More than 50 years later Eddie Daly sent me a school photograph taken in 1949. It is (will be!) reproduced somewhere here.  

The school did not have any playing fields so the opportunities to develop any sporting skills were nil.  Master Hannon was not interested in sport and did nothing to bring in anyone to develop it. The only time I recall any sporting activity was when some boxing gloves were produced and I squared up to Sean Campbell in the back yard.  Within ten seconds I had received a painful punch right on the nose and that was the end of that for me.  I can not recall whether the gloves were a private initiative on the part of one of the boys or a school thing. At any rate nothing came of the initiative.

I stayed in Glassdrummond School until 1952 when I got a scholarship to the Abbey Grammer School in Newry.  Without the 1946 Education Act it is highly unlikely that I would have had the opportunity for secondary education. As it was I did not take the 11+ examination (for reasons I never found out) and instead succeeded in the Review procedure at age 13.

I don't have any fond memories of those school days. In truth I was glad to leave. Without the scholarship I would have left within another year and given the norms of the time there is no knowing if I would have made anything of myself.  I was never conscious that the school was interested in my progress or made any special effort on my, or indeed anyone's behalf.  I have the impression that I was entered for the Review Examination only at my mother's insistence, not having been put forward for the 11+ for reasons never explained to me.

Just before I left the Primary School Father Halfpenny organised a sports day in the field across the road from Cross Graveyard.  I was entered for the 400 yards run and I won it.  Father Halfpenny has filmed the event and I recall watching the recording in the Picture House in Cross. I wonder what ever happened to that film?

We had moved out of the house in Drumbally some time in 1951 and moved across the river to a one-roomed house until the new Council Houses in Cregganduff were ready. We moved there in the autumn of 1952.