We take time out this week to pay tribute to one of Bermuda’s outstanding educators Martha Alvira Francis, B.A. (Queen’s University), J.P.

She passed away peacefully in her sleep early on Thursday morning after a short illness in King Edward Hospital. She was in her 89th year.

Mrs Francis had a most interesting career as an educator spanning nearly 50 years. She was widely esteemed as belonging to that class of teachers who inspired, as different from those who just teach. She had no hesitation in saying her crowning achievement was not so much her appointment in 1977 as Principal of Prospect Primary School, but the 14-year tenure she spent in that post.

During that time, with a God-given gift coupled with her considerable professional training and experience, as well as her peerless style of inspiring students and staff alike, and her ability to gain the confidence and support of parents, she succeeded in putting Prospect Primary into a most enviable position.

Her retirement in June 1991 was not so much by choice, as by the law of the land, forcing all teachers to ‘call it a day’ when they reach a certain golden age.

Martha Bramble, which was her maiden name, received her primary education at Central School. It is now the Victor Scott School, named after that outstanding master who introduced her to the profession immediately upon her graduation from Berkeley Institute. At the end of two years on staff at Central, she went to Queen’s University, Canada, and earned a Bachelor of Arts Degree.

Mrs Francis rejoined the Central staff where she held many posts of responsibility, at times being Acting Deputy Head Teacher and Acting Principal. Mr Scott described her as one of his most efficient teachers, hardworking, painstaking and zealous in the performance of her work. Her peers considered her to be an enthusiastic teacher who put much planning into her work.

Those were the qualities that merited her appointment to Prospect Primary, and which she accentuated during her tenure there.

She was appointed a Justice of the Peace in 1987. Having been forced into that ‘other life’ of retirement, Mrs Francis served among other things, as a member of a special panel appointed to assist judges in the Family Court. Much, if not all of Family Court proceedings occur outside of the public glare.

Mrs Francis travelled widely. She also found time to do charitable work in the community. She was a committed Christian and member of the First Church of God, North Shore.

Martha was a good friend of Yours Truly and my late wife Ismay. It stemmed from the time we entered the Berkeley Institute at the same time, having been awarded Packwood Scholarships, memorialising the physician after whom the Packwood Rest Home in Somerset is named.

Last rites for Mrs Francis are scheduled for Thursday, September 4 at the First Church of God.