Uppingham School

Uppingham School is a public school (English fee-charging boarding and day school for pupils 13–18) in Uppingham, Rutland, England, founded in 1584 by Robert Johnson, the Archdeacon of Leicester, who also established Oakham School. The headmaster, Richard Maloney, belongs to the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference and the school to the Rugby Group of British independent schools. Edward Thring was the school's best-known headmaster (in 1853–1887). His curriculum changes were adopted in other English public schools. John Wolfenden, headmaster from 1934 to 1944, chaired the Wolfenden Committee, whose report recommending the decriminalisation of homosexuality appeared in 1957. Uppingham has a musical tradition based on work by Paul David and Robert Sterndale Bennett. It has the biggest playing-field area of any school in England, in three separate areas of the town: Leicester to the west, Middle to the south, and Upper to the east.

In 1584 Uppingham School was founded with a hospital, or almshouse, by Archdeacon Robert Johnson. The original 1584 schoolroom in Uppingham churchyard is still owned by the school and is a Grade I listed building. The original hospital building is now incorporated in the School Library.

The first recorded Uppingham schoolboy was Henry Ferne from York, who was chaplain to Charles I. Another prominent early schoolboy was the Jesuit Anthony Turner, one of the martyrs of the Popish Plot.

In the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries Uppingham remained a small school of 30–60 pupils, with two staff. Despite its small size, pupils then regularly gained places and scholarships to Oxford and Cambridge universities. During that period, various lasting features of life in the school developed. It became a full boarding school, with all pupils having individual studies. This pattern was set around 1800 and some of the original studies survive, although no longer used as such. The first recorded school play was performed in 1794 and Uppingham has a thriving theatre. The main recreation in the 19th century was cricket – the first recorded cricket match, described in the school magazine, was in 1815 – and the game still thrives there. In 1846 the institution of school praepostors, or prefects, was established. The praepostors are called "pollies" around the school. One of the earliest Old Boys to gain fame was Thomas Bonney, a pupil in the 1850s, who became the most distinguished geologist of his time, and president of the Alpine Club. Until at least 1853, the school was known as "Uppingham Grammar School."

Edward Thring transformed the school from a small, local grammar school into a large, well-known public school, with 330 pupils. During his headship on 4 April 1876 the entire school, consisting of 300 boys, thirty masters, and their families, moved temporarily to Borth in Wales after an outbreak of typhoid ravaged the town as a result of the poorly maintained water system. In Borth the school took over the disused Cambrian Hotel and a number of boarding houses, remaining there for fourteen months. The move was successful in saving the school from a serious epidemic and the move to Borth is commemorated in an annual service held in the school chapel.

Thring also won national and transatlantic reputation as an original thinker and writer on education. At a time when mathematics and classics dominated the curriculum, he encouraged many ‘extra' subjects: French, German, science, history, art, carpentry, and music. In particular, Thring was a pioneer in his introduction of music into the regular system of education. He opened the first gymnasium in an English school, the forerunner of the present sports hall, and later added a heated indoor swimming pool. He commissioned a number of buildings, notably the chapel designed by the Gothic Revival architect G. E. Street.

Ernest William Hornung was at the school in the 1880s; he wrote several novels but his fame rests upon his creation of the character A. J. Raffles.

During this period the school continued to grow, with numbers reaching well over 400. These years saw the formation in 1889 of the Combined Cadet Force; the creation in 1890 of the first school orchestra; in 1896 the re-introduction of hockey; and the adoption of rugby football, with the first match being against Rugby. Uppingham pupils still take part in all these activities today.