Page 84 - KBHA BULLETIN 2

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A NOTE ON MISS MANNING’S SCHOOL

Alistair Stephen

About the years 1928 - 1931 a school having about fifteen boys and girls as pupils was held at
‘Leighton,’ Jacob’s Ladder, up the steps, on the left side, immediately behind ‘The

Anchorage’. The building was not large and was tucked away out of sight of the Main Road.

One long glass-enclosed verandah and a room or two in the house, the property of Dr. A P
Moore-Anderson, were used as classrooms, accommodating standards Sub-B to IV, though I

was not aware that these names were applied. Instruction was certainly on an individual basis

and suited to the needs of the pupil. Three of us, including Alexa Thesen and I think, Olive
Gregg formed the senior class of 1931. Miss Manning was our teacher, a gentle person and a

superb educator. She was assisted to some extent by her younger sister Jill. The boys were

prepared for W.P.P.S and I remember being entered for Bishops. It not being agreed that I
should transfer in the fourth quarter of 1931, for some reason that escapes me, I went to the

South African College Junior School instead, and after one quarter in Standard IV proceeded

the following year into Standard V. The training received, solely at Miss Manning’s school,
proved to be adequate for the considerable readjustments required. Don Nelmapius was the

only other contemporary whose name I can remember, though I believe Mona Thesen was at

the school. The name St. James Preparatory School was adopted, with colours and a pocket
badge that carried a logo, something like the design shown below. I cannot remember ever

visiting the school after leaving, even though my home was less than a kilometre distant.

Regrettably, I have no definite information as to its later development or when the school was
closed.

A few personal memories stand out: within a week of arrival having to write “Alistair is five
soon he will be six” in a book ruled “faint Irish with margin.” We learned no Afrikaans, and

after being at SACJS for a little while I could not spell “drought” in a spelling test -
illustrating the type of sheltered life one led at St. James! However, at Miss Manning’s

French and Latin were in the “syllabus,” whatever that meant, but I recall no music, plays, or

sport of any kind. Did that do any harm? I think of the enormous emphasis today on the social
and cultural content of junior school teaching. Only the odd altercation with a fellow pupil,

and being walked home by Alexa one morning when I was sick, with the mild chaffing that