neal Gwynne, and his team set off on another great Arctic adventure to climb peaks never before attempted. Below, one of them – Sam Reilly – reflects on the moment when they conquered one of the mountains that no-one had previously climbed: height, the terrain underfoot deteriorated into uneven rubble, yet the views behind us became majestic. By around 6.30am, I had finally woken fully, with the sun now poking its head above the peaks and the realisation dawning on me that today we were attempting our next ‘first ascent’ – a thought which in itself was enough to brush away the final few lingering cobwebs. With few, short stops we made progress up the slope, with the odd scramble up rocky bands. On one of the last of the slopes, Nigel spotted some bright yellow flowers poking through the rock; Arctic poppies, which had never been found above 700m in this area, were blooming at 1400m. Moments like these serve as a reminder that Greenland holds mysteries and rewards which can be found nowhere else, and so it was with renewed vigour that we walked closer to our second unclimbed peak. However, walking soon became a luxury, as when we reached a thin ridge with massive canyons on either side slow, scared shuffling was all we could manage. Aptly dubbed ‘Crap Yourself Canyon’, the ridge nevertheless provided some stunning views, some unforgettable moments, and a large adrenaline rush which enabled us to storm up to the summit. Today, at 9.30am, the group stood upon a never-before- climbed peak for the second time, having conquered a mountain standing at 1774m, and the giddy high we experienced on Monday was in no way diminished by Friday 10 July repetition. The same ethereal sense of weightlessness swept over us, as we surveyed the unbelievable panorama Despite the incredible glacial views from our perch on the below. To the west, the Greenland ice-cap stretched hillside, last night we all experienced the horrors of several hundred miles; straight ahead the glaciers and bivvying – mosquitoes, lumpy ground, and Arctic winds peaks of Gåseland, our home, and directly below the great that chill to the bone. We began to trudge up the stone canyon dropped straight down to the floor. We mountain side at 4.15am, with a combined total of 15 could not help feeling like kings and queens, overseeing hours’ sleep between us, in a dreary fashion that wouldn’t our great kingdom of rock and ice. It was with a just have seemed out of place in ‘Night of the Living Dead.’ sense of satisfaction that we turned for home, and we Before we had truly awoken we had climbed an extra were soon on the other side of the knife-edge ridge, 300m; it was 5.15am, and we had an absolutely stunning breathing a huge sigh of relief. It was then a fairly glacier not 100 metres to our right as we headed left up a straightforward climb down loose rocks towards the camp, steep ridge. We could also see the Vestfjord glacier although I’m sure our knees would disagree. Barring the directly behind us, glowing with the early morning sun odd shout of ‘below’ as dislodged rocks hurtled down the and extending all the way out to the sea. We caught a few slope, the descent passed fairly uneventfully and before glimpses of Arctic hare – large and lean with powerful legs we knew it we were back at the bivvy site. and snow-white fur. They are far less timid than you would think, as they have probably never encountered We now lie gloriously situated on the hillside, in bright humans before and thus have never developed a natural sunshine and with a sense of tired achievement and fear of them. They hopped about, sniffing and munching anticipating the week to come. grass, just a few metres from us. As we steadily gained Sam Reilly, S6 Etcetera 3 The war years remembered 2 October 1939 is not one of the universally-recognised milestones of World War Two, but it was a rather important – if not universally popular – date for pupils at Glasgow Academy. Less than a month after the official outbreak of hostilities, the War Office gave The Academy the all-clear – making it the first school in Scotland to which pupils were allowed to return for lessons after the summer holidays. And so Thursday 2 October 2009 was deemed an appropriate date on which to launch Seventy Years On: A School at War by former pupils Andrew Wylie and Douglas Anderson. Seventy years on to the day, almost 70 people gathered in the Senior Library in The Academy’s Main Building at 11 in the morning to remember what it was like to be at school while their parents got down to the serious business of keeping Mr Hitler at bay. After a brief address by the Rector, Peter Brodie, Andrew and Douglas reminisced about their time at Glasgow Academy, much of which coincided with the war years. A Transitus choir was also on hand to lead the audience in some nostalgic war-time singing – and the years rolled away. The book itself is full of clear-eyed reminiscence sprinkled with sharp and witty observations all wonderfully Douglas and Andrew’s proposal of the foundations of the Academicals’ illustrated with Douglas’s charming writing a history of the war years from War Memorial Trust.