Ian Richard Hanby sadly passed away on 27 December 2020 at the age of 80.  His classmate and friend, Richard Paden has reflected on their time together at Hymers College.

In Memory of Ian Richard Hanby, 26 November 1940 – 27 December 2020

In 1949, two young men started in Form 1 of the Hymers Junior School under tutelage of Miss Allen. The headmaster at that time was Mr.W.V. Cavill. MC with a reputation for sternness and good order – he came from the old school traditions forged by his service and the aftermath of The Great War!  We had his morning inspection lined up along the wall of the quadrangle to check for clean polished shoes, socks uniform and hats of the right type and worn correctly! Quite an ordeal for eight-year-olds but we survived, and both enjoyed our time at Hymers.

I was one of the boys and the other was Ian Hanby - we went through school together until the 6th Form when Ian went to Nottingham University to read Physics and I after a period with Blackburn Aircraft at Brough went on to Cambridge - our paths diverged but interestingly Ian returned to Hull to study Aeronautical Engineering and also worked at Brough in his vacations! After graduating Ian moved to Bristol working with BAC on missiles followed by a career change to work in mining with British Coal and living just outside Newark. Only in later years did we rekindle our contact but sadly this proved all too short as Ian passed away in December 2020. This epistle is the result of a conversation with Christine, Ian’s widow and a promise I made to write a little about our less academic activities in those 10 years we were together at the school. We were both inclined towards science and so inevitably our careers followed that direction but in later life, Ian also became a talented organ player inspired I have no doubt by the musical and classical inputs from school.

I have scoured all my old editions of The Hymerian for helpful comments but clearly we avoided the scrutiny of the eagle eyed editors and our prowess on the sports field was less than scintillating it would appear! In 1951, Ian is noted in Remove A “as our best linguist” but had to be warned about spending too much time in the Pleasure Gardens (the school’s endeavours for the 1951 Exhibition). My memory is now so hazy I cannot even recollect what was done to mark this event but clearly it had some impact on my fellow pupils. In 1952, it is noted that Hanby’s toys steadily multiply and his French linguistic skills merit further comment

Once we entered the Senior School we clearly fade off the editorial scene until we both join the Combined Cadet Force (CCF) passing Pt.1 Certificate A and in our pursuit of science we both become part of the Signals Platoon where our passing of various examinations and attaining some ability in signalling became noted over the next 3 years and achieving promotion as we progressed. My most memorable recollections of our time at school are linked to both our CCF activities and the enthusiasm of young scientists in pushing back the boundaries of our knowledge and abilities. It is just as well as our parents were fairly unaware of our activities as you will read.

In 1956, our CCF camp was at Castle Martin in Pembrokeshire and stands out in memory for a number of reasons – voracious horseflies eager to sample the blood of these Northern invaders, the apocryphal funeral pyre on the last morning in camp of all the straw fillings from the palliasses we had slept on to for the days before and supervised by Capt. Mo Mitchell and the departure of our Regular Liaison Officer, Lt. Hartley to take part in the ill-fated Suez adventure!

As signallers we even persuaded the local vicar to allow us to climb the church tower to practice our Semaphore flag skills from the top. The real high light was that Castle Martin ranges were used for tank gunnery practice and had numerous derelict tank hulls as targets scattered over the ground.  Needless to say these were a magnet for young aspiring engineers and we found with the use of a few spanners many items of booty could be recovered from these hulks and surprise, surprise found their way back to Hull.  The most interesting items were the fire extinguishing cylinders for the tank engine bays which we found were still full of pressurised CO2 gas – using a nail and a large hammer to puncture the seal we found these could be sent rocketing horizontally around the garden of Ian’s house demonstrating the fundamentals of rocket propulsion but sadly with the inevitable destruction of much of Ian’s father’s lovely back garden as the motion albeit rapid was very random -  it was fortunate that we had a fairly limited number of these heavy cylinders to experiment with.

We moved on from these short-lived antics to develop with our rudimentary chemistry knowledge an unholy interest in pyrotechnics – remember this was a time when anyone could visit any chemist and garden supply centres and buy copious quantities of interesting chemicals - carbon black, sulphur, and other chemicals which I will not detail here for my own safety! Suffice to say we perfected electrical ignition techniques making and launching rockets but far more satisfyingly, making many large craters in the back garden to complement the earlier damage wreaked by the cylinders. We even simulated depth charges in the drain running behind the Victoria Avenue houses as the containers for our chemicals became more robust – I recollect that a tubular steel chair was somehow sacrificed in this pursuit of science. Sadly, no edible fish resulted from these adventures which we tried, having heard about the use of grenades of the SOE training schools in Scotland – we were always safety conscious (at least for ourselves!) but in today’s H&S world we would have been in dangerous territory I fear.

However, we survived with all our limbs intact and moved on to greater challenges and the last one before we both went to Uni was our unshakeable belief that we could create a miniature version of the Pulse Jet engine used in the V1 Flying bomb or Doodlebug. We had seen designs in model engineering magazines and with some basic knowledge and some acquired Titanium tube tried to build one in Ian’s bedroom fuelled by petrol! The design of the petal valves defeated us sadly but if we had been successful in getting it to run I think with my later wisdom it likely that 126 Victoria Ave would have been reduced to a smoking ruin so perhaps it was a blessed failure for all!

These are some of the fond memories of an ill spent friendship with Ian – we both went onto University and Ian became an expert in atmospheric management of mines and airborne dust monitoring equipment involved in safety issues of working conditions whereas I specialised in electron microscopy - possibly without the academic environment we enjoyed in our formative years at Hymers our careers could have been very different – who knows?  

Ian is survived by his wife, Christine and three sons Richard, Andrew and Julian - his life and lifelong passion for organ and choral music especially that written by J.S. Bach were celebrated in his funeral service in Elston Church in January 2021.

Richard S Paden

OH 1949 -1959