Corporal punishment survey 69

About You:
Gender: Male
Approximate age when punished: 12
Approximate year of punishment: 1963
Crime committed or alleged: sent out of class for punching another boys arm

About the punishment
Administered by Head, or Staff member: Headmaster
Gender of staff member: male
Location punished (Classroom, Office, Hallway etc): Main Hall
Type of punishment (Cane,Slipper,Paddle etc): Cane
Number of strokes: 6
Applied to (Hand, Bottom, Legs etc): bottom
Position adopted (Standing, Bending over Chair, Desk etc): over desk
State of dress (Over Trousers/Skirt, panties, bare etc): caned across school shorts
Privacy (In private, In front of Class, With another teacher etc): In private
Given a note to take home to be signed by my father. Very effective punishments.

About You:
Gender: Male
Approximate age when punished: 12
Approximate year of punishment: 1980
Crime committed or alleged: Found out that I threw a stink bomb in the yard at break.

About the punishment
Administered by Head, or Staff member: Head of year.
Gender of staff member: Male
Location punished (Classroom, Office, Hallway etc): His Office
Type of punishment (Cane,Slipper,Paddle etc): Pump (Plimsoll)
Number of strokes: 4 or 5
Applied to (Hand, Bottom, Legs etc): Bottom
Position adopted (Standing, Bending over Chair, Desk etc): Over desk.
State of dress (Over Trousers/Skirt, panties, bare etc): Over school trousers,Blazer off.
Privacy (In private, In front of Class, With another teacher etc): Private

About the school Mixed Sec Mod
Name of School:
Town: Accrington
Country: England

Effectiveness
Were you ever punished again for the same offence?: No
Do you consider the punishment effective: Yes.

I remember thinking I was going to get away with an almighty telling off and detention for a week, when he reached into his drawer to produce an old whiteish plimsoll with no laces and my heart sunk. He whacked extremely hard and from my reactions knew it had hurt! That was luckily the only slippering I got at that school.

About You:
Gender: M
Approximate age when punished: 13
Approximate year of punishment: 1978
Crime committed or alleged: throwing a pop can off a stadium wall hitting another student on a field trip

About the punishment
Administered by Head, or Staff member: vice-principal
Gender of staff member: M
Location punished (Classroom, Office, Hallway etc): His office after we got back from trip and after school was done
Type of punishment (Cane,Slipper,Paddle etc): since it was my 3rd offense  that year(warned next serious one would be strap) and the seriousness of offense i received the strap instead of ruler( must people got ruler to hands for minor offenses)
Number of strokes: 5
Applied to (Hand, Bottom, Legs etc): bottom
Position adopted (Standing, Bending over Chair, Desk etc): bending over desk
State of dress (Over Trousers/Skirt, panties, bare etc): over underwear
Privacy (In private, In front of Class, With another teacher etc): private…no other staff was there, my friend who was with me had already gone in and left the school..he only got ruler

About the school
Name of School: Laurentian
Town: Kitchener
Country:Canada

Effectiveness
Were you ever punished again for the same offence?: No.. i was banned from any more field trips for rest of year, but did get discipline once more that year
Do you consider the punishment effective?: yes..i was trying to act cool with my friend and realized it was just stupid

Any other relevant info: a note went home and had to be signed…of course i got a bigger strapping at home because of it all

kevinont

Do you remember what type of underwear you were wearing?  I would imagine that the strap over loose shorts would have been less effective than over briefs.
Was it a  Lochgelly type tawse or an ordinary belt?

To be honest i dont remember the belt other then it hung there, it was black and was bigger then a pant belt and was designed for punishment so not a belt for pants if that makes sense , we didn’t have tawse in Canadian schools i believe or that i ever saw. That was the only time i received the strap to bottom in school, rest were ruler to hands or bottom. The strapping at  home were traditional pant belt and underwear never stayed up. I know back in those days there was no boxers and stuff they wear today, but i wore normal cut underwear, 1970’s early 1980 era, and i wore a  lot of super hero prints lol

Thanks for the details. Interesting to get a new perspective especially from a Canuck!

No problem, sorry i could not remember all the specific details, the memory of it all is like yesterday, the strap and my underwear not so much (although i do remember the underwear i had at the time, weird memory!)

Hello kevinont,

You may possibly not be aware that our contributor HH is something of an expert on Canadian school straps and is the author of a definitive study of the subject.  There is a great deal on the subject of these straps and their use to be found here.  A few threads as an introduction for those interested, listed in chronological order of origin:

• School strapping in Canada
• Canadian and Scottish Strap Comparison
• Canadian School Strap Scenes

The latter is extensively illustrated, though the occasional picture is no longer accessible.

Canada seems to have been very much inclined to use the strap for corporal punishment.  Not only was this the norm in schools, but also in prisons and penitentiaries.   In judicial detention facilities erring prisoners were subjected to the indignity of being secured on a restraint apparatus and beaten on the bare buttocks, most usually with a leather strap with a handle.  A punishment only abolished for male offenders in 1972 and used on a number of unfortunate women inmates  following a prison riot as late as 1948.

In schools however the straps were usually made from industrial conveyor belt type material (essentially textile reinforced rubber) to various standard approved dimensions and used on the hand.  There are a number of pictures in the third thread linked above (and I think even more contributed by HH in yet another thread, which I regret that I have been unable to locate

You are not alone in reporting being strapped on the bottom rather than the hand, and with adjustment of clothing involved.  In the thread Spanking in Canadian school (early 1970’s)  there are various claims including  those by contributor Cameron that he was strapped on the bottom with his trousers down in a Canadian school and also that his sister and two friends were strapped on the bare at school a few years earlier.

thanks i will look at the links and i knew about the straps in the schools but it was so rare they were used and even rarer for anybody to admit to it

I thought the Canadian strap was only ever used across the backside. In the film the culprit has it across his hand in a similar procedure to that used in Scotland.