"ALL GIRLS TOGETHER"

[Angela Woodford]

I have to say, that personally speaking, I thought the housemistresses were FAR worse than DR! Think of Millie and Miss Storm, amongst others

But surely DR was responsible for the wardmistresses, and the infirmary, and all the teaching staff (including the needlework teacher), and the food? Knowing what's going on in every part of your school is essential for a good headteacher, I'd have thought.
quote]

I absolutely agree, but, after reading Half to Remember I realised that DR was appointed as a young, possibly naive, woman (who couldn't even cook, for goodness sake) with little to no experience of managing teenage girls and mature women. I suspect that she lacked self-confidence and was too immature to effectively run the school, and that little changed in the decades that she spent at Hertford.

I don't remember Miss Storm. Who was she?

Yes, DR was responsible. She must have known about the two incidents of the girls locked into the Maid's Room; isolated as some sort of bizarre punishment. Fiona Toplis knew this was for "rudeness", the other girl never knew what crime she had committed. DR must have known that Miss Richards was a terrible bad-tempered battleaxe, but did nothing. DR appointed various weird embittered women as Housemistresses - and I just don't believe that there weren't pleasant motherly understanding women around at that time. There have always been good women.

I felt sorry for DR in a way. She had no sensitivity to anybody's feelings. I laughed when Caroline remembered seeing her in Chapel with one seamed stocking and another completely different... I've gone out in odd socks myself. Cooking? I suppose an academic woman who'd always been catered for wouldn't have seen the need to cook for herself. But it was that awful culture of negativity that was so terrible. Once, when I'd been in for a DR House Interview and come out feeling that I must be the most wretched and stupid person ever - a failure in every way! - I saw a younger girl, who has been subsequently successful - storm out of the Housemistress's room. She was angry. DR, instead of discussing or encouraging her work, had spent fifteen minutes berating her for "selfishness". And telling a sensitive 12-year-old that she "came from bad seed" was atrocious.

Lacking in self-confidence? Maybe... she would have been if suddenly removed to the real world? Because she was in charge of an institution which was a world in itself, I felt that within the Hertford walls she was supremely confident. Her jowls would quiver as she would state "This is right!". For example, summoned to that daft anti-Tampax oration, nobody challenged her in her conviction that the vaginal introitus was "a ring muscle". (Ouch!) She was always the ultimate authority. DR laid down her laws with supreme confidence.

If only she'd been able to understand...stuff!

[J.R.]

It seems to me that the boys at Horsham had a far easier time than the girls at Hertford during the same period, (if you'll excuse the expression).

[kerrensimmonds]

Here we go again. Vilification of Miss West - even though the judgement is based upon today's standards. It is getting on for 70 years since she was appointed as Headmistress (OK, naieve, young, inexperienced) and nearly 40 years since she retired. I firmly believe that she did the best she could, within the mores of the time, when she was there. Some of her judgements would not be acceptable in this day and age, but this was a Long Time Ago.

[englishangel]

Was watching Graham Norton last night and he had Emilia Fox (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0288976/bio) on and they were playing a game called "I have never watched Star Wars" whereby people say they have not done something that most other people have done. Emilia said she had never cooked a real meal, though she could do a decent jacket potato. Her Dad (Edward Fox) had given her cookery classes for Christmas!