Going Back in Time?

Number one son now has a study overlooking Quad. It has been carved out of the old Lawrence dormitory. Of course, as a Hailey boy I had little to do with the Quad Houses, but I did once or twice go into the long dorms, and those with sharp eyes can see in the new arrangements the columns which still support the roof. Originally Wilkins' East India Company College provided university style rooms. I guess one can get an impression of what they were like from Downing College Cambridge, also by Wilkins in the Grecian style, where the students live in almost square high ceilinged rooms with large windows.

That's pretty much what the Lawrence study is like - though it is shared for two. The more senior boys have smaller rooms; but at least some modern Haileyburians live in spaces like those of the Guv'nors of old.

9/11

The editors of The Haileyburian had to wait until the Summer of 2002 to comment on the events of 9/11. The (unsigned) Editorial took the form of a reflection on the passing of time and the preparation of the writer for leaving school and taking up the responsibilities of adult life. Read in the light of the decade which has passed, it still has much to say.

IN these days of carriage-less horses, one can easily forget the simpler things in life. The rush of anticipation on receiving a letter from Mama and a package of crimble cake from the stable boy's mother. But how soon 1995 sluices like a wet jelly into 2002 - in the blink of seven years, peppered only with achievement and cries of Vivat Haileyburia. How soon we forget that our end is another's beginning. 


Some of us may take the King's Shilling; some will call the City 'home'; others may yet turn to the Cloth. Whatsoever path we choose the shadow of our past will follow us like a beggar in Picadilly. 


On the wider scale it has of course been a hugely difficult year for many people. A sense of change, of fragility, of transience, is all too inevitable in the aftermath of terrorist attacks, in the state of heightening tensions in the Sub Continent and the Middle East and nearer home. The rise of the Right, the acceptance of intolerance and bigotry must be resisted. So our little lives pale against this backdrop. it has nonetheless been cheering to see the sense of camaraderie that infused the Jubilee celebrations and so far, as we go to press, the progress of the England team.


So, how will we leave Haileybury? For myself I am more and more convinced that that question must be answered in these great schools. If they are sending out a constant stream of young men and women, not only of high intelligence (because that goes without saying) but also in habits strong in principle, who have learned that lesson so hard to learn in this luxuriant and self-indulgent time, to say the words "no," and "I can't afford," then I have little fear of our Country losing her great place among the nations. Sursum Corda! Up With Your Hearts!

Conversations

Lots of conversations over dinner tonight in Common Room for a group of OHs of many different generations asked to contribute to the sequicentennial book.

Hopefully from the reminiscences will come some anecdotes for what looks as if it will be a hansom and entertaining volume.

It's late so no more now, but here is a picture.

Streets Called Haileybury 8

This Haileybury Road is in Orpington, Kent.

Streets round about are named for Charterhouse, Abingdon, Malvern, Stowe, Eton and Repton, and also for Sandhurst, and Magdalene

Annexed

Many former inhabitants of Albans will remember the Annex, which we blokes always believed to have been the morgue when Albans was the San. A couple of years ago the Council were shown round and I was amazed by the incredibly narrow first floor passageway which linked the two sides of the building.

The middle of the Annex - and the narrow passage - has now been demolished and the whole thing is going to be linked to the main building to provide for a resident House Tutor. As term began it was still a building site.

If you once lived in the Annex you may or may not recognise the place now.

Is this the best view in the school?

Some older OHs will remember the third verse of the Vivat! (It is like the National Anthem - even those who know the first verse seldom remember the second or third).

And sweet was then the victor's crown,

Vivat Haileyburia!

But friendship's joy struck deeper down,

Vivat Haileyburia!

And though our distant feet may roam

Our hearts will ne'er forget the home

The dear old school beneath the dome

Vivat Haileyburia!

The one is not new this term No 1 son, who has moved into a room looking out from Lawrence over the Quad, with a fine view of the 'school beneath the dome.'

Is this the best view in the school?

Speech Day at This Time of Year?

The Master has to give six speeches on the Induction Day as he speaks to new pupils entering the Lower School, the Removes and the VIth, and separately, to their parents. It was like Speech Day in another respect as well - it poured with rain in the afternoon. Having one to join LS and one to go into the Removes we were flitting from one end of the school to the other. (Though we only went to one of the speeches!)

Parents of new Removes have lunch in Big School

In the speech we heard, the Master spoke of how the new pupils may well find themselves forging life long friendships and associations. The day is largely put together by the Haileybury Parents Association, whose reps put in a vast amount of work; but the Haileybury Society's role is to help to foster those life long links for those who have moved on.