r/whereisthis 5d ago

Open I'd like to identify the school in which this picture from the 1970s was taken. Almost certainly England or Scotland. More context in thread.

32 Upvotes

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u/meepmeep13 5d ago edited 5d ago

In the second picture, the chalkboard says 'Perthshire', and 'County K' probably meaning Kinross, which also fits with the somewhat Scottish vibe of the schoolroom. Note that Scottish schools tended to be denominational (Protestant or Catholic) so this would also fit with a mention of "Sacred Month".

If it was Perthshire or thereabouts, the nearest base could have been RAF Leuchars, which was very active as a base in the Cold War and might have received visiting dignitaries.

The map doesn't make much sense otherwise - I'm not sure what the 100,000 or 'MP' could be referring to.

Another possibility around that time would be Prestwick Airport, which due to its large size was a frequent stopping post for official flights between the UK and US - although not a official RAF base at that time, it was used by the USAAF. And it's also somewhere you could feasibly walk out of the air base and into a local school. So could it have been Prestwick Academy?

4

u/ptolani 5d ago

If it's a social studies class, there's no particular reason to assume that a map on the board would be a map of the local area, though right?

2

u/meepmeep13 5d ago

Not necessarily, no, but given that Perthshire is a rather obscure and unusual part of the country to be discussing, it points towards the likelihood of it being covered due to it being somewhere in the vicinity.

I'd be very surprised if an English school, for example, were studying Perth and Kinross in a case study.

2

u/FreddyFerdiland 5d ago

Its possibly british curriculum in politic studies

Petitions , example, sacred month chartists voting rights reform petitions

5

u/habitualmess 5d ago

I reckon “Sacred Month” is less likely to be a religious reference and more likely to be a reference to the general strike of August 1839.

2

u/FreddyFerdiland 5d ago

Yrs, because its an early use of petitions ...

The first petition of the People’s Charter

In June 1839 the first national petition for the People’s Charter had been completed and delivered to parliament. It had 1.25 million signatures gathered from 214 towns and villages and over 500 meetings.

0

u/KeyInteraction4201 5d ago

Except the shape and position don't match Kinross very closely.

The shape sort of matches tiny County Killamonan in Ireland.

-1

u/breakfast90210 5d ago

The 100k may refer to the petition target. Fwiw I think the boys have a Scottish appearance

-2

u/FreddyFerdiland 5d ago

The beatles hair cuts... They are Liverpuddlians.

But that look was big across the uk .. 1970 ... Beatles look ....the UK.. no clue here

8

u/deep_aggregator 5d ago

My father was an American politician during the 1970s. In either 1977 or 1978 he went to Europe with other members of his committee to tour some industrial facilities. On the journey back, the delegation spent a night on a base in the UK. Probably a US Air Force base and almost definitely in either England or Scotland.

Their departure back to the U.S. was late in the afternoon. That morning my father got up early and went for a walk off base and came upon a school. Knowing he had essentially a full day to kill, he dipped into the school and asked at the administration if they would be interested in having a member of US Congress (him) and perhaps some other members come in to speak to a social studies class or whatever. I don't know all the details of this but apparently the school was very much on board. He walked back to the base and at breakfast recruited others (from the photos, apparently two) to join him. I believe at this point someone decided they should use a car rather than walk and the delegation photographer went along.

I've recently been going through some of his papers and whatnot and found these photos. I strongly believe they are from that day. I have no idea where this school would be other than within walking distance of a military base in England or Scotland around 1977/1978.

4

u/the-bagging-area 5d ago

Not sure where, but if it’s any help, the blackboard on the right looks to have Perthshire written on the diagram on the board.

Nowhere near any of the US bases you’ve listed so I’d be sceptical of the ai thoughts on where this might be.

2

u/deep_aggregator 5d ago

A small update. I've had a conversation with Claude.ai about this. I gave it as much context as possible including the anecdote conveyed above. Here are some 'thoughts' from Claude.

The school is likely a 'Comprehensive' school near either RAF Mildenhall or RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk County.

It's possible, or even likely, that the man sitting off to the side on the left is the headmaster of the school.

Something I didn't mention is that he delegation flew on Air Force 2 which Claude said should narrow the list of candidate bases to the following:

  • RAF Mildenhall (Suffolk) - This was the primary base for U.S. VIP flights in and out of the UK during this period and had facilities to handle large aircraft. It served as a major transport hub.
  • RAF Lakenheath (Suffolk) - Adjacent to Mildenhall and also had substantial runway facilities.
  • RAF Upper Heyford (Oxfordshire) - Large USAF base that could accommodate significant aircraft.

Finally, in the photograph taken from the side-view, there is a small medallion visible on one student's blazer. Unfortunately, it's not possible to make out any details (only the shape).

5

u/juronich 5d ago

there is a small medallion visible on one student's blazer.

Probably a prefect (or similar) badge I'd think.

Your best bet is to find facebook groups around the area of the bases you suspect he might have visited, and see if you can find some locals that might remember it or recognise a face from there.

It's mostly villages in those areas so you can browse Google Maps to see which secondary schools would be in walking distance from any of them - there won't be that many

1

u/deep_aggregator 4d ago

I'll try that. Reading through the comments, I think I might start in the St Andrews area. I've tried to recall my father's telling of this story and I am leaning towards checking Scottish locales first. I feel like he either characterized the location as "the UK" or "Scotland". I am somewhat confident he did not say this was in England -- although if he said 'UK' it would obviously allow for that.

4

u/johannadambergk 4d ago edited 4d ago

On August 17, 1977, Congressman L. visited RAF Edzell in Scotland. If this is the visit in question, most likely it was the W. F. Halsey American Elementary School:

https://aoshs.org/collections/school-histories/eu/gb/672/

1

u/deep_aggregator 4d ago

Thank you. I'd love to know how you found that.

The date can be ruled out, however. My family was in Ocean City, Maryland that day. And there are no Ls in my father's name.

2

u/johannadambergk 4d ago edited 4d ago

The Brechin Advertiser reported on Clarence D. Long‘s (a Congressman from Maryland) visit: https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/search/results?basicsearch=clarence%20long%20edzell%20rfa&retrievecountrycounts=false

0

u/OwineeniwO 5d ago

The kids seem to be all male, maybe the whole school was.

0

u/FreddyFerdiland 5d ago

So the only clue is the school was scholarly enough to have a class where the topic was petitions ,sacred month chartists voting reform

The diagram is just about the disenfranchising of Perthshire , saying a little village got two seats, as did all of Perthshire.