In my final year at the school a new male teacher arrived to take the top class. About three weeks into term we had been set some work to do in silence and there was the occasional murmuring. The teacher announced that the next person to talk would be slippered and silence descended once more, but not for long. A boy and girl exchanged comments and they were told to go to the front of the room. They were reminded what would happen to the next to talk and the teacher took a large black slip-on plimsoll from the drawer of his desk. He told the girl to turn so she was sideways on to the class and to bend over and touch her toes. He whacked her bottom over her skirt and she jumped up. She was told to bend over again and took another before being told to stand in the corner with her hands on her head. The boy took his two without jumping up and he was sent to the other front corner.

The plimsoll was not returned to the drawer but was put on the table near the blackboard. The plimsoll was not used that often in our class after that, perhaps once each half term and I think only ever two whacks. What did happen, however, when an occasional visitor from another class. A younger pupil would knock on our classroom door and come in to give a note to our teacher. He would read the note and pick up the plimsoll. The pupil would be told to bend over and got his or her two whacks. Our teacher would then write on the note and send the pupil back to their class. I never got whacked but shall never forget the tension or fascination in the room whenever anyone was being whacked.

When I went to grammar school the plimsoll was used frequently in the gym to encourage slackers. A well worn white lace-up rested on the windowsill behind the wall bars. For misbehavior or fooling around in the changing rooms before gym the master would send the boy to get the plimsoll and give three whacks across cotton gym shorts. Boys wore navy blue cotton shorts, nothing underneath, and white lace-up plimsolls. In winter we wore a white gym vest and for athletics also wore white ankle socks. During the lesson the master may fetch the plimsoll himself and tap bottoms by way of encouragement to achieve the exercise set. I do remember climbing a rope a bit faster than I would normally have achieve as I heard the whack of the plimsoll on the shorts of the lad on the next rope.

The cane was used by the Headmaster but the plimsoll was used by the female deputy Head on the girls. Anyway, I became attracted to the girls in their PT or sports kit, particularly at the start of term when some had brand new plimsolls and there were different styles appearing. I remember borrowing one girl's plimsolls and taking them home for the night. I wore them in my bed all night and managed to sneak them back into her kit bag the following day.

I started to buy plimsolls for myself and wife to wear around the house soon after we married, they were cheap and hard wearing. We wore slip-ons at home, instead of slippers and lace-ups if decorating a room. We still do as we find them comfortable and practical. Again if they get splashed with paint or wall paper paste then they are not too expensive to throw away, unlike modern trainers, which neither of us own. About ten years ago I joined an adult schooldays re-enactment club and attended a day school with six other adult pupils. To even the number of boys and girls one of the boys dressed as a girl and I remembered my days at grammar school when I had first borrowed a pair of girls plimsolls to wear. If I dressed as a girl I could wear "girl's" plimsolls all of the time. I started to buy girls PE kit and then a full school uniform
- Clare was born.

Letter from Clare