Sea Schools News Page
Incorporating WATTS NAVAL TRAINING SCHOOL 1903 - 49 and RUSSELL COTES NAUTICAL
SCHOOL 1926 - 49
Combined as PARKSTONE SEA TRAINING SCHOOL 1949 - 64.
June 2010
The Reunion this year is being held at the old Parkstone Sea Training School which is now Bournemouth and Poole College, at Constitution Hill Rd in Parkstone, Dorset. We do hope you will be able to come along and meet old friends. The Hall will be available from 11 am until 5 pm and a cold buffet and drinks will be served. The cost will be £10.00 per person and we are very happy for you to bring friends and family along. Please confirm your wish to attend by sending a cheque for £10 per person to :- David Allsop (Secretary). 1, Gainsborough Road, IPSWICH, IP4 2UR, Suffolk.
We would also like to invite you to bring along a prize for the very popular raffle.
If you attended last year's reunion at Barkingside you will know there was much discussion about whether the Association should continue and it was agreed that if nobody came forward to volunteer to serve on the committee then this Reunion will probably be the last one. On further discussion both David Allsop and Derek Cooley would like to stand down but Peter Simons and Mick Aves would both be happy to assist a new committee provided a Chairman designate and Treasurer designate could be found. In view of this there is a section on the return slip sent to SSA members, for people to offer to serve on the committee.
There is the possibility that the association could be continued via the website but this will need to be subsidised by membership subscription/donation.
However, the reunion this year will we hope be a very successful one although some major decisions will have to be made.We look forward to hearing from you, and seeing as many old boys and friends as possible.
Kind regards
David Allsop Secretary
Committee: Peter Simons, Chairman, David Allsop, Secretary; Mick Aves, Treasurer;
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April 14th 2010 As I had to visit Poole Hospital today, I thought it would be interesting to call in at PSTS as being the Easter holiday it would be virtually empty. I parked on the old parade ground and walked up the steep slope to Arranmore, then across past Howard, Johnston and on to Broughton where I stopped for a while to remember some of the lads who inhabited this house with me, two of them sadly no longer with us. Then down the slope between Broughton and Johnston, past the gym, back round the galley, past the officers mess and our mess deck to the back of LRCH. This is now covered in scaffolding and there was ONE lone painter working on the upstairs windows, you could tell it was taxpayers money being spent on this job, the scaffolding must cost at least £800 per week! I then drove up Constitution Hill Rd, this has been recently re-surfaced with a cycle lane marked out being at least 3 metres wide and not a cyclist in sight! As you go up the hill there are two housing estates on the left, the first being named after Captain Felton and the second named after Lt. Commander Woolven, why there was no mention of Commander Freeman I do not know. All the old “school” buildings together with Shaftesbury House have long disappeared. As I prepared to leave I watched a learner driver attempt a 23 point turn in a bright yellow car marked “Felton Driving School”, he would have been amused. Richard Eastwood. BH 58. April 2010 This years reunion is to be held on Saturday 4th September 2010 at the Chapel of Parkstone Sea Training School, which is now known as St Andrews Hall, Bournemouth and Poole College, Constitution Hill Rd. The hall will be available from 11:00hrs to 17:00hrs, and refreshments will be available. Those of you who may be looking for accommodation for the weekend please try Google- “Guesthouses in Parkstone Dorset”, of which there are two in close proximity to the school, The Shah of Persia in Longfleet Rd and Viewpoint Guest House at 11, Constitution Hill Rd or you could try the Poole Tourist Information Office. The Chairman and committee of the SSA hope as many of you as possible will try and attend this year, to see the old school before any major changes might be made and to discuss any matter they may have for the committee. March 2010 This site has been running for a couple of years now and after an encouraging start, it seems to have lost its way. The amount of input from our members and those that visit the site has dropped off dramatically. I have been conversing with our webmaster as to what we can do to try and reverse this trend. One stumbling block appears to me to be the "Forum" which is password protected with the user names being used to help us identify the individual members. It is proposed to do away with the "Forum" and incorporate some of its content into the "menu" on the "Home" page, thus anyone logging on to the site would have direct access to those "Forum" contents. The one exception to this would be the "photo archive", this contains photos etc, kindly contributed by our members and it is only right that the contributor should have the means to say if they can be copied or otherwise used. To this end a simple user-name and password would be given to all whose e-mail addresses we have, also those who apply and can show that they were at one of the sea schools or related to someone who was. We would welcome any other ideas that will improve our site and keep it running for those who find it of interest. I am informed that sadly, the Sea schools association members do not wish to fund the site after this year, this leaves us with a number of options; to close the site; to beg for subscriptions to keep it going; or to find someone who will do the webmasters job free of charge. Once again your views on this will be welcomed. In speaking to my mate John Wallace recently, we both agreed that this site and its content will be of great interest to our grandchildren and future generations, who when they research the family tree will be able to learn of the hardships and the good times we had at these sea schools. To this end I feel it is almost our duty to keep these memories alive for the future. I wrote this article on the 5th march and sadly I have to relate that John Wallace died today 11th March at his home in Northants. Richard Eastwood (formerly Goble) Broughton 58.
Christmas 2009 The past year has produced more members of the forum and many more old boys who have found the site, made contact but not joined the forum. My new years wish would be for everyone to register for the forum, there is so much more to enjoy, including the popular photo section. Contact can also be made through the forum to any one else who has registered, this can be done privately or openly using the message section. The reason for having this forum closed to all but registered members, is to keep out those sad people who seem to delight in spoiling things for others. If you are thinking of registering or if you know of any one else who might like to join us, please give it a try, if you have any difficulties then Frank will guide you through the process. Finally, if you have any material and memories that others may enjoy, please post them on the site or send to Frank who will oblige. Richard Eastwood (formerly Goble) Broughton 58. NEWS 03/07/2010 03:37 As you are aware the Sea Schools reunion is quickly approaching. For those of you who are intending to come to the 2009 reunion at Barkingside 5th September please fill in the form (click here ) and send you cheque as below. We need to know so we can arrange the catering for the day. Hope to see you on the day... David Allsop We are back to normal hopefully and those who have found difficulty in entering the FORUM may find the following information of use. When entering your USERNAME, it must be "case sensitive", eg, if Elvis Presley had been number 100 then his USERNAME would be Elvis P100, don't forget to leave a space between Elvis and P. Once you have successfully entered both your USERNAME and PASSWORD, you can get the FORUM to remember you, this saves having to enter it all each time you visit the site. There are certain advantages in registering for the FORUM, these are access to the FORUM so that you can post anything you wish (without being offensive) on any subject and reply to anything written by others. You can also access our "photo archive" which holds around 270 photos at present and is only viewable to registered FORUM users. Once registered you will see the full FORUM with posts from other members of the Sea Schools. You also be able to contact any other person who have registered via a private message or the boards e-mail system that keeps contact details private. The boards private message or email will help those who are trying to contact old friends. You will see that there are at present 39 registered users of the FORUM, two of these are for the webmaster and 1 is for a guest, this person has kindly supplied us with photos of the present day PSTS, both outside and in the houses together with other useful information. Some of you may have found difficulty in entering the FORUM recently, this is because our webmaster, Frank, has had to temporarily close access due to the infiltration of the forums by some weirdos who seem intent on polluting our site with pornography etc. This does take Frank some time to get rid of this rubbish, sometimes there are as many six a day. However, we are back to normal now but if you still cannot get in to the forum by your usual link, then type in :- forum1 after the www.parkstone-sts.org.uk/ OLDER NEWS: If you have not yet registered for the FORUM, then you are missing some really good photos etc and the chance of contacting some of your old mates. To register, you will need to supply the following details:- 1) Full name (if it has been changed, then the name you had at school) 2)The years you were at PSTS/RCNS or WNTS, eg. PSTS 1955 to 1958. 3)Your house and number eg Broughton 58. 4)Your e-mail address, this is for admin purposes only and will not be divulged. The next two are not compulsory but are of interest to your contemporaries. 5)Where you are living now, eg Town or county or country. 6)Your memories of PSTS/RCNS/or WNTS, what happened to after leaving school and what you are doing now. Lastly, if you have any photos or documents that can be copied, please send them to Frank for inclusion on the site. It is the intention to update the NEWS page on a regular basis and have it dated so that you can see the latest posting. If you have any comments or suggestions for the site, please let us know.
Richard E58 Via email 23/07/2008 Just want to congratulate you on the excellent website that you have been maintaining. My father was at The Russell-Coates Nautical School, following which he entered the merchant marine. We were in Dorset last year but were pressed for time (we are from Canada) and didn’t see any of the old buildings (we probably were in the wrong spot). Would you be able to tell us whether there are any of the old buildings from the Russell-Coates time as we are heading back next year and would love to bring back some pictures for my father (he is now 80 years old). Thank you for your work and any information you may be able to pass along. Kindest regards Greg Rickard.
Committee: Chairman:
Peter Simons: Treasurer: Mick Aves: Secretary David Allsop
Patrons: Chris and
Shirley Werrell, County School, N.Elham Norfolk |
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Last updated 03/07/10 03:37 Copyright © 2001 / 2010 Parkstone Web all rights reserved - email: Webmaster Website by Frank Cooke |