A NURSE who worked as health visitor in Burley-in-Wharfedale for 28 years before retiring in 2012 has published a book on her life as a student nurse in the 1960s at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary.

Molly Brearley’s memoir begins in the mid-1960s, as a naive 17-yer-old, leaving the security of her family home to start nurse training in Huddersfield.

Friendships soon develop with other young nurses as they struggle to cope with strict discipline, late-night studying and long working hours.

Molly said: “It is a decade of major changes, the disaster of the war over we are experiencing more freedom, enabling us to enjoy the little free time have.

“Being a group of mischievous teenagers, we soon start breaking the rules, sneaking out of the nurses’ home at every opportunity for a night at the disco.

“What an impossible job the home sister had trying to keep us all in order.

“Many changes were also happening in the NHS. Nurses were full of optimism; they started to feel more confident and were beginning to develop greater independence. Career opportunities were greater than they had previously been.

“It was a fascinating time to be a teenager working in the nursing profession.”

The book is available to order on-line from YPD books.com or by phone on 01904 431213, on Amazon books or The Grove bookshop in Ilkley.