Hi, The state education of people in Wales was patchy and poor before the "Brad y llyfrae gleision" was published about 1860s. Before then a lot of education was given in Sunday Schools, Circulating Schools where the teacher went around usually in the quieter agriculteral months and taught for a short time before moving on. There were also, more often in the towns, very small schools run by an older person assisted very often by her daughter. They taught relatively rudimentary lessons in language, writing,arithmetic and possibly geography and history. Music and Art probably depended on the skill of the teacher. One of our family had a Boarding School at Painswick which employed only family members according to 1881 census In some places these little schools ran for many years and there was one in Neath in 1940's. They had no connection in any way to the state or church/chapel schools. I'm not surprised to see someone give the occupation of school mistress on the census. Married teachers were allowed in the state primary schools in the 1940's because I had many.They were not allowed to stay in the Grammar Schools once married and that I think would have been in the early 1940's, they moved to the primary school and taught me. Katherine