by 12 Dec 2009
I posted this up on the Spiritlove forum, but wanted to keep a record here myself for my ongoing research.
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Just been doing a bit of research.
When I was 6, I won a competition. I have no recollection of the content of that competition, or what I contributed therein, save that I had to make sure my printing was neat and that it was some sort of essay to do with a publication called The Children's Newspaper.
The only memory I have is one day at school - (my last year at school in England before the family moved back to Ireland to live - that's how I know I was 6). One of a small handful of Catholic pupils attending the then C of E faith school, we Catholics were not allowed to attend morning assembly with the rest of the school, and instead were confined to the school library until assembly finished.
One morning, one of the 'big girls' popped in, announcing that the Headmistress had summoned me to the Hall where Assembly was taking place. She would not tell me the reason and I vividly remember the feeling of dread that occupied my stomach on that seemingly never-ending journey to the Hall. I racked my brain, trying to think ... what had I done wrong? The dread increased to a fever pitch when on entering the door at the back of this enormous room, every head in the place turned around in unison to fix their gaze on me as the Headmistress's voice echoed and boomed at me through the microphone, directing me to come up to where she was standing on the stage. After what seemed like an age, I arrived up on stage beside her where she handed me a rolled-up scroll and instructed me to unroll it and read the content through the microphone to the gathered assembly. I remember clearly the fancy script began 'THIS IS TO CERTIFY that [my name] ...' blah blah ... something along the lines of competition in The Children's Newspaper ... essay ... printing ... blah blah ... (I'm quite sure I must have been reading this on auto-pilot) but I remember having to read out 'first out of all entrants in England, Scotland and Wales' - and thinking at the time that they had missed out Ireland (where my parents came from and where we moved back to the following year).
Somewhere along the way, over the years, I lost that treasured certificate and the content has faded from my memory. Anyway, today I decided to look up The Children's Newspaper on the net, and found a site giving the whole history of the Children's Newspaper (a weekly publication founded in 1919, still in existence but now evolved into something called Look and Learn) With the limited remnants of memory that I could muster, I began a search through the archived editions starting in January of the year that I was 6 (not saying what that year was ... too much information) to see if there was any reference made to the competition - and there it was, in an early February edition. How exciting! This was my competition. I continued searching through the following week's editions, but at February 25th it stopped and a message came up saying 'you have reached your downloading limit for today. Please come back again tomorrow. You betcha. I'll be back in there tomorrow. Hooray for today's techology.
Quite chuffed to see a recognisable name on the advisory and selection panel - None other than THE (later SIR) William Golding ('Lord of the Flies') Wow!
I looked up the other names also. Found these three on Wikipedia.
[Only admins are allowed to see this link]
I'm really determined now to delve further into this in the hope that there is some sort of record somewhere of my essay. If I do find it, I'll post it up here.
I posted this up on the Spiritlove forum, but wanted to keep a record here myself for my ongoing research.
__________________________________________________________
Just been doing a bit of research.
When I was 6, I won a competition. I have no recollection of the content of that competition, or what I contributed therein, save that I had to make sure my printing was neat and that it was some sort of essay to do with a publication called The Children's Newspaper.
The only memory I have is one day at school - (my last year at school in England before the family moved back to Ireland to live - that's how I know I was 6). One of a small handful of Catholic pupils attending the then C of E faith school, we Catholics were not allowed to attend morning assembly with the rest of the school, and instead were confined to the school library until assembly finished.
One morning, one of the 'big girls' popped in, announcing that the Headmistress had summoned me to the Hall where Assembly was taking place. She would not tell me the reason and I vividly remember the feeling of dread that occupied my stomach on that seemingly never-ending journey to the Hall. I racked my brain, trying to think ... what had I done wrong? The dread increased to a fever pitch when on entering the door at the back of this enormous room, every head in the place turned around in unison to fix their gaze on me as the Headmistress's voice echoed and boomed at me through the microphone, directing me to come up to where she was standing on the stage. After what seemed like an age, I arrived up on stage beside her where she handed me a rolled-up scroll and instructed me to unroll it and read the content through the microphone to the gathered assembly. I remember clearly the fancy script began 'THIS IS TO CERTIFY that [my name] ...' blah blah ... something along the lines of competition in The Children's Newspaper ... essay ... printing ... blah blah ... (I'm quite sure I must have been reading this on auto-pilot) but I remember having to read out 'first out of all entrants in England, Scotland and Wales' - and thinking at the time that they had missed out Ireland (where my parents came from and where we moved back to the following year).
Somewhere along the way, over the years, I lost that treasured certificate and the content has faded from my memory. Anyway, today I decided to look up The Children's Newspaper on the net, and found a site giving the whole history of the Children's Newspaper (a weekly publication founded in 1919, still in existence but now evolved into something called Look and Learn) With the limited remnants of memory that I could muster, I began a search through the archived editions starting in January of the year that I was 6 (not saying what that year was ... too much information) to see if there was any reference made to the competition - and there it was, in an early February edition. How exciting! This was my competition. I continued searching through the following week's editions, but at February 25th it stopped and a message came up saying 'you have reached your downloading limit for today. Please come back again tomorrow. You betcha. I'll be back in there tomorrow. Hooray for today's techology.
The THIRD
CHILDREN'S LITERARY COMPETITION
organised by the Daily Mirror
Entries from now until February 23rd.
For full details of entry and awards send stamped,
addressed envelope to : '
Children's Literary Competition
Leaflet J
Daily Mirror, Fetter Lane
London, E.C.4.
. Advisory and Selection Panel:
Sir Herbert Read Richard Church William Golding
Marjorie Hourd Kathleen Raine L. C. Schiller
" this enterprise is undertaken in the belief that children are capable
of expressing themselves effectively in literary form, and that to learn to
express themselves in this manner is one of the primary concerns of education."
Herbert Read.
Quite chuffed to see a recognisable name on the advisory and selection panel - None other than THE (later SIR) William Golding ('Lord of the Flies') Wow!
I looked up the other names also. Found these three on Wikipedia.
[Only admins are allowed to see this link]
I'm really determined now to delve further into this in the hope that there is some sort of record somewhere of my essay. If I do find it, I'll post it up here.
by 
