FOR many years, the distinctive uniform worn by pupils at Gloucester House, the preparatory department for Portora Royal School, was a familiar sight on the streets of Enniskillen.

With their blazers and caps adorned with black and gold stripes, the young boys were nicknamed “wasps” by other school children in the town.

Several generations of Fermanagh schoolboys spent two years at Gloucester House before moving up to the big school on the hill.

While the preparatory department closed its doors for the last time in 1983, the award-winning building that housed its classrooms was later used by Erne Special School.

After the Erne and Elmbrook schools subsequently amalgamated to form Willowbridge School in 2012, part of the former Gloucester House building was still being used for teaching.

However, once work is completed on the multi-million pound extension and refurbishment at Willowbridge next month, the old building will be demolished to make way for a car park.

But while it represents an end of an era in one sense, Willowbridge principal Julie Murphy said she was looking to a bright future for her school.

She said that, for the first time since the amalgamation, Willowbridge will be housed in the one building.

The principal said that, after the children come back from their half-term holiday in February, they would be returning to state-of-the-art accommodation.

“It will be an amalgamation in the true sense of the word. For the first time Willowbridge will be based in the one building.

“For the first time ever, we will have one staff room. It will be very symbolic when we all go together to eat in the same room,” she said.

With many of the teachers having taught at the Erne School over the years, Ms. Murphy said that part of the brickwork is going to be saved from the demolished building.

She revealed that the Willowbridge art teacher is going to use these bricks to create something “to have a memory of it”.

Meanwhile, someone with a host of memories of the old Gloucester House building is Ballinamallard man Eric Geddes, who attended Portora’s preparatory department from September 1973 to June 1975, when Mr. Mills was headmaster.

Mr. Geddes has a further connection with the site, as his twin sons, Theo and Joel, were pupils at the Erne Special School and now attend Willowbridge.

The Ballinamallard man does not recall the Gloucester House uniform with any great affection, however.

“Going up Enniskillen was torturous as the pupils from other schools would call us “wasps”. They also took great delight in flicking your cap off.

“I suppose I felt different and not in a good way. Nobody else around the town had to wear a cap. It made you stand out at an age when you do want to fit in,” he said.

Another aspect of life at Gloucester House that was not to the young man’s liking was the dreaded ‘Saturday school’.

“We had to go into school on five Saturdays during the academic year, I think to facilitate the boarders. We were in full uniform and were in there until lunchtime.

“Getting up for school on a Saturday morning was a shock to the system. It was a throwback to an earlier time,” he said.

Despite his ambivalent feelings about some parts of life at Gloucester House, Mr. Geddes stressed that he also has many fond memories of the “great characters” who taught him and has countless stories of classroom high jinks from a more innocent time.

“I enjoyed my time well enough and I do have fond memories. Because of the boarding department, you got to meet people you would not have met in other schools in Fermanagh. You were meeting people from all over Ireland and from quite a different background,” he said.

While admitting to a certain nostalgia about the old Gloucester House building, Mr. Geddes believes that it had served its purpose.

“Everything’s for a time and a season and it served its purpose for that time. I believe that the building got an architectural award for design in the late 1960s, but it was no longer fit for purpose,” he said.