Page 41 - The Gonzaga Record 1985
P. 41
THE LIGHT OF OTHER DAYS
My earliest memory of Gonzaga is of the sight of the twin old houses as I drove up
the avenue with my parents for my first interview with the then Rector, the late Fr
Charles O'Conor SJ. The interview was not arduous, being conducted in the
main on the lap of the school's founder, while he questioned me gently about
myself and my life to date. The only part of the proceedings that even remotely
resembled a test was the request to compose a letter to a relation. I remember
'failing' this first examination by writing my address in a straight line across the top
of the page instead of in a neat box in the top right hand corner in the approved
manner. My own explanation of this lapse has always been that I was invited to
write on a sheet of lined exercise paper and was wrongly of the view that in these
circumstances different rules applied. When I say 'fail', of course, I refer to my own
shocked realisation that something was amiss with my creation; no word of
criticism passed the lips of my interviewer.
These events took place, I think, in April or May 1957. In June, I was to return
to the school, in company with those others who were to be my classmates, to take
part in a more rigorous test of my abilities. We were assembled in what in my day
was the classroom that housed Prep II and put to an assortment of written tests,
mostly of the I.Q. variety; I distinctly remember having to guide a mouse or two
through mazes of varying, and presumably increasing, degrees of complexity.
I have no memory of my first day at school. My first recollection, once term
actually commenced, is of taking part in the doubtless long extinct ceremony of
being 'Measured For The Blazer'. By arrangement with the school a gentleman
from the firm of Kingston & Co. came to the class. In turn we each stood by the
blackboard of Prep I while a silent and suitably deferrent tape measure was passed
over our persons. Further fittings of the garment took place in the shop of the
company in O'Connell Street (now occupied by a Burger King establishment.)
The matter of the blazer is worthy of further comment because in later years the
nature of the garment worn told more about the wearer than you might suspect.
Some years after I came to the school, subtle, yet revealing, design changes were
introduced. Prior to that time, the familiar mauve blazer had been decorated with
considerable quantities of green braid, not only on the cuffs and pocket tops but
also around the lapels. It was decided, whether in response to an unacceptable level
of public ridicule or simply in line with changes in fashion, to dispense with most of
the braid. The point, however, was this: boys who boasted blazers handed down
from elder brothers were still resplendent in the original braid, while new boys with
no fraternal tradition of attendance could be spotted from their more modest gear.
There was no institutionalised system of terror inflicted on the new boy that I
had heard existed in other schools. I have no doubt that this was due, not to any
excess of natural kindness in one's fellow pupils, who were as average a collection
of gangsters as one would find anywhere, but to the benevolent influence of Fr
O'Conor and of Fr White, the Prefect of Studies. The former would be ever present
at break time and during the lunch hour, always ready to take one aside for a stroll
around the as yet unfinished new building to enquire after one's progress and about
one's first impressions of the school. The latter, one met in the context of the
classroom, either as a guide through the mysteries of arithmetic tables or
33
My earliest memory of Gonzaga is of the sight of the twin old houses as I drove up
the avenue with my parents for my first interview with the then Rector, the late Fr
Charles O'Conor SJ. The interview was not arduous, being conducted in the
main on the lap of the school's founder, while he questioned me gently about
myself and my life to date. The only part of the proceedings that even remotely
resembled a test was the request to compose a letter to a relation. I remember
'failing' this first examination by writing my address in a straight line across the top
of the page instead of in a neat box in the top right hand corner in the approved
manner. My own explanation of this lapse has always been that I was invited to
write on a sheet of lined exercise paper and was wrongly of the view that in these
circumstances different rules applied. When I say 'fail', of course, I refer to my own
shocked realisation that something was amiss with my creation; no word of
criticism passed the lips of my interviewer.
These events took place, I think, in April or May 1957. In June, I was to return
to the school, in company with those others who were to be my classmates, to take
part in a more rigorous test of my abilities. We were assembled in what in my day
was the classroom that housed Prep II and put to an assortment of written tests,
mostly of the I.Q. variety; I distinctly remember having to guide a mouse or two
through mazes of varying, and presumably increasing, degrees of complexity.
I have no memory of my first day at school. My first recollection, once term
actually commenced, is of taking part in the doubtless long extinct ceremony of
being 'Measured For The Blazer'. By arrangement with the school a gentleman
from the firm of Kingston & Co. came to the class. In turn we each stood by the
blackboard of Prep I while a silent and suitably deferrent tape measure was passed
over our persons. Further fittings of the garment took place in the shop of the
company in O'Connell Street (now occupied by a Burger King establishment.)
The matter of the blazer is worthy of further comment because in later years the
nature of the garment worn told more about the wearer than you might suspect.
Some years after I came to the school, subtle, yet revealing, design changes were
introduced. Prior to that time, the familiar mauve blazer had been decorated with
considerable quantities of green braid, not only on the cuffs and pocket tops but
also around the lapels. It was decided, whether in response to an unacceptable level
of public ridicule or simply in line with changes in fashion, to dispense with most of
the braid. The point, however, was this: boys who boasted blazers handed down
from elder brothers were still resplendent in the original braid, while new boys with
no fraternal tradition of attendance could be spotted from their more modest gear.
There was no institutionalised system of terror inflicted on the new boy that I
had heard existed in other schools. I have no doubt that this was due, not to any
excess of natural kindness in one's fellow pupils, who were as average a collection
of gangsters as one would find anywhere, but to the benevolent influence of Fr
O'Conor and of Fr White, the Prefect of Studies. The former would be ever present
at break time and during the lunch hour, always ready to take one aside for a stroll
around the as yet unfinished new building to enquire after one's progress and about
one's first impressions of the school. The latter, one met in the context of the
classroom, either as a guide through the mysteries of arithmetic tables or
33
