"There were a lot of pretty girls - especially in the secretarial sections, you know!"

Those girls that came in that March intake, they all went into the stitching rooms and the training rooms. I was the only one who went into the office.
_{[Rosa, Morlands]}

I was in the Miss Morlands contest one year – I didn’t win! We had a major newsreader who came and did the judging of Miss Morlands, and I had my hair done. But the lady who wore hotpants that year won! And she deserved it!
_{[Rosa, Morlands]}

You nominated yourself for Miss Morlands – whoever was brave enough to walk down the catwalk and be interviewed. It was a funny old time, really.
_{[Penny, Morlands]}

You always knew you wouldn’t get any higher. If you had an ambition to get any higher, the highest you could get would be like Mary Stone – the manager of a particular department – but that was all you could hope for. Or, if you were in the secretarial part, become secretary to one of the directors.
_{[Julia, Morlands]}

My boss asked me once if I’d be the rep for Scandinavia, and I was tempted, but I just didn’t have the confidence. At the time, a woman travelling on her own, just wasn’t really a sensible thing to do. And I think my mother would have had a fit if I’d taken it on!
_{[Jackie, Morlands]}

There were a couple of lads at Strode that were the same as me, but they were taken off to do a different subject, not typing. I think they did politics or something. Why? It was deemed we didn’t need to know politics and they didn’t need to know how to type. I’ve never been able to get my head around that one! It was the way of the world – women had had suffrage for some time by then but even then, we didn’t need to know about politics. I suppose it was always assumed that your husband would tell you what to vote!
_{[Julia, Morlands]}