I was asked once more to take all children and staff out of the premises and we went to the Salvation Army Citadel in Church Street. As we were walking back to school afterwards one little girl told me that she was glad it wasn't a bomb "because I am allergic to smoke!"

During a national fuel oil crisis the Education Office at Northampton sent a circular to all schools advising heads that they should not have classrooms heated to the required temperatures for the beginning of the school day as the children’s bodies would fire off heat and thus this would be attained during the day.

For a bit of fun I wrote to Mr Bert Catlin, Headmaster of the Boys School, referring to his circular stating that I considered the contents rather unreasonable and pointing out that some of our children were very young. I therefore requested that he send groups of Sixth Form boys at 8am each morning to carry out physical exercises in our classrooms to raise the temperature there ready for when or children arrived.

He replied in the following manner: "Dear Mr Clarke,

Thank you for your letter regarding classroom temperatures in your school.

I fully sympathise with you on this problem and offer the following suggestion. My knowledge of physics lends me to assume that the amount of heat given off by an object is in direct proportion to its surface area.

I therefore advise you to contact the Girls' School.

Yours sincerely
H W Catlin