Cornish Childhoods: Then and Now.
Without doubt the most accomplished, and famous, former pupil of St Austell County School was the late A.L. Rowse (1903-1997) - historian, writer, poet, intellectual and, not least, proud Cornishman. From a poor background in the village of Tregonissey, and relying on scholarships to the County School and then to university, he rose to become a Fellow of All Souls College at Oxford University and a world authority on the Elizabethan era, including the works of Shakespeare. Intellectually courageous, he was unafraid of stating his opinions, a trait that did not endear him to all. Towards the end of his illustrious and prolific career he was made a Companion of Honour but, arguably, would have earned more recognition both locally and nationally, if he had compromised his pursuit of intellectual honesty with what is described so infelicitously nowadays as ‘political correctness’.
But how different is the present school to those days during the First World War when Rowse attended? His classic, bestselling book, A Cornish Childhood, provides the essential starting point for answering the question. St Austell County School was built between the village of Tregonissey and the town of St Austell. Today, the village has been swallowed by urban sprawl and the fields of Rowse’s youth have disappeared. However, some aspects remain, such as the presence of the brewery and its “exotic scent” that Rowse remembered with nostalgia. Sails can still be seen in the bay but they do not belong to the Mevagissey fishing fleet that he witnessed at night with their lights “moving like glow-worms upon the water”. The road was busy even then, with horse-drawn clay wagons “rattling and bumping along merrily”; these have been replaced by noisy motor traffic and, of course, the china clay industry no longer has the presence in the area that it once enjoyed. The sense of community has disappeared, although Rowse detected the start of this when he noted that the “fabric of the old ways” began to pass at the end of the First World War.
The County School is only a small part of the modern comprehensive, yet his description of what is now Poltair’s West Block still holds true: “wide corridors, a staircase which we thought magnificent, an upper story with windows giving out on to the football field and looking out across to the bay.” On his visit to the school in 1977, as the guest of honour at Speech Day, he lingered in front of one feature that had not been part of the school while he had been a pupil: the War Memorial windows and board. On here are the names of people he had known and, of course, his childhood was marked profoundly by the impact of the First World War. (A Cornish Childhood was written during the Second World War.) The community fell quiet with so many men, including his Headmaster, Mr Jenkinson, away at war, but discomfort and tragedy preyed on those left behind. His father went away to work in the iron mines near Banbury and Rowse’s work in the family shop extended to “the making-out of ration books and checking ration-tickets” towards the end of the war. The playing fields have been replaced by a series of buildings and further changes are imminent. In 1977 he was intrigued by textbooks that were, to him, lavishly illustrated but even at that late stage, pupils still had, as he had once, their own hymn books and, in his words, “a sweet little book in which to enter up your homework”. Since then education has altered enormously; what he would have made of computers and interactive whiteboards we will never know.
Rowse was given a rare opportunity when he won the scholarship that enabled him to move from Carclaze Elementary School to the County School and this came to mean far more to him than the half-crown his parents gave him as a reward. This was a time when working class parents longed to give such opportunities to their children but, because of financial pressures, and the near-absence of free provision beyond the elementary stage, few could do so. Since the Second World War, secondary education has become a right and facilities have expanded far beyond those afforded to the most privileged of youngsters in Rowse’s day. But here lies the rub: education, if anything, is more vital than ever before but is it valued by all now that it is freely available? On this, Rowse’s opinion was, as always, clear and trenchant but the reader will, no doubt, reach his, or her, own conclusion.
Poltair continues to provide a high quality of education, different, naturally, to that in Rowse’s day. Society has changed profoundly, as have education and, indeed, the school buildings; yet there are reminders, and survivals, of an earlier time: graceful buildings; an unrivalled view; even the screaming acrobatics of the swifts that visit us each summer, as they no doubt did in those distant days when A.L. Rowse attended the school; but, above all, generations continue to have their own Cornish childhoods here.
But how different is the present school to those days during the First World War when Rowse attended? His classic, bestselling book, A Cornish Childhood, provides the essential starting point for answering the question. St Austell County School was built between the village of Tregonissey and the town of St Austell. Today, the village has been swallowed by urban sprawl and the fields of Rowse’s youth have disappeared. However, some aspects remain, such as the presence of the brewery and its “exotic scent” that Rowse remembered with nostalgia. Sails can still be seen in the bay but they do not belong to the Mevagissey fishing fleet that he witnessed at night with their lights “moving like glow-worms upon the water”. The road was busy even then, with horse-drawn clay wagons “rattling and bumping along merrily”; these have been replaced by noisy motor traffic and, of course, the china clay industry no longer has the presence in the area that it once enjoyed. The sense of community has disappeared, although Rowse detected the start of this when he noted that the “fabric of the old ways” began to pass at the end of the First World War.
The County School is only a small part of the modern comprehensive, yet his description of what is now Poltair’s West Block still holds true: “wide corridors, a staircase which we thought magnificent, an upper story with windows giving out on to the football field and looking out across to the bay.” On his visit to the school in 1977, as the guest of honour at Speech Day, he lingered in front of one feature that had not been part of the school while he had been a pupil: the War Memorial windows and board. On here are the names of people he had known and, of course, his childhood was marked profoundly by the impact of the First World War. (A Cornish Childhood was written during the Second World War.) The community fell quiet with so many men, including his Headmaster, Mr Jenkinson, away at war, but discomfort and tragedy preyed on those left behind. His father went away to work in the iron mines near Banbury and Rowse’s work in the family shop extended to “the making-out of ration books and checking ration-tickets” towards the end of the war. The playing fields have been replaced by a series of buildings and further changes are imminent. In 1977 he was intrigued by textbooks that were, to him, lavishly illustrated but even at that late stage, pupils still had, as he had once, their own hymn books and, in his words, “a sweet little book in which to enter up your homework”. Since then education has altered enormously; what he would have made of computers and interactive whiteboards we will never know.
Rowse was given a rare opportunity when he won the scholarship that enabled him to move from Carclaze Elementary School to the County School and this came to mean far more to him than the half-crown his parents gave him as a reward. This was a time when working class parents longed to give such opportunities to their children but, because of financial pressures, and the near-absence of free provision beyond the elementary stage, few could do so. Since the Second World War, secondary education has become a right and facilities have expanded far beyond those afforded to the most privileged of youngsters in Rowse’s day. But here lies the rub: education, if anything, is more vital than ever before but is it valued by all now that it is freely available? On this, Rowse’s opinion was, as always, clear and trenchant but the reader will, no doubt, reach his, or her, own conclusion.
Poltair continues to provide a high quality of education, different, naturally, to that in Rowse’s day. Society has changed profoundly, as have education and, indeed, the school buildings; yet there are reminders, and survivals, of an earlier time: graceful buildings; an unrivalled view; even the screaming acrobatics of the swifts that visit us each summer, as they no doubt did in those distant days when A.L. Rowse attended the school; but, above all, generations continue to have their own Cornish childhoods here.