Sadly the only pupils I recall from those of you who have chosen to write on this site are Gary Burwood and Linda Powell.

However my memories of Casey are far from fond. When I arrived at Cass’s in September 1961 I recall being to told to ‘Watch out for Casey’ but he wasn’t an issue for me for I had no dealings with him in my first year. At the end of 1A I was relegated to 2B but after the Christmas exams I returned to 2A where Casey was the form teacher. Very soon after my arrival in 2A it became apparent that I was the target of Casey’s continuing verbal and physical abuse which I had to endure from January until July 1963. By then my mother had me removed, not so much from Cass’s, but from Casey and his hateful behaviour. So, a new school no more Casey and the nightmare was over.

In 1990 I had a brief to write a paper on ‘Fear’ and my memory rushed back the 26 years to Casey. Here’s part of what I wrote in 1990.

‘Upon my arrival in 2A I was allocated a seat in the front row just to Casey’s left and a little out of his arm’s reach. Sadly I was not beyond the reach of his vicious tongue, which was a weapon he was adept at using on defenceles children. Casey was my teacher for English, History, Maths and Sports, which led to my spending a lot of time in his orbit. My performance at his beloved sports was as miserable as my academic studies so I quickly found myself on the receiving end of not only his tongue but also his right arm. One of his delights was to ridicule my work in front of the class and another was to ask me questions he knew I could not answer and then to pull my ear. On one occasion we joined him in the classroom where he was seated at his desk reading. I could see he was reading a report booklet and wondered why he had one at that time of the year. Once we were settled down he told us to listen carefully to what he was going to read. He then proceeded to read out my first year report. I sat there dreading what he had planned for his encore.

When he had finished reading he announced that it was the report of one of the class members and jokingly asked for volunteers to claim it as theirs. When he had no takers he continued in a joking manner soliciting people by name and at this stage they got into the swing of it and started to volunteer themselves. When he got tired of this he quieted them down and looked at me and told me to stand up. He then announced that it was my report and read it out once more. Following another bour of abuse I was told to sit down.’

I wrote nearly four pages but the above are the salient paragraphs. I will add that I am certain that I sat next to Lorraine Overbury for those six months and have no memory of ever speaking to her. But surely that can’t be true.

I am glad I found a link to my past, and look forward to reading about the old days.