TGS 120 Chapter Mary Kemp, pupil at TGS from 1951 to 1957

My family

Prior to my arrival in October 1940, my parents, who were both born before the beginning of the 20th century, had 3 sons: Sid was born in 1919, Edgar in 1921 and Vic in 1927. It was somewhat of a shock to my mother to find herself pregnant again in 1940, at the age of 45, 13 years after her last child was born and right after the start of the Second World War.

At the time of my birth, my eldest brother, Sid, had already left home to serve in the Army. Sid married in May 1941 and never returned to live with us.

My second brother, Edgar, was still at home in October 1940, but left when he was called up to the RAF in July 1941. He used to come home when he was on leave until he got married in 1944. This just left my youngest brother, Vic, and myself living with my parents.

When the Blitz began in September 1940, the family was living in Six Bells Lane in Sevenoaks, Kent, under one of the flight paths used by the German bombers to reach central London and the London docks. 

My father was a private gardener who had been working for the Constant family since 1925, first at Ightham Court and then in Sevenoaks. The house where we lived in Six Bells Lane was provided by the Constant family as ‘tied accommodation’ as part of my father’s employment.

I attended Lady Boswell’s C of E Primary School from 1945 to 1951.

Taking the Scholarship Test

To be offered a place at a Grammar School, pupils in their final year at Junior School had to pass a Scholarship Test, often simply referred to as the ‘Scholarship’. To determine who would take the Scholarship, we sat various tests in English, Maths and general intelligence at the beginning of that school year. Children who weren’t selected, or who ended up not passing the Scholarship, would go on to a Secondary Modern. In Sevenoaks, the girls’ Secondary Modern was called Hatton Secondary School for Girls and the boys’ Secondary Modern was called Wildernesse School in Seal Hollow Road. 

Four girls, including myself, sat the Scholarship at Lady Boswell’s C of E Primary School in early 1951; I don’t remember if any boys also took the test that year. To give us a quiet environment, the rest of the children had the day off! I remember that we had to sit various tests in verbal and non-verbal reasoning, as well as Maths and English papers. English had always been my weakest subject. In the essay paper, one of the options was to write about what you wanted to be when you grew up – not having much of an idea about any future job prospects, I wrote that my aim was to work in Woolworths! But I obviously did well enough overall and I passed the test, and so did the other three girls. My parents and my brother Vic, who were always very supportive, were very pleased for me.

In the Sevenoaks area, there were two Grammar Schools for girls: Walthamstow Hall in Sevenoaks and Tonbridge Girls’ Grammar School. Walthamstow Hall was mainly a fee-paying private school with a mix of boarders and day girls, and rumours were that the scholarship girls were not made very welcome. So, not surprisingly, all four of us put Tonbridge Girls’ Grammar School as our first choice. Before our places were confirmed, we had an interview with Miss Arnold, the Head Mistress, during the Easter holiday, and all four of us were offered places. The legal school leaving age was 15 years but you had to be 16+ to take the external exams, so, in accepting a place, our parents had to certify that we would not leave school before our 16th birthday, to ensure we would stay long enough to take the external exams.

Later, the Scholarship was renamed and called the 11 Plus. This confused me for a while and I thought I had missed out on an important examination as I was only 10 years old when I took the Scholarship in early 1951. The reason for this was the fact that Kent County Education Authority, quite unusually, used the calendar year, not the academic year, to decide when you started school. As my birthday was in October, I was always one of the younger ones in my year, and already started my first year at Tonbridge Girls’ Grammar School when I was still ten.

Tonbridge Girls’ Grammar School

There were two ways to travel from Sevenoaks to Tonbridge – by train or by bus. The railway station at the north edge of Sevenoaks was nearly a mile away from my home near St Nicolas Church at the other end of town. Luckily for me this was where the regular bus service ran, so this was my choice of travel. The scheduled bus left Sevenoaks at just before 8am, arriving at Tonbridge around 8.30am. The buses were green double decker London Country buses. There were no special school buses then.

The catchment area for the school was extensive; from Ide Hill in the west across to Goudhurst in the east and from Otford in the north to Southborough in the south. As a result, generally speaking the girls did not form close friendships, because it was nearly impossible to meet up after school using public transport.

Pupils who lived more than 3 miles away from school were entitled to a free travel pass. As it’s about nine miles from Sevenoaks to Tonbridge, I didn’t have to pay for my journey to and from school.

In Tonbridge, you got off the bus at the south end of the High Street near the railway station. From here, you had to walk for about 20 minutes up Pembury Road until you reached Deakin Leas where the entrance to the school was. Once inside the entrance you walked up the driveway, past an open grass meadow to the right, towards the school buildings on the hill above.  

There was a mixture of school buildings on the site. The main, red-brick school building was finished in late 1913, with the ground floor built into the hillside so there were different levels.

On the ground floor was a gymnasium, a needlework room and a teaching kitchen. On the upper floor, there were 6 classrooms which were used for both teaching and as a classroom base for each of the forms. It was in these form rooms that the register was taken each day. For many of the lessons, you remained in your form room and the teachers changed rooms. There were also two teaching science rooms equipped with gas Bunsen burners and a library on the upper floor.

Over the years, six more classrooms and an assembly hall had been added to the front of the original building. To the side, two additional classrooms were added which were always regarded as a temporary addition. 

Subsequently, a block including a kitchen and a dining hall was built for school dinners, where all members of the school could have dinner together. But as the number of girls continued to increase, some parts of this building were converted into two further classrooms. As a result, there had to be two sittings for dinner.    

Every pupil had to pay one shilling (10p) for each school dinner. The dinner money for the week ahead was collected in cash every Monday by our form mistress. We all wore a cross body small purse where we would keep our dinner money, travel passes and often a hankie. At the time, society was almost entirely cash based and the majority of people did not have a current account with a cheque book. If you wanted to send a payment to someone else, the usual method was to use a postal order. You purchased a postal order for any specific amount at the Post Office and then posted it to the payee, so that they could cash it in at another Post Office. No debit or credit cards in those days!

All the text books and exercise books were provided by the school, as well as pencils, pens and ink. The text books were passed from one class to the next; you would write your name in the front and were responsible for keeping them in good condition for the next pupil. We each had our own desks in our form rooms, where we would keep our text and exercise books, pens and pencils. The desks did not have locks, but there was never an issue with things going missing.

We were divided into 6 houses for sporting purposes. The houses were named after famous women – Beale, Browning, Fry, Nightingale, Slessor and Somerville. I was in Nightingale.

There were many sports on offer: in winter it was hockey and netball, in summer tennis, cricket and rounders, as well as some athletics such as running and high jump.  Even though the school grounds covered 19 acres, including an open-air theatre stage, there was no swimming pool. For swimming classes, we had to go to the outdoor pool in Tonbridge. To minimise the amount of time travelling, all swimming classes were at 9am. If you could not already swim, it was very difficult to learn it during these classes, especially on cold early May mornings. Luckily, I had already learnt to swim at Sevenoaks Swimming Club, so this was not an issue for me.

In 1954, there were around 430 pupils at Tonbridge Girls’ Grammar School and 30 full-time staff. The girls were divided into 16 forms with 3 smaller sixth forms, meaning that there were approximately 25 girls in each form.

1951/2 – first year

The fact that Kent used the calendar year to determine when you started school meant that children born between 1st of September and 31st of December were still under the age of 5 when they started Primary School.

Tonbridge Girls’ Grammar School dealt with the considerable age gaps within a year group by dividing the first-year girls into 3 forms; forms 1A and 1B included all the girls whose birthday was before 1st of September, split alphabetically. Form 1C was for the girls whose birthday was on or after 1st of September. I was born in October, so I was put in form 1C. This arrangement was reflected on the term report given for each girl. For the Autumn term for 1951, my age is shown as 11 years 2 months and the average age for all the girls in the form is also shown as 11 years 2 months. Later, in year 3, when the forms were mixed according to ability and to which languages you studied, I am younger than the average age – on the term report for 3B my age is recorded as 13 years 5 months, and the average age as 13 years 11 months. 

I mostly enjoyed school, even though at times I found it quite hard work, particularly in the first year. I was not used to having to do homework in the evening.

Our mistresses were very welcoming, especially those for the first-year girls. I remember one icy morning in my first year, I slipped and fell on the pavement walking up Pembury Hill. When I arrived at school with a bloody knee, my form mistress Miss Hall bathed and cleaned it and put iodine on the wound – I remember this incident well because it was the first time I had iodine put on an injury, as my mother did not use it.

Miss Mallard taught history. She had a distinctive walk which we recognised as she was approaching the classroom. When we had an informal test about a homework in her lesson, she would walk into the classroom and drop the papers for the answers on the nearest desk saying ‘Question 1’, while she continued walking to the teachers’ desk. By the time all answer papers were finally distributed, she was onto question 3. Slightly unfair to the girls sitting in the back, but very good training – we learned to listen, remember the questions and start thinking about the answers all at the same time.

One morning in early February, we were told during lesson that we should go to the assembly hall at the end of our lesson, instead of going straight to lunch. Once we were all assembled, Miss Arnold addressed us and announced the death of King George VI. She told us that we had a new queen: Queen Elizabeth the Second, and that we were Elizabethans now.

1952/3 – second year

For the second year we stayed in the same forms.

The coronation of Queen Elizabeth the Second was in June 1953. To mark the occasion, the whole school went for a day trip to Windsor – on our own train! I remember that we were allowed to explore Windsor Castle in small groups, as they couldn’t keep us all together. 

Everyone was taught cookery for a minimum of one year. Some of us, myself included, continued it through to O/levels. In the first year, the lessons took place in the afternoon so that we could take the resulting dishes home on public transport. This could be quite a challenge if the dish included a sauce, as plastic containers with lids were not available; you had to try and bring a suitable receptacle from home.

In the subsequent years, the cookery lessons were in the morning, so we could eat the dishes we had prepared as our school dinner. This also meant that you learned how to plan and cook a meal in a given amount of time. We were taught how to cook meat, fish, eggs and vegetables and how to bake bread and cakes. As some rationing was still in place, we were also taught how to budget. The school provided the basic ingredients such flour, margarine and sugar. However, if there where special ingredients required, the girls were expected to bring them from home. We usually shared the provision of these ingredients; I was often able to contribute fruit and vegetables to the class as I had access to fresh produce from our home garden.

1953/4 and 1954/5 – third and fourth year

For the third year the forms changed and were made up according to ability and to which language we had chosen to study. All those who chose to study Latin were in form 3Aplha, those studying German and French in 3A, and the ones who continued only with French in 3B. I was not very good in French, so I did not choose to study an additional language in my third year and therefore went into form 3B. For Maths and French, however, we were ranked according to our ability, so you often ended up with different girls in those subjects. In each case, I was placed in Division 2.

As part of our general education, we were taken on visits to local manufacturers. We visited the Tonbridge Gas Works where town gas was manufactured. This was before the advent of natural gas.

We also visited a printer, where they used hot metal to set the type, a pastry maker and a cricket ball maker. While these visits were very interesting, they were not exactly helpful in preparing us for life after school, since these were not career choices open to girls. The only visit that provided us with an insight into a possible career for us was a visit to Pembury Hospital, and some of the girls did indeed wish to become nurses.

In science we were also taught about the Davy safety lamp for use in mines and the gravity fed hot water system in a house.

When my mother was in her teens, she had scarlet fever which developed into rheumatic fever which weakened her heart. By the time she was in her late fifties, she found it very difficult to walk up Six Bells Lane, which was very steep. My father therefore asked Miss Joan Constant, his employer, if the family could move to another property. Miss Joan decided to build a new house for us on a piece of land she owned behind the High Street. This house was called Sycamore Cottage and we moved there in late November 1953. On the day of the move, I went to school as usual from Six Bells Lane and came home to Sycamore Cottage.

Trip to Paris and Tours

To improve our French, we had a connection with a girls’ school in Tours, France, and many of us exchanged regular letters with pen friends from that school.

In addition, a trip to Paris was offered during the Easter holidays in the 4th form. This was arranged by our French teacher Miss Moore, and in Spring 1955 my parents agreed that I could take part. I told my pen friend Marie Therese about this trip in one of my letters to her. Not really expecting that this would happen, I suggested that we could meet in Paris. A little later a long letter in French arrived from her parents to my parents inviting me to visit them in Tours for the rest of the Easter holidays. I had to get the letter translated in school. Marie Therese’s parents explained that they did not have room for me in their flat, but that a lady who lived nearby and who spoke English would be happy to provide me with a bedroom and breakfast each morning. My parents gave permission for me to travel to Tours from Paris and stay there for the rest of my Easter holiday, from 13th until 25th April. Miss Moore replied to the family in Tours to arrange all the details.

15 girls and two teachers went to Paris that year. We travelled from Tonbridge to Newhaven by train and then took the cross-channel ferry to Dieppe. From there we went by train to Paris. On the way, we saw many crucifixes at road junctions. We stayed in a hotel in the Montparnasse area which did not have a restaurant, so we went to a nearby restaurant for our meals. There was a group from a boys’ school in Hayes Middlesex using the same restaurant.

We had to go to a bank to change our travellers cheques into French francs. Due to the parlous state of the economy after the Second World War, there was a monetary limit on how much money you could exchange into foreign currency. I think that the annual limit in 1955 was £100 for an adult and £50 for a child. Each exchange of English currency had to be recorded in your passport.

We visited all the main sites in Paris, including taking the lifts to the top of the Eiffel Tower, visiting Sacre Coeur, L’Arc de Triomphe and Les Invalides. We also went on a day trip to Versailles. On Saturday, there was a reception in the Hotel de Ville for all the English school children visiting Paris. A photograph of each school group was taken on the steps of the Hotel de Ville; it’s interesting to see that we were the only group wearing our everyday clothes, and that all the other children were in their school uniforms. It is also noticeable, in line with what was the fashion in those days, that we were all wearing hats and skirts; not one of us is wearing trousers.

For most of us, this was our first visit to another country – overseas holidays were very unusual at the time – and the time we spent in Paris was very enjoyable and very exciting. But it did not really improve our French, as we were mainly speaking English!

The rest of the party travelled back home after the week in Paris while I embarked on my solo trip to Tours – in a country I didn’t know and to stay with people I had never met before! It was quite daunting to say the least. Our French mademoiselle took me to the Gare d’Austerlitz to make the three-hour train journey to Tours. The Giquel family consisted of Monsieur and Madame, their grown-up son Jacques, their daughter and my pen friend Marie Therese and their 7-month-old baby son Jean Pierre. They were very friendly and welcoming. On my first afternoon in Tours, to make me feel at home, Marie Therese took me to an English Tea Shop for afternoon tea and cakes. I had to explain that I did not like tea or milk and did not drink it at home – not a typical English girl of the time!

Jacques and Marie Therese spoke some English but most of the conversations were in French. I attended school with Marie Therese and tried to help with their English lessons, but I’m not sure that it was much of a success.

I visited some of the local chateaus including Langeais, Villandry and Ambroise and various sites in Tours. During my stay in Tours, there was a fire in a small local hotel where some English students were staying; 4 of them died in that fire. This must have been upsetting news back home.

I met up with 2 older girls from my school while I was in Tours; they were also staying with families and we travelled back together via Paris. My brother met us with a car in Newhaven to drive us home. 

Unfortunately, Marie Therese never felt confident enough to come to England. Our friendship continued by letter for a time but we lost contact before we finished school. We did meet again in the 1970s, when I went to France with my then husband on a touring holiday, and one of the places we visited was Tours. 

My trip to Paris and Tours started my lifelong enjoyment of visiting other parts of the world – you can say I really caught a travel bug then. The visit also gave me more confidence in general and with my French, although I never fully felt comfortable speaking it.

Speech Day

Each year in late July, there was a Speech Day when all the exams passed and further education places achieved were honoured. 

Each year in July, pupils’ achievements – examinations, awards, form prizes, trophies and successes in further education – were honoured during Speech Day. The celebration included speeches and musical performances by the school orchestra and choirs.

Form Prizes were given to around half a dozen girls in each School Year. I’m not sure how the girls were chosen but I was awarded one of the Form III prizes in July 1954 and one of the Form IV prizes in 1955. You were asked to choose what book you would like as your prize up to a cost of 7 shillings and 6 pence (equal to 37.5 pence in decimal currency).

For my III Form Prize, I chose Unique to Australia which identified how Australia was different to the rest of the world. I chose this book because my father had been born in Sydney, Australia.

For my VI Form Prize, I chose a new edition of the Authorized Bible issued by The British & Foreign Bible Society. This may seem a strange choice, but it was a very interesting and unusual edition, showing the Bible as a great travel and history book with illustrations, maps and timelines.

Looking at the programme for Speech Day in 1954, it is very clear where the majority of girls went on to further education – teaching or nursing.  

1956 – GCE exams

Before I sat the GCE exams in the summer of 1956 I had had a few conversations with my Head Mistress Miss Arnold about my future.

There was no particular encouragement from any of the adults, including the teachers, for us grammar school girls to be aspirational in our career choices. In general, most girls were expected to marry and be financially supported by their husbands while running the home and having a family. The only exception was if you wanted to become a teacher; in this case you were considered for a course at a university. You would go on to study your chosen subject for 3 years, followed by a 4th year at a teacher training college.

Running a household required skill and knowledge, and all girls had to be taught how to cook and sew; hence these subjects were also included in our lesson plan.

In homes at that time, you had very few labour-and-time-saving devices like washing machines, dishwashers and vacuum cleaners. To do the wash for the whole family was time consuming and usually took one day a week. It all had to be done by hand, the only help being a hand-turned wringer to remove most of the water before the washing was hung up to dry. Few families owned a vacuum cleaner, so floors were usually covered in lino, which was easier to clean and cheaper than carpets. Most homes did not have refrigerators and it was necessary to shop for fresh food nearly every day.

Milk was delivered daily to the doorsteps of homes in pint-size glass bottles. The milk was transported from the milk depots at night by the milkmen, using motorised or electric vans called milk floats. When the milk bottle was empty, it was dutifully washed out and left on the doorstep for the milkman to collect on his next visit. Back at the depot the bottles were sterilised, filled with milk and delivered again. The milkman collected payment once a week using his notebook showing the milk that he had delivered. Milk was also sold in special diary shops attached to the milk depots.  The main suppliers of milk in our area were United Diaries (called UD) and the Co-op. We used the Co-op.

Bread was also delivered six days a week to homes in the later 1940s using small vans. 

Once most of the rationing restrictions were lifted, the Co-op also provided a delivery service for groceries, which my mother used. She would write a list of the supplies she wanted delivered in a small notebook, which was handed in at the shop. A couple of days later the requested items were delivered. The next time my mother went into the shop she paid for the previous delivery. 

The only career suggestion made to me by Miss Arnold was to study institutional management at a technical college. This qualification would have enabled me to run a large canteen at any of the factories, schools or offices, or in institutions such as hospitals and military facilities.

Looking back, I realise now that in making this suggestion Miss Arnold was well aware of the limited financial situation of my parents, and that they did not have sufficient income to support me for any length of time. Since 1945, further education was free for students, the fees were paid by your Local Education Authority. This included maintenance grants for other living expenses.  

Up to 1950, the external examinations taken were the School Certificate and the Higher School Certificate, which together were called the Matriculation. They were very demanding examinations; you had to pass in 5 subjects in one sitting for the School Certificate, and in 3 main subjects and 1 minor one for the Higher SC, again in one sitting. If you failed in one subject, you had to re-sit all of them again at the next sitting. You had to be over 16 to be able to sit the Matriculation.

In 1951, a new system of General Certificate of Education Examinations at O Level and A Level (ordinary and advanced level) was introduced. You didn’t have to sit them all at the same time and you only had to re-sit the ones you failed. The examinations were offered by two boards – the University of London board and a joint Oxford/Cambridge board. The results were given as fail, pass or distinction.

By 1955, the 16+ age restriction was removed, and in June/July 1956, I sat my O Levels in the General Certificate of Education (GCE). The results were not available until the middle of the summer holiday. In order to receive your results during the holidays, when the school was closed, you had to self-address and stamp a postcard, and write the subjects you had taken on the back. When the school received the results, they marked them as ‘P’ for Pass or ‘F’ for Fail next to your list of subjects and posted the card to you. Anyone looking at the card could see your results!

One of my chosen O Level-subjects was Domestic Science (Cookery). There were 3 elements to the GCE examination. The first element was a planning session when you selected from the options on the exam paper what you were going to cook in the practical exam. You had to list the ingredients and produce a timetable for the cooking session. About 2 weeks later you took the practical exam in which you actually cooked what you had set out in the planning session. External invigilators came to the school to supervise the practical exam and mark your finished dishes. Talking was not allowed during these practical exams. Finally, there was the theory paper which had questions about equipment and shopping patterns, cooking methods, menu planning, nutrition and ingredients. The practical and the theory exams were marked separately and you had to pass both elements.

My other subjects were Pure Mathematics, English Language, Geography and Religious Knowledge of which I passed Pure Mathematics, Geography and Religious Knowledge. To nobody’s surprise, I continued my love/hate relationship with English Language by failing this subject. It was more of a shock that I also failed my Domestic Science exam. It made me reconsider the previously suggested career and I wondered if it really was the right path for me. With hindsight, I think it was a sign that my heart was not in it.

You had the opportunity to retake any of the subjects you had failed in the autumn. In Domestic Science I had passed the practical but had failed the theory exam in the summer. It was agreed that I could retake the theory exam in the autumn and use the practical result from the summer. This time I passed.

I also resat the English Language exam but again failed.

1956/57 – lower sixth

As I was still only 15 years old in July 1956, and our parents had certified that we would not leave school before our 16th birthday, I had to stay to complete another year. We were only the second group that had completed our O Levels with some of us not being allowed to leave school yet, and so there were no lessons set for us.

A few of us expressed an interest in Maths, so we joined the A Level Maths course, even though we would not stay long enough to complete it. Other subjects which were introduced to us included Architecture and Greek Literature in Translation. In Architecture we studied Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Norman and English architecture. I found everything about this subject absolutely fascinating, and studying it in my final year at grammar school gave me a lifelong interest in architecture. In Greek Literature we studied both the Iliad and the Odyssey by Homer, Socrates and plays like the Medea. This subject also interested me greatly – and as was the case with Architecture, it has continued to do so to this day.

1957 – finishing school and starting employment 

After some more discussions with Miss Arnold about my future, it was suggested that I could try and find employment as a clerk with an insurance company in the City of London. This was something that suited me well; I was good at Maths and enjoyed the subject, and my failure in English Language meant it was unlikely that I would be considered for secretarial work. Miss Arnold had an application form for employment with Sun Life Assurance Society. I completed and posted off the form in January 1957 and was offered an interview at 63 Threadneedle Street in March 1957. I was offered employment starting in August 1957. I worked at Sun Life for 20 years; I was made redundant in 1977, when they moved Head Office to Bristol and I preferred to stay in London, where I found other employment.