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1987 REUNION – 25th ANNIVERSARY By James Michel (BH ’87) In 1982, I arrived at Cheltenham College with my parents in nervous anticipation of starting at a new school with new classmates. Thirty years later I found myself returning with the anticipation of meeting them again. Only a few weeks previously, a late invite to the 1987 leavers’ reunion arrived in my inbox. Should I stay or should I go? Hmm… I love parties, but I’ve probably got nothing particularly interesting to talk about. I’m not famous. I’m not particularly successful. I don’t own a large multi-national company and I’m certainly not a millionaire. I doubt that I could even afford to send any one of my three kids to a boarding school in Britain, let alone to The College. I’m living in Germany these days, so it’s a hell of a long way to travel for a party. Perhaps it would be easier just to say no and forget about it... I wonder who will be going. It would be nice to see them. I could always pretend that I’m the President of the Seychelles. At least he’s got the same name as me if anyone tried to “google” me. No, I should go as myself without any pretense. Besides I’m happy – that’s contented, and not demented, I’ve got a loving family and I’ve had quite a remarkable and varied life since leaving College. Not all success stories, but then again success stories never made people split their sides with laughter. I’m going! Quick, book the flights! On Saturday 13th October, at about 6 o’clock, I arrived at Cheltenham in the pouring rain. It had been a long time since I was last here. Within the next hour, I was checked into my hotel, teamed up with my old friend Richard Trevithick (BH) and suited in my dinner jacket. Richard had agreed to meet up with some of the Newick crowd, so we marched up to The Beehive – a pub much loved for the fact that probably every boy who was ever at The College had sneaked in (underage) and ordered a pint of beer. Astonishingly, word had got out and there was already quite a sizeable crowd of OCs gathered there. And what a delight. After half an hour of whetting the whistle and trying my hardest to remember everyone’s name, we left the pub in a large group and made our way diagonally across the College Lawn towards the College Library where the champagne reception awaited us. The library interior had changed considerably. Gone were the shelves of dusty journals that nobody ever seemed to read. Gone was that depressing green decor, which always gave that impression of an old gentlemen’s smoking club in London. In its place now was a more inviting blend of white, grey and beige.
Welcoming us through the door was none other than Malcolm Sloan (a.k.a. “Paddy” and former Housemaster of Christowe) with his wife Cathy. And what a warm welcome it was. So many faces that had faded over time, suddenly re-ignited in my memory. We were no longer the gallant young princes who had left the College back in 1987, but now the stately dukes, slightly stockier and portlier. Those 80’s quiffs had receded back, which made some of us – dare I say it – “slapheads”, but in most cases projected an air of prestige and worldliness. However, there were a few people who really appeared not to have aged at all and had somehow preserved their youthful looks, but I’m delighted to say they were a small minority. I should point out that I was referring to the gentlemen OCs and not the ladies. It has to be said that the Chandos crowd looked stunning! It was hard to believe that any of them could have been in the same year. In total there were 46 OCs present and quite a few came with wives and husbands. There was also a good turn-out of our former masters and their wives. Present were Richard and Margaret Morgan, David and Jenny Levin, Robin and Angela BadhamThornhill, Charles and Julie Wright, Robin and Gillian Proctor, Trevor Davies, Malcolm Mennie, Gerry Smith and Tim Pearce. While sipping our champagne, we listened to the words of the present headmaster, Dr Alex Peterken, as he took us down memory lane by reminding us of several humorous and thought-provoking facts, which he had dug out from the College Archives. His welldelivered speech was then followed by “our” Headmaster’s speech. When it came to giving speeches, Richard Morgan was without any doubt the master: without raising or straining his voice he could address a crowd of 600 rowdy individuals and hold their complete attention for well over 5 minutes. I was pleased to see that nothing had changed since 1987. While he told us some wonderful anecdotes, I was momentarily transported back in time to 1984 when I remember him addressing us with his wonderful dulcet tones during a College assembly in Big Classical. I snapped out of it in time to raise my glass for a toast to the wives, who had braved to come along with their OC husbands. Then it was time to make our way to the College Dining Room. It hadn’t changed much, except for the food. A delicious three-course-meal (did school dinners really ever taste that good?) was followed by a second round of speeches, wonderfully compèred by Malcolm Sloan, and we took a moment of silence while we
remembered three individuals from our year who had passed away. Daniel Bingham (L), in his speech as former Head Boy, made a toast to the masters to show appreciation to them for their valuable contribution in our lives that was above and beyond school education. Finally we were blessed with a hilarious speech from Malcolm Sloan. There was no research required here. I am adamant that Malcolm could remember everyone in the room that evening that he had at some time “busted” for smoking, drinking or doing some lewd act. And tonight of all nights, he wasn’t going to let any of them forget. This was a highly amusing speech with a number of innuendos aimed at several notorious individuals who were present amongst us. After coffee, some of us smokers slipped out discretely into the Quad to break College rules (again), shortly before being ushered into the Staff Common Room. In fact the name bears no relation to what was revealed to us. One could describe it more accurately as a “Luxury Staff Club House” with its fireplaces and its upholstered antique furniture. On the left of the door on entering was a table full of freshly uncorked wine bottles. These were emptied remarkably quickly and by the time the clock hands had reached midnight, the discussions had turned to the next topic: where’s the party? Little did the poor unsuspecting manager and his barman of The Queen’s Hotel know that a troop of over 40 OCs would be suddenly descending upon their bar, demanding a large number of drink orders that would span until 4:30 am. For me this was a moment of reminiscing with my old Boyne contemporaries (a.k.a. Brooke-Smithites). We lived very closely together for 5 years. We were like brothers. And while we chatted about events long passed, the years began to melt away and for a moment it was almost as if we had never parted. We were perhaps more cynical, but we were all there to recapture something from our youth that had meant something important to us during our time at College. I certainly did.
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