I passed the 11 plus in 1967 in South East England. It was a great day, I lived with just my mother, my father was dead and we didn't have any other family which we saw regularly, but my mother arranged a small party in celebration and I recieved a model plane as a reward.
The school itself was of the traditional kind, as i found out when we went to the school outfitters, grey shorts, blazer and school cap. the P. E. kit was just white shorts for gym, rugby shirt and shorts for games and then there was swiming, just a white towel required for that.
I was a shy boy I didn't have many friends and spent most of my time reading or studying, which ment that i got into very little trouble and had never recieved anything more then the occasional spank from my mother.
From the first day at grammer school it was clear that this was going to change, the 100 new boys sat in the school hall to be told that all school rules were to be followed to the letter and that the cane could be applied to the bare buttocks of any boy by any master.
It was the next day when the real shock came, second lesson was P. E. My class marched down to the changing rooms, the P. E teacher ushered us all inside and when we had all sat down went into a speach about how important it was to be fit and then he said
'right boys this is the proceedure, when you come into this room the first thing you do is strip!'
We looked around for a second nobody doing anything.
'Strip! last boy naked gets three of the cane'
At that there was a lot of movement 24 11 year old boys trying to get out of thier clouthes as quickly as possible.
'Strip in silence' he said.
'When you have taken off all of your clouthes place your gym shorts on the floor in front of you with the name tag visible, if your shorts are not clean, ironed and with a name tag you will get three strokes of the cane and you will be doing gym without them'
'When you have placed your shorts on the floor, fold up your towel so that your name tag is vissible and stand holding it above your head arms and legs wide appart!'
When we had done this the room was full of naked boys holding towels above thier heads. The boy who was last to get undressed was a small blonde boy who was clearly somewhat clumbsy.
He was grasped by the ear by the P. E. teacher, brought to the middle of the room , told to bend over and grip his ankles, which he did, then infront of the rest of us he was given three sharp strokes.
'right boys this is how every one of my lessons beguins. so if you don't want to feel the cane you had better practice getting undressed.'
He then walked around the roon inspecting the white towels and P. E. shorts.
'right boys put your shorts on and your towel over your right shoulder'
We then marched out of the room and down two corridors untill we came to the shower room whch was a large tiled room with just an archway leading to it with no doors. There were hooks on the wall and we were told to place our towels on the hooks and then marched to the end of the coridore where the gym was located.
After a vigorous session of gym we were marched back to the changing room told to take off our shorts and marched naked back to the shower room.
The P. E. teacher then sat on a stool watching us shower, after which we had to present ourselves , hands on heads , for his inspection.
The blonde boy who had already been beated was the first to present himself.
'I didn't see you wash you willy and balls boy'
' I didn't see you wash between your buttocks either'
'Did You!'
' no sir'
'Bend over'
The boy did as he was told, three more strokes landed across his already bruised buttocks, he cried out at each stroke and was crying at the end.
'stand up boy I don't think you were the only one, back in the shower, we will now have a lesson in washing ourselves.'
We all got back in the shower, the water now cold.
The teacher then started shouting out parts of the body for us to wash.
'Willy'
24 11 year olds soap thier willy.
'Balls'
24 11 year olds soap thier balls, and so on.
I was glad to get back to the changing room and get my clouthes back on.
I thought this was as bad as it could get but Rugby and swimming!