Joy Last (nee Leek), was the ninth of her mother Emma’s ten children – five boys: Jack, Steven, William, Robert & Claude and five girls: Dorothy, Ruth,Violet & Gillian. Her father, John Leek worked at Rookery Park farm as the horseman responsible for the stallion and walking him to local mares that needed servicing. The family’s first home was at Elmsley Cottages in Little Street.
At 12 years old she contracted diphtheria, a highly contagious disease spread by close contact with an infected person and until the age of 13 she could only contact her parents and siblings through a glazed door or a window.
Joy was a pupil at Yoxford Primary School where each class had 30-40 children. The Head Teacher was Mr Hacon and the three Assistants included Miss Stevenson and Miss Keble. The subjects taught were Maths, English, History and R.E. ‘All the teachers taught everything’. Children would be walked down to the Old School for cooked lunches. Pupils were organised into four age-group classes and Joy did not pass the 11-plus exam. After school she worked in a local factory making parts for the TV company Pye of Cambridge. They were situated in Brook Street.
She was an adult when she contracted polio or infantile paralysis. She now lives in a bungalow fitted with ceiling-mounted hoists. She has no strength in her legs and has carers visit her four times per day.
For a lady that has suffered so much she is an amazingly cheerful person. If only inoculation had been widely used in her school days.
Interviewed May 2019