“There was the intriguing “Major” Bill Jordan, reputedly an ex-secret service man who had worked behind enemy lines during the war. In his short time at St Bede’s he taught middle-school English with fastidious attention to detail and extreme annoyance at the excessive use of corporal punishment around the school. On one occasion he burst into the room next door and grabbed the strap from a teacher he believed was over-doing it. Relations between the “Major” and several staff members became strained over the strap issue.”