SYDNEYSIDE WITH JANET PARR No schoolboys at the “Schoolboys’ Own”

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33062, 1 November 1972, Page 7

SYDNEYSIDE WITH JANET PARR No schoolboys at the “Schoolboys’ Own”

The preview invitations went out in little leather school bags containing marbles, modelling clay, yo yo, apple and hard-boiled egg—ah that general sort of bric-a-brac supposed to overflow the pockets of the average schoolboy, according to popular fancy. And according to the popular, though not always reliable, chroniclers of the schoolboy, too-—such as Richmal Crompton, Anthony Buckridge, and the recorder of the doings of Billy Bunter and the Greyfriars gang, Frank Richards.

But is popular fancy always the best judge of hard fact? “Who’d want a hardboiled egg in his pocket?” asked a disgusted 10-year-old. “First time he bumped into somebody, he’d have a pocket full of squashed egg.” Marbles, it was conceded, might be there sometimes. And the yo yo. But only in the season. For the old childhood mysteries still operate. These things have their allotted span and place within the framework of the year, appearing suddenly and

simultaneously one day all over the place—as if some I underground password has ; gone the rounds overnight—’ and disappear just as suddenly a few weeks later. POPULAR CONCEPTION I I don’t think you can doubt! that a lot of the popular* myths about boys and the! popular conception of the boy i —socks concertinad round; ankles William fashion, tie; askew, grubby of face and: voracious of appetite—have been dreamed up by adults. Not all, of course. “If I didn’t chase him every morning,” said a mother surveying her angelic looking offspring as we sat waiting for the choir to burst into song at the school open day, “he’d never clean his teeth or comb his hair.” So it was with a certain amount of curiosity that I went to view what the invitation was all about— a “Schoolboys Own” exhibition housed in the “Big Top” at Wentworth Park and the brainchild presumably of adults. The last time I had been in the Big Top it was packed to the flaps for the Moscow Circus. There was plenty of space this time. For the things the “Schoolboys Own” seemed to lack was schoolboys. They were staying away in droves. Was it the old mystique of knowing what’s on and what’s “in” operating again? It was hard to say. But a disgruntled father had one answer. “I thought this was going to be educational,” he said, as he waited while his son queued for 35 minutes for a go on the mini bikes, one of the few things attracting really solid patronage. “If you ask me. it’s a circus. There is nothing here for the kids.”

It was not strictly true, of course, but one took his point. Inside, an elephant called Bimbo was keeping company with two lamas and a donkey and her foal. There were some pastel-tinted chicks to be had at 30c 'a time, kittens and puppies, and the inevitable goldfish in the inevitable plastic bags of water. There was a “gold mine” reached by climbing steps and sliding down a rope into sandy dirt containing goldpainted pennies, which could be exchanged for chocolate bars.

There were some archery butts (“free ice-cream for two bullseyes”) trampolines, clay to be modelled, and a railway worked by hand levers and running from “Perth Central” to “Kings Cross.” There were a greasy-pole, pillow fight, cork-firing bazookas, a simulated jet. plane trainer, and a kind of human ludo with a pretty girl to spin a numbered wheel to tell you how many squares you could advance, and give you a prize if you made it “home.”

There were some other things in the same vein, some rows of chairs where a candidate for the 1977 school intake was tucking into his bottle. And, because this is 1972 after all, the amplifier was dishing out Don McLean and “American Pie,” Daddy Cool, Hot Butter, and their electronic “Popcorn” Tom Jones and “Maria.” And rather curiously, even considering that pipe bands can be top of the pops at the moment, a lugubrious bagpipe version of “The Day Thou Gavest Lord is Ended.” I decided that it had, indeed, and it being a late shopping Thursday night, I took the quickest route to the city centre to take part in the purchase of a lawn mower. It could be that the hardware shop, a big one on George Street, suppliedjpart

of the answer to the mystery jof the non-participatingi ischoolboy, at the “School-; i boys Own.” Mrs McMahon, wife of the i Prime Minister, had been in | I the shop earlier in the day; ; choosing Christmas cards for ■ her children in the “shop; within a shop” opened again ■ this year to sell cards on be-; half of a number of chart- 1 ties.

But now a boy and his; father were trying out a mini-; billiard-table. A salesman; watched with a careful; though fairly indulgent eye! as another child tested an! exercise cycle. There were! pets in the pet department! and a man demonstrating al kitchen gadget among huge; mounds of shredded cabbage! in the housewares section. There were innumerable locks, keys, demonstration door chimes, light dimmers, to be felt and fingered and fiddled with. It could be the explanation, of course. There isn’t too much you can think of —unless you are very' inventive and imaginative—to show kids these days that they can’t see just as well somewhere else, and often by accident.

The average department store promotion, for instance, usually manages to throw up a fair number of gimmicks and amusements. There are lions roaming loose at Warragamba if you care to drive out there. For $2 or so, you can ride a mini bike almost all day at the enclosed track at the Showground. The Easter Show produces a fair number of technological things and asks you to have a go. You can buy a real gold-panning dish at the Army surplus and camping stores and try it out on a week-end’s camping. Flocks of children take to the Harbour in their own little boats on Saturdays and Sundays and many more can find real “treasures” — anything from a penknife to a pearl button—scuffling their feet along the beach after the tide’s gone out. In their own homes and classrooms, children today deal fairly nonchalantly with electric and electronic devices that would have been the wonder of Greyfriars and the Billy Bunter mob. It makes >it hard for anybody with enough temerity to think of setting up a “Schoolboys Own.”

But — are children today pushed into too much too soon? And could a boy’s worst friend be his mother? This is at least part of the thinking behind that recent move in Sydney to end weekend football for the “little leaguers,” the six to 11-year-olds.

The codes themselves, Rugby league and Rugby union though not so much soccer and Australian Rules, see a real danger to the future of football in pushing boys into it too soon so that they are “burnt out” and fed up with it by the time they are 13 or 14, and could be ready to take it seriously and enjoy it.

Apart from the risk of injury, football not being the gentlest of sports, officials pretty well agree that the No. 1 enemy is the parent, male or female. Week-end football, say officials, was started originally so that children could learn to play the game and be ready to take it up more seriously later on. Said one league official: “I’ve done some junior refereeing and it’s not only the fathers who are the trouble. I’ve taken some decent old knockings from the women.”