I totally agree with the above comment. I went to Portrack and Tilery but failed 11 plus because I was absent too much with illness at the wrong times. The Tech system caught you if you really wanted a third chance to make good. Names I can not recall, But we did the Lyke Wake, walked through the market with an extended ladder for a laugh and generally enjoyed studying. I passed and went on to MSc etc.
The “Tech” on Nelson Terrace was a really great place. We went there for two years to take five “O” Levels, which we couldn’t take at Mill Lane, and the relaxed atmosphere was a real step change. We had a great maths teacher called Ernie Knaggs, who was an elderly gentleman who made numbers interesting and therefore so much more enjoyable. Mr Johnson taught us technical drawing and how to play basketball. After those two years I went into an engineering apprenticeship for which my time at Nelson Terrace laid the foundations.
I too am grateful to Stockton Technical College having failed my scholarship in 1939. I was sent to learn basic engineering with the girls learning to make munitions at an annex down Church Row. The instructor was a smallish man with a strange eye and a grey warehouse coat. I got on very well with him and I will always be grateful to him for passing on his skills. My first job was to make a square using files and scrapers and of course soldering. I still have it today.
After this course I was put in the “time office” at my Uncle Fred Kidd’s factory further down Church Row, just past the railway bridge and on the right. See comments already with Stockton Pictures on Fred Kidd’s..
I totally agree with the above comment. I went to Portrack and Tilery but failed 11 plus because I was absent too much with illness at the wrong times. The Tech system caught you if you really wanted a third chance to make good. Names I can not recall, But we did the Lyke Wake, walked through the market with an extended ladder for a laugh and generally enjoyed studying. I passed and went on to MSc etc.
LikeLike
The “Tech” on Nelson Terrace was a really great place. We went there for two years to take five “O” Levels, which we couldn’t take at Mill Lane, and the relaxed atmosphere was a real step change. We had a great maths teacher called Ernie Knaggs, who was an elderly gentleman who made numbers interesting and therefore so much more enjoyable. Mr Johnson taught us technical drawing and how to play basketball. After those two years I went into an engineering apprenticeship for which my time at Nelson Terrace laid the foundations.
LikeLike
I too am grateful to Stockton Technical College having failed my scholarship in 1939. I was sent to learn basic engineering with the girls learning to make munitions at an annex down Church Row. The instructor was a smallish man with a strange eye and a grey warehouse coat. I got on very well with him and I will always be grateful to him for passing on his skills. My first job was to make a square using files and scrapers and of course soldering. I still have it today.
After this course I was put in the “time office” at my Uncle Fred Kidd’s factory further down Church Row, just past the railway bridge and on the right. See comments already with Stockton Pictures on Fred Kidd’s..
LikeLike