Simon Langley 2.0

T’other day I decided to find out how deep the deepest well in the UK was. This is a very difficult task indeed!

I did find some information on a well which was sunk on Southampton Common which according to this document is 410m deep - bonkers.

Anyone know if this is true?!

Here you go! It’s called Fascination by Alphabeat

Just discovered an awesome new website. It is a very simple idea, brilliantly done. Basically you are allowed to add 5 feet* of books, movies and music to your shelf. Each item you add has a width associated with it, so you have plenty of space to play around with. Once you have added all your stuff you can receive custom recommendations based on what other users have read/added etc. There are also most popular lists, mini shelves for specific types of books and the best part is, from a usability perspective it is an absolute pleasure to use.

Take a look: www.5ftshelf.com.

* This is because (as the site will tell you) in 1909 Dr Eliot, then President of Harvard University, claimed a liberal education could be achieved by reading a collection of books that would total no more than 5ft in width. A local publisher challenged him to name them and he responded with what became known as the Harvard Classics.

Is there anyone in the whole world that likes IE6? I doubt it! Why? Because it is the most annoying piece of software in the whole world, especially from a web design perspective.

Tables behave very oddly in IE6, especially if you use align=left/right within the <table> tag. If you do choose to do this then be advised that text will wrap around the table like it would do on an image. This can be especially troublesome if you have various tables on top of each-other as they all sit side to side, which will completely destroy page layouts.

Moral of the story, don’t bother with align=left/right/centre, it’s more trouble than it’s worth, use CSS instead.

I have read various books from this particular genre, but this is the best one I have read thus far. If you like history and are not afraid of a bit of gore then you should definitely give it a go.

One striking aspect of the book is the brutality of the British justice system in times gone by. For example if you fell foul of royalty you’d be executed for treason by being hung drawn and quartered (dragged on a hurdle to the place of execution, hanged until almost dead, bowels and ‘privvy members’ removed and burnt whilst you are still alive, heart removed and body chopped into quarters, dipped in tar and displayed on gibbets). Bearing in mind you could meet this fate by simply writing something that offended the royal family, it’s no wonder lots of people met their end is this way. Rather curiously if a woman murdered her husband in the 1500s, she could be executed for treason as well.

Another fascinating aspect of the book is the superstitions and beliefs of the day. For example people who were executed (or so we are told) were more concerned with what happened to their body after death than dying. Being gibbeted (the whole or part of body of the executed being hung in chains on a road/river) was literally a fate worse than death. Another example of superstition of the day were the unlucky souls convicted as a highwayman, a crime that would almost certainly be punished with death. The executed felon would be buried at a crossroads where a stake was driven through their heart, in the belief that their spirit would take the wrong road…

Other parts of the book include chapters on the notorious prison Newgate, where felons had to pay to board, Tyburn where an estimated 100,000 people were executed over the years and The Tower of London which was rather gruesome to say the least.

Some other interesting aspects of the book include:

• The general public loved ‘good hanging’ and tens of thousands used to turn up to watch. Gory executions were most popular.
• Some felons were sentenced to a stint in the stocks or pillory. Depending on the nature of the crime committed and the popularity of the felon, the general public could stone the accused to death. ‘Willful murder by persons unknown’ was cited as the cause of death in these cases.
• Heretics (those practicing witchcraft etc) were burnt at the stake. Often if the wind was strong, instead of fanning the flames it would prolong the suffering by preventing the flames taking hold and blowing the noxious smoke away. It was known for people to take up to 2 hours to die if this situation arose, their causes of death being ‘loss of blood plasma’.
• Those felons who would not enter a plea in the 1600’s were often subjected to a form of torture that was frowned upon even then. Pressing involved the gradual application of successive weights to the accused until they either died or indeed entered their plea. Some persons were known to withstand weights of 400lbs before succumbing to the inevitable.
• Traitors and enemies of the state after their execution had their heads placed onto a stake and kept on London Bridge. There were so many heads there, a ‘Keeper of the Heads’ was required.
• After being mercilessly tortured, Guy Fawkes managed to jump from the gallows, breaking his neck and thus avoiding being hung, drawn and quartered. His fellow conspirators tried the same trick but the rope snapped and they were subjected to even more brutal deaths.
• After an execution, the family of the deceased would have to literally fight for the body which would often be claimed by surgeons’ agents who would do gruesome experiments/research on the corpse.

Enjoyed these gruesome facts? If so go and get the book!

Here is the scenario:
You are shipwrecked on a desert island, there is plenty of water but there are no animals living there that are large enough to eat. You are allowed an unlimited supply of one particular tin of food, the dilemma is which tin do you choose?

By the way the baked beans would be a stupid choice, I have only used the picture as an example…

This sort of thing does not happen very often, once a decade perhaps.

Very few events warrant a place on my blog but I think this one certainly does.

Michael Jackson is the biggest pop star the world has ever known and is probably one of the most famous people to have ever lived.

Once upon a time the only way to get your site spidered by search engines was to manually submit it to the Yahoo directory (come on, in 1997 what other search engines were worth using). Nowadays, search engines are a lot more advanced and don’t require any manual work. This is great, but sometimes search engines can be a little too good at finding things, sometimes things you don’t want finding.

Take the following example… I run a website www.openmeetings.co.uk which I host on a subdomain of this website. I have changed the name servers of the subdomain so http://subdomain.simonlangley.co.uk/index.php  will be shown as http://www.openmeetings.co.uk/index.php as long you access through the site through the latter URL.

Now, whilst this is a cheap way of hosting multiple websites, the one drawback is that there are two versions of every page, but with different URLs. Anyone who knows anything about SEO will tell you that this bbbbaaaadddddd news. Search engines will penalise pages that appear to be duplicated, the reason for this is probably because the content is not original, will be of less use to users and/or is more likely to be spam related.

Up until now (for the above scenario anyhow), it was almost impossible to prevent search engines spidering the subdomain. One way to prevent spidering was to ensure that under no circumstances were links to the subdomain are used. This is fine for static HTML pages, but the second you start using PHP or other server-side scripting, the chances are subdomain links creep in (even for a short time) and as such are spidered.

At the start of 2009 a new method of overcoming this problem was developed and is (apparently) supported by all the major search engines. The method uses a ‘canonical tag’ which sits in the head of you document. The canonical tag tells search engines what the actual page should be, so if (as per the scenario above) a search engine stumbles across a page that differs from the URL in the canonical tag, it will be ignored.

Of course there are lots of other reasons why duplicate content can arise (campaign/tracking codes etc), which I won’t go into here, but this method will work for these too.

To implement a canonical tag place the following code in the head of the page:

<link rel="canonical" href="http://www.mysite.co.uk/index.htm"/>

So there you are!

I’ve heard a rumour that search engines use the canonical tag 95% of the time (who comes up with these stats is beyond me), so it’s not quite watertight, but certainly better than ye olde days.

J.M. Hanson, J.S. Pinkney, D. Collinge, R.W. Wrathall, W.A. Baddiley, E.F. Venables, R.F. Davies, D.E.C. Coleman
W.D. McConnell, R.S. Stephens, K. Hall (captain), P.A. Kingston, H.F. Barker
G. Martyn, B.D. Mattock

A rather spooky looking photo of the Worksop College south front including the Chapel, taken summer 1936.

Click for larger version

The panelling of the Great Hall was obviously a big event, it gets three separate mentions!

• We are very grateful to Messers. Sisson and Parker, Nottingham, for the gift of a handsome volume: “The Jungle in Sunshine and Shadow” to the library.
• On March 17th whilst First Prep was in full swing, the electricity supply broke down, thereby plunging the School into gloom but lightening the hearts of the toilers, thus provided with a first-rate excuse for shortcomings on Monday. Strange shapes crept ghost-link along corridors and stairways, groping their way to dinner in a candle-lit Hall, whilst Mr Barker, resourceful as ever, converted his Sunbeam (if it is a Sunbeam) into a literal ray of light by parking it in the Cloisters and turning on the headlight. The engineers had the good taste to spin out the breakdown until all were in bed, one Prep, to the good.
• Our swimmers are hoping for warm weather next term, as they are eager to hurl themselves into the Swimming Bath, which is not nearly double its former size.
• The panelling of the Great Hall in now completed and has proved most successful, considerabley enhancing his appearance. During the holidays the walls are to be plastered in the old type of rough plaster, in a sort of parchment shade. It is hoped also to have the roof cleaned, treated with preservative and coloured to tone with the panelling.
• Whilst the panelling experts are here, we hope to have the woodwork of the Chapel also treated by them and the result should greatly improve the appearance of the Chapel.
• Now that the Great Hall has been panelled it is hoped to replace the existing furniture by something in keeping with its appearance and to install  a new High Table.
• The gymnasium has recently been provided with new apparatus and is efficiently equipped at all points.
• Congratulations to F. Martin on playing for Oxford University XV in two matches and to G. Laing on being picked for the army. Laing  was unfortunate in being off the rugger field towards the close of the season due to a damaged rib. Congratulations also to Venables and Stephens on being picked for the North vs South - Venables for the third year in succession.
• We need not have much fear for the future standard of the game when house matches produce such excellent performances as that which G. Martyn gave at scrum-half in the final house match between School House and Mountgarret. He certainly had a very large share in winning the cup for School House.

The following is a list of British athletics records as they stood in 1968:

100 yards
9.4 - Peter Radford (1959)
100 metres
10.2 - Menzies Campbell (1967)

220 yards
20.5 - Peter Radford (1960)

440 yards
45.9 - Robbie Brightwell (1962)

880 yards
1:47.0 - Chris Carter (1966)

1500 metres
3:39.1 - Alan Simpson (1964)

Mile
3:55.7 - Alan Simpson (1965)

3 miles
13:06.4 - Ian McCafferty (1967)

5000 metres
13:33.0 - Michael Wiggs (1965)

6 miles
27:23.8 - Bruce Tulloch (1966)

Marathon
2:13.45 - Alistair Wood (1966)

3000 metres steeplechase
8:32.4 - Maurice Herriot (1964)

120 yards hurdles
13.9 - Michael Parker (1963)

440 yards hurdles
50.4 - John Cooper (1964)

High jump
2.08 - Gordon Miller (1964)

Pole vault
4.80 - Mike Bull (1967)

Long jump
8.17 - Lynn Davies (1966)

Triple jump
16.46 - Fred Alsop (1964)

Shot
19.56 -Arthur Rowe (1961)

Discus
57.00 - Gerald Carr (1965)

Hammer
64.95 - Mike Ellis (1959)

Javelin
79.78 - John FitzSimons (1966)

Decathlon
7392 -Clive Longe (1967)

Fred Alsop was a triple jumper of some note and was the first modern British triple jumper to make an impact at world-level, and was the first Brit to jump over 16m (Perth, 1962). At the Tokyo Olympics in 1964 Alsop was leading the final with 16.46m (also a British record), but would eventually finish just outside the medals in 4th place. In 1965 he jumped a wind assisted 16.65m (+2.5) against Hungary, but never improved beyond his Tokyo mark despite success at the 1966 Commonwealth Games in Kingston (Jamaica). Also a decent long jumper (7.74m in 1964), Alsop won the AAA long jump title  on three occasions.

I run the Newark Half Marathon website for Newark AC and I recently decided to re-vamp it. The old site was looking quite tired and with the 2009 event quickly approaching I thought a new lick of paint was required.

I decided to use WordPress instead of a proper CMS as it is quite a small site.

Here is the updated site for the Newark Half Marathon.

Championship Manager was my favourite game back in the day and here are some top tips for anyone wishing to play it now (you can download it here).

• Use 1-4-5 formation, sounds crazy but it works, try it
• Paul Warhurst can play defence, midfield or attack right, left or centre - versatile or what!
• Jason Kaminsky (Nottingahm Forest), if you put him in the team and play him for a couple of seasons has the potential to be awesome
• Noel Whelan and Jamie Forrester work very well together
• Colin Cooper always ends up playing for England…

One of my favourite websites is the Waybackmachine - an Internet archive of websites dating back to 1996. It really is amazing how much some sites have changed. Here are some very good examples…

The BBC website in 1997

It seemed to be the fashion to use black backgrounds in 1997!

 The Coca Cola website in 1996

I have no idea what this is about…

 The McDonalds website in 1996

Ditto

 The Pepsi website in 1996

Prepare for an epileptic fit looking at this background, it is mental.

Taken from the Worksopian December 1933

The match of the season. Trent held an unbeaten record in all matches since 1931, when the fifteen has beaten them here and had not scored less than 30 points in any school match this year. The team, however, rose to the occasion in a remarkable fashion and all played  their best game. It was clear from the start that the Trent backs were fast and clever, A. Obolensky, on the right wing being particularly dangerous, but the School’s forwards were so energetic and the tackling so deadly that they were seldom allowed to get far. In the first few minutes the school pressed hard and J.B. Wentworth-Smith was nearly over. A. Obolensky ran well for Trent but was splendidly tackled by G.H. Stephens on two occasions and Worksop returned to the attack, when F.T. Hopkinson just missed with a drop goal and half-time came with no score. The school pack kept Trent penned in their 25 for the greater part of the second half and after W.R. Andrews had nearly scored, F.T. Hopkinson scored a good try far out. Trent made efforts but R.S. Rennie spear tackled A. Obolensky in great style and a strong run by G.H. Stephens put the school on the attack again. C.W. Walton had a good attempt at a drop but this ended the scoring although the school continued to press, the pace of the Trent backs and S. Harrision’s saving getting them out of some awkward situations.

Worksop College 3 - Trent College 0

Worksop College XV: R.S. Rennie, J.B. Wentworth-Smith, P.L. Bichard, K. Hall, G.H. Stephens, R.B. Green, C.W. Walton, K.R. Dixon, J.C.R. Venables, W.A.C. Johnson, W.R. Andrews, R.S. Stephens, T.F. Gaskall, J.J. Wood, F.T. Hopkinson.

Rugger retrospect - taken from the Worksopian December 1936

This has been a most successful season, one of the best for many years, in spite of several unfortunate injuries, which necessitated continual changes in the side and scarcely allowed the XV to settle down at all. Actually, we have only had our full team out in one match during the whole season, but in spite of that we have up to date won nine out of twelve games against strong opposition, two of our really outstanding victories being to defeat Waterloo A at home and Wrekin away, with only 14 men on each occasion; while in our recent match with Denstone, when we lost a man again in the first ten minutes and with 14 were extremely unlucky to lose by a margin of two tries to a goal and a penalty goal, is still in everybody’s mind as a fine display by the team, which unfortunately did not get its reward, moral victory though it may have been.

Our success has been based on a fine pack of forwards, intelligent and hard working, admirably led by P.A. Kingston; outstanding amongst them have been H.F. Barker, J.C.B. Teale, R.D. Maddock and D. Collinge, but is is really unfair to make comparisons in such a fine eight. An unfortunate accident deprived us of D. Coleman for nine matches altogether, and his thrust and leadership in the backs has been difficult to replace, but P.E.F. Rhodes and J.S. Pinkney have always been dangerous in attack and R.I. Knox has been consistently good at scrum-half. Our other casualty, L.A. Stredwick, on the right wing, has also been off for nine matches and without him we lacked a little essential pace on the wings.

With a full side out, the backs have played excellent football and some of their tries obtained by fast passing and quick backing have been really good. The defence too has been good throughout, R.F. Davies being very sound at back, and tackling and the covering very satisfactory. At Epson, we were unfortunate to lose H.F. Barker early in the game and this, combined with the cleverness of the Epson stand-off, made our defence look worse than it really was. With most of our three-quarters returning and a number of promising forwards coming on, the prospects for next season are more than bright.

Results

F.N. Baird, D.N. Youens
R.F. Davies, R. Grain, R.D. Mattock, C.S. Harden Esq, D Collinge, D.J. Hunting, P.J. Hill.
J.B.C. Teale, D.E.C. Coleman, P.A. Kingston (Capt), H.F. Barker, P.E.F. Rhodes.
J.S. Pinkney, R.I. Knox.

I think the following article about a mummified cat found in the wall of a Devon house is very interesting. If was the owner of the house I would leave the cat where it is.

I wonder why people thought cats could fend off evil spirits, weird!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/8011361.stm

Some of my personal favourites

Bill Stickers Will Be Prosecuted - Bill Stickers is innocent!

Jesus wepped
At the advertising agency which lost the Schwepps account

I thought clap was a form of applause until I discovered Smirnoff

The grave of Karl Marx is just another communist plot
Charing Cross Road

God is dead - Nietszche
Nietszche is dead - God
Friedrich Nietzsche was a nineteenth-century German philosopher who wrote critical texts on morality and religion

Don’t let them cut hire education
Camberwell School, 1977

One would think to read all this wit,
That Shakespeare came here to shit

An excellent quaffer called Rafferty,
Went into a gentlemen’s lafferty,
The walls caught his sight,
Quoth he: ‘Newton was right,
I am now the centre of Grafferty!’

A road sign in Lincolnshire:
TO MAVIS ENDERBY AND OLD BOLINGBROKE
To which someone added:
The gift of a son

Kentucky Freud Chicken - Mother-fucking good
Camden

On a Norfolk village poster advertising a talk on ‘What to do if you are going bald’
Someone has added:
Prepare to meet thy dome

Cricket retrospect - taken from the Worksopian July 1936
Undoubtedly the outstanding feature of the season has been the weather; never has the rain been so persistent, and we have unfortunately had many matches scratched as a result. Starting with only one colour from last year, it was natural to expect the XI to show inexperience in their opening matches, and throughout the season the batting has been uneven - at times good, at other times definitely uncertain; too many of the side play slightly across the line of flight and this invariably leads to disaster. Some of the performances have been excellent, however notably against M.C.C., Sheffield Collegiate and the Craven Gentlemen - and there is no reason to suppose that with approximately seven of the XI again available next year the batting should not be as consistent and sound throughout the sides it has been spasmodically good this season. For P.N. Harvey, W.P.J. Walker, D.E.C. Coleman, W.D. McConnell, K. Hall and captain, G. Martyn have all played excellent innings at times.

The bowling, while lacking in variety, has proved very steady - the brunt of the attack having fallen on G. Martyn, P.E.F. Rhodes and F.E. Warburton, who have all done well, as at the moment each has taken 23 wickets at a cost of just over 12 runs a-piece. They have been fortunate in having the assistance of the best fielding seen for many years at the School. The standard in all the matches has been exceptionally high and has done much to make up for deficiencies elsewhere.

J.B.C. Teale, W.S.P. Ward, K. Farnes Esq., K. Hall, W.D. McConnell
P.E.F. Rhodes, D.E.C. Coleman, G. Martyn (captain), P.N. Harvey, F.E. Warburton
W.J.P. Walker, J.G. Dudley

Interestingly at the 1936 College Sports, K. Hall broke the College cricket ball throwing record with 105yds 1ft 9in (96.32m) - which I personally think is rather impressive. I would not mind betting that no Worksop College student has thrown as far since.

Has anyone else noticed it is really difficult to find shops in London that sell discus and hammer shoes?

I have found a rather good shop in North London called Milett Sports that stocks quite a few varieties. They also do javelin spikes, track spikes and running shoes. Well worth a visit!

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Here are some pictures of some graffiti in Newark, Nottinghamshire. The pictures were taken a few years back off Lincoln Road.

I am currently building a mobile optimised (optimized if you are from the US…) site and thought I would share a few tips and tricks I have learnt along the way. There are not a great deal of sites that deal with mobile optimised page building, so here are my tips:

• Never use tables for layouts!
• Try and keep you coding as simple as possible, avoid inline style, JavaScript and server side scripting where possible.
• Don’t use background images - nearly all mobile browsers will not display them.
• If you want to use rounded corners for boxes then I would strongly advise using Alessandro Fulciniti’s Nifty Corners technique (which is brilliant) - this is supported on the vast majority of mobile browsers I have tested.
• Don’t set a width on your page elements - especially the page wrapper. If you do then the mobile browsers make a real hash of the content. If your pages appear too wide in the browser (this often happens on the Blackberry browser) add the following meta data to the <head> tag:

  <meta name=“viewport” content=“width=320″ />
  
  <meta name=“viewport” content=“initial-scale=1.0″ />
  
  <meta name=“viewport” content=“user-scalable=false” />

• For some reason mobile browsers really don’t like divs that are floated left, try and avoid this if you can, however floating lists seems to work
• Try and wrap text around images, mobile browsers tend to interpret this quite well
• Bulleted lists often get the style stripped out, so if you use list-style-image to set your bullet image don’t be surprised if it does not work. One solution for this is to set the list style to none and insert the image before the text. This way even if the bulleted list is displayed (which on quite a few browsers it will be) at least the image is displayed as well
• Make sure you test your pages on various devices, browser combinations, not just on an iPhone!

Download Microsoft Photo Editor here

Now I am not a fan of Microsoft at all, however Microsoft Photo Editor has one really useful function that I have yet to find in another program.

Basically it allows you to select a colour (or colours within a set tolerance) to be made transparent within an image. This is really useful and a really quick way of getting rid of a solid background colour. Of course this is not very useful when you have a background colour that is of varied colours - but never the less useful all the same.

To do this, select the transparent colour picker:

Select the tolerance:

And what do you know, the area you selected (or at least the area you selected within the tolerance) is now transparent.

Can this be done in Photoshop? If so I’d love to know how!!

A very random, but very useful tip I read today. If you want to know whether an egg has gone off (or not), drop it in a cup of water, if it floats it is off. This is because as an egg goes off, gas is produced thus making it more buoyant.

A tip to save money in the credit crunch!

Another unbeaten rugby season was achieved in 1942/1943, although the points scoring was not as prolific as the previous season, some excellent victories were achieved. The drawn match at Sedbergh included a try by Nim Hall, the only try Sedbergh conceded that season.

Photographs of rugby teams actually playing rugby in times gone by are extremely hard to come by, especially during the war years. Dr C.H. Ewart a member the 1941/1942 and 1942/1943 XVs (both unbeaten) has been kind enough to lend me his collection of information relating to this time. The photographs below are contained within The Illustrated Sproting and Dramatic News, November 26 1941.

Please note that the photos below are quite large and as such may take time to download if you have a slow connection.

P. Carmichael swerves to score one of his many tries for the College XV
C.H. Ewart hands off an opponent on his way to scoring a try
H.D. Jennison (in the scrum cap) leads a charge with T.A.S Anderson
N.M. (Nim) Hall kicks a penalty as the rest of the team look on
J.M. Taylor (scrum half) gets the ball away to N.M. Hall

It took me a while to find this re-mixed version of the Don Thomas classic, so here you are, great song!

Further to my article on the Worksop College rugby team of 1941 the following may also be of interest. The 8 results below are the only ones that can be found, the remaining 6 (probable opponents would have been C.S. Harden’s XV, Old Worksopians, Rosslyn Park Colts, Waterloo ‘A’, Blackheath ‘A’, Wrekin College) are unknown…

Rest of England team versus the Home Counties
M.G. Locket (Downside), R.D.N.Fabricius (Solihull), L.F.L. Oakley (Bedford), J. Carmichael (Worksop College), P. Parker (Bedford), S.T. Thoebold (Haileybury), A. Fairbairn (Haileybury), A.C.W. Abrahams (Bedford), A.G. McCullum (Imperial Service College), G. Lamb (Clifton), J.H. Hartridge (Oundle), H.D. Jennison (Worksop College), M.J. Sussey (Rugby), J.P. Sawtell (Radley), T.A.S. Anderson (Worksop College)

The Rest won the match 34-11 with Carmichael scoring 3 tries and Anderson converting 3.

By the end of the season the Worksop College XV had played 14 matches and won 14. The team had scored a total of 403 points, and conceded only 13 (not 389 & 12 as was widely reported). N.M. Hall the stand-off half (fly half) had scored 129 points. Bedford School were also unbeaten winning 12 games, scoring 354 points and conceding 26.

Back row (left to right) - R.V. Thompson, E.R. Holliday, J.M. Taylor, T.B.Greenwood, C.H. Ewart, W.G. Briggs
Middle row (left to right) - P.J. Walker, E. Hall, C.S. Harden Esq, G.S. Joss, D.F. Bachelor
Front row left to right) - P. Carmichael, T.A.S. Anderson, H.D. Jennison (Captain), N.M. Hall, J.B. Millar

Cuthbert’s College was the original name for Worksop College and Crown was the former name of Talbot House, just in case you were interested…

Click on image for larger version

The 1937 Worksop College athletics sports were pretty unique, mainly due to the fact that J.S. Pinkney (Shirley 1934-1938) equalled or broke College records in the three sprints. It is worth bearing in mind that this was 1937 and that Pinkney’s times of 10.2s, 23s and 53.8s for the 100y, 220y and 440y (11.1, 22.9s, 53.5 for the metric equivalents) were quite exceptional. Rather ironically Pinkney’s strongest event was the long jump, the one event he did not break a record at the sports. Pinkney had however jumped 21ft 3in (6.45m) earlier in the season, this record lasted until 1980 and even now has only been bettered by 35cm (D. Dykes 6.80m, 2008)

Pinkney, P.E. Rhodes (1934-1939) and A.L. Evans (Shirley 1934-1940) were all excellent sportsmen. Pinkney and Evans both went on to gain international rugby caps, the former also played for The Rest at cricket and gained Cambridge Blues at Cricket and rugby.

100 yards
1 - J.S. Pinkney, 2 - P.E. Rhodes, 3 - P.L.S. Griffiths
10.2s - equals schools record

220 yards
1 - J.S. Pinkney, 2 - P.E. Rhodes, 3 - L.A. Stredwick
23.0s - new school record

440 yards
1 - J.S. Pinkney, 2 - A.R. Hill, 3 - A.M. Harvey
53.8s - new school record

880 yards
1 - C.C. Rees, 2 - J.R.M. Tomkins, 3 - H.H. Monks
2m 09.8s

Mile
1 - J.R.M. Tomkins, 2 - C.C. Rees, 3 - P.K. Harrison
4m 52.9s

120 yards hurdles
1 - A. Stredwick, 2 - D.C.C. Wakefield, 3 - D.D. Forbes
16.0s (new school record)

Long jump
1 - J.S. Pinkney, 2 - A.L. Evans, 3 - J.S. Ingham
20ft 6in

High jump
1 - E.R. Bangor-Jones, 2 - G.P. Carmichael, 3 - P.E. Rhodes
5ft 3in

Cricket ball throw
1 - J.B.C. Teale, 2 - G.J. Cripps, 3 - P.E. Rhodes
97y 2in

Mile relay (1 x 440 yards, 4 x 220 yards, 1 x 440 yards)
1 - School House, 2 - Shirley
3m 30.2s

Senior victor ludorem
J.S. Pinkney (Shirley)

Sports flag
Shirley

Worksop College has produced a whole host of top class cricketers over the last 114 years of its existence. I reckon the team below would surely be unbeatable!

S.R. Patel (Talbot 1998-2003) - Nottinghamshire, England
A Parkin-Coates (Mason 1998-2001) - Nottinghamshire, England Schools
P.J. Sharpe (Shirley 1950-1955) - Yorkshire, England
T. Ullyott (Portland 2002-2007) - England Schools
S. Corlett (Portland 1963-1968) - Oxford University, Ireland
A.J. Good (Portland 1966-1971) - Lancashire
R. Wilkinson (Talbot 1993-1996) - Yorkshire, England Schools
A.L. Evans (Shirley 1934-1940) - Cambridge University, England
H. Watson-Smith (Mountgarret 1899-1901) - Warwickshire
R.A. Kettleborough (Portland 1986-1990) - Yorkshire and Middlesex

During the summer I tend to compete in a lot of open meetings. The reason for this is that I compete for Newark AC in a few league meetings but as I live in London I can’t do them all. Open meetings are perfect for a bit of competition practice and of for setting PBs without the pressure of competing in 800 other league events.

The problem with open meetings is that they are notoriously difficult to locate. Searching online does not return a great deal of results. The majority of athletes find about open meetings through word of mouth.

As a result, I decided to setup a new website (openmeetings.co.uk) that simply lists open meetings by date and/or region.  The site is free to use for athletes and clubs.

Check it out - www.openmeetings.co.uk

Boxing was a popular sport at English public schools until the early 1970s when it was outlawed due to its rather barbaric nature. Boxing gloves in those days were filled with horse hair and no doubt a great deal of nasty injuries were inflicted.

The photograph below shows the Worksop College boxing team that competed at England Public Schools Championships that were held in Aldershot in 1911. J.W.F. McNaught-Davis (Mason/Cross 1904-1912) gained the College’s first Blue in 1913 when representing Cambridge.

Left to right - G.F.G. Rees (Mason/Cross & Pelham/Fluer de Leys 1905-1913), J.W.F. McNaught-Davis (Mason/Cross 1904-1912, C.L.J Rees (Pelham/Fluer de Leys 1905-1911).

Worksop College beat Worksop RUFC 16-12 on the school field here today in a cheerfully excellent match of carefree open Rugby Union football. The match was to ce1ebrate the school’s diamond jubilee, and the two teams were strengthened by international, university and county players. The school side Included eight such players among them J. Butterfield, who is on the staff.

What was of special interest in the match was the way in which the school and club players combined with their more august colleagues. Here the school did particularly well, but not only did the boys respond superbly to their seniors’ promptings but those promptings themselves could hardly have been less selfish or more helpful. The club side’s guest players tried just as hard and except at stand-off half were only slightly less effective. They were, however, not nearly so efficiently supported. The difference proved crucial.

If the seven boys who played in this match, indeed, were fair samples of the first fifteen, then the Worksop school side must be a good one, one boy however played with distinction. He was Grieve, the school stand-off half. He has excellent hands which so sensibly, and alone of the 30 players he kept warm and dry from the misty drizzle with mittens. He passed well with the proper, contrary body swerve which enabled turn to draw first-class players early. He had an eye like a hawk for an opening, a quick cut or swerve to go through it. He was a splendid and surprisingly shrewd and tactical kicker, had command of most of the variations, and was as alert in cover as in support.

Grieve timed his passes to King and Butterfield beautifully, performed a flicked reverse pass scissors with King as if 1he had played with him all his life, flicked two unexpected inside passes to his win forward with the coolness of a veteran, and parried rushes from the line-out without a trace of flurry. He made a clear-cut opening for King’s try and scored the school’s last deciding try himself by racing outside Emmens, who had cut inside powerfully after a short, quickly taken line-out and had the width to pass out again. Grieve, indeed, was delightful to watch and played Winn, his opposite, out of the game.

As if Grieve were not enough the school has a remarkably thrustful fast wing forward. For all his short stocky stature and mere 16 years in Emmens. He sticks at nothing and expects to score from every outside edge. And score the plucky boy did. He beat his man and shook off the full-back after Butterfield had given him his first edge, and when Butterfield next swerved wide to the left, Emmens whipped behind and inside him and scored without a hand being laid upon him.

Finally in attack the school had in Metcalfe a reserve scrum half who made one wonder how good the regular one is. Metcalfe has only a short pass, but it is extremely quick and accurate. Forward the school had two particularly solid hardworking locks, whose backs were straight in the tight and who must in all conscience have shoved hard and well only because Thomson for the most part leaned and neither Sumrie nor Mitchell overworked themselves. Nazir’s quality was that he survived in the front row in the company of Mullen, Porisse, Berridge, Labuschagne and Jacobs. And survive firmly to the end he did. At fullback, Kidd tackled bravely and kicked fairly well. He has a deal yet to learn about positioning and above all must learn to go down on the ball.
Two things were clear from the start - both sides first aim was to play open, fast, attractive football and none of the visitors had the slightest intention of injuring each other or any of the boys. The game thus lacked only in controlled ruthlessness. The opportunities for clever combined running were the greater and the school side provided it generously. That the club side by comparison failed to do so was because Winn had a nightmare match at stand-off half. He ballooned passes over his centres’ shoulders and into their faces, hurled the ball impossibly at their feet and once, indeed, achieved a leg break. Hosen and Hopper thus had limited chances. Neither gassed consistently well in any event and when they did too often a wing or last man dropped the ball. Thus, while each of the school’s four tries, two of which King converted came from consciously designed and cleverly executed movements only two of the  club’s tries were similarly ordered.

Worksop College XV
J.M. Kidd (Worksop College), M.H. Holliday (Bradford), L King (Harrogate), J. Butterfield (Northampton), N.J. Emmens (Worksop College), A.T.W. Grieve (Worksop College), D.M. Metcalfe (Worksop College), R. Nazir (Worksop College), K Mullen (Derby), R. Porisse (Sale),  J.P Richardson (Worksop College), D.R. Wilson (Worksop College), G. Mitchell (Wilmslow), R.V. Thompson (Sale), R.M. Sumrie (Headingly)

Worksop RUFC XV
D.J. Turner, H Heaketh, R Howell (Loughborough College), D.J. Hopper (Harrogate), R. Gibson, R.R. Winn (Northampton), R.W. Adams, M. Berridge (Northampton), N.A. Labusechagne (King’s Hospital), C.R. Jacobs (Northampton), M.W. Horrocks, I.J. Salway, V. Bowles, E. Warner (Nottingham), M. Barross

Referee: C.R.W. Francis

Back row - Bagley, Lewis, Davies, Woodward, Adkins, Holmes, Butterfield
Middle row - Evans, Wilkins, Hall (capt), Kendall-Carpenter, White, Stirling
Front row  - Shuttleworth, Regan

During the early years of Cuthberts college the main games were association football, cricket and cross country runs, the latter was also enjoyed (really?!) by members of the teaching staff. After the building of the outdoor swimming pool in the late 1890s swimming was partaken, as was fives. Soccer matches were enjoyed against local teams in these early years and as with cricket, the inclusion of staff bolstered their ranks. Staff of particular note at this time were the Rev F.B. Hawkins, the Rev C. de Labat and Mr T. Hedworth - all excellent cricketers and soccer players who traveled to Mansfield in their spare time to partake in Rugby, a game that would not find its way to Worksop for another 25 years. With regards to pupils at this time R.H. Palmer (Fleur de Leys 1895-1899) was the main exponent, he was head boy twice in the late 1800’s, and was “a stalwart full back” and a useful member of the cricket team. Palmer also set the first school 100yds record of 10.4. R.V. Patrick (Crown 1899-1906), who was captain of the College football XI for three years, is described as “one of the best soccer players the school has ever turned out”.

As the years passed the College became stronger and better opposition was sought. Mount St Mary’s, Trent College and Denstone began to figure as rivals. In 1911 a cross-country match against KES Sheffield was organised and in the same year boxing was first mentioned. With regard to the latter, in 1913 the college had its first Blue in the form of J.W.F. McN Davis (Cross 1904-1912) gaining his for Cambridge in 1913 and in 1914 W.J. Armstrong (Mason 1911-1914) won the bantam weight title at the Public Schools Competition held at Aldershot. In 1912 J. Tasker (Cross 1899-1904) was playing first class Cricket for Yorkshire and H. Watson-Smith (Lion 1899-1901) was keeping wicket for Warwickshire.

Worksop College is most fortunate in that over the last 100 years or so athletics performances have been recorded very diligently. As a result, not only are athletics records available, but also previous records.

W.B. Thompson (Mountgarret 1949-1954) was the first National calibre athlete from Worksop, he won the College’s first National title (over 200 yards low hurdles in 1954), closely followed by P.R. Brunyee (Talbot 1952-1956) winning two All England Schools titles in 1955 and 1956 both over the high hurdles. In 1975 M.P. Hay (Mountgarret 1968-1973) became the College’s first full international when he represented GB at the decathlon. The Buckner brothers still remain the College’s only Olympians, Jack represented GB at Seoul and Barcelona over 5000m and Tom at the 3000m steeplechase in Barcelona. Other internationals include S.D. Heggie (Portland 1989-1994), S.T. Lewis (Shirley 1988-1993) and B.Foster (Portland 1970-1975). Most recently M.Lambley (Shirley) has become a real force to be reckoned with on the British hammer throwing scene - his 2009 best of 68.98m was good enough to ensure selection for the European Under 23 Championships.

1993 is certainly a stand-out year. A school athletics team that can boast a B-string 100m/200m runner at 10.70/21.95 is quite mind boggling, Mr Alex Simpson is very unfortunate not to hold a College records in the 100m/200m/long jump! Some other names that warrant a mention:

• P.S. Southcott’s 1948 100y time of 10s that was never bettered until we went metric in 1973.
• J.S. Pinkney whom set 3 x College records at the 1937 Sports (10.2 - 100y, 23 - 220y & 53.8 - 440y), his long jump record (set earlier in the season) lasted until 1980. Pinkney also played rugby for England and was regarded as one of England’s best schoolboy centres/wings of the late 30s.
• J.D. Bray - won the England Public Schools 100m/long jump (10.88/6.70) in 1986 and only recently lost his long jump record to D. Dykes (6.80)
• J.K. Gibson - half an inch off 6ft for the high jump in 1961 when in the lower VIth. Was also close to Pinkney’s long jump record (“and what a good record that is”).
• M.R. Woodcock, D.M.W. Griffiths, D.J. Reason - from the highly successful athletics teams of the late 50s and early 60s. All members of the Rosslyn Park sevens team that finished runners-up to Edinburgh Academy in 1960. Woodcock ran 50.30/1:56 for the 440y/880y, Griffiths 4:23/1:58 for the mile/880y and Reason 22.6 for the 220y. The latter played England Public Schools rugby.
• R.E. Randle - sadly killed in a road accident in the early 60s, Randle at the same match in 1963 missed the 100y and 220y records by a tenth each (10.1/22.7). Also held the College decathlon record pre-metric. Played England Public Schools rugby.

1941 and 1942 produced two more phenomenal rugby teams at the College - both which remained unbeaten. The latter was voted the best schoolboy team in England (an honour shared with Bedford School). The 1941 XV, captained by H.D. Jennison scored a whopping 389 points against only 12 and was noted for its back division of N.M. Hall (Shirley 1936-1943), J.B. Millar (Mason 1937-1942), P. Carmichael (Pelham 1937-1941) and E.R. Holliday (Talbot 1936-1943). During the course of the season Trent and Mount St Mary’s were heavily defeated; Ampleforth 6-3, Denstone 17-3, St Peters York 28-0 and most impressively the mighty Sedbergh were walloped 30-0. Tragically Jennison, T.A.S. Anderson (Pelham 1934-1942) and Millar died in 1944 in Normandy at the battle of Falaise Gap, where they were all tank commanders. On a happier note Hall who captained the 1942 XV, who was first mentioned in a trial game for Prep in 1936 went on captain England 17 times and is still regarded as being one of the finest kickers of a ball the game has ever seen.

Worksop’s runaway victory (taken from The Guardian 1941)
‘Worksop College overwhelmed Mount St Mary’s College at home and won as they pleased by nine goals, one penalty goal and five tries to nothing. P. Carmichael, E.P. Clark and J.B. Millar combined outstandingly well for Worksop, and were well fed by N.M. Hall who also converted the five tries and kicked the penalty goal. Forward H.D. Jennison was outstanding, while G.S. Joss and J.W. Phillips also played very well in a good pack. Worksop are developing into a strong, fast and battling side.’

Back row (left to right) - R.V. Thompson, E.R. Holliday, J.M. Taylor, T.B.Greenwood, C.H. Ewart, W.G. Briggs
Middle row (left to right) - P.J. Walker, E. Hall, C.S. Harden Esq, G.S. Joss, D.F. Bachelor
Front row left to right) - P. Carmichael, T.A.S. Anderson, H.D. Jennison (Captain), N.M. Hall, J.B. Millar

- R.V. Thompson - Represented England in 1947 at Twikenham.
- H.D. Jennison - Played for the English Public Schools team in 1941. Had he not been killed in WWII, would have probably gone on to play for England.
- N.M. Hall went on to captain England a then record 17 times.

Bull Sand Fort (or the Northern Fort as it was known for security purposes during its construction) is the largest of the two forts in the Humber Estuary, visible from the Cleethorpes shoreline. It was in 1914 that plans for the two forts were finalised. Bull Sand Fort was to be located on sand banks 4200 yards south-west of Spern Head lighthouse with deep water channels three quaters of a mile either side. The contract for the building of the Bull Sand Fort was awarded to C.J. Willis & Son of London who had submitted their proposals in April 1915. More to follow…