Harry Tuyn and his family at Sizewell Hall
Recently we have had several enquiries about Sizewell Hall when it was a School. Do you know anything about it? This picture was taken about 1956 and was supplied by Virginia Peace, fourth from the left. Elaine and Harry Tuyn are in the centre at the top.
Did you attend either the Boarding School or “The Summer Holiday Course”? The following photos are of some of those Summer Schools.
I spend 2 summers at Sizewell when it was an International Summer School where foreign students (up to 18 years old ) came for 6 weeks to learn English. In 1957 I came in April to look after the daughters of the principal Harry Tuyn whilst their German Nanny went on extended leave and the following year I was a staff member looking after “health and welfare” of students and staff. My name is Anneke but (as the then baby could not say that )she called me Ankie. So in this country I am now known as Ankie or Anne!
Most of the male tutors were past and present university students and the female staff came from Sweden or Germany plus a few local ladies.
After 54+ years I cannot remember any names except Kathleen and Haleh a Persian girl who spend years with the Tuyn family and was educated by them. Haleh was the head cook in 1958. On that photo I am standing next to Harry Tuyn and Haleh is standing next to me.
This photo was taken in 1957. Supplied by Anne van Woerden. Where are you now?
Do you have any pictures that we can share on the web with other visitors?
The Tuyn family and staff on the terrace with Kathleen Anderson standing, at the end of the course with Harry Tuyn and Kathleen. She was the secretary and really a Jack of all trades (admin wise) The Tuyns also had a boarding school in Switserland in the winter so Kathleen had a full time post.
The students were not allowed to speak in their own language and if caught doing so they were fined. I can’t remember how much but is was probably 6 pence a time. The money collected in the 6 weeks was used to fund the leaving party! (Anne van Woerden.)
Please contact us and perhaps you can be reunited with past friends.
When the School at Sizewell Hall closed in the later 1950s, Harry Tuyn started an English girls’ finishing school in Château d’Oex, near Gstaad. Harry sadley died in Canada many years ago.
I’m glad to see dear old Sizewell Hall is being put to such good use. I was a pupil at Sizewell Hall School in 1952 until it closed in 1955. It was small a coeducational preparatory school for eight to 13-year-olds, joined for the summer by foreign students.
There were only three or four teachers, including the headmaster, Harry Tuyn, a Dutchman who taught us English, French, German, Latin and Greek by turns! It left me, for instance, with a lifelong passion for literature, nature study and music.
We were allowed to make full use of the 35 acres as our playground, except for the area beyond the pond, which was out of bounds in the summer after a boy was bitten by an adder. What was different from other schools I attended is that we seemed to be one community of children, tolerant of our differences in age, sex and background. One fellow pupil was Sheridan Morley, the theatre critic, whom I see in the paper died not long ago.
I would love to get in touch with others who were there at that time. Robert? Wayne? Gijs? Clara? Arnold? Geraldine? Dorothy? Harleh? Karen? Gretel? Mr Hobson? Miss Acheson? I wonder where you are now. Look after yourselves.
Brian
