Schoolboy shoes of the 80's!

[Stonigut]

Anybody remember that if you were a roots man and leaning left of center that Cougar Paws was the choice of school shoe.

Back in the early to mid 80's that was the shoe, I am sure that was just a nickname I have no idea what brand that actually was even though I wore a black one for years. Very comfortable and made for walking on long trips to other high school institutions that fronted or touched the Halfway tree/ Constant Spring road line, thinking of that now that is actually four schools, possibly five, was there not also a private high school for a while just behind Merle Grove.

[Mosiah]

Anybody remember that if you were a roots man and leaning left of center that Cougar Paws was the choice of school shoe.

Back in the early to mid 80's that was the shoe, I am sure that was just a nickname I have no idea what brand that actually was even though I wore a black one for years. Very comfortable and made for walking on long trips to other high school institutions that fronted or touched the Halfway tree/ Constant Spring road line, thinking of that now that is actually four schools, possibly five, was there not also a private high school for a while just behind Merle Grove.

Dunrobin High School (and Prep) were the private schools behind Merl Grove.

[Stonigut]

I was thinking by the church on the side of the gully fronting HalfWay tree road. dunrobin more to the west and entrance is off Washington blvd.

[Karl]

Holy Childhood High School...just below Half-Way-Tree. Is that the school you were thinking of?

[Stonigut]

No, but I almost forgot about them. Never thought about it before but all these girl schools are on the main north/south road through Kingston, so Andrews, Childhood, Merle Grove, Queens and Immaculate, I guess they were all trying to stay away from JC and get closer to Calabar.

[Tilla]

Stoni, you talking Ballet shoes. Remember General Trees sang about "Man an 'ooman dem steppin' it in ballet".

[Mosiah]

I was thinking by the church on the side of the gully fronting HalfWay tree road. dunrobin more to the west and entrance is off Washington blvd.

I have no idea where you are talking about. As far as I know, there was no other school in that vicinity, Queens being the closest to Merl Grove.

And remember, Dunrobin HS's entrance was off Dunrobin Avenue, not Washington Blvd.

[Stonigut]

You in the right area, but back in dem days certain man did wear ballet shoes with bell foot pants and other man like me did wear Cougar paws which was a regular kind of structured shoes but very comfortable, at the time I also remember that it was more of a roots man/ left leaning thing versus a sort of stylish right leaning politically, that is what I remember.

[Tilla]

What about the Earth Shoes?

[Mosiah]

'Ow dem fava alligator suh?

Clarks wannabees!

I had a version of earth shoes back in the day. It was (lawks, mi shame fi say it) kind of like a platf...whoa! Look at the time!

[Stonigut]

No, is not that either, maybe it was just a Cbar thing as Jc, Wolmers and George's was pure disco and soul man in dem days, only Bar and Kc had some real roots man.

[Willi]

Huh?

StGC was everything!

[Willi]

Clarks
Bata bouncers
Converse and pro-keds sneakers
Hush Puppies


Cougar Paw was a style of shoe not a brand, unlike say Kangol, which was a brand of cap. People used to like the boat style loafer as well. Then you had the suede shoes too...

[Peter R]

.. JC was/is relatively isolated... I believe our closest neighbouring schools were/are Papine (in my day a Jr. Sec.) and Campion. St Andrews was/is considered a sister school but we really had little contact; some of our sixth formers went to Andrews for subjects JC didn't offer; I started sixth form at JC and had the option of going to Andrews for French (I was the only student who chose that for a subject that year); after a month at JC and not looking forward to having to jump on a bus twice a day to go to Half Way Tree in the middle of the day, I opted to move to C-bar which had at that time a very good sixth form Languages programme.

I must admit, I enjoyed my time at Red Hills Rd. though it was a long commute for me to get home; had to take two buses and walk, or three and walk a shorter distance, to get home. I lived back then on UWI campus (pops was a lecturer).

[Peter R]

Those I found very ugly... in my household we had to accept whatever our mother decided, talk done! And what she decided was definitely based on value for money... fashion and style never entered the picture