GPS schools held their annual regatta in April every year on the Nepean River. Following the British tradition, GPS stands for Great Public Schools although they were all, with the exception of Sydney Boys High, private schools charging big fees. As Penrith High School was a state school, it was not included in this category although we all thought that it was pretty great.

Remarkably, very few Penrith children went to a private school. Parents at every income level either sent their child to a state-run school or to a school in the Catholic education system.

The GPS boys and their families would flock to the river to see which school won the rowing eights and became the Head of the River as the championship was called. As High Street was then part of the Great Western Highway, they had to drive through town in their buses and private cars with their school colour ribbons attached to their vehicles, giving the old school cries. We were accustomed to our own conservative school uniforms, so straw boater hats and military uniforms on schoolkids seemed a bit odd to us.

Most of the town gathered along the road to watch the passing traffic. There was still a sectarian divide in Penrith in those days so a few of the believers, even though they may not have had a son in a GPS school (then all male) would get over-enthusiastic. The Catholics in that category would cheer one of the Catholic private schools – Joeys or Riverview – and the Protestants barracked for Protestant schools like Shore or Scots, even adopting the colours of that particular school. The rest of us didn’t give a damn and just jeered and hooted.

The procession of vehicles generally took a couple of hours and for most residents that was the end of it. Spectacle over! However, some of the wealthier families who lived in Nepean Avenue which fronted the river held house parties and watched the boat races over cucumber sandwiches and a glass of champagne, or so I imagined. As probably did the poorer plebs who lived across the river in Emu Plains, but with a Sargent’s Pie and a Toohey’s New instead.

The more aggressive youths in our community carried on the day by going down to the spectator stands along the river and trying to start a fight with some private school boys, while the bolder girls paraded along the stands hoping to attract the attention of a boy with nobler blood than the locals. These endeavours were mostly unsuccessful.

They still hold the Head of the River each year in Penrith but I suspect that the locals now have more things to interest them than to stand on the footpath watching cars carrying people they don’t know to an event that few of them care about.

Still, in those days, anything happening outside the ordinary was a big event for us.