Memories Index

Mr Jacob Morgan, headmaster.
I had little contact with him in school until mid Form 4. It being war time, several of our masters had been called up for service and one of these was "Benny" Boulton who had taught us for one and a half years before he suddenly disappeared. For all his faults, which have been well documented, "Benny" was a capable teacher and under his guidance we prospered. Replacement must have been a tremendous problem, for "Jake" and some of the other teachers (of whom the best was Lewis Lewis) "covered" us for many weeks until we eventually got a new maths teacher. His name mercifully escapes me and his teaching methods were to prove not only odd but in truth disastrous. He was ancient in years and long retired but more importantly had never taught Maths. We wondered out loud whether he had ever taught anything. It was not until mid Form 4 that news of the shambles of mathematics in Form 4 filtered through to Jake.

He decided to put our Form to a test in arithmetic, algebra, geometry and trigonometry, set and marked by himself. Lyn and Llew were by far the best in maths in our form and later went on to 6^th Form in the subject but in Jake's test they came out on top all right but with marks such as 2%, 1%, 3% and 5%. I may be exaggerating slightly here but certainly no one exceeded 10%. My combined total for the 4 subjects was 2%. Jacob Morgan went ballistic. The geriatric teacher did not return next day; in fact I doubt if he lasted past lunch time. The result was that Jake who normally taught only Forms 5 and 6 took over for the remainder of our school days. It was a tribute to him that from that low point and with a little over a year to go before our CWB exams most of us performed well enough to gain "Credits" while Lyn. Llew and a few others achieved "Very Good" status.

During our second year at school, Jake asked our class how many of us could not swim. About a dozen of us put up our hands so Jake decided that he was going to teach us. He arranged to meet us at the river bank one evening and proceeded, sitting in the cool shade of a tree about 10 yards back from the river bank, to instruct us in the art of swimming. His preferred stroke was the fashionable (in the twenties) sidestroke and his orders were issued in a stentorian voice, which soon attracted a sizeable audience of passers-by. We had a lot of fun and so did they while Jake got red in the face and we thought that he was going to have a heart attack. I wasn't much of a swimmer before Jake's lessons and I wasn't much better after but the twenties sidestroke is still all I can perform in the water.

I liked Jake and he was very helpful to me in my school days and beyond and he and I corresponded for years especially after I emigrated to Australia. He was interested in my career, as no doubt he was of many others', but particularly my assimilation into a new Country and the problems of a country surgeon and the great distances involved in home visits and such like.

Mr Prosser Roberts
Mr Prosser Roberts taught me junior Welsh as well as PT. He could be irascible when roused and was not called 'Dragon" for nothing. This attribute caused me a considerable problem, as I had no wish to antagonise him unduly. However I was unable to avoid it and through no fault of my own. I would submit my Welsh homework to Mr Roberts who would correct and mark it. My father would then insist on checking my work (he being an accepted authority on the Welsh language) and would not only correct my work but also the corrections Mr Roberts had made. I was then expected to front up to Mr Roberts and "discuss" my father's comments. This situation occurred on a weekly basis with the only visible looser being me, although Dragon didn't come out of it too well either. My father was equally hard on both of us. Eventually I summed up the courage to seek a truce with both parties involved and it was agreed that my father would correct my work first before I submitted it to Mr Roberts. To be fair, Dragon quickly realised that neither he nor I was ever going to win and we both got on quite well thereafter.

Mr. Roberts had a legendary sense of hearing, it being said that he could hear the whispered voice at 100 paces. That was put to the test when we were sent out to dig trenches behind the school in case of air raids. After toiling valiantly for about an hour under a hot sun and the surveillance of Dragon, one of the boys, hidden out of site in a trench, called out in a voice that could be heard a mile away, "How about giving us a hand Mr Roberts?". Silence was the only answer. The trenches were a source of great interest and indeed were highly successful until it rained. Fortunately they were not ever really required.

Mr Lewis Lewis
"Lou Lou" or "Lousy" was our Geography Teacher but his teachings extended beyond his subject as it did with all the better teachers. He amazed me with his ability to draw a perfect circle. With a chalk in each hand, starting at 12 o'clock, he would draw two perfect hemispheres arriving together at 6

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