The Chimneys

By Heather Holmes

Have you noticed the school chimneys? Tall mock Tudor trios decorated with fleur-de-lis and foliage. Apparently the Tudor design symbolises the ideal of education administered as a form of charity.

To tell the truth I didn’t notice them on my first visit - as a teenager on a school trip in the 60s. It was the interior that made an impact.

A long, long room running the length of the upper floor, with tall benches jutting out from dark walls and high windows. Pencils and rulers, pens and ink. Students working on book jacket designs.

My idea of heaven – an art college. I should have studied art but I gave up art lessons for a free afternoon and became a teacher instead.

Many years later I found myself back in Heaton and got used to passing the school’s austere frontage. Then, with a baby and an excitable two year old, I was introduced to the playgroup, through an unmarked door round the corner.

The rather sinister entrance belied the wonderful opportunities inside. The playgroup was a life saver.

It was bright, lively, multicultural. While the children were occupied by the lovely warm Annie Moir, mothers swapped recipes, learnt Bangladeshi dances, chatted on the old sofa.

My children moved into the school and I joined other parents in the yard. Now I noticed the chimneys.

There had been many changes – no trace of the old art college, replaced by remodelled classrooms and lowered ceilings – but the chimneys stood like sentinels guarding the children below.

As a school governor I witnessed change of a different kind - Local Management of Schools where the school budget was transferred from the local authority to the governors – quite a responsibility and much scratching of heads.

Then there was the successful Hopping Mad for a Nursery campaign when everyone linked hands around the school.

Newly elected as chair of the governing body, and extremely nervous, I had to give the vote of thanks to the Lord Mayor at the opening ceremony. Not my finest hour!

Back to the chimneys. My son, Jack, played a chimney in the centenary celebrations. He narrated the story of the school dressed in a brown brick costume. Simon, dressed in a suit, danced the Charleston. Rob and Jill performed Vaudeville. Someone had provided a proscenium arch with velvet curtains so it looked like the real thing. It was just one of many amazing productions.

Ten years later we won a grant to build a new sports and arts centre, creating a new entrance on Chillingham Road. A group of us designed and made a bright mosaic sign, featuring the school logo, to go above the door.

There had been a competition to design a new logo and the old Chillingham bull had been replaced by – you’ve guessed it – the three chimneys – against a background of the rising sun.