Ships Nostalgia banner

Marine Engineering Lecturers Remembered....

93K views 171 replies 97 participants last post by  sternchallis 
#1 ·
In the vein of other threads......Lets hear your anecdotes about your time in Phase I and III and the lecturering characters ......!!!!
Rgds.
Dave
 
#73 ·
Bill Dandy, must be him! It was an AWFUL wig, yes!

We loved Joe Kenny, he always had us laughing sometimes with him, sometime at him - got me through electro-tech with 96% and a distinction though!

I did waste some time interfereing with Nurses though, but married a farm girl!

Glug glug in the Kingsman!! Then later the Waldeck in Wavertree where our digs were.
 
#74 ·
Nice to see my good friend AndyP1 has appeared! I have refound a lot of people via SN. Yeah BD was larger than life. Who was the workshop lecturer with the Morris Minor? Joe Kenny was good at elctrotech, although I haven't a head for electrics and had to resit. I got high 90's too but was limited to a simple pass. Also, in mechanics we did not study hydraulics ("never comes up!"). Needless to say, the whole group had to resit. I often wonder what became of my account in the Midland Bank at the top of Mersey Road - I had a lucrative sideline selling Mexican handicrafts which I brought back from my leaves!
Rgds.
Dave
 
#75 ·
God knows how any of us passed a single thing in between the important things in life:
playing rugby
helping Dom Pisani with the fishing boat
even more rugby
watching "Apocalypse Now" at a certain cinema a la makko
extra rugby on sundays with chris white
chasing totty in the Cabin
Playing rugby
keeping the barman busy in the swan
legging it from the Royal Infirmary Nurses Home to get to lectures on time
keeping the local offy goinfg with purchases of draught rum & can of coke
Winding up Bill Dandy & makko in lectures
calling snoopy mcphereson in lectures and ducking when he turned his head
 
#76 ·
Recent discussions in the UK press about examiners giving "Hints" about exam paper content to teachers reminded me of an incident in a certain College of Nautical Studies on the banks of the river Clyde which I suppose should remain nameless. (Scribe)

The college ran two Phase III courses six months apart - so one had exams in June and the other lot had exams in December.

Late November a well intentioned mechanics lecturer sat the class down and in hushed tones suggested in great detail what topics should be revised and what topics could be safely forgotton about for the exam in a couple of weeks time.

Safe in the knowledge that the exam was now "in the bag" the students did what all students did when armed with such information, went on the piss and left all the revision until the night before.(Pint)(Pint)

Unfortunately when the exam paper was opened on the day of the exam the questions bore no resembelence to those crammed the night before.

Our dear friend the mechanics lecturer had "hinted at" the questions for the JUNE paper.:(
 
#77 ·
Pat Callaghan was the geordie "hard nut" reffered to, 2nd year workshops, Southampton and Warsash. Engineer's arms was his hang out, where we played together on the darts team.
Seddon was head of phase 1, when I returned for phase 3 he suspended me on day 1.

Ghost
 
#78 · (Edited)
Just found this thread and it's jogging a few distant memories.

I went to GCNS in Feb '74 when they had just finished building the workshop block. The deadline for completion must have been tight as one of lads leant against a door frame during the showaround and got wet paint all down the side of his coat! Some of the names that I remember were Willie Muir, Dougie Patterson (electro tech seemed to be one big Scotland versus England slanging match!), Mr Small and Mr Riddel.

This was at the time of the streaking craze and there had been a few instances in England but none north of the border. We managed to convince one of the lads to streak across the bridge over the Clyde and be the first streaker in Scotland. We agreed that if caught, we would all chip in and pay his fine. One of the lads drove alongside him and another took photos which we took to the Daily Record who printed them in the paper the next day. He didn't get caught, but wasn't the first as another guy had streaked elsewhere in Scotland a day earlier. It's a good job he didn't get caught as the fines imposed in Scotland were higher than in England and much more than we had anticipated!
 
#81 ·
..........This was at the time of the streaking craze and there had been a few instances in England but none north of the border. We managed to convince one of the lads to streak across the bridge over the Clyde and be the first streaker in Scotland. We agreed that if caught, we would all chip in and pay his fine. One of the lads drove alongside him and another took photos which we took to the Daily Record who printed them in the paper the next day. QUOTE]

Hi Dave

I was in Phase 1 (Eng) and watched this from the fourth floor windows - word had spread of the performance!
Rumour had it that he was only going to streak accross the bridge but the "support vehicle" was caught by the traffic lights and he had to carry on and do the full circle around the next bridge up and back to the college. (*))

John
 
#79 · (Edited)
A few more memories, this time from Phase 1 at Poplar Tech (1971-73).

The head of Marine Engineering was a Mr Girling, not that popular from what I recollect.

Our Thermodynamics lecturer was Mr Shephard, father of Gerry Shephard of the Glitter band. He used to start the Monday morning lesson talking about all the "weirdos" his son had brought home that weekend.

I think the Maths lecturer was a Mr Groves, blonde hair and bushy beard. One day he shaved the beard and had a haircut and looked completely different. He told us that he occassionally shaved / had a haircut and them would pickup ex-girlfirends, pretending to be his twin brother. He would then see if he could get the girls to tell him what they thought of his "brother". He seemed to have quite a dry sense of humour as well in class.
 
#84 ·
Memories of Poplar Tech



Hi Dave,

I remember Mr Girling as Department Head; he provided me with good references when I left before the end of Phase 3, which enabled me to progress onto an HNC course shoreside.

The other names that come to mind are Messrs Lomax (Heat); Mallia, a Maltese guy who rolled his 'r's (Electrics) and Rathbone (Workshop Tech). Can't recall the names of the mechanics lecturer who worked on the WW2 Stirling bomber or the guy who did General Studies and drove the Morris Traveller.
 
#88 ·
This is not exactly spot on the original post, but it is close.

There was a Senior Chief (E-8 paygrade) on my ship named John Gobbo. This guy scared the holy hell out of me and most other sailors on the ship. He had been in the Navy well over 20 years and had served in WWII when very young. He was almost cartoonish in his manner, his voice was like 10 miles of gravel road, the khaki uniforms he wore at sea were almost faded to white, and the brass fouled anchor chief's insignia on his cap was completely green from verdigris. His vocabulary was also one of the most colorful I had ever heard. I think percentage wise, any given sentence had more curse words than legitimate ones. The "F" word was close to being worn out by this man alone.

I did not witness this, because he was a Bo'sun, but it occurred while I was on board. He had assembled some of his men to give them a lecture about the proper use and maintenance of a watertight door. It was not a long lecture, probably only 3 or 4 minutes, but one of the guys counted how many times he said 'f**k' or a derivative thereof. If I remember correctly, it was in the 60's or 70's. He actually was a bit of a somewhat-known legend in the Navy.

In 2005 I had the opportunity to talk with him at a reunion. He was near 80 and not in real good health, but it was a great pleasure and honor to talk to him. I was very surprised to find that he in fact had a perfectly normal voice and mild demeanor, that whole 'Popeye' thing was an act...



Piccy of BMSC John G. Gobbo, USN
.
.
.
.
 
#89 · (Edited)
Back to Argyle Road, Southampton where I was a Blue Star Cadet during Phase 1, '71/'73 and Phase 3, '75/'76. I recall Alan Seddon as the Head guy with Bill (Knocker) Norris as his 2 I/C. I remember that he smoked utterly disgusting smelling cigars all the time! Val Parsons (again) and I don't think anyone has mentioned Keith Hazzard or Bob? Gibson. (Bangla) Daish (Can't recall his first name) and a bloke called Mercer down at the Heavy Workshop in St Mary Street. Smoked an absolutely Minging pipe! I met Alan Seddon again about '88 or '89 when his son came to Shetland to work for BP. Anybody else remember old "Mac" who was the storeman in the Heavy shop?
Also, What about Neil (Tonka) Toye? Liberal studies, whatever the H**l that was!
Happy Days!
Colin Hunter
 
#94 ·
George Louden from Airdrie, the Electrotech lecturer at GCNS told us a great story from a previous end of Phase 1 drinks do.
One inebriated cadet was sitting next to Sandy Smith and said "Sandy, you're a bastard, you're all right, but you're a bastard."
After an uncomfortable silence, and a sheepish look on his face, " I've just realised what I've just said. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have called you Sandy, Mr Smith".
Sandy was a diamond, and I hope this story was true.
 
#96 ·
At Shields in the Xtra's class was the Heat engines lecturer (Name escapes me a pleasant chap from Pamatra-In his early days: Then there was mechanics Morton? Hydrdrualics he went on to become the NE President of the Institute, and Electrics By-again memory deceives me. A great course and great men. Do not forget the Naval Arch Man who wrote and authored REEDS books 1 & 2 on Naval Arch. Names escape again but memories are sweet. It was a lot of hard work. for Part A & B. Dream on boy dream on, I am talking late 70's.
 
#99 ·
I did my Chiefs Steam endorsement in S. Shields in 69, before the exam word went around that some old Examiner was brought out of retirement for a few weeks, and that he was sure to ask about steam recips. in the orals, even if you had answered that question in the written paper which was optional by that time. Even though I had sailed on a Steam recip. job to be questioned about it was the last thing I wanted. I was staying in Westo Towers and someone had made a cardboard model of the reversing gear and link motion from the lid of a shoe box.Also staying there was an Indian Engineer who was studying for an Extras, He stayed up 'till nearly 1am with me, until I felt I could answer questions on "linking in and linking out". I have been greatfull to the entire Indian nation ever since.
Next day I am off to Newcastle to take my orals, of course there was'nt a mention of recip. jobs. The Examiner was Mr. James another Indian, I still remember walking on air when I came out, at least it felt like I was.
 
#100 ·
I did my Chiefs Steam endorsement in S. Shields in 69,....

You were a wise man to listen to the lecturers, as I was not.

The easiest certain (T5) question, we were told, would be on transmission lines. Involving hyperbolic trigonometry (mathematically one up on any navigator types in copy). Let us say that I could have SINH'd had I heeded the advice and done a little revision. As it was I didn't even read that question, fortunately scraping through.
 
#102 ·
James Watt College, Greenock, in the 50's. There was Mr MacEachern....a dry old stick, then there was Jimmy Rushton who got the attention of a class of teenage boys on the first day by telling them that there was a mathematical formula "the angle of dangle was equal to the heat in the meat". Naturally after that we paid attention to everything that he said.
 
#112 ·
Tutors

Had a great guy at Hull College of Technology. Dave Taylor, I think he was Head of Dept', Marine Engineering. He had his Combined Chiefs Cert at an early age. I was at night school at the college when Dave Taylor came into the class an anounced that President Kennedy had been assasinated, so I'll never forget that class.

Mike
 
#114 ·
Had a great guy at Hull College of Technology. Dave Taylor, I think he was Head of Dept', Marine Engineering. He had his Combined Chiefs Cert at an early age. I was at night school at the college when Dave Taylor came into the class an anounced that President Kennedy had been assasinated, so I'll never forget that class.

Mike
I have "An Introduction to Marine Engineering" by D. A. Taylor, MSc, BSc, CEng, MIMarE, MIRNA sat on my bookshelf here in my office. It was given to us along with buttons, braid, ruler, compass etc. upon commencing our Cadetship with Ocean Fleets (Jan '80)It is a good little book with clear explanations on many topics and good ilustrations!

Regards,
Dave
 
#118 · (Edited)
Poplar 1975-76 77-78

MEP lecturers Bill Munday (who looked and sounded like the actor that played Egg & Chips in the Dustbin men) and Peter Robinson. Bill did the best 3D sketches ever and regailed the class continually with stories.

Workshop practice Mr Heber-Hall

Naval Arch Mr Andrews (Julie)

Technical drawing - Mr Wesley Smith - Vietnamese and completely inscrutable

Applied Heat - John Satchwell
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top