“Until 1935 this School could pride itself upon rapid and healthy internal development. Now it begins to extend its influence into the outer world, for the Phoenicians will carry its spirit to a diversity of occupation. The Society was founded on February 18th at a happy meeting in the School. Hall A party of forty boys and girls with five of the staff spent a delightful week of the Easter holidays in Germany, under Mr. Barbanel’s leadership. Two parties of the Literary Society went to see the offices and press of the Daily Sketch, an ex­perience that everyone else envied.”

Regarding "...the delightful week...in Germany" (remember this was 1935), the following are extracts from the article written on the subject by P. Woodham (4A, Spartan) at the time.

Easter Week in Germany, 1935
“It was dark before we reached our first stop, Aachen, where we saw our first Nazis. We arrived at Cologne about 11 p.m. where we caught a local train that got to Königswinter, our destination, at 12.30 a.m. Königswinter was a delightful place, nestling between the Seven Hills and the Rhine. When we arrived many flags were hanging out to celebrate Hitler’s birthday, and the streets looked very picturesque...
We were impressed by the friendliness of the German people, and most of us made friends with sone German boys and girls. On Saturday morning we had a very interesting talk on Nazism by Herr Kamp, a local Nazi official and tourist agent. He showed us national socialism from the German point of view, a change after reading some English newspapers. Of course, he left out the unpleasant side of Nazism, but he referred to Germany’s right to re-arm.”



“THE PHOENICIANS”
“Drayton Manor School until recently lacked something that is essential to the life blood of any good school-namely a strong body of old pupils. But now we have an ever-growing number of old boys and old girls, who have taken a very wise step by forming an association.
Why did they call themselves “The Phoenicians ?“ In the first place they re­jected any name like “The Old Alsatians”, because in this age of wireless, people who call themselves old anythings are likely to be called cads. Secondly, “Drayton Manor Old Pupils’ Association” could hardly be used by spectators at one of their football matches-it was too big a mouthful. Thirdly, although Athsparotro was suggested as a euphonious blend of House names, it was rejected because it was too strongly reminiscent of a vegetable. “The Phoenicians” was chosen because it bears some relation to our House names, and is easily remembered, said, shouted and printed.”