The Not-So-Secret Workers
of Bletchley Park
Ann Viner attended Bletchley Teacher Training College which had been established in some of the Bletchley Park buildings following the Second World War and these are some of her memories of the place.
Ann is married to Stuart, a friend of the Editor.
After the Second World War in 1945 when the thousands of
workers who had done such amazing work at Bletchley Park departed, what happened
to the buildings? The buildings were abandoned and allowed to become derelict.
In the years immediately after the war there was a great need for new teachers to replace those teachers who had stayed on after retirement during the war, and also to teach the increased number of pupils when the school leaving age was raised to 15. It was decided that Emergency Colleges would be set up to train the new teachers required and a new college at Bletchley was set up in some of the buildings which had been built to house the Codebreakers during the war.
Some of the derelict buildings at Bletchley were refurbished and became the last of the Emergency Training Colleges. Dora Cohen was appointed as the Principal in 1947 and after 2 years it then became Bletchley Park Training College.
It was Dora who took the buildings and created an inspirational working college fit for purpose. Dora Cohen was a visionary; her standards were of the highest and, according to her ‘gals’ (students), second-to-none. It started as an institution without history and she rapidly created precedents and annual events to fulfil a need for tradition. She acquired a small horn to represent the Alpha in the
Greek Alpha and Omega signs, which were incorporated in the motto of the college, "In my end is my beginning". Large lion statues were acquired to guard an entrance to make it look impressive.In 1958 I decided that teaching was for me and I went for an interview (in which I had to sing) and was accepted to start my training in January 1959. For 2 years we worked hard to learn the skills and art of the teacher and we were certainly taught how to teach. We were not secret workers, but we were made to work hard. A certain amount of fear was part of the process as there were rules: from not walking on certain blue-coloured carpets, to nodding, "Good morning," to the Vice Principal on the way to breakfast every day. All students had to sign in by 10pm from Monday to Friday but there was freedom till 10:30pm at the weekend! We were not allowed to have bare legs on teaching practice and had to wear rompers for gym!! Oh there were lots of rules!
The College occupied only part of the Bletchley site; we were forbidden to wander around the other areas and, along with the rest of the world, we didn’t learn any of the secrets of the activities of the codebreakers till many years later. But one thing we did learn was that some of the other huts were used by a GPO training centre for lots of young men but we didn’t dare venture from our site! How times have changed.
It is interesting, however, that although we complained about the restrictions we all agree, when we meet up for reunions, that the years we spent working at Bletchley Park are among the happiest and we appreciate the friendships we made 56 years ago. I have more recently returned to Bletchley Park as a tourist and visited the Exhibition, and was very interested to find that my bedroom had been in part of the Japanese Code Breaking building.
After 20 years at Bletchley the college moved to Wheatley near Oxford and is now part of Oxford Brookes University.
Ann Viner
(Kilsby, Rugby)