Coley School – part 3 and final part
Mr Chandler had left that year to take over a new school at Southcote and our new headmistress was Miss Scoble. Miss Scoble was very fond of country dancing, and gave us a lesson once a week. We practised in the hall and as the music started she would shout out what steps we had to take and stamp time. She had the patience of a saint because we used to mess about although it was in a nice way. A couple of boys would get us laughing and like Charlie Welfare she had the hardest job to keep a straight face.
Once a year all the Reading schools gathered at Palmer Park for a mammoth country dancing event. Miss Scoble was very proud of us when we behaved ourselves and never put a foot wrong.
Leaving Coley was very hard. I shut myself in the toilet for hours after my last day there. The teachers, Miss ClemMurphy: Miss Inkley: Miss Austin: Charlie Welfare and Miss Scobles, stood head and shoulders above the staff at Alfred Sutton Girls which was my next school.
After 60 years I still say they were an impossible act to follow.