Sports Day, Grange Home School, 1973

I had a communication from Ewan, a Blipper who went to the Grange Home School in Edinburgh from 1972-1974, the same years our children were there, and was wondering if I had any pictures of the school.

I have had a look through the photos we took during our Edinburgh years and don't seem to have any of the old school building which has since been torn down. OilMan had quite a good camera and went around the city just before we were scheduled to leave it, and took some nice pictures of some of the landmarks around town, including the then North British Hotel (now the Balmoral) the castle, Holyrood, Waverly Station, and Arthur's Seat. We had a stunning view of the latter from our kitchen window. 

Alas, the only pictures of the Grange Home School that I have been able to find were probably taken by me on Sports Day, because OilMan would have been at work in Glasgow. I have no idea what camera I would have been using but clearly it wasn't a very good one, and clearly I wasn't much of a photographer. Nonetheless, for the sake of memories, both mine and Ewan's,  I have put up a picture of Dana in pigtails with matching blue ribbons crossing the finish line in some race neck and neck with her friend Habu, who was a boarder and came from Egypt.

Ewan wanted to know if I remembered Miss Seely. I do if she was the person we knew only as 'Matron', a rather formidable person dressed from head to toe in what I assume was the white nurse's garb of the day, but looked to me like a nun's habit. She was always in charge of escorting Habu, dressed in her 'traveling clothes' (a kilt, as I recall) and carrying a bag with play clothes in it, to me when I came to pick her up to come to our house to play. Heaven knows, this arrangement created more dilemmas than it solved...did I return her to her 'traveling clothes' before returning her to the school? Should I give her tea? Tea was a meal that always mystified me as it had never been anything more than a beverage as far as I was concerned. A very small boy named Angus, who came to play with Tim stuck his hand out as he was leaving with his mother and said, "Thank you very much for having me, even if you didn't serve a proper tea...." I'm afraid this precocious three year old thoroughly traumatized me when it came to serving 'a proper tea' to anybody....

Miss Morley-Smith, the headmistress, was less formidable and quite perceptive about  recognizing two American mothers who were a bit adrift in Edinburgh. She was quite persistent about introducing us.  When she finally succeeded in getting us together, we began talking at the school and continued talking all the way back to my house. We were still talking non-stop as I made a snack for the kids. She laughed  and said , "I just can't tell you how much I'm enjoying watching you slapping together those peanut butter sandwiches!"

We were kindred souls in a foreign land in those early days, and we surely had Miss Morley-Smith to thank for it.