Up

Members of Staff

Norman Jones RIP

The Death has occurred of Norman Jones, Chemistry, one of the School's longest serving Masters, having  taught for many years in both Bond St. and Winshill. His obituary is in the Burton Mail of 16th June 2005.
 

Bill Gillion, Headmaster, 1958-73

William 'Bill’ Gillion, who served the school between 1958 and 1973, died of a heart attack in the garden of his home in Berkeley, Gloucester, on June 12. He was 92.   Dozens of mourners attended St Mary’s Church in Berkeley yesterday to pay their last respects at a service conducted by Mr Gillion’s nephew, the Rev Robert Gillion.  A mathematician and keen member of the Burton Grammar School Old Boys’ Association, Mr Gillion graduated from Trinity College in Cambridge before following a career in teaching.   A well-travelled man, he spent time teaching at a British naval school in Turkey before arriving in Burton to replace the late Horace Pitchford as head.  His daughter, Daphne Field, who attended Burton Girls’ High School before leaving for university in Birmingham at the age of 17, told the Mail that her father was dedicated to his profession and enjoyed keeping busy.   She said: "He was very much a teacher, a serious minded man who had involvement with a school in Stroud after leaving Burton through being a governor.   "He liked things like the Scouts, walking, gardening and travelling and was a member of the Rotary Club.   "It was a very moving funeral service and everything went very well."

  Mr Gillion joined Burton Grammar School the year after its premises were moved from Bond Street to Mill Hill Lane in Winshill, living at Rolleston during his years in the town. In 1975, two years after he left, the school closed, and is now the Abbot Beyne School’s Evershed building.   His first wife, Frances, died of cancer, and Mr Gillion met his second wife, Edith, during his time in Gloucester.  Harry Smith, 81, of Repton, was taken on by Mr Gillion as head of mathematics at the grammar school, and the two became close friends. Mr Smith attended the funeral on behalf of the grammar school old boys.   He said today: "There is so much to say about him. He was a much loved and greatly respected headmaster who retired because of the pending onset of comprehensive education, as he felt the school was going to lose its identity.   "He was tremendously keen as far as academic standards were concerned, and the achievements of the school were never higher than under his headship. In one year in the 1960s, we had no fewer than 13 scholarships at the school.   "He was a proud man who supported everything the grammar school stood for and always came up to the old boys' dinners until four years ago, when the journey got too much for him."    William Herbert Gillion leaves his wife and daughter, who both remain in Gloucester.      ( JAMES BENSTEAD - Burton Daily Mail - July 2004)

 

The Burton Dialect

I live on the border of three dialect areas, in fact, at Burton-on-Trent in Staffordshire. The dialect of Burton itself is the last gasp of the dialect group from the west of the Pennines coming down and across through Stoke, while across the river (Trent) in South Derbyshire we have the dialect group from the east of the Pennines coming down Nottingham and Derby. Go south less than 10 miles and you have Midlands dialects. The villages to the south are more isolated (by intervening farmland) but the South Derbyshire and Burton dialects have been in close proximity for a number of generations without the distinction being particularly blurred. You can easily tell from which side of the river people come - unless they're talking "posh", of course. The demarkation between Burton and S. Derbs. linguistically ties in pretty exactly with the Danelaw boundary as indicated by placenames (very obvious opposition between the -tons and the -bys round here.) ... from a longer article by the good robin r langton… Gain an insight into his love of words at … http://homepage.ntlworld.com/adarob/xword/x_word_index.html -   http://www.roblang.demon.co.uk .  He even blames David Shrubbs for his addiction.         ........................       The Lord's Prayer in Old English

 

Found this slightly blurred photo of an incredibly youthful Walter Chadbourne taken at Photographic Society meeting at Bond Street in 1955. from Keith Dadley