Room 2D

Continuing on the theme of orphaned artwork not connected to a specific story or comic strip, here are three fabulous drawings by the illustrator for early Blushes (I think maybe Alan Bell), which were featured in issue 32 of Justice magazine. Each of them tells a story in itself. Firstly, here is  The Volunteer : What is going on here? The headmaster stands, hands on hips holding a cane, surrounded by a group of girls — three senior-looking ones (prefects?) one of whom is holding a report, and seven younger plump-bottomed girls in vest and pants, one of whom has her hand up to volunteer. What is she volunteering for? Is this a group punishment and she has offered to go first, or is she volunteering to offer up the name of the culprit the Head is looking for (possibly the girl on her left, hence her alarmed look)? Are those punishment marks already on the volunteer’s bottom and that of her neighbour? What is the role of the ...

From Uniform Girls 14 As Jane stubbed out the cigarette carefully on a wooden post, she tucked the butt-end into her jacket pocket to hide the evidence. It was only then that she heard the slight rustle of another presence in the stall as feet disturbed the thick lining of straw. ‘You know the rules about smoking in the stables, Jane,’ came a voice out of the gloom… ‘and the penalty for it.’ Jane peered into the darkness, trying to identify the owner of the voice. ‘Who the hell’s that?’ The head lad stepped out of the shadows and moved down the row of stalls towards the girl. ‘And in my opinion, you would benefit considerably from a sound thrashing.’ ‘A thrashing, Mr Greaves?’ Jane’s voice rose nervously as she realised she had been caught out at last. All those surreptitious gaspers she had snatched behind the barn, in the barn, in the tack room, in the stables themselves, and she’d never been caught. In six months as...

Dear Sir, I refer to your excellent Issue 22, and in particular to a letter from one ‘J.S’, headed Congratulations , which has sparked off my interest enormously! What a splendid idea, that readers should ‘adopt’ a suitably youthful and attractive teenager of their acquaintance and then report to other readers on their plans for dealing with her in loco parentis , as it were! And what a fellow this J.S. is! I can just imagine him chatting amiably with his ‘sweet, sizably-bottomed’ Miranda, playing the kindly neighbour or whatever he is, and all the while picturing that pretty face distorted with crying and wet with tears, that bottom squirming across his lap and, ‘in respect of food and board,’ the delightful Miranda spreadeagled across her bed making the payments that J. S. said he would expect her to make, ‘when he felt like it.’ You can’t trust anyone, can you! The one omission from J.S.’s letter was a photograph of Miranda. What a pity he couldn’t have sneaked a snap of her, ...

Story (?) from Blushes 1 with a visual appearance by Alan Bell himself I believe. The following letter, addressed to the department of the Home Office responsible for Approved and Industrial Schools, formed part of a report submitted by the then Chief Inspector of Approved Schools in Warwickshire, which as an insight into the conditions obtaining in such establishments is illuminating; as an exposition of the kind of double-think with which the administrators of approved schools — or one of them at least — approached the matter of corporal punishment, it is, to say the least, revealing. For anyone interested in verifying the authenticity of the document, it may be found under the reference: HO 45/14545 at the Public Record Office. Kenilworth Training School Model Rules Chief Inspector of Reformatories (C.P. in girls under 16) Minutes In May last there was a serious revolt on the part of the girls at this Reformatory...