MUNRO COLLEGE IN THE 1960’s
By Olivier Stephenson
Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid; neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is heaven.
Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5: 14-16
Long before I even put a foot on its grounds, I had heard about a school up in the mountains, somewhere in the parish of St. Elizabeth.
The first time I came to Munro was when my older brother, Erik and I went with our mother to meet the headmaster, Mr. Richard B. Roper. While the road from my home in St. James was bearable as Jamaican roads of the day were then, the drive from Santa Cruz up the Santa Cruz Mountains was nothing short of an endurance test. It was a winding, grinding, bumpy, dangerous cut-stone surfaced, red dust lung-choking experience.
Upon arrival at the school gate, Erik’s immediate reaction – he had been attending Calabar High School – was one of terrified disbelief, with utter dread: “Jesus! Where are you taking me? This is No Man’s Land!”
In all fairness, the setting of the school was unquestionably at once picturesque and daunting. The casuarina (or so-called “willow”) trees that lined the driveway from the front gate were all tilted in one direction by the perpetual mountain wind which one could hear moaning gently through their branches.
But the capstone to our arrival at headmaster Mr. Roper’s office was the view that overlooking the Pedro Plains, a dramatic, awe-inspiring panorama, stretching from the Pedro Bluff all the way to Black River and beyond. For anyone who has never seen it, it was captured by late acclaimed Jamaican photographer Ray Chen in his book, Jamaica, taken from the garden of the headmaster’s residence. Its real magic can be seen on a bright, clear Caribbean day, where the blue sky and sea all appear as one with no discernible horizon. The evening sunsets are equally magical, for it is only then that one can finally spot the horizon, as the sun sinks into Caribbean Sea. Even as a youngster who was accustomed to a view from the hills of Reading, St. James, overlooking Montego Bay, I was nonplussed.
This splendid, quiet, bucolic setting, however, did in no way foreshadow the experiences that I was yet to encounter.
The night before I started, when I was packing my suitcase to get ready for a new phase in my young life, I was so filled with anticipation and glee, I kept singing that old Fat’s Domino’s hit song “I’m Gonna Be A Wheel Someday,” a really nice up-tempo R&B song.
“I’m gonna be a wheel someday,
I’m gonna be somebody,
I’m gonna be a real gone cat
Then I won’t want you …”
This went on and on until at one point my father stopped by the bedroom door and broke my reverie: “Eh-heh,” he said ominously, “Munro is going to knock all of that foolishness out of you, my son.”
At that point his words of caution immediately struck a feeling of foreboding in me which would remain right up until the very moment I unpacked my suitcase in the Calder House (now Pearman Calder) junior dormitory.
The moment of truth had arrived.
I was trying to process the images that were presented in the school brochure with what I was now seeing in actuality. I felt as if I was in the Twilight Zone. It was like one way in no way out – until mid-term or end-of-term. The only means contacting home was via mail, telephone – which was in the headmaster’s office – or by telegram.
The overall culture of the school is based on that of the British grammar school system, and the school population was multicultural and international. There were students from Venezuela (boys whose parents worked at oil companies mainly in Maracaibo) who spoke Spanish but also had other backgrounds, such as Russian and Greek. There were students from Australia, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Canada, the United States, Great Britain, Sweden, Turkey, St. Lucia, the Bahamas, Curacao and elsewhere. Most of the teachers were from Great Britain. The physics master, Mr. Keith Warren, taught Prince Charles at Gordonstoun boarding school in Scotland before coming to Munro. Munro was a truly microcosmic United Nations in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
The daily regimen included dormitory competitions (overseen by a house master and prefect on duty for the day), breakfast, chapel, classes, lunch, tea, and games – which was mandatory, unless one had a written medical excuse. The school possessed numerous playing fields for cricket, football and track and field – it is said that Munro has more playing fields than any other school in Jamaica. Cricket was played on Top Field, Hospital Field, Willows and Hillside, and at Bottom Field the playing areas were listed alphabetically from A to E. The school’s overall sports program included hockey, cricket, football, table tennis, tennis, and rifle shooting. With the sports program that existed at the time, I saw boys who were clearly obese when they first came to the school, and were able to trim down over a relatively short period of time. It did not matter whether one was talented or not in whatever sport they participated in, the fact was, they had to participate, like it or not. Those were the rules.
Another curious mainstay was the paddle tennis courts where “Padda” football – or “padda footy” – was played on a daily basis and/or whenever the opportunity availed itself to play football with a tennis ball. We even had regularly organized tournaments between houses that were held early on Saturday mornings. While P.E. classes were a literal nursery for developing young talent, so was “Padda” football which was excellent training outlet for up-and-coming ‘ballers to hone their skills.
Dormitory competition was an on-going contest between houses to determine the tidiest dorm of the month, and the winning dorm – junior or senior – would receive a cake. That was the prize. A simple cake. The dorms had to be rendered scrupulously clean. No hint of lint on the beds or floor. Zero. The beds had to be made with “hospital corners”. A piece of clothing found anywhere out of place would result in loss of points.
Games period was followed by showers, dinner, prep and lights out. There was chapel twice on Sundays unless one had a legitimate religious excuse not to attend, and everything was all orchestrated by a series of bells.
The school barber, a local area gentleman known as Andy, was the person responsible for the grooming of the hair of students, which had to be at a certain regulation length. Andy knew only one style: Basic. This was in the era long before afros, dreadlocks, fades, Mohawks and sundry other liberated popular hairstyles ever evolved.
For Saturday night entertainment there was a regular film show in the gymnasium, (now the Harrison Memorial Library). There was a wide array of organised extra-curricular activities that included a variety of clubs for photography, auto mechanics, gardening, radio, art, golf, chess, stamp collecting, Cub Scouts, cadets, debating society, choral group (senior and junior), drama society, music society, school council (which planned fundraising events); a club for walkers, talkers, model planes, ICF, (senior and junior); Friday Talks (with guest speakers in wide-ranging subjects, which was optional). There was even a newspaper (The Spark) that was started at one time but had a brief life.
The “hop” (dance) between our sister school Hampton, when the occasion came about would be a good way to sublimate overactive teenage hormones. During such occasions we boys would be verbally given a code of conduct for the dance, including the degree of closeness or distance between dancing partners, particularly with slow songs. If dance partners got too close they would be separated by attending masters.
Munro also had its own mythology and legends: stories of headless slave ghosts and a slave burial ground that is supposed to be under the tennis courts.
The basic cuisine offered on the school menu was something that was truly left to be desired, the likes I’d never encountered before nor since. On average, breakfast usually consisted of either cornmeal porridge or cream of wheat, served with a huge pitcher of hot milk, bread, bully beef (corn beef). Lunch and dinner would flip-flop between patty with white rice or rice and peas, hot dog with rice and peas along with a gravy that could be more approximated to a kind of brown musty pot water; chicken with rice with that similar gravy; a kind of meat that I have to this day I have still not able identify and, of course, the omnipresent beans staple. Dessert would switch between bun or Jello (red or green). No vegetable or salad of any kind or description. The overall diet could safely be described as Spartan, at best. And to think people used to fight over that food. I hear Munro food has improved drastically since the 70’s, but not soon enough for us.
For the more adventurous in our midst, there would from time to time be raids of the staff room refrigerator, where Staggy’s rum or Red Stripe could be acquired.
During the Christmas term, which was the season for Inter-secondary School football, one critical fact came into play here. Cheering was also compulsory. If one didn’t know the school cheers – and there was a long list of them – there was hell to pay from members of the senior school and prefects. In the Christmas term of 1961, I was called upon before a group of senior school young men. The scenario was another longstanding Munro ritual. Here’s how mine went:
“Hey, boy, come here!” I turned and pointed to myself to indicate if it was I to whom they were referring.
“Yes, you! Come here.”
I went and stood before them, clearly intimidated.
“You know your cheers, boy”?
“Uh …”
“Know you cheers by Friday – all of them”!
“Yes, please”.
I would then have to get a list of all the cheers and swot and learn them by rote, with line-for-line accuracy. In other words, know the like the back of my hand. On the stated day I would be summoned back by the same group of seniors to say the cheers – all of them!
“You know your cheers now, boy”?
I shuddered. Then I was given the command:
“In Arce …”
I had to be careful not even to hitch or flub a line or I’d be whacked over the head by a three-foot long navy-blue and gold striped “cheering stick.” After each cheer I would be given the command to recite yet another:
“Bobo-ski-watten …”
At the end of the test, there was no congratulations for getting them right. I was simply dismissed by a demeaning:
“OK, boy, gwaan ‘bout yuh business”!
A longstanding tradition which had existed at Munro for a home football match – whether Under-13 (now U-14), Under-15 (now U-16) or First XI, was for the team to traverse the narrow path in single file on the hillside starting from beside the rifle range and Delco plant all the way down to the playing field, with the two goalies in tow and led by a mascot – usually a small junior school boy – bearing the school flag. The entire school would be amassed on the eastern side of the playing field where they formed an aisle or passageway for the team to run through onto the pitch. To behold the team coming down from the top of the hill down the long winding path to the playing field gave one goose bumps. It was an almost majestic sight to behold. One knew then that what was about to take place would be an engaging spellbinding event. And if it was a major match, such as against a team like Cornwall College, our constant menacing rival, then one’s blood would pump to the point of bordering on explosive hypersensitivity.
The 1964 da Costa Cup Champions, with legendary coach Ken Walton. Current Board Chairman Ryan White (older brother of former Housemaster Bonito White) is 2nd right, front row, and current MCOBA 2nd Vice President Kenry Jackson is 1st right, back row.
Being in a boarding school such as Munro, one learnt immediately to develop a very thick skin – unless you already had one. I had one because I had two older brothers. An integral part of the school culture at the time was a thing called “roosting,” literally translated the term meant “roasting” or one-upmanship. This was a phenomenon that went on 24-7. Non-stop. And one had to be able to give as good as one got in the constant activity of verbal joisting and jibing. I am one who likes to tease or rib people – particularly if it’s someone whom I like or am friendly with. Oftentimes when people would take the ribbing the wrong way, I would have to let them know that I was merely joking. Nowadays whenever I tease someone and recognize that they were taking it the wrong way, I would say to them simply; “My friend, you would never have survived at Munro.”
Speaking of things to survive, at the end of a school term there would be ritualistic experiences that one would have to brace oneself for, such as bed-scuttling, shoe polishing and tooth-pasting of one’s face and/or hair while one slept. The customary remedy for such an experience was to stay awake throughout the entire night.
When I recall hearing Old Boys who visited the school on occasion say “this is the best time of your life, enjoy it.” I would think to myself, “Is he out of his mind?” As a teenager one could not wait to leave school and get out on one’s own, because the aura of freedom and adulthood seemed so very attractive. Truth be told, however, they were right.
Once, during the 1980s, while I was at Doctor’s Cave Beach in Montego Bay, I overheard some youths talking about their school experiences at Munro. I couldn’t help myself and butted in by mentioning to them that I too had gone to Munro.
“What year were you at Munro?” one of them asked.
“I left in ’66,” was my proud reply.
They all stared at me as if I were ET the extra-terrestrial.
“Me, rhatid!” one of them exclaimed, “How old are you, man?”
Immediately, I felt very ancient. The reality of age and the actual passage of time had not occurred to me until that very moment.
That was three decades ago. The reality is that those same youths are all now adult men who also now feel ancient looking back at when they were at Munro.
Olivier Stephenson is a journalist, playwright, screenwriter and author of Visions and Voices: conversations with Fourteen Caribbean Playwrights, (Peepal Tree Press, 2013).