No Intercourse in the Corridors:
Geoffrey and Doris Swan
Doris Hawkins sat for the Junior Public Examination in 1943 from the Commercial State High School. She had hoped to become a teacher of commercial subjects but, after accepting a Junior Teaching Scholarship became a primary teacher. In 1945 she was appointed as an Assistant Teacher on Probation to the Kedron State School, and then as Head Teacher of the (now closed) Elamen Creek State School. She also taught at Nudgee, Bald Hills, and Goondiwindi, and spent two teaching periods in England.
As a part-time evening/ correspondence student she completed her Senior and then as an evening student took a BA from the University of Queensland, majoring in Latin. After leaving the State system, Doris taught in the primary section of St Aidan's Anglican School, and later in the secondary school, at various times teaching Latin, both ancient and modern history, English, and botany.
Geoffrey Swan sat for the Junior Examination from the Brisbane Grammar School and in May 1944 accepted a Junior Teaching Scholarship to Kelvin Grove. In 1946 he was appointed as an ATP to Wilston State School and a year later was Head Teacher in Caffey, thence to Carmilla West and Verrierdale (all now closed) schools.
He then taught at Churchill and Ipswich Central Boys, where he became interested in special education through the attached opportunity classes.
After teaching at the Petric Terrace Opportunity Classes, he went as Head Teacher to the Special Schools at Rockhampton and Sandgate and then as Principal to the State School for Spastic Children at New Farm, where in 1968 he was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to study the education of cerebral palsied children in Europe, the United Kingdom, and the USA.
He too completed his Senior by correspondence and then as a part-time student took a BEd from the University of Queensland. Later he completed a double Master's degree in special education and education administration.
Tn 1973 he was appointed Inspector of Schools Special Education and upon retirement in 1987 was awarded the OAM for his services to special education.
Geoff and Doris Swan enjoy reading, music, theatre, small dogs, their garden, and especially talking to each other!
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Geoffrey: We were at College in parts of 1944-45 as Junior students.
Doris: Yes, I came in March 1944, I had already had employment as a typist of sorts. Well, people went to College in batches and a dozen of us went along to the Education Department and stood there in a straight line.
One candidate asked if it would be a good idea to go back to State High to do the Senior first, and then apply to the College. And we were told quite definitely that we were wanted "now".
If
we did anything frivolous like that - if we went and did Senior- we might not be needed in two years' time. So we all went along as students to College.When I arrived at College it happened to be a day that my batch (JIB) were out at prac school - it must have been a Wednesday- and so I was put in with the "big" girls - that is, the Seniors, with whom we Juniors usually never met- but they found a seat for me and I sat there. It was just like being in Grade 1 again, particularly as the lesson they were having, and I think you would have to call it a lesson rather than a lecture, was needlework and the lady who took needlework was Jeanette Gilbert.
Geoffrey: Well I didn't arrive until May. I was a late batch because I had a job as a clerk in the Gas Company and that was a protected activity and you could not be released unless the manpower authority said you could go, despite the fact that I was going to become a teacher.
So I arrived at College in May and I shall never forget going into the Treasury Building, which housed the Education Department, with another batch of late starters. We were interviewed by someone called Ridell, who was the Chief Inspector and known as the "Oyster" (difficult to prise open!).
I think we were also sighted by LD Edwards, the Director General, someone for whom I later gained great affection and respect and who was the great
intellect of the twentieth century in the Education Department.
We were all viewed by Ridell and Edwards, comments made aloud - "The physique looks all right", "Some of them need to tidy up their speech" -and then we were told how to catch a tram to Kelvin Grove.
No one had cars in those days - not even the lecturers drove cars. Everyone travelled on the tram. This wasn't because of wartime shortages really, but poverty - that was one thing that kept us on the trams and, of course, cars were not a feature of the ordinary household in those days.
I arrived at College to find it occupied by the North Brisbane Intermediate School on the lower floor, along with the Domestic Science section of the Teachers' College. This is now A Block - then the only block, except for a small change shed for the men, as we were called, at the back.
We did not have much contact with the Domestic Science girls- they seemed to spend their entire life in that area which was kind of the kitchen, dressmaking area, under the rule of one Miss Staeheli. She was separate from
the rest of the herd in that she travelled up from Sandgate every day, not in the train, but in the bus!
Now, entrance to the College - I went up the front steps of the College and that was the first and only time in my entire period as a student that I ever used the front steps - they were for the exclusive use of important visitors and the lecturers. Students used the steps around underneath the College.
Then I waited in the hall there to be received by one /A Robinson, the Principal - known as Old Rocks - the epitome of rigidity, authority, and control.
We were then taken into the College office and given two notebooks with grey covers - one was to be used as notes of lessons and the other was to be used as an observation book. This was for our time in prac school.
We were also given a copy of the 1930 syllabus -with amendments -a copy of the State Education Act 1875 and amendments, the regulations, and also a copy of The Practical School Method by PA Cox and RM Macdonald (published by Blackie and Son). Much later, in 1987, I went and had a look in the history section of the Department to see if I could find a copy and I came across the 24th edition published in 1913; so in 1944 the text book we used for practical school method was published around the turn of the century!
Later on we were given a couple of other text books, in our second year - Education Data and First Principles by Percy Nunn (published in 1920) and another book called Learning and Teaching, an Introduction to Education and Psychology by Hughes and Hughes which was published in 1937. Those were more or less the text books for the entire timeat Teachers' College.
And I too arrived when my particular group was out at prac school.
Doris: Another thing I remember about my first day, when all my class was absent; I went up those very front steps and waited to see Mr Robinson. He asked me a few questions but could not get beyond my first response when I had said "Yes" in the way I had always said it; he nearly hit the roof I realised afterwards that he was thinking that I had an American accent and had been out on the town with Americans - very sinful!
I had to say the word over and over and it got worse and worse, so the best he could do was send me to a speech correction lady, Sadie Foster. So on Tuesday at lunchtime I went there along with the people who could not pronounce "r" or "s" and said all these little rhymes and other things that were supposed to correct my unacceptable accent.
In the end I was expelled frorn there because everybody else was catching my way of saying "Yes". 1 never thought to tell him that I had learnt to speak in Liverpool. Twenty years later I could have been conducting classes and would have been able to name my own fee!
Geoffrey: I went to a speech correction class too because I had an incipient stammer and I think too that some of my vowel sounds were not as pure as he thought they should have been. So I found myself in a speech correction class and I think that I too was kicked out of that class because I was a bit impudent and thought it all rather a joke.
I think there were about sixty seniors in our year (1944), about fifty women and ten men - rather an insignificant lot of men, I thought. Seniors went to prac two days a week, as did the second year Juniors, fIIs;first year Juniors, /Is, went on one day a week. So we never mixed with any second year Junior students. We would have been in the College with them on one day a week but most of the JIIs were appointed to schools during the year and started to move out.
GROUP Jld (Men) - 1944. Courtesy of Geoffrey and Doris Swan Back row: r<..obcrl l\_1;dcr, fo/Jn M11ndm1, Jo/Jn Bym111, Frank Dm,cson, Willi111n !Bill! l la111ilton, Bill O'Sulliz,an, Geof(re11 Szuan, C!t11r/es C!temssc, Tmn Kerr, Alon Yates 3rd row: Les Ganley, fo/Jn f11111es, Les C11rlic, D11Pid /\cm!, Kcz,in Asp/11nd, Joseph lnuin, [mes/ Dixon, Krn /11/cs, George Willimns 2nd row: George C11rpl1n;. /11n McMil/11n, Ccoffl·c_11 Mars/1111/, Kcit/1 Wes/, La11n· M111'rs, /-iarold Sutc!ijrc·, fmncis !St11n) Kmgcr, Colin C/ork, Jcrn1 W!tc/11n, St11n F11ton Front row: Ct1ril Co1111cll, Jim Lrnlw11, Max /-iirst, Selwm1 l louslon, Lionel Bmndt, Philip Bmy, Jol//l O'Connor
Doris: That happened to us - in second year I was appointed to Kedron in August, but quite a few people had already gone by then. Because of the shortages, some people were going out even in May.
Having been told at the outset that we didn't need Senior, we then found that it was, in fact, desirable and went to the Old Fire Brigade building on the corner of Edward and Ann Street to evening tutorial classes. What happened, of course, was that you could be going along well and then be appointed out to the country and find that the subjects you had selected were not offered by correspondence courses - so you had to drop your studies.
GROUP ]1b (Women) - 1944. Courtesy of Geoffrey and Doris Swan
Back row: Ellie Ralmsloben, Patricia Conway, Beryl Hickman, Bonnie Osborn, Claire War/and, Dawn Johns, Joan Neilson, Heather Penker, Marjorie Wormington, Margaret Williams, Maureen Otto
3rd row: Ellen(?) Graham, Jane Huston, Fay Luck, Doris Hawkins, Maureen Cole, Paula Palmer, Beth Royan, Joan De Leacy, Nella Fleming, Nettie Pettigrew
2nd row: Gloria Shears, Joy Skinner, Hazel Zizer, Alice Cox, Paula Gou/enitcl1, Joan Wilkie(?), Wenda Collins, Gwen Watson, Sheila Byrne, Patricia Twomey
Front row: Angela Cameron, Margaret Johnston, Aileen O'Brien, Joan Lefrancke, Heather Davis, Ursula McAna/an, Dorothy Nash, Noe/a Conquest
Geoffrey: Could we just go back to our arrival at the College? I just want to talk about the upper floor, which was devoted entirely to the College but which had been furnished for the North Brisbane Intermediate School. The furniture was those dual desks, screwed to the floor and made for 12 and 13-year-olds, and here were we, great gangling adolescents, 16/17/18 year-olds, having to sit in this inappropriate furniture. Very painful.
The other thing that was interesting was that the arrival of a lecturer indicated that we stood still until invited to be seated. Apart from being
irritating, the agony of unwinding yourself from the inappropriate furniture was terrible - except for Phil Radcliffe, it was just '"Morning men, sit."
Now another thing - I never saw a cleaner in my entire time at College.
Maybe the College didn't have one, because the place was always positively grubby. In fact, one time the toilets were so filthy that one of the lecturers organised a working bee to clean them - terribly unhygienic; and there was no such thing as a carpet on the floor.
As well as musical theory we also learnt about the appreciation of music.
There was a collection of records and we were permitted to go in and play them, weren't we?
Geoffrey: Yes. Those records, I understand, were a gift to the College from the Carnegie Foundation. They were all 78s and went with a portable gramophone and occasionally you could borrow the records and the gramophone - at lunch times, mostly.
Doris: That was quite liberal really, for the time - I thought that was wonderful - another of Charlie Hall's ideas.
We had a music exam - theory I suppose, written - and then, for the practical, which was rather daunting, we had to conduct a three part round -your own group, divided into three parts. You had to be able to sing and hold a tune and you had to sight read something. It seemed to be pretty stringent really, didn't it?
Were there recorders?
Geoffrey: No recorders, fifes, for those who really couldn't hold a note - recorders came later. Sometimes the fifes were not tuned properly, either.
Doris: They never are. I've never heard any two fifes tuned alike. Apart from teaching and learning how to teach, I thought that I got a basic grounding in music theory, which I had not learned before.
In Art I learnt the basics of art, taught by Mina Laing and Clare Hunt.
Geoffrey: That was in our first year, but in our second year Van Homrigh had come back from the war. I enjoyed the art very much and I shall never forget being introduced to the French Impressionists by Mina Laing, with
illustrations from a book.
Students who were not committed on a Friday afternoon went in for an extra art period and that was most exhilarating, the discovery and the tremendous enthusiasm. It has lasted forever, my affair with the French Impressionists.
THE COLLEGE ART COLLECTION
An attempt: hu been made dulnc ihe year to e1tabll1h a Collece Art Colleetlon.
thro!!: ~~:r',:::o:r~,wl~te 001:!.~~:l!!e ~~ce::dm~r~
Fund, which eon•i•t• of voluntar7 contrlbutiou from 'the
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~:uctf ::•r:f:atl!:elrol::t,e':;e:;:r:;:m.:rt
o:!hundred sufnea1 for the purcha1e of ~ work• of Fu:e1':.!:J,e~&ve G!~1c-:ecf l;J.'!re:o1l!::f"ou,. •ti and other•
The 1tudent1 have eoni1'1huted & 1um of £53/11/0l thl1 year, which, added to an am.ouni of 03/18/81: collected in 1944, hu provided • cr••d total of £"17/9/ti, for the pur- cha1e of worb of art.
Pictures purchased from the Students' Art and Craft Fund are as follows:-
1. "Rocky Headland, Magnetic Island" (water colour )-William Bustard.
2. "Gordon's Crossing, Pine River" oil)-William Bustard.
3. "Alma Den, North Queensland"· (water colour)-Douglas Annand.
4. "Evening Shadows" (oil)-Lilian Pedersen.
5. "Home Gate" water colour)-A. E. Reuter.
In addition the following full-sized prints have been purchased from the Fund:-
"The Bridge at Moret"-Alfred Sisley.
"Summer"~laude Monet.
"Old Lady"-Rembrandt.
"Cornfield in Provence"-Van Gogh.
"Harbour in Brittany"-Pierre Wagner.
"Fishing Boats of St. Mary's"-Van Gogh.
Paintings purchased by the College from De- partmental funds:-
6. "The Lost Cat" (water colour))-Winifred Towers.
7. "Wild and Garden Flowers" (oil)-Vera Leichney. ·
8. "The Cottage, Tamborine" (oil)-C. H. Lan- caster.
9. Boat Building, Breakfast Creek" (water colour)-P. Stanhope Hobday.
10. "Campers, Noosa" (water colour)-Roy Paget.
11. "Low Tide" (monotype)-Tom Garrett.
Paintings presented to the College by Miss Mary Corkery:-
12. "Still Life" (oil)-Gordon Esling.
13. "Sydney Harbour Bridge" (wood-cut)-Mar- garet Prestorl.
Presented by Artists:-
14. "Mt. Morgan Mine" (oil)-William Bustard.
15. "In the Belah Scrub" (water colour)-Ken- neth MacQueen.
16. "Sketch of Western Hills) (oil)-Robert Johnson.
17. "Mt. Patawata" (charcoal and wash)-Hans Hey sen.
18. "Beach Group" (oil)-Serjeant Parry.
19. "The Dead Tree" (oil)-Gordon Esling.
20. "The Drowned Bird" (brush drawing)-Doug- las Annand.
21. "The Pottery" (oil)-C. H. Lancaster.
22. "Nudgee Waterhole" (water colour)-A. E.
Reuter.
The College Art Collection, Spearhead, 1945
While we were at College the Student Advisory Council was established and started collecting money for the art collection. We got an allowance in those days from the Government - I think it was 5 bob a week, and tuppence every payday, which was once a month, went into the art fund.
During our time at College we acquired a William Bustard, McQueen, and a drawing of Hans Hysen - they were the ones I particularly remember. The College acquired maybe a dozen or so paintings and something aesthetic happened in that rather terrible building- it was exciting!
I think that started on the initiative of Mina Laing and Claire Hunt. Of course, those pictures were very reasonably priced - the artists were probably just as impoverished as the students who put in their tuppences each month.
Another thing, these two women were very active in the Queensland Art Gallery Society and encouraged us to attend the various art shows in the city - in the old Canberra Hotel they had a gallery, and the Queensland Art Gallery - we could visit both after College. So there was great involvement and, again, this excitement.
And another thing - Charlie Hall went to orchestral concerts with his students and in those days the Queensland State String Quartet had just been established under Ernest Llewellyn.
They came out and played at the College too.
Doris: Really we were luckier than
if
we had gone on to do Senior, because I think it was the kind of education that I really wanted. I know so much more about music and art and even, I must say, needlework, as much as I hated it. I discovered that when I was left all on my own I did everything that Jenny Gilbert had told me - and I came to enjoy it. I would not have done that had I continued at high school.Another aspect that we have not talked about yet is phys ed. I learned how to swim - and elementary lifesaving. We came away with many skills. I could not believe that in such a short time such an impression could be made.
The day was divided up into periods, very much like a school timetable, and there was never what you would call a free period. From the moment you arrived at 9am or 9.30am until you left at 3pm or 3.30pm every part of the day was taken up, timetabled. Very much like a secondary school.
We didn't go on organised trips. I don't think it an age when anybody went on trips. Places to go to were suggested and we would do that for ourselves;
but life was too busy, what with College and evening classes. We did not take a minute out of the schedule time - but we did go to the Queensland Art Gallery and the Canberra Gallery.
Geoffrey: I think I recall the Student Advisory Council developed a Chess Club and they subscribed to some newspapers and put some tables in one of the corridors for students to read.
This material is taken from an interview with Denis Cry le in 1989.