News Assignment 1

Nita’s Switchboard Story

Nita Gudgeon revealed some of her earliest experiences as a switchboard operator in the Second World War today.
Aged 82 and now living in Bournemouth, Mrs Gudgeon was twenty when she volunteered for the army.
She proclaimed one morning “Mum, I’m gonna join the army and travel the world.”
When her mother asked her the reason for this abrupt decision, she simply smiled and said “I’m fed up of living here and sharing the bedroom. For once, I want my own bed.”
Mrs Gudgeon had thirteen other siblings with which she grew up with in Southampton.
Nita always had to share a bedroom with them throughout her childhood and nine are still alive.

In 1946 she was trained for six months in the United Kingdom to become a telephone operator.
Achieving a technical understanding in the signals and switchboard system, Mrs Gudgeon became an expert within a year. Switchboards were manual devices used to connect telephones to outside connections, a vital role when receiving messages from headquarters.
Many of her friends and colleagues had seen placements in Cairo and France, so unsurprisingly she was disappointed with the announcement that she would be working in Germany.

She soon realised the opportunity she was being given when she experienced the end of the war in Berlin.
“It was a life changing experience and one that I will never forget. When people lined the street, you couldn’t help but be happy with them.”
Mrs Gudgeon’s children expressed how proud they were of her mother and how happy they are after living in Bournemouth for 35 years.
Now retired, Nita Gideon concluded her recollection by looking at the sky from behind her sunglasses.
“I’m not ready to go just yet either.”