Know any old boys (other than yourself!)or teachers who have had books published? Share details here.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1954-59

Current location (optional) Denholme

Mine are too boring to mention in polite society, but do include a study of Aboriginal Recidivism and Raven's Standard Progressive Matrices

My class mate Jim Hall did write several French textbooks (under the name C. James Hall), which were quite widely used in this area. I dont know if they are still in use. No doubt they were a vast improvement on 'Milton and Fox' Clarendon French Course !

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 58-64

Current location (optional) Wirral

I always remember picking up one the books that someone had changed to read, "Milton the Fox"

I know that Ted Bottomley wrote, "A Journalist's Guide to the Use of Good English" published in 1971 by Star Publications. Ted attended KBGS around the late 30's and early 40's. He can be seen on the 1940 school photo in section 3 - 2 rows behind Neville Hind and first to the left next to a lad with a striking hair style.

I know that Ted worked as a journalist on local papers in both the North East and the West Midlands. I knew him slightly through church and scouting connections. Sadly he died whilst relatively young in the mid 1970's.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1955-1961

Current location (optional) Paisley Scotland

Apropos of nothing much at all,Robert; the funniest piece of graffiti I have seen and it could possibly have been written by an ex KBGS lad, was in a pub toilet in Paisley. It read,"please flush twice,it's a long way to England"!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 55-60

Current location (optional) Harrogate

Alec - if it was an ex KBGS lad I can assure you that it certainly was not me. I may have a Scottish wife and Scottish grandchildren but I am still an Englishman through and through.

I'm wondering whether we were in the same form? 4X then 5X up on the 'D' corridor with Albert Braithwaite as form master?

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1955-1961

Current location (optional) Paisley Scotland

It sounds like we may well have been,Robert. That was the route I went. I've been trying to put a face to the name but failed dismally. Not really suprising after 50 years. If you go to the 1960 school photograph, I'm the handsome one on the back row, 15th from the left, sandwiched between two sticks of rock.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 55-60

Current location (optional) Harrogate

Alec - I managed to find you and I see that one of the sticks of rock beside you was "Froggy" Hall who I do remember was also in our form.

I'm on the second back row. If you start with the lad directly in front of you counting him as as 1, then I'm number 5 to the left, the middle of 3 sticks of rock.

I'm not surprised you don't remember me - my KBGS's career was pretty undistinguished. In fact I stayed on for a repeat 5th year; this turned out to be one of the better decisions of my life as I finally managed to improve significantly my tally of O levels.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1955-1961

Current location (optional) Paisley Scotland

Gotcha! I remeber the face but names escape me. The only ones I remember are the two to my right:- Jim Keighley and Peter Perfect. I also recall Roger Manton, a rather agressive youth who once went nose to nose with the scripture master, poor man. 5X were certainly a motley crew. I suppose most of them will be out on Licence by now!

I wonder if Gareth feels his question has been adequately answered. His thread seems to have suffered from the incontinental drift many are prone to. In the world of academe, Sir Herbert Butterfield was author of some twenty books (and innumerable articles) in his years at Cambridge and Princeton, among which 'The Whig Interpretation of History' (1931), 'Napoleon' (1939), 'The Statecraft of Machiavelli' (1940) and 'George III and the Historians'. None are now in print, but that is the general fate of academic writing.

Asa, Lord Briggs, is someone else who has been mentioned often on our site. His first (history) book was published in, I think, 1955, he too has been very prolific; among his best-known books are 'Victorian People', a three volume 'History of the BBC', 'A Social History of England' and 'Victorian Cities'. While many of his earlier works are now out of print some can still be obtained, I notice, on Amazon. He retired as Provost of Worcester College, Oxford, in 1991, but is still very active in the world of history and education. Indeed, in October of this year 'A Social History of the Media: from Gutenberg to the Internet', written in collaboration with Peter Burke, will come out (at £53 it sounds like another huge piece of writing).

More modestly, I published a dozen or so books mainly, though not exclusively, in the field of Modern Italian Language, Literature and Cultural History, among which 'Cesare Pavese: A Study of the Major Novels and Poems' (CUP 1982), 'An Introducation to Pirandello's "Six Characters in Search of an Author"' (1985), 'State Control in Fascist Italy: Culture and Conformity, 1925-43' (MUP 1991) and, with my son, Andrew, 'Transfiguration and Reconciliation in Eliot's "Four Quartets" (1995). Only '"Onde di questo mare": Reconsidering Pavese' (with R. Riccobono, 2003) and 'F.T. Marinetti: Critical Writings' (with G. Berghaus, 2006) remain in print. In 2002 I was the honoured recipient of 2 Festschrifts.

In non-academic vein, an old boy who, so far as I am aware, has never been mentioned in these pages, is the poet and playwrite, Gordon Bottomley (1874-1948). He was quite a celebrity in the twenties and thirties, publishing 7 collections of verse and no fewer than 15 verse dramas. He was a close friend of the painter, Paul Nash, and the poet, Edward Thomas, and a very prolific correspondent. He was (with Denys Harding) the first editor of the WWI poet, Isaac Rosenberg. Most of his papers, together with set-designs that Nash did for several of his plays, were bequeathed to the Tullie House Gallery in Carlisle.

Two other writers I know of are J.J. Waddington Feather (detective stories, I think) - and maybe he could be prevailed upon to speak for himself - and, more as a compiler than writer of books at the local level, Ian Dewhurst. I myself have published one novel, 'The Lych Gate' (2000) and am trying to find a publisher for a second one set in Australia in 1850.

There must be quite a number of old boys, unbeknown to me, who have published books in different fields, including novels and poetry, but maybe Gareth's 'other than yourself' has prevented them from revealing their lights.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1951-58

Current location (optional) East Yorkshire & East Lancashire

Re publishing Books. I have published 2 non-fiction "blog" type books called "Nothing is Forever.Is it? based on Commonsense is free but can be valuable. My close K.B.G.S. friends have been hugely entertained by these "pearls of wisdom"! However on a more serious note Ian Dewhurst reckons that the relentless rise of the Internet re -"blogging" will mean that serious research books in the future will change education as we knew it in the past.i.e. we will have to be computer literate to access this academia.
So it looks like "Talk and Chalk"and in the case of K.B.G.S.-flying chalk and `board rubbers will be consigned to the dust-bin of History.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1959-1966

Current location (optional) Haworth

I remember reading in my youth, a school story 'Unwillingly to School' by Paul Greenwood who was Head of Music until about 1960 or 61

(PS on a personal note it was unfortunate I should have mentioned on June 16th post my old friend Jim Hall, who died a week or so later.)

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 58-64

Current location (optional) Wirral

Many congratulations Ian, well deserved.


http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/ne....or_Mr_Keighley/


I know you won't read this via the internet , but , what the heck, it's worth a posting !!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1950/1955

Current location (optional) Keighley

Derek - is this the link you mean?

That's the one Chris.

Ian was at KBGS and as he doesn't believe in computers he isn't likely to read it on the web-site.

A wonderful historian and raconteur, who regularly gives illustrated talks to local societies and groups. In his laconic Yorkshire way !

His books on Keighley through the years are always well received.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1950/1955

Current location (optional) Keighley

If he tried using the internet i'm sure he would find a treasure trove of information, not least kbgs.com !

Would it be possible for us all to colaborate possibly using a wiki to write our own book on kbgs?

John, in a manner of speaking we are all already doing this, everytime we post a message. Looking back through the very many pages that have now been written, the school's history has been beautifully, often very intimately illustrated and charted. Certainly, it makes for much more lively reading than any other such history I have dipped into.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1951-58

Many thanks Doug. Just the kind of reply I had hoped for. I didn't know Herbert Butterfield was on old boy. But if I had looked at Famous Old Boys on this site before I posted my question I would have! And from Oxenhope too. Flippin heck! He was even a Gifford Lecturer - up there with the likes of Dewey, Whitehead, James, Bergson, Schweitzer, Toynbee, Chomsky. He (Butterfield, not Chomsky) said "if ever we get rid of the word state there will always be something just as bad to put in its place."

And thanks Brian for the note about Paul Greenwood's book. He was music teacher there during my time. I don't suppose that's still in print, but surely all the books mentioned should be available in Keighley Public Library for those of us still near enough to call in there.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1954-59

Current location (optional) Denholme (garethwhittaker99@hotmail.com)

Paul Greenwood is living in Skipton. Telephone number in the Skipton Phonebook.

He looks forward to talking about /discussing KBGS with fellow
ex-pupils/teachers

The book quoted by Brian "Unwillingly to School" isn't in print BUT a copy is held in the Yorkshire Collection at Wetherby and can be borrowed on request via a local Public Library.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1950/1955

Current location (optional) Keighley

Baron (J C) Hatch of Lusby, of Oldfield in the County of West Yorkshire (1917-1992), who was at KBGS in the 1930's, and "was Commonwealth Correspondent of the New Statesman from 1950-1970 wrote numerous books on Africa from The Dilemma of South Africa (1953) to Two African Statesman (1976)".

This is an extract from his obituary in The Independent written by Lord (Hugh) Jenkins. I found it on Google.

John Hatch was a contemporary of Asa Briggs and my brother, and was a prefect when I started at KBGS in 1937.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1937-1944

Current location (optional) Huntingdon

Wilson Midgley started his career in 1903 as joint editor of the first number of The Keighley School Magazine (which two years later changed its name to The Keighlian) along with Herbert Whitaker and Walter Dawson. During the 1930’s he was features editor of The Star and later editor of “John o’London’s Weekly”, a publication of which Herbert Whitaker’s brother Frank was also one time editor.

He later became a journalist, who when based in America in 1928, wrote “Possible Presidents of the USA”. In or around 1948 he wrote “From my Corner Bed”, “Cookery for Men Only” and “The Terrible Turk and his ten talkative daughters”. I knew of “From my Corner Bed” as I had read it many years ago, but when I found details of the others on Google I wasn’t sure they were written by the same Wilson Midgley. However when I phoned my brother last Sunday, he pulled out from his files a letter he had received from Ian Dewhirst which confirmed that our W.M. had written these four books.

Those of you who are railway enthusiasts may be interested in the following, written by O.S.Nock, the well known railway author.

With a few short mini-features I was lucky enough to catch the eye of Wilson Midgley, features editor of the Star. Beginning in June 1932 he took 'Signs for the Colour Blind' from me. Then followed 'A Robot Railway', 'Pacific 1933', 'East London's Searchlights', 'Speed Up to Paris'—in the course of about two years. 'Pacific 1933' was his re-titling of a piece on the first Stanier 'Pacifics' of the LMS, which came out that year. I forget what my own title was, but Midgley skilfully parodied the title of Honnegger's well known fantasia 'Pacific 231', which was played recently to excellent effect at the musical night at the Albert Hall, organised by British Railways at the time of the 150th Anniversary of the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1975. Anyway, right back in March 1934 I wrote to the Star and asked if they would like an article describing a footplate ride on 'Pacific 1933'. Midgley did not actually commission an article, but his reply was encouraging enough for me to ask the LMS for the necessary permission, and to my delight they gave it —not only for the 'Pacific', but to ride any other engine, between Euston and Edinburgh, where I was intending to spend the Easter weekend, that year.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1937-1944

Current location (optional) Huntingdon

Brian(?) Lund,in my year, also from Steeton, had a book published on the history of "Keighley Cougars", so I am informed from a usually reliable source.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 55-60

Current location (optional) Harrogate

A few weeks ago I made a list of books mentioned in this thread and went along to the Keighley Library in North Street curious to see how many were available there. Only one by Asa Briggs was on the catalogue! After expressing my amazement I was told that there might be more on a separate catalogue upstairs in the Local Studies Library. A later visit found that only a couple more were listed up there. But the lady at the desk said that more might be held, uncatalogued, in a back room. And indeed several were found there, but nothing by Ted Bottomley, Doug Thompson or Paul Greenwood. The Library expressed a wish to acquire titles by these and any others to add to their collection of books by local authors. When they have catalogued their present holdings perhaps Chris could copy it to the site.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1954-59

Current location (optional) Denholme (garethwhittaker99@hotmail.com)

Gareth, in all honesty, I wouldn't have expected the kind of stuff I have written to have got into Keighley Public Library - especially when, since Mrs Thatcher's 'golden years' of culture crippling, money has been tight for libraries. It was all too narrowly specialised, I think, for a small town public library.

As for Gordon (not Ted) Bottomley's quite esoteric plays and verse, well, some of it might yet be kicking around in a cellar there, but it was hardly crowd pulling stuff, even in its time. I have never seen or read any of it myself but he does crop up in some Guides to English Literature.

Incidentally, does the Philip Snowden Library survive that used to be housed in the old reference library upstairs? In fact, does the old reference library survive...?

Yes Doug, the Philip Snowden Library is still there on open shelves in the Local Studies Library, presumably where the old Reference Library used to be.
Although I didn't actually see any, the lady assured me there were books in the back room by Gordon Bottomley but not "A Journalist's Guide to the Use of Good English" by Ted.
Unfortunately, if they do eventually get any of your books, they will probably remain in the back room and be available for reference only inside the library and not for loan.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1954-59

Current location (optional) Denholme (garethwhittaker99@hotmail.com)

....Anyway, Doug: the fine points of cricket and trainspotting seem just as narrowly specialized, as esoteric, to me as modern Italian literature yet the library has plenty of books on these. And are you sure the cutbacks didn't have a serious impact on acquisitions in these areas too?

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1954-59

Current location (optional) Denholme (garethwhittaker99@hotmail.com)

On the refurbishment of the Carnegie Library, the number of BOOKS thrown away in the skips was staggering !!

"There won't be room for all of these books" (IT'S A LIBRARY ! DOH)

So some Bradford Council numpty told his/her operatives to dump £000s of Keighley's Historical books and other works !!

Non Keighlians deciding on the outcome of something for which they have no heart or interest.

Typical jobsworths !!

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1950/1955

Current location (optional) Keighley

Don't know anything about this dumping of books but for the last 6 months or so hundreds of withdrawn books from Kly Public Library have been appearing regularly for sale in Bradford Central Library. Why not in KPL? There's plenty of room.

Years at KBGS e.g. 1958-1964 (optional) 1954-59

Current location (optional) Denholme (garethwhittaker99@hotmail.com)