Memories: Mick Jagger loathes his old headmaster

Mick Jagger (of Rolling Stones fame) retains a special loathing for his headmaster at Dartford Grammar School. He was an iron-fisted disciplinarian, he tells Nigel Williamson in an interview in April 2000.

Even 40 years on Mick Jagger retains a special loathing for his old headmaster. “He was called ‘Lofty’ Herman and he was a classic short person. He was an iron-fisted disciplinarian, totally cold and unapproachable,” he says with a lingering resentment.

Yet it was not only Lofty who dished it out. “Every master had his own tortures. There were some who would just punch you out. They’d slap your face so hard you’d go down. Then there was the ear torture. They would drag you up to the front of the class and lecture you while twisting your ear the whole time. You’d feel it for the rest of the day and your ear would be glowing red.”

The boys gave back as good as they got, according to Jagger. “There were guerrilla skirmishes on all fronts with civil disobedience and undeclared war, between them throwing blackboard rubbers at us and us throwing them back.

“There were paper darts, pea-shooters, catapults. It was like something out of a cartoon in a comic book. Some of them had better ways of dealing with it than others and the sports masters were OK. But the rest were terrible. We were at complete war with them.”

I tell him that the school prospectus today emphasises self-discipline. “That’s wonderful. I think it changed in the Sixties  when they stopped having so much corporal punishment. There was a whole culture of violence.

“It was fear and loathing in North Kent and we didn’t make their lives any easier. It was terrible what we did, really. Even the ones who were OK got caught in the crossfire. The behaviour patterns were entrenched. We just abused them all, whether they were decent or not.”

Extracted from the Irish Independent (Dublin), 1 April 2000.

Picture of Mick Jagger in his school uniform: credit unknown.

For more True Memories, click here

Traditional School Discipline

Traditionalschooldiscipline@gmail.com