Mrs Pitt takes over as headmistress in 1973, having taught first Latin, and then English at the school.

Mrs Pitt, who is conscious of neither age nor colour, is prepared to defy apartheid laws, and in 1974 she introduces isiZulu as a school subject and employs a black teacher. Two years later, the Soweto uprising takes place when resentment boils over at new government regulations that stipulate that half of school subjects must be taught through the medium of Afrikaans, which is seen by blacks as the language of the oppressor.

The Soweto uprising of 1976 is to have a major impact on the school’s admissions policy: it offers a place to its first black pupil, in defiance of apartheid laws.