Derby Diocesan College: Girl students were locked in at dances so there was no hankey pankey

(Redirected from Girl students were locked in at dances so there was no hankey pankey)

With around 16,000 students, several campuses, a vast array of courses and the chance to enjoy a social life which has brought the city centre alive, Derby University is one of the most popular places to study for young people. But 50 years ago, it was a very different story, as Pat Parkin discovered from two former teachers who trained at one of the old colleges which was a forerunner of the University.

DERBY Diocesan College for the Training of School Mistresses was opened in 1851 in a formidable building on Uttoxeter Road, Derby.

Each year, 80 or so young women would go through a rigorous entrance interview before being enrolled for a two-year course so that they could be employed “in educating children of the labouring, manufacturing and other poorer classes”.

Among them, nearly a century later, were two young women who studied in different decades but became close friends. Today they share similar memories of an enjoyable, though very strict, education.

The Church of England college was run under a regime of rigid discipline and rules unlikely to be accepted by today’s generation of young women and yet Brenda Kellock (nee Proctor) and Pat Fitton (nee Metcalfe) have nothing but fond memories of their experiences.

“I don’t think any student today would really believe how rigid the rules were,” said Pat. “We really were treated like children, even though we were 18.”

Brenda was even younger because, in 1942, the war enabled girls to go to college at 17. So it perhaps wasn’t surprising that there was a strict 10pm (10.30pm on Saturdays) curfew.

Even the clothing they wore was strictly vetted. Bright nail varnish was banned and resulted, on one occasion, in Pat being thrown out of a modern dance class (done in bare feet) for painting her toe nails red, with the dismissive remark from the lecturer: “We don’t do that sort of thing here.”

A highlight of the college year in those days was the once-a-term treat when boys from Loughborough College and Cranwell, the RAF training college, were invited to join the students at a dance.

But so worried were the authorities about inappropriate behaviour, that the young people were locked inside the dance hall all night with the principal, Miss Helen Hawkins, standing guard at the top of the stairs, to ensure no-one went outside.

“It started at 7.30pm and ended at 11pm, and you had to be signed into your lodge by three minutes after that, so there was no chance to dally or talk afterwards,” laughed Pat, who lives in Littleover.

All students were counted into the chapel at eight o’clock every morning and anyone late in for breakfast had to go to the top table to apologise.

This was a time when students were expected to be “young ladies” and if there were any boyfriends on the scene, they had to meet Miss Hawkins so she could check their respectability.

Brenda recalled one occasion when a young man was in the common room and a staff member arrived. In fear of a good telling off, she pushed him into a cupboard in her room to save him being caught.

“We were only chatting but no boys were allowed without permission,” she said.

But young people were as inventive then as they are today in attempting to break the rules and foil adults.

During the war years, the Uttoxeter Road site was commandeered by the ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service), so Brenda’s first year as a student, in 1944, was spent at Elvaston Castle, where the college was evacuated to.

“We were very privileged, though it was bitterly cold with no central heating. I shared a room with three other girls at the top of the castle. To get to the bathroom, we had to descend 60 stone steps, which was not a lot of fun on a freezing, January morning,” she said.

Nightlife was non-existent. Brenda remembers the most daring thing she and her friends would do was to cycle to nearby Borrowash with a music satchel placed on the handlebars, returning with it bulging with chips. “Food which was strictly forbidden,” she laughed.

High jinks and dancing were a favourite pastime, even though they were mainly all-female events, though Brenda did recall one occasion when a busload of wounded American soldiers came to the castle.

This inevitably resulted in Miss Hawkins keeping an even closer eye on her young charges.

“I suppose we were very young and inexperienced and it was a terrific responsibility on the staff,” she said.

During her second year, the students returned to the old college on Uttoxeter Road and, after a massive clean-up operation, settled into student life in Derby.

“In my time, everyone had to sign in by 9.45pm and there were no late passes,” said Brenda.

By the time Pat went to the college in 1950, most of the young women would spend their spare time going to the pictures. Visits to dance halls and pubs were still taboo and they had to be back in their halls of residence by 10.30 every night.

“We were expected to behave like proper young ladies. The staff never used our Christian names; we were always addressed as Miss Jones or Miss Smith. I suppose we were all pretty unworldly compared with today’s generation of students but it was a wonderful time of life in those days and we had a very good education.”

Pat and Brenda met when, as young married mothers, they job-shared at Gayton Avenue Junior School in Littleover. They have been friends ever since. Pat worked for 20 years, teaching at St Peter’s C of E School, Littleover, and Brenda became a peripatetic teacher.

Both still serve on the committee of the Derby Old Students’ Association and Pat is still its secretary, as she has been for many years.

They are both supporting the university’s current efforts to create an alumni list of the 41,000 former students who have attended colleges in Derby over the years.

The colleges were amalgamated to form the University of Derby in 1992 and include Bishop Lonsdale College, Derby Tech, Derbyshire College of Higher Education, Derby School of Occupational Therapy and Derby School of Art.

Former students can join the alumni association either online at www.derby.ac.uk/alumni or by calling 01332 591368.

Pages linking here