Category Archives: school

About the new Zebra Crossing near Larkmead

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A new Zebra Crossing
A new Zebra Crossing has been installed at the top of Spring Road to help the morning migration of students going to Larkmead School, along Faringdon Road, and returnng home later in the day.
A new Zebra Crossing
Recently installed crossings on busier roads in Abingdon have been of the Pelican or Toucan variety, with traffic lights. The Zebra Crossing pre-dates such bird named crossings. The Belisha beacons either side are named after Leslie Hore-Belisha, the Minister of Transport, who introduced them in 1934 – according to Wikipedia.

Abingdon 450 Exhibition

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Abingdon 450 Exhibition
Michael St John Parker, Headmaster 1975 – 2001, gave a very interesting talk this evening about the exhibition at Abingdon Museum – Abingdon to Zanzibar – an A to Z of Abingdon School over 450 years. The talk was in the Roysse Room – the one time school room.

In the talk there was high praise for some ex headmasters such as Thomas Woods 1716-1753 during whose time a lot of the nobility sent their sons to Abingdon, when it became a top school in the country. There was less praise for another headmaster who started off with a good complement of pupils but ended up with just three, then did a similar act of decimation at his next school.

One ex pupil, Colonel Bringfield, became a national hero when he stopped a canon ball with his head – was decapitated, but saved Lord Marlborough whose horse he was holding on the battlefield. As a result Colonel Bringfield has a monument in Westminster Abbey. Another Old Abingdonian, called Ridley, helped stop the Slave Trade in Zanzibar.

The talk also gave a new angle on local historical figures like John Roysse and the Tesdales. I expect it will be printed in time so well worth reading.

The story of a community garden – Part 2

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community garden
Carswell School’s Reflective Sensory Garden is at last beginning to look more like a restful place, but it’s taken lots of hard work. Governors, staff, parents, neighbours and friends have spent many weekends laying out the beds and shifting hard-core, compost and soil.
community garden
They are hoping to be able to lay the paths before the winter sets in. There will be quite a lot to do with pegging down the weed membrane and then lifting, carrying and distributing the path aggregates, as well as compacting the self- binding gravel. If you’d like to help them, come along 9:30-12:30 on Saturday 10th December.