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I suppose I was something of a thorn in his side, but strangely enough, I have always remembered him, and the school with a certain degree of affection. It was a great institution. It and I were just not compatible.

Though a state school owned and operated by Sheffield City Council, Firth Park had some of the pretensions of an exclusive public school. At that time, it catered only for boys. Girls were banished to a similar institution on the other side of the city. There were no fees, entry being purely by the Scholarship Exam.

Traditionally the term 'grammar' implied that the school taught Latin and Greek grammar. As far as I know, Firth Park never taught Greek. Latin was taught to the upper stream within the school as they were considered as Oxbridge material. Latin was a prerequisite at that time for the more prestigious universities. The "Red Bricks", the lesser institutions such as Sheffield's own university, being beneath Firth Park's dignity.

Despite the school's lamentable snobbery, its academic achievements were impressive, as attested by the many honour boards, which adorned the walls of the Old Building.

The staff wore plain black academic robes without mortar boards for everyday wear, reserving their full academic regalia for Speech Day. The students wore a distinctive scarlet uniform. The local hooligans called us Red Knobs because of the scarlet cap.

Discipline was strict. Corporal punishment was the norm. One master had a leather strap called Quebracho. It was a painful reminder that quebracho was a substance used for tanning hides. The teachers delegated the main method of punishment to the prefects. Liberal and enthusiastic application of a slipper meant you did not sit down for the rest of the day.

Our history teacher for the first two years was Spike Johnson, at that time he was in the tenth of the thirty-five years he was to teach at the school. His teaching technique was simple and unique. For most of the term, he would regale us with funny stories, which never had anything to do with history. The crunch came a month or so before the exams. He filled his blackboard with dates, which we had to learn by heart. I have never been sure whether my love of history grew from or in spite of Spike's teaching, but he was a great and loveable character.

One of his stories did much to establish and maintain the Old Building's reputation for being haunted. We knew the Old Building also as Brushes Manor. It featured a large weather vane in the shape of the silhouette of a running fox with a large brush, or tail.

Room two on the top floor at the eastern end was supposed to be haunted. It could be accessed either from a corridor running from the main staircase or from a very narrow servant's staircase at the rear. The alleged ghost was claimed to be that of a servant girl who escaped being raped by the master of the house by running down the servant's stairs and drowning herself in Longley Creek.

I never saw the ghost myself. The only unusual feature associated with the room was glowing spot on the ceiling of the corridor immediately outside. It did provide a strong greenish light in the gloomy corridor. I suspect it was left over from some prank, though it did maintain its glow for all the four years I attended the school.

The school had quite a reputation for teaching modern languages. In 1946, the school introduced Russian making it a fine training ground for spies. Gerald Brook, from the year below me, became quite famous when he was caught spying in Moscow. The Russians released Gerald in exchange for one of their spies, after treating him to several years in their well-known resort of Siberia.

Ronald Hurst - 27 April 2007

See also - Spike's Ghost Story