A.O.S.A. 2000 ANNUAL REPORT
Arthur Grainge has spent much of his working life in Canada, but despite a deceptive slow Canadian drawl there is no doubt as to his origins and where his heart lies. For Arthur is not only a Yorkshireman through and through but also one of the most generously warm hearted of Aytonians.
Brought up in Stokesley, Arthur began his long association with Ayton when he arrived at the school to join a group of ten year olds who comprised Junior A. This was Ayton's response to evacuation and the wartime poverty of opportunities in state primary schools. My first memory of my new classmate was of his jolly laugh and his ability to relieve our early homesickness by persuading us that most of life was intrinsically funny, if only we tried hard enough. When this failed he took the more practical step of inviting some of us on parent leave to his home in Stokesley for tea and maternal sympathy. Throughout his school career, no-one was better at cheering us up and generally bridging the gap between the experience of boarders and day scholars.
Together we all survived the toughening experience in the austere environment of Ayton in the immediate post war environment of rationing and shortages. Especially, as he remembers, the rigours of those early winter football seasons under “Whisky” Dewar, Stan Jones and Cliff Morgan, when football strips were in short supply, sending out teams of “Shirts” and “Skins” onto the snow and ice which encrusted top field in the memorable winter of 1947.
Despite this chastening experience, Arthur went on to represent the School at both cricket and football. He says he seemed to keep wicket a lot because it required no running all over the field. He also played football where he demonstrated what was referred to in a Beckside report as a cultured left foot, though he has wondered ever since “ why it is only left feet which are cultured ?” The sporting involvements remained after school, where the wicket keeper turned to fast bowling and the inside forward turned into a goalkeeper and he gave many years of service in the local amateur leagues in the North Riding and in Durham.
After leaving school with his “O” levels, Arthur went into municipal government as a trainee accountant with Middlesbrough Corporation in the Borough Treasurer's Department. In the 1960s the newly burgeoning computer industry drew him to Dorman Long Steel, where he became a computer programmer. In the late sixties, he and his family emigrated to Canada where he became a business systems analyst for a mine management company in Sept Iles. In 1972 he left for the capital, Ottawa to become a civil servant in the same field.
Arthur continued his active interest in competitive football leagues in Canada until he was 47, qualified as a Canadian Soccer Association licensed coach and coaching instructor. After this he developed elite club teams both in the Ottawa region and at the university, specialising as a goalkeeping coach. He also made time to extend his experience as a most capable musician, forming his own classic jazz band in the New Orleans style.
Now retired for some years, Arthur has been a most active overseas secretary for the Association, assiduously tracking down Old Scholars and reporting their news to the editor. In this new and potentially difficult period in its history, the Association is lucky to have as its President someone of such cheery good humour with such a vital and enthusiastic interest in old scholars. We wish him well during his period of office.
David Siddle (1946-54)
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