Pamela Chesters (Class of 1974)

GWLC

Number 5, George Sq. ( note to you budding historians, the University has renumbered the Square and they call it Number 7, but it’s the same building so when you look at old records be mindful that building numbers can be changed!)

The building was actually three large private houses linked together. I believe they were not all bought at the same time. When my mother was a pupil the whole school was at George Square but then St Albans Road was opened for the Nursery to Primary 5. ( although in those days P1-5 was called , Preparatory – classes d and c being P1, classes b and a being P2 and then Lower junior school – classes 1a and 1b, being P3, classes 2a and 2b being P4 and classes 3a and 3b being P5)

By the late 1960s George Square held about 700 pupils – primary 6 had 3 classes of 33 pupils and so broadly there were a 100 in each year thereafter till 5th and 6th year when some girls left early. Partly because a number of us had sisters in different years we knew many pupils by name so it felt a friendly place.

Prayers happened every morning. You can see Miss Fleming, the Head in this picture at the lectern – the 6th form stood behind her, 4th and 5th on the sides of gallery with senior choir standing opposite the head. Under where the head is standing was the orchestra and then primary 6 through to 3rd year with middle school choir (S1-S3 at the very back. All the female teachers stood either behind the 4th and 5th year or at the sides of the years downstairs. The male teachers – and there were only 4 in my time, stood behind the 6th year. They processed in, behind the Head, every morning. (so much for equality of status!)

To the right of Miss Fleming, as you look at this, there is a panel between the second and third window which was a notice board with the names of all the Heads since the school opened and between windows one and two and three and four are actually two long notice boards which listed all the duxes of the school - these all hang somewhere in Colinton Road. You can just see the top of the wooden chair which is now in Mr Roffe’s office behind window two. Also at Colinton Road is the wooden clock with “GWLC “embossed in gold paint. It was set in the gallery railing directly opposite the Head’s lectern.

The hall, which was actually at basement level, was just big enough to have a single badminton court – though visiting teams were always put off by the proximity of the pillars which held up the gallery. Many a shuttlecock got caught in the chandelier hanging from the ceiling and the panes of glass in the ceiling were prone to the odd leak.

The main door to the whole school was up a few stone steps from street level which took you on to the gallery ( roughly from where this photo must have been taken) but pupils were never allowed to use that except when with our parents or for the school dance. The rest of the time we had to use the stairs down to the basement where all the cloakrooms were.

Before the school existed as a school, this whole hall and gallery was actually a garden, (there was a reason why one building was built side on to the Square but I can’t remember now) the very elaborate stone doorway to the left of Miss Fleming, was the original entrance to the building . Immediately behind this was the infamous Tiled Hall. It was therefore not a hall in the sense of a large school hall but of an entrance hallway – probably not more than 20 foot square. Since the university took over the building it has changed as they put in a fire door but the very poor quality picture below was taken on my last day (1974) and shows the painting of Miss Ainslie – the first Head Mistress. If you were sent out of class you had to sit on the bench which would have been to the left of the big cupboard until the Head was free to see you.

Because the (I think) 3 original houses which make up the school were not all acquired at the same time the room numbering system was completely illogical. Going down one corridor the rooms numbered 7, 8 , 47, 48 , 49 making it difficult for new staff members to find their way.

There was no modern technology in the classrooms – just a conventional blackboard. This is a picture of Room 48 which looked onto the Square where Miss Nicol taught history.

I’m sure others will have told you about the Admirals Kitchen ( in the basement) and the Dark Passage off that - which was where many of the cloakrooms were – each form class having its own room with a peg for your coat and slipper bag ( as we were supposed to change from muddy outdoor to indoor shoes though in later years this was never enforced or checked by the time I got to senior school, and where we changed for gym, dancing etc. There was very little natural light in this area – hence the name. There is a debate as to whether the ghost – named the Grey Lady lived there or elsewhere in the building…..

We played games at Liberton. There were 4 excellent hockey pitches – flat and mainly well drained just off Double Hedges Road but now a housing estate. The pavilion had no electricity and consequently no hot water for showers etc and was lit with gaslighting which hung from the ceiling. We all played hockey in the winter with tennis and athletics in the summer. Primary 6 and 7 went back to St Albans Road for netball and rounders. It was possible to do some other sports - badminton, volleyball, fencing , sailing and there may have been others that I have forgotten.

St Albans Road was also three large houses – the first had the nursery – a single class of 20, normally all 4 year olds with a couple of 3 year olds who spent 2 years there . I remember my entrance test at age 3 where I was shown a variety of objects and asked what I would use them for, one was a penny (buying sweeties!) and one was a postage stamp. Then I was taken to another room where Miss Fleming and the St Albans Rd Head asked me if I knew my name and address and then I had to run round some tables in a particular order and then they asked me if I could read - and I remember thinking that I thought that is what I was coming to school to learn so instead I had to describe a picture.

The 2 buildings for P3 – 5 were linked together with a long enclosed corridor but the garden behind all three buildings was linked together albeit we played in separate areas.

The four houses: Falconhall, Melville, Lauriston and Greyfriars competed against each other in games, house choir and house drama etc. If you had a mother or an older sibling at the school you went into the same house as they had been in at the beginning of primary 3 ( so you can tell if you look at old photos of young pupils, if they had the school crest on their tunic and not a house badge , they were in P1 or P2.) Until about 1970 we did gym and dancing in dancing tunics with baggie matching pants – they were in house colours – see Melville below. After that we had to wear even less flattering leotards.

Lessons at George Square were every much of the chalk and talk variety. We did no Scottish history after we left St Albans Road and other than learning about the island of Foula, ( somewhat obscure it has to be said) no Scottish geography. While we studied 2 Shakespeare plays each year in senior school there was very little contemporary literature and none that I can remember by female writers. In modern languages, we were largely dependent on the class teacher to teach us the right pronunciation as there were no language labs etc although a trainee teacher from the appropriate country was recruited each year to help with conversational language. These were always young women except one never to be forgotten year when a German male assistant was recruited. Tall and blond, on his first day, when he processed into Prayers with the other male teachers, and audible murmur went round the assembled masses. Needless to say the following year all the language assistants were female.

We also knew very little about our teachers, their lives, interests etc and views on anything other than the subject they were teaching. The vast majority of them were unmarried. Consequently they seemed rather distant. The standard of teaching was variable – a few were inspirational and at the other end of the scale, some struggled to maintain much discipline – which may account for the hordes of girls who were sent out of class for largely minor misdemeanours and ended up in the Tiled Hall. While occasionally HM Inspectorate came to check the standard of teaching (and we were always told they were there to assess us not the staff) I don’t recall a single occasion when the Head of Dept sat in on a lesson being taken by one of their staff. Apart from the PE staff, there was minimal interaction with staff outside the school day except for the 2 week outward bound course we went on at Ardrostan ( on Loch Earn) which some staff members also helped on.

Miss Fleming, didn’t take any classes and I have no idea what she thought was important or unimportant. She did smoke like a chimney in her office (though nowhere else that I was aware of) While I understand she supported the idea of co – ed education there wasn’t any visible preparation from the pupils perspective which is perhaps surprising as the primaries merged the year after I left and the senior school the years after that. The only real organised meeting was the ballroom dancing classes when the boys or girls in S6 were bussed across to the other school – and a hideously embarrassing eyeing up of the opposite talent then occurred before the dancing lessons began.

There was very limited careers advice – one on the English teachers was responsible for this and kept various prospectuses for the Scottish universities – the assumption seemed to be you would ether go to a Scottish university ( of which there were only 8 at that time) or train to be a teacher or a nurse. I remember she gave the whole class a talk on possible careers once, starting with A for actuaries and accountants. It wasn’t a success and at no time were people invited into school to talk about what they did in their jobs.

There were a number of charities that the school supported. In no particular order : there was a collection for the Lord and Lady Polwarth Children’s Home every Christmas where we donated old toys and we also knitted baby clothes. It was displayed on the gallery and there was a house competition for the best display. We also knitted woollen squares to make up blankets for the poor in Africa. We also sponsored an animal at Edinburgh Zoo – Joey the penguin in my time which we were taken to visit while at St Albans Road.

There weren’t many excursions – apart from the zoo we were taken to Edinburgh castle and Holyrood while at St Albans Road. And Linlithgow Palace, Dalmeny Church and Cairnpapple in P 6 & 7 and there was a French and German exchange in Senior school ( 5th year?)

When we were in 6th year we were taken to the High Court to see justice in action and we also had one lesson a week on current affairs, taken by one of the history teachers but as I recall it was more about how government worked rather than a debate about the social issues of the day. Scottish Regionalisation came in about that time and some of us were sent to the Edinburgh City Council for a cross Edinburgh schools discussion about it. The absence of social media almost certainly contributed to us being less well informed than today’s pupils. And some of today’s issues such as BLM or climate change were less well understood. It’s also worth pointing out that we were a much less diverse community then than now- in my whole time I can only remember one pupil of African descent ( who was adopted and had white siblings at school ) and one Asian girl. There was an element of pupil engagement via the Captains Court where Miss Fleming met the class captains en masse – I think termly, but it was rather more one way communication than what I would say was a genuine interest in what we thought could be done to improve things at the school.

Finally one thing all girls will remember is the annual closing (and prize giving) concert – held in the Usher Hall which could fit almost all the senior school in the seating behind the organ and was a mixture of choral and orchestral work performed by the various choirs and school orchestra. We marched in and out to a tune which for many is almost as iconic as the school hymn and definitely contributed to a feeling of being part of a bigger community.

Pamela Chesters née Beveridge (Class of 1974)