Both Tony and Geoff were the brain boxes of the family, as they passed the examination that allowed them to go to the local Grammar School.
I also passed the entrance examination but there were not enough places to cover all the entrants, so I stayed at the school I was at.
I went to St Joseph's RC School that was situated at the top of the hill known as Holloway. I went to this school because my mother said they gave the better education than the local infant school.
I started school at the start of the school year in September 1948 and I loved my years at St Joseph's because the majority of the teachers were Nuns from the local Nunnery. Sister Scholatisca was the Head Mistress of the school, and she was what you would call on the 'large' size, and I can still visualise her sweeping into the classrooms with her black habit flowing around her.
Of course in 1948 people did not drive their children to school as they do now, so we all walked to school. We didn't think anything about the distance and we did this in all types of weather. It used to take me about 20 minutes to walk the mile and a half to school.
This walk took us along the Bristol Road towards Malmesbury, down a large hill, passing Westhill House in its grounds on our right, with the Gaston's turning on the left. At the bottom on the hill we then had to walk up another steep hill towards what was known as The Triangle. Along this section of the walk we passed a small factory on our left, this belonged to Triumph, they made ladies underwear.
At The Triangle we took the road called Abbey Row and this took us pass a large posh 3 star hotel called The Old Bell Hotel, we then had a choice of ways to go. Malmesbury Abbey was next to the Bell Hotel and we could follow a back path around the back of the Abbey and this would bring us out at a small square, to get to school we would turn left here and follow this path which led between some house and this would bring us out onto a main road, we then only had to cross this road, of course this road didn't have as much traffic as it would today, when we got across this road we turned followed the pavement to our left and the school was just around the corner.
As I said if we didn't go around the back of the Abbey we followed the pavement to our right and then cut through what is known as Bird Cage Walk. This path cut between to Abbey grounds in the front and a large Steeple, which is the only part, left of the original parish church adjacent to the Abbey. This walk brought us out onto the Market Cross; you then went across the Market Cross and followed the road that led round to the School.
I believe my love of learning stems from my years at St Joseph's, because all of the teacher's had such enthusiasm and dedication for their subjects that it was passed down to us. I was never too keen on physical exercise, although I did attain the honour of being included in the Netball Team.
St Joseph's covered all the basic subjects that were needed to give us a good education and their methods were such that I don't think they had many failures.
The only downside, as far as I was concerned, was we had to attend the local RC Church for special services. This church was connected to our school by way of a path that went behind all the houses until you got to the church.
When I became 13 I was moved from the main school building itself, to an annex, this annex was situated in an old house in a small road just off the Cross Hayes car park. The rooms where the classes were held had very high ceilings with rafters. In those years, we didn't have biro's, we used ink pens. Our desks had glass inkwells sunk into the tops of the desks. It was the monitor's job to ensure these inkwells were filled every day.
The ink pens we used were very basic, just a wooden handle like a pencil with a metal nib at the end. They made great darts, and we used them to good effect throwing them up into the rafters. Because we were grown up enough to be allowed to use ink pens, this meant that we were issued with blotting paper. If you tore a corner of the blotting paper off and dunked this into the inkwell, it could be rolled up and thrown at a child or person whose attention you wanted to get. It was splodgy and wet and made an awful mess of your clothes.
I stayed at St Joseph's until the summer after my 14th birthday.
I had decided on a career as a secretary so was enrolled at Swindon Technical College, and started there in the September of 1958. I did what was known as a 2-year full time secretarial course, leaving Swindon Technical College in the 1960 with all the relevant qualifications needed.
In my time at St Joseph's during the 1950's there was an eclipse of the sun. I can remember we all went out into the playground and were given a piece of Mica. Mica is a piece of tinted rock formed mineral material that was used as an insulator in electric's and a substitute for glass.
We held this Mica up to our eyes so as we could observe the moon eclipsing the sun.
Apart from the usual lessons we had, Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic, we also did History, Geography and Religious Studies. We were also encouraged to do Physical Exercises as well as Country Dancing. Our own classroom teacher gave these Country Dancing lessons with the assistance of a special education programme for country dancing on the wireless.
The wireless was also used to give us singing lessons. These singing lessons were of old sea shanties and country songs etc. One of the ones I remember was called 'Who is Sylvia' as well as 'Blow The Wind Southerly' One of the most popular radio-singing teachers at the time was a famous Operatic Contralto singer Kathleen Ferrier. She had a beautiful deep voice and I can still hear her singing these lovely old time songs.
We had many lessons via the wireless on different subjects.
