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She’s done the lot – investigations, features, reporting and reviewing – but now it’s time for Western Morning News feature writer Gloria Schofield to pack away her notebook and unglue the phone from her ear. As she contemplates retirement, read about her inauspicious early days in Plymouth…

Two weeks after I joined the Western Morning News, in March, 1971, I wrote a panicky letter to my friend back home in Hertfordshire. “I’ve made a terrible mistake. It’s horrible. I’ve got to get out of here.”

Well, I was young, and homesick, and I couldn’t understand the Plymouth accent at all. (“Are you a bit deaf, m’dear?” asked the chief reporter, after I’d said “What?” and “Pardon?” for the 48th time).

But, obviously, the paper and the place and the people grew on me. It’s only now, more than 30 years on, that I’m really “getting out of here” – taking early retirement so that my husband and I can move nearer to our children and grandson.

Even as I write this, I can hardly believe I’m leaving. What will I do without the daily routine of work, the opportunity reporters have of meeting such an amazing range of people, the chance to sound off, every week, in my column?

And what will I do without all the office jokes, the office gossip, the office conspiracy theories, the office characters and the much-loved office friends?

Of course, over the past 30-odd years, there have been many times when work has seemed quite as horrible as it did in that first fortnight. But the overwhelming memories are about the thrills of getting a good story, the lovely people I’ve met, and the fun it’s all been.

I’ve done every job, I think, except sports reporter. My stint as investigative reporter was not a success. During the Anthony Blunt scandal, we had a tip-off that he was lurking in a posh house in Plymouth. I set off intrepidly, straight from home, to find out the truth. I had to take along my son, then aged seven, who had woken up covered in spots. Still, I thought, he’d be good cover for my detective work.

I knocked on the front door.

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