Ushaw College Photo Essay Number Six (posted 20/05/2010)

These are photos of the Junior House, or the Junior Seminary, or just the Sem.  I was not able to take a photo from directly in front of the Sem, as I will explain later.  So you will have to use your imagination - the Sem is built like the letter 'L' with an extra horizontal at the top of the 'L'.  On the left of the right photo is St Aloysius' chapel, and you can just see the end buttress on the right of the left photo - the main building has two wings. 

In the centre of the main building we have the front door, which leads on to the main corridor.  On the right hand side of the front door was the room occupied by the Junior House Prefect of Discipline; in my time this was Mr David 'Darty' Bullen (Remember, the priests were all addressed as 'Mister' not 'Father').  On the left hand side, there was a Playroom (Common Room). The top storey was one long dormitory; each boy had a small cubicle, all made with wood partitions and the doorway was a curtain.  At either end there was a special cubicle for the Minors who looked after each year group: the Minors were chosen Divines in Minor Orders - hence Minors for short.  Their job here was to make sure everybody got to bed at night and got up in the morning (9 pm and 6.45 am respectively, I think).

On the left hand wing, the ground floor housed Playrooms and, at the end,the Junior House Study Place (stewpot).  The upper floor on this wing had the rooms for the professors who normally taught in the Sem.

On the right hand wing, the ground floor held classrooms and, at the end, the lovely chapel of St Aloysius (which you can see on the right photo).  The upper storey on this wing was a continuation of the dormitory which stretched above the main corridor. In the right photo, behind the tree, you can see what is a corridor which led to the College, which we youngsters marched along two-by-two to go to the Refectory for meals four times a day or to the St Cuthbert's chapel on Sundays for High Mass and Vespers.

Behind that corridor was the Gymnasium (knees bend, arms stretch, hup, two, three, four).  The skylight of the Swimming Baths is just visible above the corridor.  More about the Swimming Baths on another occasion.

The reason why I was not able to photograph the Junior Sem from the front is that the place is in grave danger of falling down.  The whole area is barricaded off, so that the nearest approach is what you can see in the photo on the left.  A College servant told me that the place has been vandalised- copper wire stripped out, wash basins and toilets smashed, etc.  No-one is allowed to visit for fear that something nasty and heavy might fall on them.  Many years ago the Junior Sem was closed when the numbers dropped and Upholland College in Lancashire took on the role of Junior Seminary for the Northern Dioceses.  Since then Ushaw's Junior Sem has had a chequered career, with nothing much happening, because various authorities - the Bishops, English Heritage, County Durham Planning Department - cannot agree on what to do with the place. The result - dereliction!  I would have loved photos of St Aloysius, the dormitories, the main ambulacrum, even the wash-place, but the chance is long gone.

Nor is this the only area which has suffered harm over recent years.  More to come!

Ushaw College Photo Essay Number Five (posted 14/05/2010)

This is a photo of The Bounds, taken from the top floor of the Conference Centre.  The grass extends way over to the right, where at the end there were tennis courts (now a car park), and to the east there was a nine-hole golf course, shared with a herd of cows, which made playing golf a real challenge at times. On the north, or left, side of the photo, there are three large walled, open, areas and a number of enclosed spaces.

This is a view from ground level, and clearly shows the ball-places and the Cat Ring in the foreground. I have to admit that I have forgotten most of the rules of Cat.  The game was played with two sides of seven players; the Feeder 'feeds' the ball from his gloved hand with a complicated set of bows, the Striker hits the ball, and the 'in-team' rushes madly around the ring to touch cat-stick to hole (seven holes) before the fielding team throws the ball to the Corner who tries to hole the ball before the player touches it with his cat-stick.  I know, I know, it sounds complicated.  I was quite good as a Feeder, but if you messed up on the feed, or if the striker mistimed his stroke, you could get a very nasty blow on the hand.  I also often played in the out-field - the only problem there is that I could never throw the ball very far - I would throw it in, then run after it, pick it up and have another throw - then the in-fielder would throw it the rest of the way to the Corner!

This cabinet in the Refectory Ambulacrum shows a Cat-stick (towards the back, bulbous head, long thin shaft); there is also a block of wood from which we used to chop and carve our own sticks.  The other sticks are battledores - this was for the game which was played on the large Ball-places in the photo; it was a kind of open-air squash.  In the small ball-places, called Racquet Houses, we played the same sort of thing but used our hands to hit the ball.
The furthest Ball Place was the scene of an outdoor Mass to which the whole diocese was invited; thousands turned up but I am not sure of the occasion - I think it could have been the 150th anniversary of the founding of Ushaw in 1958 - I am sure that someone will be able to tell me (us).

What you may not be able to see on the photos are the Keep Off signs and barricades to keep anyone away from the ball-places.  The whole wall is in danger of falling down.  There is a sense of dilapidation about much of the Ushaw grounds, which is regrettable but understandable when there are so few students.  In my next post I will tell how we used to manage the grounds in the nineteen-fifties.

Ushaw College Photo Essay Number Four (posted 6'05/2010)

These photos came out better than I expected; they are of the model of Ushaw College, which is now in the Front Ambulacrum, though in my time at Ushaw it was centre piece in the Museum, now sadly cleared and turned into some kind of rather weird two-way facing chapel.  The model is in a glass case, with reflections from nearby windows and the edges of the case visible.

 The top photo clearly shows the main front block of the College buildings with the quadrangle behind, and with the East and West Ambulacra forming a square with the wash-place and Refectory making the fourth side.  On the northern end of the East Ambulacrum is the site of the original chapel but which is now the Hall.  To the left of main block is the Big Library and to the right is St Cuthbert's Chapel.  Behind St Cuthbert's is the Museum (was the Museum) and behind that is the Infirmary.

The second photo shows the Big Library, with Div's (Divines) Classrooms behind it. The large building behind that is what has become the new Conference Centre - originally intended to be new classrooms and living accommodation for the ever-expanding College student population (didn't happen). And to the right of the photo the area we called The Bounds.

In the third photo we have the Junior House (the Junior Sem(inary), main entrance in centre, study-place (stewpot) to the left and St Aloysius chapel to the right.   The Swimming Bath and the Gymnasium are on the corridor which links to Junior Sem to the main College.  Behind the Swimming Bath you may just make out the white walls of the College Cemetery.

I will be posting about the Junior Seminary, The Bounds, the Cemetery and the gardens and Pond at the front of the College fairly soon.

Ushaw College Photo Essay Number Three (posted 03/05/2010)

Sedes Sapientiae

Opposite the Front Door, on the Front Ambulacrum, stands this statue of Our Lady, Sedes Sapientiae.

Our Lady, Seat of Wisdom.

When passing the statue, professors and Divines would raise their birettas.

(Birettas were worn at all times in the ambulacra).

Lower ranks would salute the statue by bending their right arms at the elbow up to the shoulder.

To acknowledge the statue and the presence of Our Lady.

I remember that when our Science teacher, Mr (Father) Aidan Pickering, was discussing various rock types, he told us that this statue was made of alabaster and could easily by damaged by a finger-nail scratch; we were warned not to experiment with this!

1n 1950, when Pope Pius the Twelfth proclaimed the dogma of the Assumption, the whole College gathered in front of this statue of Our Lady to sing the Te Deum, the traditional thanksgiving hymn of the Church; maybe we also recited the fourth glorious mystery of the Rosary and sang Hail Queen of Heaven, a hymn written by Dr Lingard, a former professor at the College.

Ushaw College Photo Essay Number Two (posted 02/05/2010)

As I was saying ....

...... there are four storeys to the College main front.  On the ground floor, the window to the right of the front door looks into Ted Stone's office.  The next two windows are for the Professors' Parlour.  It was in this room that the body of any College priest who had died was laid out and all students were encouraged to view the body and offer prayers for the deceased.  As I recall, there were three deaths in my time: Monsignor Corbishley, President for my first few years, Canon Billy Dunne and Father 'Wocky' Towers, both of whom had spent nearly all their lives at Ushaw and had both ended up as Spiritual Directors. 

The remaining windows are of the Reading Room where the Orals were held, of which I have already spoken; for one year, in Rhetoric, I think, I was Librarian of the Reading Room.  Not a very onerous job - I had to keep the place tidy and maintain a decorous silence.

On the other side of the front door the ground floor windows all belonged to Divines' Playroom, the common room used by the four years of Divinity for common 'down-time', for smoking, playing billiards and table tennis, and occasionally listening to the radio (only at approved times and on approved channels!).

Behind these rooms there was the length of the Main or Front Ambulacrum, which looked out onto the central quadrangle. Opposite the front door there was the Sedes Sapientiae - but more about that later.

On the second floor, which was named President's Gallery,  the rooms were all occupied by professors.  The President had the three windows over the front door, and the most senior profs had the rooms on either side overlooking the front.  There was a Grand Staircase leading from the Front Ambulacrum up to the President's Gallery, nicely carpeted, which we students were not allowed to use.

The gallery above President's Gallery was called Top, and as you can see from the size of the windows these rooms were mainly for students or junior profs.  This was originally the height of the building, but the very top floor was added later when numbers expanded, and it was given the name Tip-Top.

Behind the main building was the quadrangle, and two other ambulacra were built from either end of the main building to form a square around the quad.  These two ambulacra, the East and the West, were made up of classrooms, the Professor's Dining Room and Playrooms.

Above the West Ambulacrum, the gallery of student's (and some profs) rooms was called Hell, because these rooms had pianos in them where students could practise each evening - sometimes the combined noise from a dozen pianos was absolutely excruciating. The gallery was well-named!  Above this gallery, there was another with student rooms, whose name I have completely forgotten (even though I had a room here for a year).  Surely someone can remind me of that name.

Above the East Ambulacrum, there was a dormitory for the younger students; maybe forty youngsters were crammed into wooden-partitioned bed-spaces with a curtained entrance, a bed and a chest of drawers.  This area has now been turned into en suite rooms for visitors.  Nothing was en suite in my time! Not even for the President!

On the northern side of the quad, there were two large wash-places, with cold water in my day, where students from the East Dorm came to get washed. On the other side of the ambulacrum was the Refectory, the kitchens and the Hall (where the Readings Up were held).  What is now the Hall was originally the site of the College chapel. 

I think that this quadrangle and the buildings around it was the whole of the College when it was first established in 1808, until a President called Monsignor Newsham  (President from 1837 to 1863)decided to make the College into the premier Catholic college in England.  Amongst other things he built St Cuthbert's Chapel, the Hall and the Junior House.  He is often called the second founder of Ushaw.

Ushaw College Photo Essay Number One (posted 30/04/2010)

I recently took a number of photographs of Ushaw College with the intention of writing a photo-essay: simply photos with a few words of explanation.  But, as I looked at the photos, so many memories came back to me that I think that this could last for some time!

The first photo is this one.  It is of course the front of Ushaw College with St Cuthbert's Chapel at the far end.  Clearly there are four levels of galleries with rooms on each side of the central passageway.  The height is about sixty feet to the roof.

Beginning at the main door, at the centre of the ground floor, the window to the right of the door was the office of Ted Stone, one of the College servants.  Dear old Ted Stone!  He was the most visible perhaps of all the College servants.  I think I may have to digress here!

The two other College servants that I knew best, even though we were not supposed to fraternise with College servants, were Peter Seed (Clerk of Works) and Vincent Rangham (College Secretary and Financial  Wizard).  These College servants were loyal and long-serving members of the Ushaw Team - their sons and grandsons are still working at the College.

But back to Ted Stone.  He was rather small and slight, with a moustache.  His first job was porter and door-keeper.  All visitors to the College reported to him as they entered the main door, and he would then take them to meet whoever they had come to see. Or later after a phone system was introduced into the College he would use the intercom-phone to announce the arrival of the visitor. 

That was only a part of Ted's duties.  He was often drafted in to be a real porter - hefting buckets of coal to the rooms of the professors who all had coal-fires.  At that time there were no lifts (elevators), which meant carrying  coals up three flights of stairs.  Hard work indeed!

His other principal duty was Postmaster - he ran the College Post Office. He received the incoming letters and parcels, sorted them and distributed them; he emptied the post-box on the Front Ambulacrum, weighed and priced outgoing parcels, sold stamps.  He was indeed Postmaster to the College.

At General Election time he was in charge of the ballot-box, which would go in the small waiting room to the left of the main door and he would check off the voters and issue voting papers; he would seal the ballot box at the end of voting and make sure that it was collected by van to go to the Count.

When he had nothing else to do, he would become a barber, cutting student's hair.  It wasn't quite a Marine-style of cut, but almost that.  After having been shorn, the remark often made was "I feel a Stone lighter!" - a remark that Ted must have been heartily sick of hearing.  His haircuts were also the origin of the phrase "I'm going to have a Stone", or "I've been Stoned".  (Fifty or sixty years ago we couldn't have imagined any other meaning for these words than that they referred to a haircut by Ted Stone).  He didn't receive any pay from the students, but later when we were officially allowed to smoke I for one often laid a couple of cigarettes on his counter as a thank you. (We all smoked like chimneys in those days).

Enough already - I must get back to my photo of the front of the College.  Next time!

If anyone has any other recollections of Ted Stone, please let us know by adding a Comment.

Ushaw, Exams and Results, Part Two (posted 26/04/2010)

This is the scene in the Hall on the last morning of the Ushaw Training Conference: Dr Joseph Shaw, Chairman of the LMS, is addressing the priests and conferees.  But for the purposes of this post, ignore the people and look at the front of the stage, which I think is called the proscenium; take away the steps and the piano which Paul Waddington is leaning on.  (The seating in those old days was not made up of cinema-style chairs, but simple wooden benches.)  This is the setting for Readings Up.

In all the schools ('years') from Underlow to Rhetoric, there were quarterly written examinations, and usually the results were just posted on the various noticeboards in each playroom (Ushaw-speak for common room).  But there was also in each school (year) something called 'school order'; in other words someone was named as first and someone was named last, with the rest in between.  The school order was settled once a year for the following year at the end of the Third Quarter exams - actually, I can't quite remember whether it was at the end of the First Quarter, just before Christmas, or just before the Summer Holidays.  In any case the matter was settled at what was called Readings Up. 

The whole College is assembled in the Hall, filling it to capacity, from the President to the lowliest student.

Standing at a lectern on the front of the stage stands a Divine (I think) with a large book in which all the results of all the years from top school to  bottom school are written in Latin.  The most important results are those of the Latin Tests, because on these are based the school order for the following year.

Each school takes its place in a single line at the front of the proscenium, in the school order as it has been.  Then the Divine begins to speak: "In Latino, primus Petrus Jones, secundus Joannes Hogg, tertius etc etc." One by one as your name is called you walk back to your seat.  Woe betide you if you do not recognise your Christian name in Latin, or are petrified like a rabbit in the headlights, and all around you your friends are leaving you behind and your panic gets even greater, until someone in the Hall whispers out loud that your name has been called and you can sit down, only to receive a quiet cheer as you finally move!

In many cases the new school order resembles the old one with a few ups and downs here and there.   But sometimes someone who has been at the top of the school order has a bad day and drops a lot of places.  It happened to me: I began at Number Two in the old school order, but my Latin results that quarter were obviously bad and the front of the proscenium was half empty, with me standing forlornly at one end and a big gap developing to one side of me, until my name was eventually called out at number 11 or 12.  I received a subdued jeer for that!  And the special irony was that that particular Readings Up settled the school order, not just for the following year , but for the rest of the years at Ushaw, through Philosophy and Divinity.

In the end, of course, my final school order has not made any difference to my life as a priest.  But Ushaw had some hairy moments, and that was one of them for me.

I look forward to hearing others' recollections of Readings Up.