Our move to Kamloops was a happy one. My friend, Laura Maloney, introduced me to so many wonderful people. I was soon playing in a two-table bridge club and singing in the United Church Choir. My husband settled in as Mr. Clement's new pharmacist and the children, Peter and Wendy, made friends with the neighbourhood children.

The principal of the High School was Bill Gurney. My sister, Estelle, had taught school with him years before in Rutland. It was through him that quite a bit of tutoring work came my way. After school and on Saturdays, I had students for help in Latin and French. It was a source of pocket money for me and I enjoyed doing it. So when my children were well-settled in school, my husband finally agreed that I could put my name on the substituting list. I had barely replaced the receiver when the phone rang and I was offered a full time teaching position in the Kamloops Senior Secondary.

That first year, I had a real hodge podge of courses - Grade 10 Latin, Grade 11 English, Grade 9 Social Studies and a Grade 12 course called Effective Living. I worked like a dog preparing my lessons but loved it all. The staff was friendly and helpful and I soon had a host of new friends. Esme Foord was head of the Counseling Department. She planned to take a year off to attend Queen's University to get her doctorate. She began to groom me to take over her work while she was away. She brought me stacks of books on psychology and counseling. My summer holidays were spent hitting the books. But by September 1st I had some inkling of what I was supposed to be doing.

That next year, as well as the counseling I had one Latin class and several English classes. I had my own office and enjoyed the work of counseling the girls. Being a parent was a great help to me, I'm sure.

When Miss Foord came back the next year, I still continued with counseling. A new school had been built at the top of 8th Avenue to accommodate the growing enrollment. The old brick High School became an elementary school. Our new school had a wonderful gymnasium and a large auditorium. There was a whole suite of counseling offices. The library was well-equipped and there were two staff rooms - one for the ladies and one for the men. But it wasn't long before the various staff members used the handiest room regardless of sex.

It was wonderful being in an up-to-date state of the art school building. The Home Economics rooms had the latest equipment as did the Woodworking and Metal Shops. Bill Gurney was a great principal who managed to keep his large staff in harmony.

The following summer and several after that I went to summer school in Victoria and Vancouver to obtain my counseling certificate and when Miss Foord left to teach at U of Vic, I became head of the Counseling Department. My work included intelligence and aptitude testing.

My summer holidays were shortened because my duties started well before the opening of school. The principal and I spent long hours working on the timetables. The students chose their courses for the next year before they left in June, but there were always dozens of new students each year, some from out of province, who had to be evaluated and fitted in.

On opening day, it was a mad house. Students lined up outside the counseling offices wanting changes in their timetables. They wanted a certain teacher for math instead of the one they had been assigned to. Some teachers were popular but we couldn't overload their classes. It was a pretty tricky situation and called for all the tact we could muster. And all the time, we had to keep an eagle eye on the courses chosen to make sure that they fulfilled the requirements for graduation.

By the end of the second week of school, things were ironed out, class sizes were more or less even, and most of the students were satisfied. Extra-curricular activities were begun. Each teacher was expected to sponsor several of these. I took over the Students' Council for many years and found it very interesting - also the Y Teens, the Badminton Club and the Future Teachers' Club at various times.

The Y Teens were a wonderful bunch of girls and we had a great time. Each year in June we all spent a weekend out at Shuswap Lake at the United Church Camp. On the Saturday evening, we all gathered at the lakeshore and the girls launched bits of bark and driftwood fixed with small-lighted candles into the water. There was a short ceremony and singing and it was supposed to represent their entrance into adult life.

On the Sunday morning, they put on a church service complete with sermon, But, it wasn't all serious. There were fun and games. Each person had to demonstrate a handicraft. I showed them how to make bowls with raffia and Ponderosa pine needles.

Although my counseling duties kept me busy most of the time, I always kept at least one Grade 12 English class and often a Grade 11 Effective Living course to maintain a closer contact with the students. The Effective Living course was a pretty broad one including units on child care and household management and I tried to be as innovative as possible. One morning, I had a former student who had married, bring her baby to our class and bath him. It was the year I had 50 students in the class and we had to hold our sessions in one of the Home Ec rooms. It was a most successful lesson. The girls had dozens of questions for the young mother.

This led naturally to knitting, and with the help of one of the stenographers in the office who gave up her coffee break time to assist me, we taught the girls to knit. Another project that was very popular was in the household equipment unit. I was getting tired of my old ice box and could finally afford a refrigerator. So, the assignment was that each girl was to visit the various stores, get all the information possible, and decide which was the best refrigerator on the market. I would buy the one they chose. The make that came out on top was the Kenmore and, of course, I bought it. And, it proved to be a good choice.

I had a very good relationship with the girls. They were always respectful, yet felt they could come and talk to me. Our classes were sometimes hilarious. I remember one incident on April the 1st. I had gone to the classroom only to find it empty. But as I passed the girls' washroom, I had heard giggling. So, I went back to the office and asked one of the stenos to go to the washroom and sternly order them all back to class. In the meantime, I hurried back to the room and hid behind a screen. Soon, they all came trooping in, muttering, "Who does she think she is - ordering us around?". When they were seated, I popped out saying, "April Fool". Well, they laughed so hard the principal came to see what all the noise was about. Fortunately, he was a good sort and enjoyed the joke.

In fact, we had a wonderful staff at Kamloops High. It kept changing of course, but, over the years there were many dedicated teachers and I made many good friends. I will always remember Miss Ruth Harrison, the Librarian. Dashing to an English class, I would desperately need a reference. A quick trip to the library and Miss Harrison would have what I wanted. Mr. Karl Knapp was head of the English department and always ready to help. Marion Owens taught Singing and was responsible for many of our wonderful productions.

Each year we would put on a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta - HMS Pinafore, The Gondoliers or The Mikado. It provided a wonderful opportunity for the drama classes, student orchestra and singing groups to show off their accomplishments. These productions were very popular in the town and the auditorium was filled for each of the three nights they were put on. On the last night, the staff entertained the cast at a party in the cafeteria. A group of us made up parodies on the various songs in the operetta and sang them for the students. For instance, the year we did The Mikado, three of us lady teachers dressed up as old hags with blackened teeth and sang, "Three old maids from school are we - laid on a shelf for all to see — " as a parody on "Three Little Maids from School". There were other parodies with the principal even taking part, and the students loved it. The students finally got tired of Gilbert and Sullivan and turned to something more modern. One year, they put on "West Side Story".

The whole school became involved in these productions. The Art classes vied with each other to make the best posters and program covers. The typing classes worked on the programs and there were great line-ups for parts at auditioning time. My son, Peter, who couldn't sing a note desperately wanted to be in the Pirates' chorus the year they did "Pirates of Penzance" . I couldn't believe my ears the day he came home and jubilantly announced that he had made it. I talked later to Marion Owens and she said, "He was so enthusiastic, I couldn't turn him down. I'll put him right next to his friend Ian Fraser who is a strong singer. Don't worry. It will be all right."