Remembering Miss Phillips
We are sad to announce that Miss Nesta Phillips has passed away, aged 100.
Nesta had a lifelong association with the Girls’ Day School Trust. She taught Classics at Brighton and Hove High School GDST before joining South Hampstead in the 1950s as Head of Classics. Nesta stayed for 25 years and, during her time at the school, became Deputy Head. Nesta passed on her enthusiasm of the ancient world to countless South Hampstead students. She passionately taught them how Classics can add an extra dimension to all aspects of life and how the subject influenced many areas of Western thought. Former students and staff will recall her sharp intellect and how her career and South Hampstead were central to her life. Earlier this year, students and alumnae sent Nesta cards and wished her congratulations on her 100th birthday. Below is a selection of memories and recollections of Nesta written by her former students and colleagues.
Memories and recollections
I have just read the sad news of Miss Phillips’ death. I was at South Hampstead from 1970 – 1977 and during that time very much enjoyed having her as my Latin teacher. She did indeed inspire a great love of the classics for which I am very grateful. She certainly lived a long life and will long be remembered.
Sarah Ackroyd
I am so sad to hear this news, but impressed to see that Miss Phillips lived for over a century. I remember a positive and smiling person, who was pleasant to and had time for all, including those who were not in her lessons. In about 1968 she arranged a day trip to Oxford to see ‘The Birds’ by Aristophanes, in Greek. Many of us went along just for the fun of it, even though we were not studying Greek. That says a lot about how friendly she was!
Susan Alterman
I was at South Hampstead from 1966 – 1973 and benefited most from Miss Phillips during the Sixth Form; she had faith in me where others wavered. As a result of her support, I had a fulfilling last two years of Sixth Form and went on to exciting studies at St Andrews University and beyond. She was fiercely bright alongside a modest, compassionate nature, which served her pupils so well.
Susan Blum (class of 1973)
When I first graduated from South Hampstead Junior School to the Senior School, I soon learned that Miss Phillips had a reputation for being strict and stern. When she became my Latin teacher, I soon realised that her reputed strictness concerned good manners and sensible behaviour. She was a fair and reasonable person who expected her pupils to comport themselves properly. Miss Phillips was an excellent teacher and her lessons were a delight. Her academic standards were high and she wanted us to fulfil our potential. She always encouraged, never harangued. My A Level Latin studies were hugely enjoyable and I went on to take Latin as a subsidiary subject at university.
Her educational (“drawing out”) skills extended to her pastoral role as our form mistress, where she inspired us, not only as schoolgirls preparing for exams, but as young women with a role to play in society generally. It was while in her form that I became so aware of her personal warmth and kindness. By the time I left South Hampstead, a school so blessed with the quality of its teaching staff, Miss Phillips was one of the two teachers whom I easily ranked as my all-time favourites.
Throughout my life I have remembered Miss Phillips with great affection and gratitude. I shall continue to do so. I should like to convey my condolences to any family and friends also mourning her death at the splendid age of 100.
Margaret Borland-Stroyan née Borland (class of 1965)
I was so sorry to hear of Miss Phillips’ death. She taught me from 1953 to 1961 and I still have the school photo with her in it. She was a bit fearsome and we were terrified of her – she was firm but fair. She must have been the very last teacher of that generation and I was fortunate to have been at South Hampstead with Miss Phillips and others like her. But 100 is a grand old age and I hope she was in good health to the end.
Jill Cantor
As a contemporary of Jocelyn Stell (née Whyte) and Bridget Micklem (née Scopes) who featured on the picture celebrating Miss Phillips’ 100th birthday, I have very fond memories of lessons both in Latin and Ancient Greek with Miss Phillips. She truly inspired us with her own passion – something that I have sought to emulate in my own teaching and now training of teachers. Particular memories include being taken through the relevant parts of St Luke’s gospel at the end of our first term of Greek – just before Christmas. It gave us such a sense of achievement. She supported us patiently with our understanding of Latin and Greek literature – even if she did leave some of the more ‘naughty’ bits for us to study for homework! I didn’t continue with Latin or Greek after A level but have retained a lifelong interest and draw regularly on what she taught us which I feel is what education really should be about.
Miranda Dodd née Chappell (Class of 1980)
I was sad to hear, this morning, that Miss Nesta Phillips had died. That she died at the great age of 100 was a mitigation of this sadness. I had heard in recent years that she would like to hear from old students, and regret very much that I did not act on that. One never forgets one’s school teachers, and the image of Miss Phillips (she was and is, for me, “Miss Phillips”) is clear in my mind—a good replica of the photo I found on the school’s website just now.
Miss Phillips made a great difference to my life. Unlike many of her students, I took my A-levels in Latin and Greek (along with French, since the school could not manage also to teach me Mathematics, which I had preferred). This enabled me to win an Exhibition to read classics at Girton College, Cambridge, where I achieved a “first” in the preliminary exams to Part 1 and again in Part 1. I moved on to read Moral Sciences for Part 2 of the Tripos, and in due course began a career as a philosopher.
Though I did not specialise in classical philosophy, I did not leave that behind me. We had studied Plato’s Republic at school—I am not sure in what course or in what language we did that—and for many years I used that as a text in an Introduction to Moral Philosophy course at the University of Connecticut and then the University of California, Irvine. As I told my students, there is much to disagree with in the Republic, but it is a masterwork nonetheless, and much can be learned from arguing for or against the views it expresses. Though I taught the book in translation, I was able to introduce my students to some of the key terms in Greek.
Studying classics has been beneficial in many other ways. It has enabled me not only to enjoy the delights of reading Homer and Virgil, among others, in the original languages but also to understand from their roots a variety of words from different fields and languages, including medicine, not to speak of all of the allusions to classical history and literature that one finds everywhere.
Just now I looked for Nesta Phillips on the Web, and found that a distinguished classical historican, Barbara Levick, dedicates her book Claudius to “my teachers in ancient history” with “Nesta Phillips” listed first. I imagine that there are many whom Miss Phillips helped on their academic way, along with many others whom she introduced to the riches of the classical world and its languages. I was interested to read that Miss Phillips had taken students on several very enterprising expeditions to Greece and beyond. I don’t think I had that opportunity. She must have been relatively new to South Hampstead when I was there, and perhaps still finding her feet in her post. I went up to Cambridge in 1961. Among the classicists there I made several life-long friends. And it all goes back to Miss Phillips, of whom I shall continue to think with gratitude, and affection.
Margaret Gilbert
I’m sad to learn of Nesta’s death and recall happily the support and kindness she extended to colleagues joining the teaching staff at South Hampstead in the late 1960’s. Her friendly, warm nature was reflected in her relationships with staff and students. She was encouraging of the taught curriculum and also extra activities, introduced after the end of exams in the summer term, for older girls. She made a wonderful contribution to the ethos of the school, being concerned for the development of the whole person.
Barbara Hilton (former Chemistry teacher)
Between the years 1984 and 2001, my husband and I lived in Hong Kong where he was Professor of Law at the University of Hong Kong, and I was enjoying a ‘mid-life career change’ as a barrister. Some time during the nineties, we were on board the Star Ferry going over to Kowloon to have dinner. I spotted someone who looked very much like Miss Phillips but I wasn’t quite sure if it was her; so many years had passed since she was my teacher. As she got off the boat, I rather nervously approached her and asked if she’d taught at South Hampstead. To my delight she responded positively. I was strangely excited at this unexpected meeting and was longing to have a chat with her. But before I could even begin, she asked me ‘Are we on Hong Kong side?’ I told her that we were not – we had, in fact, just landed on Kowloon side. She then said, ‘Oh dear, we’re meant to be on the other side’, and she and her companion leapt back onto the ferry just as it was commencing its return crossing! She disappeared into the mists! It was both frustrating and memorable.
Penelope Jaffé
In 1973, we had finished our O-levels and were foot loose and fancy free. There was time to fill between the end of exams the start of the school holidays. Miss Philips offered to take us up to Hadrian’s Wall to explore what the Romans had kindly left behind. There must have been about 6 or 7 of us girls and herself. We all travelled by train together, and then she was to pick up a mini-bus or similar to drive us between the various sites. We checked in to our youth hostel and Miss Philips went off to collect the vehicle. Unfortunately, she was involved in some sort of collision on the way back to the hostel. Although not badly injured, I think she was rather shaken up and concerned about sorting out the insurance etc. Happily for us, she trusted that we would be responsible enough to fend for ourselves for the next few days, and that is exactly what we did. We had a glorious time, rambling along the wall and perhaps using buses to penetrate further afield. I can’t remember the details. We all met up in the evening with her so that she could quiz us as to what we had learnt that day. Not many teachers would have placed such implicit trust in the good behaviour of her pupils and allowed them the freedom to wander around the countryside scarcely supervised. This was before the days of mobile phones, and if we had got ourselves into a pickle, then we would have had to sort it out for ourselves. Luckily, we were South Hampstead girls and we were well equipped to shoulder the responsibility.
I do not know if she ever confessed to the school what had happened and after a few days rest she was back to her indomitable self, shepherding us to various forts and making sure that we profited from her learning and expertise. We certainly kept quiet about it – no-one wanted to be recalled to London on the train. Thank you , Nesta. I have never forgotten that brief interlude when we roamed Hadrian’s Wall in the sunshine and felt like grown-ups.
Mary Jones (nee Saxty)
I had great respect for Miss Phillips as a teacher of Classics, and was fortunate that my first year of Latin was with her, thus giving me an excellent base. Sadly she never taught me again. However she was a valued form teacher when I was in Upper Sixth (Year 13). Thanks to very sensible advice from her, I decided to apply to Oxford rather than Cambridge on pragmatic, non-academic grounds. The choice was the right one, I got in, had a wonderful three years which shaped my life. So very frequently, in my mind, I say “thank you, Miss Phillips”.
It cannot have been easy giving pastoral care to nervous 17 year olds, in widely varying states of maturity, and dealing with their parents at the same time. Miss Phillips achieved it time after time, always with patience and good humour. Occasionally after I left school I would meet Miss Phillips. We always discussed the value of studying the Classics, and she was delighted to hear that both my children studied Latin and Ancient Greek to A level. When I last saw her she was enjoying teaching Ancient Greek to a retiree who had always wanted to tackle it, and was enjoying it greatly. Miss Phillips life contributed to the continuing study and enjoyment of the Classics, and its influence on the thought of many.
Vicky Maltby
Miss Phillips taught me for both Latin and Greek to A level. She was a superb gentle but firm teacher with undeviating standards and to this day I can still hear her in my mind’s ear. There were only two of us doing Greek and lessons took place around radiator in the main hall because there were not enough classrooms to accommodate a minority subject. I was taught with Lucy Gaster, a brilliantly gifted young woman with a stunning ability to put English poetry into either Latin or Greek. I remember Miss Phillips being moved to tears by a piece of Lucy’s poetry but somehow she made it gently clear that she valued both her pupils equally so that our lessons were always a pure pleasure. She was able to restore my confidence with the same gentle approach after I made a mess of A levels and I am glad I repaid something by getting an Exhibition to Cambridge.
Janet Neel (class of 1958)
I remember Nesta Phillips with great affection as a kind, caring and very supportive form teacher. I shall always be grateful to her for encouraging me to apply to St. Hilda’s College Oxford.
Diana Preston (nee Faith)
I remember Miss Phillips very well. Even though I never studied with her, she imbued assembly with a great sense of importance which strikes me now as really special because she knew, whereas I didn’t, that the memories of these occasions would carry us through thick and thin at a later date. Miss Philips was precious and loved by the whole school.
Susannah Self (class of 1975)
I went onto study medicine and at aged 60 I am still practicing. To this day Miss Phillips’ influence stays with me as naturally many medical words and phrases have their derivation in the classical languages of Latin and Ancient Greek. When using such expressions I am taken forever taken back to Waterlow House in the mid 1970’s and our lessons with her. She was a force to be reckoned with and clearly influential on the many hundreds of girls she taught.
Dr Lisa Silver (class of 1978)
Nesta was extremely proud of her A level Latin and Greek students, deeply loyal and interested in all they did. There were, I think, two of us who became in due course fully-fledged academic classicists (both of us in fact Ancient Historians), and I am the second. The first was Dr Barbara Levick, from Nesta’s early days at Brighton and Hove High School (who will be 90 next year), a very distinguished scholar, and Fellow and Tutor at St Hilda’s, Oxford for almost 40 years. When I went up for scholarship interviews at Somerville (in November 1964), a process spread at that time over two or more days, Nesta arranged for me to meet Barbara – a trek across town, and quite a privilege. I’m sure this contributed greatly to my confidence and ability to cope. Barbara and I retained a bond formed by the link through Nesta. On that same occasion, Nesta also sent me off in the opposite direction, into genteel North Oxford, where I was invited to tea by her erstwhile Cambridge teacher, Professor Jocelyn Toynbee, by then settled into retirement from teaching. It says much for Nesta, I think, that she kept this close connection with her own mentor and that on her recommendation, the eminent Ms Toynbee received a shy and rather hopeless schoolgirl with gracious hospitality that I have not forgotten.
Nesta is remembered, as Latin teachers inevitably are, for getting her classes through the endless grammar, fearsome unseens and baffling set texts. She did this with aplomb; but it was only when I got to know her better that I realised that she was in reality no lover of the exclusively language-based, narrow, elitist approach that was only just beginning to shift, and felt constricted by it. She once confessed that she would have loved to teach Geography – which indeed would have spoken to her adventurous spirit and passion for travel. Nesta was strikingly ahead of her time in seeking a broadening out of the Classics curriculum to embrace the ancient cultures as a whole. The most enjoyable part of what we did in the Sixth Form was to be sent off to work on independent projects, to find our own way into Greek vases, or architecture or some Roman personalities. In the coming decades, Nesta was able to be part of the revolution in Classics teaching that kept the subject alive in schools and also in universities. For her too, this was clearly a huge breath of fresh air. In later years, she enjoyed mixing in classical circles and was active, I think, in JACT, the reforming Joint Association of Classical Teachers. Nesta clearly had clout: she once recommended me as a lecturer for the London branch of the Classical Association, and duly negotiated dates, marched her chosen group off to an early meal beforehand (at Garfunkels in Tottenham Court Road, of whose salads she approved!), and made sure everything went off impeccably. None of this came across as bossy, however, but rather it was characterised by the genuine friendliness and warmth that marked Nesta’s personal dealings. It was an enormous pleasure to be hosted by her that evening. I am happy too that we were able to remain in touch through the following years, even if not able to meet nearly as much as I would have liked.
Tessa Rajak (nee Goldsmith) (class of 1964)
After I joined the Staff of South Hampstead High School in September 1969, as Head of the History Department, I rapidly realised Nesta Phillips was a power in the land — as a mine of information about the whole ethos of the School, its pupils staff and parents, plus its role in the wider community of the Girls’ Public Day School Trust ( now the Girls’ Day School Trust), and the local Hampstead community. As I learnt to navigate my way ,Nesta became a source of wise counsel, especially when I joined her as an Upper VI Form Mistress –cum guide and mentor. I owe much to her in teaching me how to collate the UCAS applications to Universities and Higher Education. Her wise advice, to think ahead and so hopefully avoid confrontational situations, did I think, help me to avoid possible pitfalls and challenging situations.
In October 1977 I married Stephen Runnacles and left South Hampstead in December 1977, but I kept in close touch with Nesta. She became a greatly valued friend and was often involved in my family’s social activities , based in Tite St Chelsea while I went to live in Maidenhead first and then the nearby village of Cookham Dean. She loved coming to join us all in our large family gatherings and would happily talk with my father about Greek philosophy and the role of the classics in education. After the birth of our daughter Jane in June 1979, we were delighted to have Nesta as one of her godmothers , and she took much interest in Jane’s education and career in medicine and paediatrics.
Looking back over Nesta’s long and very interesting life , I was fortunate to listen to her recounting her early memories of her father after his return from military service in World War 1. He was lucky to have no physical wounds but was in need of mental rehabilitation in its early stages then. He went to Craiglockart Psychiatric Hospital outside Edinburgh—- a world well described by Pat Barker in her novel “Regeneration” (published 1991)–and life at home in Swansea required many adjustments for her mother. Both Nesta’s parents were Grammar School teachers and greatly valued education, so were naturally very proud when she gained a place in 1939 at Newnham College Cambridge; this appreciation and emphasis on the intellectual aspect of education continued throughout her life. While at home on vacations, Nesta helped to de-brief sailors on the Arctic Run during World War II—–a very dangerous business transporting weapons and food to Britain’s ally, Soviet Russia , with harrowing conditions for all involved. In 1995 she went with a group to be honoured by the Russian Government in Murmansk for their war work —an event she greatly enjoyed.
After Cambridge, Nesta well described to me the choice facing her in 1943 with Britain still at war—Bletchley Park and secret work (only revealed much later as decoding enemy communications) or teaching—-and she chose the latter, and went to be Head of Classics at Brighton and Hove High School (GPDST). While in Sussex, Nesta recounted the events leading up to the June 1944 D Day Landings in Normandy—–the vehicles, ammunition and equipment lined up in the small lanes near the coast. On the actual day, 6th June, her school entertained many wives and mothers of servicemen crossing the English Channel; this gesture undoubtedly helped to boost morale and so contributed to the ultimate success of this great enterprise. Once VE Day arrived , 8th May 1945, Nesta was full of enthusiasm to go and join the crowds celebrating in London; she was outside Buckingham Palace when the Royal Family came on the balcony and she danced in Piccadilly Circus, —although her thoughts were often with those still fighting in the Far East until VJ Day on 15th August 1945
Nesta showed great initiative when she organised the first dchool trip overseas to West Africa on the “Minerva”—-still afloat! She loved travelling and with her intrepid spirit, she came to know very well the classical world of Greece, Italy , France and the Near East. She would regale me with stories of trips around Jordan, Iran and Turkey, taken in the days before mass travel, so transported often on mules and living in very basic accommodation by today’s standards. In addition she took many groups of post-Ordinary Level (now GCSE) girls along Hadrian’s Wall and she had an encyclopaedic knowledge of all ports of call – and it was always great fun. She was indomitable when travelling long distances as in South America and she loved Peru and Lake Titicaca. On her travels, she invariably made new friends and would talk about them with great interest and enthusiasm once home
Nesta engaged very directly with new acquaintances, and all were treated the same, whether a retired Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, at a Classical Association lecture to which I accompanied her, or a firebrand Trade Union leader of the Mine Workers, – a noted foe of the then Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, Arthur Scargill was travelling on the same train seated beside Nesta described by her later as “a charming man” and kindly went to buy her a cup of tea and they engaged in a long conversation. After he had left the train, a fellow passenger told her who she had been talking to, much to her surprise, as she was a staunch “Daily Telegraph” reader!
The Daily Telegraph always accompanied Nesta, primarily for the crossword which she finished at lightening speed every day. Her style of dress at School never varied. She always wore a tweed skirt, a flowery cotton short-sleeved blouse topped by a serviceable cardigan (pulled together and used to great effect when admonishing naughty girls sent by usually young staff new to the school to report to her outside the staff room), sensible stockings and shoes, plus a fawn mac or tweed coat outer-wear. She was ready for all eventualities and I doubt if her like are seen around SHHS today!
Finally to sum up Nesta, I would apply the following adjectives—–intellectual, intrepid, indomitable, but above all INSPIRATIONAL as a teacher and as an amazing friend.
Elizabeth Runnacles (nee Piachaud), former teacher at South Hampstead High School