about author

Diane Jacqueline Clarke was born within the sounds of Bow Bells at the General Lying-In Hospital on Westminster Bridge Road in Central London, close to Waterloo Station. Parents Frank Clarke and Denise Leloup met and married in Brussels as the Allies liberated Belgium at the end of WWII. They settled in South London to raise a family, which included a younger brother Anthony to Diane. As a young child Diane’s upbringing was largely in French, spending most summers with family in Brussels and the Ardennes, and she only learned English when starting school in South London.

She attended school in Streatham, South London and as a teenager graduated from Furzdown Teacher Training College in 1969. She met her future engineer husband of 54 years, Richard, while at college and married the following year to become Mrs. Diane O’Reilly.

She taught at a number of primary schools in South London and Surrey and always had a love for teaching young children, including her own son David and daughter Sarah. She became headteacher (principal) at a primary school in Leatherhead , Surrey for a number of years before moving to support her husband’s job relocation to Allentown, Pennsylvania, USA in 1996.

Daughter Sarah currently teaches pre-K in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Son David who married and moved to Sydney, Australia in 2000 tragically passed away in early 2024. Diane still has family and friends in the UK which she visits often. She has two grandchildren Georgia and James in Pennsylvania, and a granddaughter Chloe in Australia.