Qeggs

A Memory of Barnet.

I attended Queen Elizabeth’s Girls Grammar School from 1954 to 1959, and in 1957 the Queen came to visit. We all had to practise our lessons for ages beforehand (mine was French), and when she came to our classroom she spoke to us in French. We all gathered in the hall for a special assembly, and the head girl presented her with gifts for Charles and Anne (Andrew and Edward hadn’t been born then) and the Queen gave us all an extra day’s holiday!
We only studied 4.5 days a week and used to have Wednesday afternoons off, unlike the boys’ school who had to go in on Saturday mornings. There was a very old Tudor building next to the main school, called Tudor House, and only 6th formers were allowed in there, so we all felt quite grand! The school became a comprehensive long after I left, and I haven’t been back to Barnet for years so I expect it’s changed beyond recognition now. In my day we had trolleybuses as well as normal buses, and the high street had individually owned shops, though we had Woolworths and Boots. There was a greengrocers called Eastmans, and a drapers called Clarks, where we had to buy our school uniforms (though later we had to buy them from Selfridges, which was very inconvenient), and the Salisbury Hotel, which seemed quite grand to my childish eyes.

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