Writtle: 40 years reunion next year

[JP1]

Next year will be 40 years since I "graduated" from Writtle (HND Ag 82-85)

I'm trying to arrange a reunion so if anyone knows folks who finished in '85 please let me know

A few photos of JP1 with hair (one looks like Action Man hair !)

My Brother quipped earlier the group photo looks like the Bullingdon Club !

 

[Gone Shooting]

75-78 detainee here ! Heck we had some fun - simple college days with great people.

 

[JP1]

75-78 detainee here ! Heck we had some fun - simple college days with great people.

Detainee - like that . Better than peer group / cohort / alumni ........

 

[essexpete]

Did you ever work out the value of an old lorry?
I left ( with my then girlfriend and wife now of over 34 years) in 1983. We started with 42 on our HND course, there were similar numbers on OND ag and Com Hort. Our HND group have a reunion every year, somewhere in the country and will have 20 plus of the originals on a good year. I ( and I am sure I can speak for my wife) had a great time at college and continue to have a great time with the best friends one could wish for.
We have included a few old lecturers in the last few years, Liz and Steve Warr, Andy Notman and Tony Howard. Tony has recently not been well but with luck is on the mend. The older lecturers are more or less sadly departed now. My wife worked for a few years for Doc Wilson, after her retired from WAC.
Writtle, after several years of questionable management, has now been swallowed up by Anglia Ruskin Uni.

 

[tullah]

Doc Wilson’s lectures were recovery time from the night before.

 

[essexpete]

Doc Wilson’s lectures were recovery time from the night before.

He was difficult to follow at the best of times but was a kind gentleman, he wanted the best for everyone and encouraged my wife to go on and do a degree.

 

[tullah]

He was difficult to follow at the best of times but was a kind gentleman, he wanted the best for everyone and encouraged my wife to go on and do a degree.

Absolutely. Soil science was not a subject to inspire us but of course it was the basis for everything.

 

[uztrac]

I remember doing a specialist agricultural machinery course at Writtle in 1960/61.They had a dairy herd and we got involved in muck spreading with land wheel drive & pto variants.All part of the 2 year course in Ag at Colchester College.

 

[Kidds]

In one of the rare Wilson lectures that I was managing to follow he was telling us how soils naturally migrate downhill.
It depended on the soil type how they were effected by the slope and went on to give examples of various soil types and the degree of slope that allowed migration.
Someone frantically taking notes yet less able to follow asked if the degree was fahrenheit or centigrade.
Doc Wilson was baffled and it struck me that at that moment he was feeling exactly how we all did for the majority of his lectures.

 

[Barleymow]

Did the nca in 80/81 ,we went on a visit with Tony Howard, he got of the bus to go and see where we had to go. We all got of the bus and hid up , he wasn't happy whe he found us

 

[alomy75]

Did the nca in 80/81 ,we went on a visit with Tony Howard, he got of the bus to go and see where we had to go. We all got of the bus and hid up , he wasn't happy whe he found us

That name sounds so familiar. I left 2005 ish; he couldn’t still have been there then could he?

 

[Tim G]

That name sounds so familiar. I left 2005 ish; he couldn’t still have been there then could he?

Yes, Doc Howard lectured animal science. If you were caught yawning in his class you were sent to run a lap of the carpark to wake up!

 

[alomy75]

Yes, Doc Howard lectured animal science. If you were caught yawning in his class you were sent to run a lap of the carpark to wake up!

Doc Howard! That’s it! Yeah that does sound familiar

 

[Hilly]

You look really different with hair

 

[essexpete]

Did the nca in 80/81 ,we went on a visit with Tony Howard, he got of the bus to go and see where we had to go. We all got of the bus and hid up , he wasn't happy whe he found us

You must have been on the same course as Stewart Cooper and Pete Schwier? Tony H was one of the best lecturers we had.

 

[Barleymow]

Yes I was ,we were learning how to take a calf temperature Tony said what ever you do don't loose the thermometer, as he shook the mercury down and broke one as it hit his leg ,ever one burst out laughing. Think we had 23 in the back of a marina pickup

 

[JP1]

Yes, Doc Howard lectured animal science. If you were caught yawning in his class you were sent to run a lap of the carpark to wake up!

He didn't suffer fools gladly. Actually he reviewed my thesis and awarded me a distinction

 

[trebornella]

I remember doing a specialist agricultural machinery course at Writtle in 1960/61.They had a dairy herd and we got involved in muck spreading with land wheel drive & pto variants.All part of the 2 year course in Ag at Colchester College.

I did a similar course from 1974 to 77, one day a week (wednesdays) as part of an agricultural engineering apprenticeship. Spent the mornings at the workshops ( now known as Kings Lodge Campus according to google maps ), and the afternoons up Cow watering Lane with Martin ? Rowell. WAC DEMS. Never went to the main college buildings though.

 

[dickspanner]

Did he mention Capstan Full Strength cigarettes?

 

[Tim G]

He didn't suffer fools gladly. Actually he reviewed my thesis and awarded me a distinction

Certainly didn't suffer fools. There was a guy in our group called Gordon, can't remember his second name, but he was from Dorset and had the accent to go with it. He had a habit of blurting things out before thinking about what he was saying and I will always remember doc sighing in a very pained tone "Gordon...........your depriving a village of it's idiot!"