Memories of a spelling test 1955 Junior block English class, teacher Terry Walsh, 26 boys arranged in five rows.
Sitting towards the back in the row by the window was David Pearson. I think his father was somehow connected with the army because David had a tank spotter scope resting on the window sill, which he used to read the names on the Pullman cars of The Golden Arrow which would steam past sometime after 11am from Victoria heading to Dover. Towards the end of the period Terry sprang a spelling test. We all took a fresh sheet of paper and entered our names and date. He read out 20 words with precise deliberation. At the end of the test the papers were handed down to the front of each row and collected by Terry. The papers were to be marked and returned at the next English class. At the beginning of the subsequent class the papers were distributed to each of the students. However, Terry was left with one blank sheet of paper which he held up to display. ‘D’ (name withheld to protect the guilty party), he said, ‘By a process of elimination this must be your submission. The page is completely blank. You haven’t even put your name or date on it. Can you explain why?’ ‘D’, who sat second from the front in the row by the window said, ‘Yes, sir. When we started the test my pen had run out and I didn’t have time to refill it. My pencil broke as you can see when I started to print my name, and we are not allowed to use biro, so I used my thumbnail. If you hold the paper up to the light, or shade it with a pencil ...’ At this stage, the whole class, including Terry, were having convulsions. Thanks to Terry, I believe that 80% of the laughter along the upper floor corridor in that year came from this 1D class. At one stage Terry even asked the class to keep a lid on the laughter as he was receiving bad press in the Masters’ common room.
Geoff Maile (55–62)
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