Follow Up! 2020

T H E H A R R O W A S S O C I AT I O N M A G A Z I N E 2 0 2 0

Follow Up! Once Upon A Hill James Blunt talks about his time on the Hill

The Real McCoy Pen Hadow is on a mission

Green Minds OHs working in sustainability and wildlife conservation

Game, Set, Match The new Prenn Hue Williams Court

03

THE EXECUTIVE President His Royal Highness Prince El Hassan bin Talal (The Park 1960 3 ) Chairman Adam Hart (West Acre 1977 1 ) Executive Board Heyrick Bond-Gunning (West Acre 1985 3) James Darley (The Park 1984 3) James de Broë-Ferguson (The Grove 1981 3 ) Will Orr-Ewing (Elmfield 1998 3 )

FROM THE

CHAIRMAN Dear Fellow Old Harrovians As I sit down to write this introduction to Follow Up! in my dining room, converted during the current Covid-19 virus lockdown into a family office, with my wife, daughter and two OH sons sitting near me working, my mind turns to the momentous changes that have been thrust upon us.

I have been hugely impressed by the strength of purpose that has been shown

Director Perena Shryane ha@harrowschool.org.uk

in the UK and overseas to counter the spread of the virus. Many have exhibited

Alumni Officer Shama Alimohamed alimohamedsp@harrowschool.org.uk

young and old. Where living together has not been possible, regular interaction

Communications Officer Jessica Bellringer bellringerjr@harrowschool.org.uk Database and Research Officer Emma Pinto pintoel@harrowschool.org.uk Digital Information Officer Chelsea Caterer catererc@harrowschool.org.uk Financial Secretary Cece Walker hadtaccountant@harrowschool.org.uk Careers Advisor Michael Wright wrightmd@harrowschool.org.uk

bravery in the face of adversity and there are countless unhailed heroes to whom we owe our thanks. Most of us will have hunkered down with other family members, via Skype, Teams, Zoom, FaceTime, WhatsApp and even the traditional telephone with family, friends and colleagues has increased markedly. I have been delighted to connect and reconnect with OHs young and old through OH Connect and social media. Many a wry joke, video (and even meme) has been shared, a few of which I have even been able to show to my wife! What a godsend new technologies have proven to be, in keeping us both connected and amused.

It was pleasing to see from the recent members’ survey that OHs value the Harrow Association. The OH community appears never to have been stronger.

The numbers attending recent dinners and events have been greater than ever.

Many of us are using OH Connect to make business and social connections.

Our community is an incredibly strong group spanning the globe and providing social access to fellow OHs through the numerous OH clubs and societies, catering for a wide range of interests. It also offers contact to the many OHs willing to help those seeking work experience, mentoring or business contacts – you may have noticed that we have recently introduced a Business Directory on OH Connect to those wishing to promote their goods or services to fellow OHs. The Harrow Association will continue to provide the platform for social and business interaction between OHs and will be enhancing these opportunities as we move towards celebrating the 450th anniversary of the School’s foundation in 2022.

Printed on Paper which is sourced from well managed forests and is FSC certified. The printer and the manufacturing mill are both credited with ISO14001 Environmental Management Systems Standard and are both FSC certified. The printer holds EMAS, the EU Eco-label.

I hope you enjoy reading this year’s Follow Up!

Stet Fortuna Domus Adam Hart (West Acre 1977 1 ) CHAIRMAN • HARROW ASSOCIATION

Editors: Jessica Bellringer, Catharine Robinson, Perena Shryane Design: TheCircus.uk.com UK Print: Optichrome Advertising: William Landale (The Grove 19783 ) Advertising enquiries to: landalewjf@harrowschool.org.uk or 020 8872 8522.

Contributors: Adam Hart (West Acre 1977¹), Alastair Land, James Blunt (Elmfield 1987³ ), Timothy Dalton(Newlands 19923 ), Alexander Gray (The Head Master’s 19943 ), Hugo Taylor (Druries 1999 3 ), Alastair Dick-Cleland (The Park 19753 ), James Wild (Elmfield 20043 ), Pen Hadow(The Park 19753 ), Hary Bucknall (West Acre 1979 3 ), Richard McColl (West Acre 19933 ), Michael Phillips (West Acre 20033 ), Michael Wright, Kasia Fletcher, Carlo Agostinelli (The Head Master’s 20143 ), Marie Staunton, Douglas Collins, Peter Hunter, Alexis Casdagli, Tace Fox, Noel Bolingbroke-Kent (Moretons 19533 ), Anne HallWilliams, Emma Pinto, Chelsea Caterer, Shama Alimohamed Photographers: Will Cooper, Roddy Paine, Adam Duke and Rachel Marchant (Newlands 1986 3 ).

Due to space constraints we have not listed the OHs who supplied correspondence, event reports or their own news and images for News in Brief, but we are very grateful to them.

Cover: James Blunt (Elmfield 1987³) © Gavin Bond Photography

04 FROM THE

DIRECTOR A few months ago, when we started to think about the focus of the sixth edition of Follow Up!, little did we know what was about to hit our global community.

With the School and our office all working remotely, it’s been an interesting challenge to put together this annual collection of inspirational OH endeavours, but my sincere hope is that it will entertain, inform and inspire you. It is a bumper edition, larger than ever, reflecting the busy year we’ve had, and the enthusiasm from you all to contribute to the magazine.

Last autumn we said goodbye to Luke Meadows who left for pastures new, having spent ten years working in 5A. I would like to take this opportunity to thank him for the enormous contribution he made during that time to all things digital in 5A. We also said goodbye to Arusha Pillay and I thank her too for all she did to help us with the smooth running of the HA. This year’s theme of sustainability and wildlife conservation has never been more topical and there is no shortage of OHs leading the charge in this area, not least the awe-inspiring Pen Hadow, who you can read about on page 66.

Our highlights, which I hope you will enjoy, are a Q&A with our new(ish) Head Master, Alastair Land, who has been steadfastly steering the ship during this difficult time, and another with the ever-entertaining James Blunt. I would also like to extend grateful thanks to all our contributors this year for the fascinating features they have provided, most while also on lockdown.

Last but certainly not least: to the 2020 leavers, welcome to the OH community!

As you leave Harrow, please make full use of the global OH network which you are now joining. Sign up to OH Connect and make connections with over 3,500 OHs who are using the site. While your Harrow experience was so sadly cut short, I know you will be warmly welcomed into our wonderful OH community and that you will benefit greatly from its support in your future endeavours in myriad ways.

We wish you the best of luck in your next steps, at university or whatever they may be, and we hope to see you very soon at reunions and networking evenings.

I end with the hope that we will soon be able to consign social-distancing to history and to begin welcoming you once more to our usual array of OH activities and events, not least our 450th celebrations in 2022.

Perena Shryane

WELCOME TO THE NEW OHs The following Harrovians become Old Harrovians this summer:

D I R E C TO R • H A R ROW A S S O C I AT I O N

BRADBYS

DRURIES

ELMFIELD

LYON'S

MORETONS

NEWLANDS

P Azagra Tojar

GAH Burton

WRJ Blunt

AA Abishegam

A Abdulla-Zada

PK Benigni

FG Bamford

ASP Courage

TJJ Carden

HJ Bell

MMA Cowley

J Choi

GPF Biles

CWH Gurney

CJW Fisher

JA Chohan

JRJ Davis

CBO Christie

AGT Harris

JE Langston

RJA Guthe

HC Cleeve

JMA Debiase

JAM Donohugh

SA MacNaughton

HG Lempriere-Johnston

OTS Heffer

J Han

CAT Desmond

WHR Dutton

H Muhammad

AD Moses-Taiga

GCN Ho

A Hong

JWW Downing

Z Fan

HNR Ng

BB Moses-Taiga

PE Kinnaird

JJM Kajoba

GL Gaffey

AM Hogben

ABN Nicholls

AWA Moses-Taiga

KTK Lee

AJ Leung

MM Majdalany

CW Jago

SK Shi

PC O'Toole

WA Orr Ewing

HPZ Lozinski

SM Murjani

EPA Josserand

NRC Syms

WK Shankland

P Patel

AP McK Martine

NLJ Neal

RAL Litton

RJW Tanner

ACJ Wood

AT Rogers

M Shanahan

JD Posner-Kane

LBT McK Morrison

A Shaydullin

NN Sharma

Baron PJBE Schell

LH Ng

WFB Thompson

N Teepsuwan

A Shumeyko

WEG Pattle

HGT Wilson

HRT Zumbika

JX Wang

GAW Wooding

05

RENDALLS

THE GROVE

THE PARK

WEST ACRE

IJ Ajibade

THE HEAD MASTER'S

THE KNOLL

JWvZ Bonas

AY Beckett

FP Deacon

NYAA Amaning

JZ Chen

JCB Behan-Woodall

CI Akinluyi

CA Butler

TJ Farr

AM Chowdhury

J Cho

BYC Chiang

FXE Anton-Smith

AFF Heilpern

AV Hirdaramani

EEMG Clark

CPT Davidson

GH Craven

LAP Florescu

BJD Hill

J Ittipakorn

ME Dismont Robinson

WJ Esam

BDT Davies

JTC Griffin

D Huang

HC Kyd

GRS Hall

MA Fitzgibbon

TRG Gianasso

ST Hargraves

ADJ Leney

CAH Mackenzie-Smith

JS Harris

AJT Hall

GL Herron

WTG Holyoake

JM Linares

SM Mannan

TM Khan

CEL Harrison

AC Holmes

CH MacLeod

CO Ohler

HWW McCreanor

E Kim

MFL Little

TP Nash

LK Malhamé

LTL Polturak

GJ Mingay

JC Law

HR Pearson

PHAV Nguyen

C H Mason

F Praditbatuga

FAW Murley

L Leekie

T Placintescu

CD Powell

G O'Brien

AW Ross

H Qureshi

J Leung

FJK Scott

N Shishkarev

EGS Prime

AWB Saunders

JV Robson

SJ O'Dell

EC York

TWC Tang

TJ Seely

HFB Saunders

SJR Rugge-Price

AJL Rowlins

SCP Smith

AJC Walker

V Singh

JP Shepherd

RS Wijeratne

TFJ Ward MC White

FOLLOW UP! • CONTENTS

06

COMMUNITY

08

INTRODUCING THE HEAD MASTER

34

OH BOOKS Written by you

A Q&A with Alastair Land

36 10

OH SURVEY What you had to say

12

CORRESPONDENCE

Spotlight on two new clubs: OH Shaftesbury Enterprise and OH Wellbeing

40

News and views from our readers

16

SOCIETY SPOTLIGHT: OHSE AND OHWS

LISTINGS: BOOKS Hugo Taylor chooses his five favourite reads

ONCE UPON A HILL We catch up with James Blunt

42

R & R: SOMETHING FOR THE WEEKEND Alastair Dick-Cleland shows us some unusual places to stay

20

OH NEWS Records broken, honours received, promotions made, businesses started, mountains climbed, and more

31

ENGAGEMENTS, MARRIAGES, BIRTHS AND DEATHS

46

BIG PICTURE: JAMES WILD Sculpture inspired by nature

48

EVENTS REPORTS AND SOCIETY UPDATES Highlights from a very busy year

07

CAREERS AND E M P LOYA B I L I T Y

H E R I TAG E

66

88

PROFILE: PEN HADOW The Real McCoy

GAME, SET, MATCH PRENN HUE WILLIAMS

110

Noel Bolingbroke-Kent’s solo to Churchill

The new rackets court

72

OHs WORKING ACROSS THE GLOBE

91

A view from Colombia

LOOKING FORWARD A Harrow Development Trust update

FIVE HUNDRED FACES

114

SECRET HARROW: DOORS

OTHER 76

SECTOR SPOTLIGHT: OHs IN SUSTAINABILITY AND WILDLIFE CONSERVATION Saving the planet for a living

84

92

96

FORTY YEARS ON: THE HARROVIAN IN 1980

116

LOYAL TO THE HILL

118

An exhibition about the legendary POW AT Casdagli

CAREERS ADVICE

OH PROMOTIONS Offers especially for you

UPCOMING EVENTS And how to stay in touch

A word from Careers Advisor Michael Wright

85

86

CAREERS CONVENTION

100 450 YEARS ON The next part of the story – Two Victorian icons

GO STANFORD! Carlo Agostinelli’s first year perspective

106

HARROW LIVES Marie Staunton, Head of Library and Archive

HA PODCASTS Wherever you see this symbol, visit the HA SoundCloud page to hear more from, or about the, OH mentioned.

Find out more at ohconnect.org.uk

FOLLOW UP!

08

INTRODUCING HEAD MASTER

ALASTAIR LAND

It is a year since Alastair Land took up the position of Harrow's 35th Head Master at the start of the Summer term in 2019. Alastair went to Manchester Grammar School before achieving a first-class degree in Natural Sciences at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was president of the college's students’ union. After completing his PGCE at Cambridge, he began his career at Eton as a teacher of biology. There, he became a Deputy House Master and held several extra-curricular responsibilities including command of the CCF. Alastair then spent nine years at Winchester, where he was Master in College and a member of the Senior Management Team. Alastair was Deputy Head Master at Harrow for three years from 2012, before moving to Repton as Headmaster. He has retained his interests in outdoor activity and scholarship and is involved in the strategic development of boys’ boarding in the 21st century.

What, or who, first inspired you to teach?

I am very lucky to have had some amazing and inspiring people in my life who showed me aspects of nature, science and the power of good mentoring. Memories formed in youth, can often grow increasingly gilded (or sour) but the recollections I have of being with my maternal grandmother as she went around her garden and orchard are not idealised. There was a sense of determined peace and purpose about her.

She wasn’t chatty at all, so when she talked about the onions, potatoes, beans and apples as I helped her in the immaculate beds that she maintained, I treasured the words and imbibed them deeply. So I learned a lot about growing things and about the insects and other animals in that context. At primary school, I had an astonishingly maverick science teacher, Mr Jones, who did classic

experiments with us such as measuring the speed of sound across the playing fields using the starting pistol.

He also had a preserved human brain in a four-litre ice cream tub: I marvelled at that. My teachers at MGS were all excellent practitioners, but I think I arrived with a pre-formed preference for science so those teachers got a more attentive ear from me. My chemistry teacher was brilliantly old-school; we did incredibly convoluted organic synthesis experiments while, at the same time, he maintained this machine gun of questioning around the room on physical and inorganic topics, “to keep all of the mind up together” as he put it. As my experience of school had been so good, when the opportunity arose to teach overseas in a year out I leapt at it. Teaching was such a privilege: helping people understand the same things that I found fascinating.

09 What lessons have you learnt from your career that have been put to use in your role as Head Master at Harrow?

The principal lesson that I have learned is that everything is a lesson. No experience, either grand or unedifying, is negligible or unworthy of some reflection or analysis; maintaining – keeping alive – that catalogue of “stuff that happens” and sequencing it as a useful mental library is an important discipline. There is, it follows, a lot to draw upon. Much of it would be expected and I certainly wouldn’t want to give an exposition of the trite or clichéd to Old Harrovians, yet I think that the most important lesson or whetstone for me of my practice have become the questions: “Have I released, enabled, or enriched the talents and activities of others today? Can I do that better tomorrow?” I have been involved in education as a professional for more than 25 years, from a British Council School in Kathmandu in the year that the Berlin Wall came down to this the year of Covid. In that time I have learned much about empathy, starting from where the counterpart is, not where I am; about difficult conversations and why it isn’t in fact kind to avoid them; and about constancy: being reliable is a greater asset than being likeable.

Harrow doesn’t stand still, it develops and progresses, it is forward-looking and defines the cutting edge, its beaks and non-teaching staff have kindness, intellect and zeal; and Harrovians are capable, shrewd and loyal.”

What were your first impressions on returning to the Hill after three years away?

Harrow doesn’t stand still, it develops and progresses; it is forward-looking and defines the cutting edge; its beaks and non-teaching staff have kindness, intellect and zeal; and Harrovians are capable, shrewd and loyal.

There was all this, and much more in fact; we are unmistakeably true to the best of our traditions, which include benefiting the communities that surround the Hill.Those three strands of yesterday, tomorrow and current context together make for a highly invigorating milieu.

So my second, third and ongoing impressions are that it will only ever be the greatest honour of my life to serve Harrow School and that the Hill’s life makes it an wholly engaging place in which to live, move and have our being.

What have you been most proud of and inspired by since your return?

Edgy pupil-led drama, a challenging solo, the boy who starts in Yearlings F and finishes as a try scorer in the Cs, the vision, scholarship and determination I see in so many Harrovians and the unwavering commitment in the boys to improve communities and the environment.

Among colleagues there is a commensurate level of diligence, progressive practice and cheerful capacity.

It all gets you up in the morning and, in turn, gives you reassurance to sleep at night.

Is there an OH/Giant of Old you particularly admire and, if so, why?

There are the great science heroes of course: Ronald Aylmer Fisher and Sir Joseph Banks. It is difficult to be a biologist and not have come across their lives and work.Where I stand in Speech Room means that I have a lot of eye contact with Peel, Butler, Palmerston, Nehru, Shaftesbury, Churchill, Guthrie and King Hussein. I have read about their lives and been struck by how often they had to act outside and beyond their normal base of support, even oppose it, to ensure success and progress.

The combination of steel, vision and selflessness in all of them is striking.

Do you have a favourite Harrow song?

I love the songs; I always have the Songbook on my desk wherever I am working. I am fascinated by the origin of songs, their place in our history and that they are an indivisible aspect of the Harrow identity. A Songs event, or indeed an event with songs is unmistakable, it is us. Some of the songs are amusing, some a delightful fantasia of history and founding myth; some – in fact many – celebrate the virtues of games; a good number the balance of athleticism and the life of the mind; and some are not quite repeatable in the 21st century! There is such variety too, the gentle solos, the complicated ones that the XII have to sing and the rousing whole-School numbers. From the Hong Kong Club to a House Bill Hall, we all know what to do when that chord (first inversion of B flat major) of Forty Years On strikes, we are bound together in our souls as the by-heart and heart-felt words are sung.

What advice do you have for this year’s leavers as they become Old Harrovians?

It’s the best Old Boys' club in the world bar none; you can gain a lot from the Harrow Association, because so many have invested in it for so long. There will be times when you want to be distant from School and times when you’ll feel the need to be closer; that is natural. I hope you’ll be generous and open-hearted to the fellow in your year who wants to be in touch and needs support, or that further down the line you’ll be willing to mentor a 2040 leaver who needs to know how to make his way in the world.

What would you like to say to the OH community at this time?

The world really has changed, and forever. We should look out for each other (and our School). There will be the need for support, discernment and generosity. Thinking back to the Giants of Old (and not so Old), many of them acquired mythic and legendary status because they were the first to see that the paradigm had shifted irrevocably and were in the vanguard of response and adaptation. They didn’t hang around mournfully pining for things to go back to “normal”.

What excites you about the future of Harrow, especially with its 450th anniversary approaching in 2022?

That Harrow, with its growing international family, is fearlessly future facing, determined to set generations of young people, as their best selves, on their path to being ready for the real world.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

12

CORRESPONDENCE DEAR PERENA

DEAR EDITOR

I am looking forward to the Rendalls dinner in October, but in the meantime I thought you might enjoy sight of this photograph of three Harrow Lancers.

There was a story in today's Times about 601 Squadron in the RAF. This put me in mind of a member of this squadron, Pilot Officer Gordon "Mouse" Cleaver (Small Houses and Druries 19233), who had been at Harrow and took part in the Battle of Britain, which has its 80th anniversary next year. The story is really about his being shot down over Winchester in 1940 and his eyes becoming filled with particles of the aircraft canopy. The ophthalmologist who treated him was a Mr (later Sir) Harold Ridley. It was he who noted that the particles of plastic remained inert in Cleaver's eyes. In 1948, Ridley was asked by a medical student at St Thomas' Hospital in London if the cataractous lens which had just been removed at surgery would be replaced.

This was the trigger for Harold Ridley to invent the intraocular lens, the first of which he implanted in February 1950. When he decided on the material from which this lens would be made he remembered how the polymethyl methacrylate in "Mouse" Cleaver's eyes had shown no reaction. He chose this, albeit in clinical quality, to be one.

We were attending a Blue White Blue reunion of officers commissioned into 17th/21st Lancers on a blazing hot day in Somerset. In the photograph (left to right) are Lieutenant Colonel Charlie Buxton (Elmfield 1965 2), Colonel the Reverend Christopher Walker (The Park 1957 1) and Colonel Rupert Wieloch (Rendalls 1972 3). We all had the distinction of commanding B Squadron, 17th/21st Lancers on independent operations. There is another coincidence because Christopher was my first squadron leader when I joined the regiment in 1979 and both he and I were captains of boxing at Harrow and in the rugby XV. Remarkably, there were enough OHs to make up a School XII, however, we did not break into Songs because we were at the home of an Old Etonian and I think we were inclined to be more at ease on the Harrow footer fields than in the Music Schools. The other School representatives were: JJ Buxton (Elmfield 1957 1); AJE Snowden (West Acre 1965 1 ); Viscount Brookeborough (Druries 1966 2); CE Robinson (The Park 1968 3); TN Lowes (The Grove 1969 3); Prince Obolensky (Druries 1970 1 ); MTO Stanley (Druries 1970 3); JHS Akerman (The Park 1973 3) and FJW Elwes (The Grove 1980 1).

Best wishes Rupert Wieloch (Rendalls 1972 3 )

Best wishes

DEAR HA TEAM Thank you very much for this invitation.

I can’t make 9 November, but I thought I’d share with you that the main, if not only, reason we joined the Marmots in about 1962/63 was because it was run

by George McConnell (House Master of Rendalls 19463–1961 2 ) at the time – who let us drink BEER at meetings!

I was never remotely interested in mountaineering - although three of us did spend a happy few days camping and birdwatching with George on Skomer, off the Pembrokeshire coast!

Richard Packard MD DO FRCS FRCOphth FRCOphth

Hope the evening goes well.

(The Head Master’s 1960 )

Best wishes

Consultant Ophthalmic Surgeon

David Milne (Moretons 1958 3 )

2

13

Left: V1 flying bomb also known as a ‘doodle bug’ and above: A V2 rocket preparing for launch.

DEAR SIRS DEAR SIRS I hope the readers of this publication are well during these difficult times.

I would like to thank the OHs who were so kind to write letters in response to my correspondence to last year’s publication. I am also very grateful for the generosity reflected by the donations received for my Harrow collection.

A puzzling item I am including from the collection in this year’s publication. It is a Leaver’s card from Peter Scaramanga, who had been at Harrow in the 1950s.

He was allegedly the inspiration to Ian Fleming's ‘Scaramanga’ character in James Bond. This was not a donation, instead, a private purchase from another collector and I wish to identify the name 'Errol' that Scaramanga signed. The School Archivist was not able to identify Errol and the only piece of information I was given upon purchase was that Errol had employed in the School Farm, although this is not confirmed.

I wonder if some readers of Follow Up! might recall Errol?

With best wishes Jun Wha Shin (Elmfield 2017 3 )

Harrow’s Flying Bomb I am endeavouring to fulfil a promise made whilst attending the delightful Carol Service in St Stephen Walbrook Church on 9 December. As the oldest Member attending, it was apparent that I was the only person there who witnessed the flying bomb attack on the Hill. However, there must be other 90+ year old members still alive and kicking with similar experiences so, hopefully, I am not the only surviving witness.

It was afternoon, visibility was good and the entire School Army Cadet Force was being put through vigorous marching practice under the command of one of the Masters. In those days, from this position, one had an uninterrupted view to the south east with the original Wembley Stadium clearly visible on the horizon.

As is usual on such occasions, the Parade Commander was getting increasingly hot under the collar with our lack of precision. I can remember being told that the next man to make a mistake would mean a complete repetition of the march programme and so on until he witnessed a fault-free performance!

We were continuously marching in roughly a west to east to west direction and there were no other sounds other than calling the step and the sound of our footfall. From past experience, our ears were inherently tuned to recognise the popping-rumble sound of flying bombs as they flew past to further destinations and, when heard, one’s brain automatically locked into total attention.

Whilst on the march, I looked to the south and could easily see one of them flying over the top of Wembley Stadium and quickly realised it was coming directly towards the Hill. Most of the other boys would have heard and seen it too but no-one dared to break step. Surely the Parade Commander must have heard it too, but no! He ordered another ‘About Turn’ and none of us disobeyed the order. Seconds later, it felt like an age, he did respond and urgently ordered us to rapidly clear the Parade Ground and/or lie down wherever we happened to be!

Believe me, we didn’t waste time. It was somewhat chaotic. The bomb was right overhead, the engine cut almost simultaneously and, in what must have been just a handful of seconds, a huge explosion followed. By pure luck the doodle bug cleared the School buildings and fell just over the north-west side of the Hill top.

Regretfully, members of staff were killed and injured but no boys were involved.

The parade was abandoned and it was a relief to find the School itself and our individual Houses remaining undamaged.

With the exception of the V1 incident, I do not recall any interruptions to any lessons or School activities during my time at Harrow, the bottom line was ‘carry on regardless’. There were just a few nights spent sleeping in the House cellar passages during the London Bomber air raids.

By way of background There is a fascinating description on Wikipedia covering both the V1 flying bomb also called a ‘doodle bug’ and the V2, which was a rocket exploding on impact.

Both carried just under 1 ton of high explosive. Of the two, the V1 was, by far, the most disturbing. Once heard, one had to concentrate on whether the noise was getting louder or softer, if it was going to cut out, and then to anticipate the explosion, the timing of which depended on whether it dived or sometimes glided down. With the V2, one heard nothing but a huge spontaneous explosion and directly followed by a sort of swishing sound which was its sound of approach, the rocket was super-sonic.

Best wishes Guy Crossley-Meates (The Knoll 1943 1 )

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

14

CORRESPONDENCE DEAR EDITOR I read with interest, as always, the latest Harrow Association Magazine, especially the article on OHs in medicine, especially anaesthesia, and I wonder if my story would be of interest in that context.

After an all too short period at Harrow, my parents had to return to New Zealand, and I had to leave. I finished my education in New Zealand, at school and then Medical school. After a period of three years in the local hospital, I was awarded a Nuffield Scholarship to train in Anaesthesia at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, under the first Professor of the subject in the world. This man was a New Zealander who was born in 1897 and was christened with the names “Rewi Rawhiti Macintosh”, as Maori names were popular at that time. He left school at the onset of WWI, and managed to get into the Royal Flying Corps, but was shot down on his very first sortie over enemy lines and spent the rest of the war as a POW. Post-war he trained in medicine, and then became a (self-taught) anaesthetist.

While playing golf, he met William Morris (later Lord Nuffield) who was steadily giving away his fortune, especially to Oxford, where he endowed several chairs including Anaesthesia, and persuaded Macintosh, who had by this time changed his name to Robert Reynolds, to take the appointment in 1937. Macintosh did a lot for the war effort, including training many doctors for field anaesthesia, testing life-jackets and designing equipment for the war hospitals. I spent three years under his guidance, before returning to New Zealand, where I practised in the specialty until I retired.

Best wishes Charles McKinnon (‘Mack’) Holmes (Rendalls 1948 3)

DEAR EDITOR In the recent edition of Follow Up! there is an interesting article about The Harrovian 40 years ago. The article shows a picture of the Speech Day edition of The Harrovian from that year which contains an interview which I did with the actress Dame Peggy Ashcroft. I no longer have a copy of that interview and just wondered if I might be able to have a copy of that edition of The Harrovian.

I vividly remember my arrival at Peggy Ashcroft’s house in Hampstead. It was a January day in 1979 and it was snowing hard, so I turned up on her doorstep covered in snow to be greeted by her slightly dour housekeeper. Dame Peggy was herself very charming. It was my second interview; I had already interviewed Timothy West for The Harrovian who had a connection with the Hill as he had been educated at The John Lyon School.

Thereafter, I and my friend James Poke (Rendalls 19763) started a magazine called The Harrow Review. James did some immensely distinguished interviews with major figures from the music world (including John Taverner, Lennox Berkeley and Sir Adrian Boult talking about Elgar, Holst and Vaughan Williams, all of whom he had known personally) and I continued interviewing actors, among others Paul Scofield, Donald Sinden, Joan Plowright, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen and perhaps more off-piste Frankie Howerd. The one OH actor I interviewed was Edward Fox (Rendalls 1950 3).

All, in a pre-PR age, were unfailingly kind and generous of their time.

1

Of all the interviews, the one I particularly remember was with the elderly actress Athene Seyler. In the end, it was never published and probably few people would know of Miss Seyler now. In the course of that interview she told me how she had fainted as a girl with the excitement of seeing Sir Henry Irving on stage, and she reminisced about her early days in the theatre; she had made her debut during the Edwardian period in 1909. Living history.

Kind regards Adam Rice (Rendalls 1975 3)

2

15 REMEMBERING

BEA HOLLOWAY DEAR EDITOR I wanted to write to you in memory of Bea Holloway, who died earlier this year and whom, I’m sure, many Old Harrovians will remember fondly.

Bea Holloway was Everywoman: a talented artist and an authority on English literature, a seamstress, an inspired gardener, a wonderful cook and a delightful and cultured woman.

She will be remembered at Harrow for the many School performances where, as part of the wardrobe team, she toiled away either in the bowels of the War Memorial or in the Ryan Theatre, sewing and snipping away, fixing wigs brandishing feathers, and enthusiastically stuffing padding down the fronts of boy/girl actors!

A perfectionist, the only time she was seen to be remotely cross was when stage management omitted to cut the crusts off sandwiches offered in a period drama.

1

First photograph. A view of the Globe in 1994. Very little thatching, no walls, plastic seats and scaffolding.

2

Second photograph. An actor looking as though he is trying to strangle Head of Drama Martin Tyrrell. He is in fact trying to do up his collar.

Bea died peacefully at her home on the 18th January. She was 97 years old.

3 For those fortunate enough to have known her she leaves wonderful 4 memories, but her greatest legacy will be her paintings. She would always take photographs at different times during play rehearsals, later working them up into one composite picture.

Here in this watercolour, painted shortly after The Taming of the Shrew was performed at the Globe Theatre in 1994, we show how she did it.

Third photograph. Benedict Cumberbatch (The Park 1990 3) who played Petruchio.

Fourth photograph. Three make-up ladies and an acting beak. From left to right, Anne Hall Williams, Jane Lemmon, James Morwood and Ann Etheridge.

I also include some other photos I have found of Bea, taken in her garden and at work in the Ryan.

Yours sincerely Anne Hall Williams

3

4

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

16

UPON

17

Singer songwriter James Blunt (Elmfield 19873) left Harrow in the summer of 1992 and went on to study Aerospace Manufacturing Engineering and Sociology at the University of Bristol. After university, he trained at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and was commissioned into the Life Guards, rising to the rank of captain. Following a career in which he saw active service, he retired from the army in October 2002 to pursue his dream of becoming a professional musician.

To say this dream has paid off is something of an understatement as James is now a multi-millionrecord-selling and award-winning artist. He also has the reputation of being one of the wittiest celebrities on Twitter. We caught up with James in the middle of the worldwide tour of his sixth studio album Once Upon A Mind.

Š Gavin Bond Photography

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

JAMES, THANK YOU FOR FINDING TIME TO SPEAK TO US. Congratulations on the phenomenal success of

Once Upon A Mind. You’ve described your latest album as your most honest so far, written full of thought of the people who matter to you. The incredibly moving cornerstone song of the album, Monsters, is about your father, Colonel Charles Blount (Elmfield 1960 1 ), who is suffering from stage 4 chronic kidney disease.

Are you able to tell us how his treatment is going?

My father has just been given a second-hand kidney from Charles Blount (Elmfield 1972 2), and at this stage, pre-Coronavirus pandemic, is doing extremely well.

He is currently immunosuppressed, so we’ll see what this year brings.

"

You aren’t lucky – you create luck.

You shouldn’t hope to be in the right place at the right time – you should be everywhere, all the time.”

18 The video for Monsters is heart-rending and poignant and portrays the type of honest and sensitive communication that many men, in fact men and women, would like to have with their fathers, but perhaps avoid.

What would you say to other men, or indeed any adult, about how to communicate with their father in different circumstances and at different stages of their lives?

I guess it’s easier to write things down and then present them in some form later. I am incredibly close to my father but have never had an emotions-based conversation with him. When he became ill, I had things I wanted to say, so I put them in a song.

© Gavin Bond Photography

19

© Gavin Bond Photography

My old House mates generally get in touch when I’m on tour in various cities, and it is always great to see them. I get to see people as far away as Sydney, Tokyo and Birmingham whom I would otherwise have lost touch with.”

Do you ever talk to your father about your respective times at Harrow and in Elmfield and how your experiences differed?

No. But his name is on the board of boys who had attended, as were other family members over a few generations – so I at least know he was there!

You served in the British Army for a number of years and then switched career to music about 18 years ago. What would you say to any OHs considering a career change?

If you could give one piece of advice about this, what would it be?

You aren’t lucky – you create luck. You shouldn’t hope to be in the right place at the right time – you should be everywhere, all the time. So, my advice would be that, more than anything, success is about determination and persistence.

Has Harrow had any influence on your music career?

Can you attribute any of your musical inspiration to your time at the School?

Definitely. In the Sixth Form, I organised the Elmfield entry for the House Music Competition. I formed a band consisting of drums, electric guitar, the bagpipes and vocals. We performed a medley of Flower of Scotland, I Can’t Walk and It’s Grim Up North and – we lost.

[Ed. For clarification, any type of fagging at the School is forbidden; it has been since the 1980s and would not be tolerated by the School today!]

You came to the Elmfield House Dinner last Autumn at Mosimann’s. How much does your old House mean to you and are you still in touch with many of your old House mates and your House Master?

My old House mates generally get in touch when I’m on tour in various cities, and it always great to see them.

I get to see people as far away as Sydney, Tokyo and Birmingham whom I would otherwise have lost touch with.

Do you have a favourite Harrow song and if so,why?

Mr John Blount is the Elmfield House Song, and I was always asked to do a verse solo.

Your tour dates include a performance at the Royal Albert Hall on 7 April, do you remember Churchill Songs at the Royal Albert Hall in 1990 when you were at School?

I’m pretty sure I did a solo that night of Good King Wenceslas. It’s one of the best venues in the world, and I’m very sad that my gig there in April will probably be postponed because of coronavirus.

[Ed. Since the time of writing all tour dates have been postponed due to Covid-19.]

What is your fondest memory of Harrow and Elmfield?

Fagging. It was supposed to be illegal but, when I was in the Shells, I was paid £15 a term to fag for Toby Robertson (1982 3). I had to call him God, bring him coffee and open his curtains in the morning, make his bed and organise his laundry. He’d get me out of trouble with others in the top year, buy me cigarettes and beer at the weekend, and it was a fine arrangement.

And lastly, you are known as one of the funniest people on Twitter; do you have any tips on how we could improve our Twitter following?

Maybe try being entertaining.

[Ed. Thanks James!].

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

OH NEWS 1940s AM Pelham Burn MBR JP DL LLD MBE (Elmfield 1945 3) was awarded an MBE

by HM The Queen in a private ceremony at Balmoral Castle accompanied by his wife Anne and eldest daughter Amanda.

On 19 December 2019, Angus and Anne celebrated their diamond wedding anniversary.

1950s DLD Reid (Newlands 1952 2), at the age of 81, runs Centimex, a performance improvement business. In 2019, he was approached by SAP SE, the leading ERP software development company, to ask whether he would become one of their entrepreneurial partners.

MJH Weedon (Druries 1954 2) catches moles to save lawns in South Oxfordshire and West Berkshire as a part-time hobby. You need A levels and to have been a former Head of School and Latin Contionator, a Cambridge MA, two Blues and a Harvard MBA to outwit the persistent moles in this activity!

RP Salm (The Head Master’s 1955 2) was awarded the Order of Distinction (Commander) in October 2019 for his services to tourism, winter-sports promotion and community development in Jamaica. In 1969, Richard built a cottage colony hotel, Club Caribbean, in Runaway Bay in Jamaica, with four English friends including another Old Harrovian, J Hamilton (Newlands 1954 2 ).

The hotel now has 230 rooms and is very popular with British guests. Richard is also the President of the Jamaica Ski Federation, having represented Great Britain in the 1964 Winter Olympic Games.

His son Andrew (albeit a Carthusian) was the first international Jamaican Alpine ski competitor, in the World Championships in Vail, Colorado, in 1999. Richard has been responsible for several community projects in his Parish of St Ann, including a highly successful tennis programme for children, a prep school he founded and the sponsorship of numerous charities.

20

He and his son are currently developing Drax Hall Estate, a 2,400-acre former plantation, into an integrated resort and residential development.

Professor RCA Harrison (West Acre 1957 2) has been a senior Professor of English at the City University of New York for the past 25 years (having taught at numerous universities including Cornell University in the Ivy League, the Universities of Texas at Austin and California at San Diego, plus Essex University in his native UK), teaching in Comparative Literature departments.

Carey recently took unofficial retirement from his long career as a writer, which includes 12 novels and over 200 plays for stage, screen, TV and radio, in order to concentrate on Dr. Cicero Books, an indie publisher for whom he works as Acquisitions and Commissioning Editor.

Carey plans to work for a few more years at the City University after turning 76 this year.

1960s RB Packard MD FRCS FR (The Head Master’s 1960 2) gave keynote lectures at Ophthalmic Conferences in Greece, Italy, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Thailand, UAE, USA and the UK in 2019. Richard has also co-written and co-edited The History and Evolution of Modern Cataract History.

The Revd CSP Douglas Lane (The Park 1960 3 ) was appointed Chairman of the League of Friends at Teddington Memorial

Hospital. With a new board of Trustees, the team have in the last 18 months funded projects in the hospital totalling almost £600,000. Simon is also expected to become President of the Twickenham Club from the 1 July 2020.

AJA Aiken (The Head Master’s 1963 2) spends his time looking after his two grandchildren and has recently enjoyed travelling to Madeira.

Dr AO Wilson (The Park 1963 2 ) has been appointed Vice-President of Fauna & Flora International. Adrian works alongside the eminent OH conservationists JMN Page (The Grove 1967 1) and MJH Rice (Rendalls 1981 1) in support of the world's oldest international wildlife conservation organisation, which has been quietly shaping and influencing conservation practice since its foundation in 1903.

FFIs focus is on protecting biodiversity, which underpins healthy ecosystems and is critical for the life-support systems that humans and all other species rely on.

CAStC Chute (The Knoll 1962 2) started and is now running an award-winning property management business called Chaloners of the Hamptons, which he founded seven years ago after 30 years in the City and on Wall Street. To celebrate his 70th birthday, he completed a nine-day trek to the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro where he reached the Uhuru Peak at 19,341ft. For his 71st birthday, Chal cycled 333 miles along the Allegheny Passage from Pittsburgh to Washington DC.

Colonel PRC Flach MBE (Moretons 1966 2) and Lt Col JRD Kaye (The Grove 1964 3) make up two of 24 of Her Majesty's Body Guard of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen at Arms, a ceremonial Body Guard that forms part of the Royal Household and is based at St James's Palace. The corps are commanded by five officers including Peter, who is the Lieutenant, and John, who is Clerk of the Cheque and Adjutant.

The Gentlemen accompany and attend the sovereign at various events and occasions, including the state opening of Parliament, state visits, royal garden parties, the Garter Service, receptions of the diplomatic corps, royal weddings, coronations, investitures and lyings in state.

21

JER Lumley (The Grove 1974 3) and CFR Lumley (The Grove 1977 1) have continued with their family tradition in working in insurance. They are now running the UK’s largest family-owned independent broker specialising in private client insurance, Lumley Insurance, where OHs are always very welcome.

PJG Aldous MP (The Knoll 1975 1) was re-elected as the MP for Waveney in the 2019 General Election.

JMC Plane (The Knoll 1975 1), Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry at the University of Leeds, was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2020.

RNP Hadow (The Park 1975 3) was a contestant on the Christmas 2019 special of University Challenge, competing for UCL. JWJ Griffiths (Bradbys 1976 1) has won Phase 2 of Glasgow City Council's Health and Social Care competition to develop the company's Safehouse Platform, the first artificial intelligence falls detector to keep people safe at home without using wifi, wearables or cameras. John was asked to present the technology at Taiwan's Smart City Expo last April, the only UK company selected to present in AI50 World Innovations. John formerly worked as a Technology Specialist (Smartcities and IOT) for the Department for International Trade and was founder of Secure Sensor Innovative Design Ltd.

SD Eadon (Druries 1965 3) will have completed 50 years in the classical recording industry in May 2020 and will subsequently retire from his record label, Abbas Records. Simon has produced many award-winning albums during his career, one of which won a Grammy.

1970s

PVFS Manduca (Rendalls 1965 3) announced he will be retiring as Chairman of the Prudential Group plc in 2020, after eight and a half years as Chairman and over ten years on the Board. In that time, the company demerged their UK business to create a new plc, M&G, where share prices more than doubled.

JN Lambert OBE (Rendalls 1970 3 ) has been appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the New Year Honours List 2020 for services to social mobility in education.

HR Dundas (The Head Master’s 1966 3) continues as international arbitrator and mediator in the UK, the PRC and Vietnam.

Hew is co-author of the definitive texts on the arbitration laws of both Scotland and Vietnam and the author of over 220 articles in legal journals worldwide. He is active in the livery, being a past Master Arbitrator, a Liveryman Shipwright, Master Mariner and Court Assistant, and is also a Musician, Member of the Royal Company of Merchants of the City of Edinburgh (the only Royal Livery Company in the UK) and a Burgess of the City of Edinburgh, an historic position recently resuscitated.

RWA Curtis CBE (Rendalls 1970 2 ) wrote the screenplay of the 2019 film Yesterday, directed by Danny Boyle and starring Himesh Patel in the lead role. The film was released in June 2019.

RG Drax MP (Elmfield 1971 2) was re-elected as the MP for South Dorset in the 2019 General Election.

ADW Fothergill CBE (Moretons 1973 2) has been appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2019 Birthday Honours for services to film.

SP Pollock (Elmfield 19741 ), Director of Ceremonies of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem, was invested as a Commander, CStJ on 13 February 2020.

Vicomte S de Baritault du Carpia (The Knoll 1977 3) is creating a giant decoration imagined in 1864 by the great architect Viollet le Duc, who influenced Gilbert Scott of the Vaughan Library.

This is happening in the Great Hall of Roquetaillade Castle in Bordeaux, one of the last English-built castles in France.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

22

GT Opperman MP (The Grove 1978 3) was re-elected as the MP for Hexham in the 2019 General Election.

SS Aulak (The Knoll 1982 3) is currently partner and Member of the Partnership Council at BDO LLP.

SJ Sebag-Montefiore (The Knoll 1978 3) presented a three-part series in November 2019, Vienna: Empire, Dynasty and Dream, on BBC Four. It explored the Habsburg emperors and Vienna's struggle to defend Christendom.

AJ King (Bradbys 1984 3) started his fintech company Suite2go in 2017. The company bridges the current gap between software vendors and the financial services industry. Many large international fintech companies do not have the time, resources or relationships to break into the Australian market, and the Australian financial services market was missing out on some worldclass technology as a result.

SAB Greig (The Park 1978 3) recently launched his new restaurant and beach club Bambu Menorca.

PS Wannamethee (Rendalls 1978 3) has served as the Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Thailand for the United Nations in Geneva since 2017. Peter has held various diplomatic positions in Geneva and Washington DC including Director General Spokesperson of the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

1980s RWH Seely MP (The Head Master’s 1980 1) was re-elected as MP for the Isle of Wight in the 2019 General Election. He came back to the Hill on 21 January 2020 to give a talk to the Palmerston Society.

Bob spoke about his joy of being back at the School, encouraging the boys to take every opportunity provided to them and gave an insight into his political career.

Lord JN Bethell (West Acre 1981 1) was appointed Government Whip in the House of Lords and a Lord in Waiting to the Queen in February 2020.

CR Larizadeh QC (The Knoll 1981 3) has been elected Chairman of the Family Law Bar Association 2020–21 and will oversee the interests of some 1,800 family barristers nationwide. Cyrus was also invited by the Attorney General of Bermuda to train their lawyers and safeguarding teams on questioning and evidence gathering in children cases.

S Hatteea OBE (The Head Master’s 1984 3) was awarded Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the Queen's Birthday Honours list 2019 for services to aviation.

JJ Kennedy (Rendalls 1984 3) completed his third and fourth-and-a-half Ironman triathlon in 2019. Jake is also working on writing his second children's book after a successful launch of his first this year.

BJW Samuelson (Newlands 1985 2) has continued to mess around with cars for a living rather than engage in any sort of meaningful work. Further examples of his wasting a perfectly reasonable education have included leading a convoy of Bentleys across rivers in Iceland considerably deeper than the cars' prescribed wading depth, being Patrick Dempsey's co-driver on an Austrian rally (leading to the team earning the nickname McDreamy and McFlurry) and designing a drive across Europe in a Dacia Sandero, which he rather unkindly left his colleagues to carry out. More high-octane buffoonery is being planned in the hope that his clients don't seen through his very thin veneer of competence.

GF Chandler (The Park 1985 2) is living in Hastings, studying chess and playing saxophone. Gregory works as a volunteer at his local theatre, The Stables, and is also reading lots on politics and psychology.

FCN Dickinson (Elmfield 1985 3) is a DJ who has been part of the UK's underground dance scene for the last three decades. This summer, Felix was scheduled to perform at inner city electronic 2020 in Leeds and Love International 2020 in Croatia.

ME Denison (The Head Master’s 1986 3), with his company SKYMAGIC, delivered a Guinness World Record for a never-before-seen PyroDrone performance, launching a synchronised swarm of 196 PyroDrones high into the night sky, breaking the world record for the 'Most Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) Launching Fireworks Simultaneously'.

PyroDrones are a new generation of drones developed by SKYMAGIC, a world-leading performance drone light show company. The customised fleet of dynamic, autonomously flown outdoor and indoor drones are each mounted with a super-bright RGB pixel and deployed by a single groundcontrol station across state-of-the-art flight software.

In addition to SKYMAGIC, Mungo is Managing Director of NEWSUBSTANCE, a show design studio who have worked across a range of projects from national-day ceremonies across the Middle East to international recording artists including Beyoncé, Mumford & Sons and Take That; from large blue-ribbon spring events like the Dubai World Cup to music festivals including Coachella. NEWSUBSTANCE also designed the Ice Strike for Disney’s Frozen The Musical currently on Broadway.

23 JHP Barabas (The Head Master’s 1986 3) has retired as a partner of the law firm Gibson Dunn and is now focusing on lighting up the world with his LED business Tagra Lighting/Ultraleds and his seasonal business Cape Town Kite Club, a lodge for kite surfers in Cape Town.

JA Stabb (The Head Master’s 1986 3) sent his eldest son William to Harrow in 2019, scoring a century of Stabbs in The Head Master's going back four generations to 1920.

CW Tan (The Knoll 1986 3) has founded Azimuth Asset Consulting, a specialist consultancy advising asset owners and asset managers on strategic and organisational matters, having previously worked in the global investment management industry and as a financial institutions M&A banker.

JH Blount (Elmfield 1987 3) has released his sixth album, Once Upon a Mind. He describes this as his most honest album, noting that the songs were written with thought full of the people that matter to him. James also competed in Series 3 of The Great Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up to Cancer on Channel 4, producing a replica of his pub made from biscuits in the showstopper challenge.

JGAS Churchill (The Grove 1989 3) won Company of the Year Award at the BETT Awards in January 2020 for Scanning Pens, an education technology company he co-founded. The business supplies pen scanners for supporting young people and adults with reading difficulties such as dyslexia or English as an additional language (EAL). Half of all UK secondary schools now use this technology in classroom and exam settings. In recent years Scanning Pens have established offices in the US, Canada, Australia and India.

1990s RSN McColl (West Acre 1990 3) was awarded Best English Language Podcast for 2019 by the Latin Podcast Awards for his weekly English-language podcast out of Colombia, entitled Colombia Calling.

BW Ingram (The Head Master's 1991 3) and CWV Tweddle (Elmfield 1991 3) completed IronMan Switzerland in Zurich in July 2019, in a time of 12 hours. They raised money for Alzheimer's and Cancer charities.

MCW Coates (The Head Master’s 1992 3) and his partner Caroline have started a charity called Harry's Hydrocephalus Awareness Trust (www.charitychoice. co.uk/harryshatcharity) with the aim of improving the lives of children with hydrocephalus through raising awareness, support and research into the condition. Their son Harry was born with the condition caused by an arachnoid cyst and had four brain surgeries by his first birthday. They found that there was very little support for families in a similar situation and, with Caroline's skills in this field, have been able to grow the charity quickly over the first year and hope for further growth in the coming years.

SM Guillebaud MBE (Newlands 1986 3) recently moved to Bath after spending 20 years in war-torn Central Africa. Simon retains the role of International Director of the Christian charity he set up, Great Lakes Outreach. In 2018, he and his wife were appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) for their services to development in Burundi. Simon has three children and spends most of his time preaching and speaking around the UK and abroad, and networking, connecting and fundraising to leverage their impact in the nation of Burundi, where they were granted citizenship.

MM Stewart (The Head Master’s 1991 3) in the last year, has produced Escape Plan: The Extractors with Sylvester Stallone and Trauma Center, The Long Night and Force of Nature with Bruce Willis.

GH Walker (The Head Master’s 1991 3) released two albums this year. Havana Classic, with his group Classico Latino, which was runner up in the UK Latin Awards. Songlines described the album as "spiced-up ... slinky and elegant", and it received unexpected plaudits from DJ El Chino's Colombian Salsa blog. Meanwhile St John's Voices, the mixed-voice choir of St John's College, Cambridge, released Choral Music of William Mathias, described by Gramophone as 'a hugely entertaining display of dazzling choral singing'. OHs may wish to listen to either of both albums on Spotify!

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

24

OH NEWS HRH Prince DP Karageorgevitch (Moretons 1991 3) and Ms Valerie DeMuzio were married in the church of Saint George in Oplenac, Serbia. The religious ceremony was officiated by His Grace Bishop Jovan of Sumadija and His Grace Bishop Irinej of the Eastern Diocese of the Serbian Orthodox Church in America.

BA Uttley (Moretons 1991 3) was part of the successful Silver Spitfire expedition; over four months, 27,000 miles, 91 stages and 26 countries, the pilots and crew entered airspace in which no Spitfire has flown before, in a plane that last saw action in the Second World War before being grounded for 50 years. Ben was the photographer and filmmaker and plans to release the footage in time for the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Britain in August this year.

LP Fox (Rendalls 1991 3) featured on the second series of Celebrity Gogglebox on Channel 4 with his cousin, fellow actor Emilia Fox. HJ de C Prideaux (Bradbys 1992 3) runs his own interior design business in London, Henry Prideaux Interior Design, having spent several years working with some of the industry’s most recognised interior design practices. Henry works primarily on high-end residential properties in London, the Home Counties and abroad and would be delighted to assist any OHs on their own refurbishment projects.

TEW Noad (Druries 1992 3) has been living and working in northern Italy for nearly ten years and is currently the president of the British Chamber of Commerce for Italy.

Any OHs requiring assistance regarding business matters in Italy should feel free to get in touch with Tom. RJ Bryan (Moretons 1992 3) is Director of Pilcher Group, a family property business established in 1898, which has delivered thousands of family homes as principal developer. In 2019, the company expanded to launch Pilcher Contracting in response to demand for prime Central London contractors.

NP Harrison (Rendalls 1992 3) is Founder of Broadstone Concierge, bespoke property solutions. The company specialises in managing, maintaining and repairing properties for both the private and rental markets, ranging from single dwellings to managing multi-unit private portfolios on behalf of clients.

AMK-T Li (The Park 1992 ) is Founder and Managing Partner of AC Ventures, after completing the merger of his fund, Convergence Ventures with his Stanford classmate Pandu Sjahrir’s fund, Agaeti Ventures. The new fund will continue their focus on investing in transformative digital businesses in Indonesia and the South East Asia region.

3

JW Glerum (Druries 1993 3) is currently working for Anglian Water as the Flood Control Officer, responsible for managing all flooding in East Anglia (Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Hertfordshire).

Jon is married with two children and lives in Devon.

NW Humphreys (The Knoll 1993 3) has been selected to represent Great Britain in his age group at both the ITU Sprint Distance Triathlon World Championships in Canada and the ETU Sprint Distance Triathlon European Championships in Sweden in 2020.

RP Etchells (The Knoll 1995 3) has moved to Nairobi with his wife and two-year-old son. He is currently working as the CFO for Africa Logistics Properties, a real estate business developing modern logistics and distribution facilities in East Africa and is still involved in rugby and sits on the board of a local premiership rugby club.

25 Far left: JF van Zeller, far left bottom: NMN Chandiramani, left: GK-T Chein, below: DR Hinckley.

Father BM Eadon (Druries 1998 3) was appointed Vicar of St Bartholomew's, Brighton, and was due to be instituted by the Bishop of Chichester on 26 May 2020.

NMN Chandiramani (Newlands 19953) and his wife Katerina, operate, a thriving vacation rental and tourism business spread across three continents.

Their company, HOSPITALITYEXPERT, own and operate a number of villas, townhouses and apartments geared towards the short-term rental market.

DR Hinckley (West Acre 1995 3) after a fleeting stop off at university, found that a career in the police and army carved a path for him into the world of private security. Doug now services high-profile events, close protection and surveillance requirements, as well as private firefighting.

By recruiting from the armed forces and emergency services, his WH Management Group continues to expand quietly and confidently and is always open to new and challenging opportunities. The All England Lawn Tennis Club Wimbledon, the NFL, Henley Royal Regatta and Burghley Horse Trials are just a few of its long list of world-famous clients.

S Datta (Bradbys 1997 3) continued his musical success into 2019. Some highlights include headlining the Green Fields stage at Glastonbury Festival 2019, performing his own compositions fusing Indian music with choirs at the BBC Proms in August, solo performances at the WOMAD festival in Wiltshire and the Indian Music Summit in Jaipur. Soumik is also the lead presenter of Rhythms of India, a BBC series broadcast in September 2019. In 2020 he released new album, Jangal, in response to the world's ecological crisis.

JRL Cottingham (The Head Master’s 1997 3) took over the running of his family business in 2015 and, in May 2019, his company DK Engineering was awarded the Queen's Award for Enterprise International Trade.

CN Okeke (Druries 1998 3), with his entertainment company Eclipse Live, co-founded the Gidi Culture Festival, which was created as a result of a demand from local youth for affordable and accessible entertainment in Nigeria.

The sixth consecutive festival was held in 2019 in Lagos with 10,000 people in attendance.

OC Hicks (The Grove 1998 3), alongside welcoming second son Brough into the world and planning more oceanic expeditions, has recently become Executive Director of the Arksen Foundation, a not-for-profit platform for ocean research, conservation and restoration. Its objective is to build a super-fund for ocean protection called '10% for the ocean'. Our oceans, the largest ecosystem on the planet, currently receives less than 0.5% of philanthropic funding. The 10% fund aims to redress this issue during the UN Ocean decade.

GK-T Chien (The Park 1998 3) is Head of Special Situation Financings at InfraRed NF, a global real estate investment manager.

He is part of the Executive Committee responsible for management, fundraising and lending investments, and is based in Hong Kong. The Private Debt Investor magazine chose him as one of the Top 30 Global Rising Stars 2019 and he recently led InfraRed NF to win Real Estate Debt Fund Manager of the Year 2019, Asia-Pacific.

His loan portfolio is around US$3 billion in development value and 17 million square feet across Greater China. He is also an honorary headmaster of a school in China.

FE Conway (The Park 1999 3) moved companies in December 2019, joining Bohill Partners as an executive search and advisory consultant, focused on hiring senior individuals across the real estate, infrastructure and private equity investment world.

2000s TCE Gamborg (The Grove 2000 3), just under four years ago, setup Skal, a specialist drinks marketing agency that work predominantly with spirit brands and focuses on consultancy, social media, events, and design. Skal was setup at just the right time as the gin boom really kicked in and people’s appetites for premium alcohol brands grew. In 2020, the business launched its own brands from South Africa, released a sparkling mead in April and is planning to launch a sparkling wine in September.

JF van Zeller (Elmfield 2001 3) has been based in Kenya for the past eight years, working across Africa for the private sector, in the security and defence industry, and for the United Nations (WFP), assisting in the co-ordination of regional preparedness/ response for the Ebola virus disease (EVD). In August 2019, Jonty set up a consultancy called Alamaya, which provides intermediary solutions for corporations needing representation, and governments and inter-governmental agencies requiring solutions. Alamaya is working across Kenya, South Sudan, Uganda, Somalia and DRC, providing intermediary, consultancy and government services including assisting in preparedness for the Covid-19 response.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

JE Haycock (The Knoll 2001 3) submitted his PhD thesis for examination at the University of Surrey in 2020.

His thesis is entitled ‘Exploring the innate immune system of the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus) to control Elephant Endotheliotropic Herpesvirus infections’.

The project was funded by a number of zoological institutions across Europe and the results have already been put into action to save the elephant calf Indali, which featured on Channel 4's Secret Life of the Zoo. S Hussain BA, MSc (The Knoll 2002 3) has completed his MSc and Diploma Level 4 in Financial Planning. Shahmir works as a Client Account Executive at Ablestoke Financial Planning, part of Quilter Financial Planning, and can offer work experience opportunities to Harrovians looking to get into wealth management and financial advisory.

26

JAP Wild (Elmfield 20043) presented his collection of bronze sculptures at his first major exhibition, ONEWILD. The exhibition showcases a range of vulnerable and critically endangered species sculpted from the untameable medium of scrap metal and then cast in bronze. The work is aimed at raising awareness of critically endangered species, with 20% of each sculpture sold going to Fauna and Flora International.

HMA Khayat (The Head Master’s 20043) was named in the EY Entrepreneur of the Year Greater Los Angeles 2019 finalist list.

KL Kwong (Druries 20053) married the love of his life Tyra on 29 March 2020.

The ceremony took place in a private garden of Hong Kong with a small group of close friends. With all the anxiety about local restrictions, social distancing and the unpredictable weather, Kai feels truly blessed to have had a smooth and warm wedding to start the new stage of his life.

OWL Feather (Moretons 2005 3), who is a poet and musician, took to the stage of The Playhouse Theatre in London this year with his spoken-word piece Circles.

His work focuses on growing up in the city and the ebb and flow of relationships that fall in and out of our lives.

SJ Stirrat (The Head Master’s 2003 3) having first showcased his jewellery-making as part of his Art Scholarship application to Harrow aged 13, continues to grow his bespoke jewellery company Blackacre. He specialises in high-quality engagement rings and created more than ten for OHs this year. In addition, Sam was hosted by the Chairman of The Hong Kong Jockey Club, Dr Anthony Chow, in his private box for an evening of racing and jewellery earlier this year.

OOR Adeniyi-Jones (West Acre 2006 3) featured in Forbes 30 under 30 – Art & Style 2020.

Tunji's art is inspired by West African history and mythology and his own Yoruba heritage.

He has held solo exhibitions in London, New York and Los Angeles, and The Dallas Museum of Art owns one of his paintings.

KN Pittalis (Rendalls 2006 3) and AJ Pittalis (Rendalls 2007 3), two OH brothers on very different work-life journeys, created The Mind Field Podcast aiming to open conversations around mental health. They are now well into season two and guests include entrepreneurs, influencers and athletes, as well as experts on the mind and those who live with daily challenges around mental health. They all offer their views on what mental health is to them and how they have overcome problems in the past. Kyri and Alexi recently recorded an episode with VL Sankey (The Park 1962 3) on his book The Way: Finding Peace in Turbulent Times.

AAA Nelson (West Acre 20063) represented Ghana in September 2019 in the inaugural Middle East and Africa Ruby League Conference and the MEA Conference in Lagos.

The team had mixed results, including a 10-4 win against Cameroon, and placed Ghana in the World Rankings for the first time at number 33. After leaving Harrow, Abeku played Rugby League at Oxford University and was awarded his Blue in 2013.

NPA Patel (Druries 2007 3) is launching a brand new light-hearted podcast series Doctors Don't Talk. Taking you on a journey, Dr Nik and his colleagues explore how heart-breaking life and death decisions are personally affecting junior doctors working on the frontline fighting Covid-19 and beyond. This podcast aims to raise awareness and gives insight into a secret world where junior doctors rarely express their emotions.

AK Shankar (Elmfield 2007 3) founded Atcha, a new food delivery business serving salads, sandwiches and rice bowls with an Indian twist. Since launching as a street food pop-up in 2018, Atcha has been based in a "dark kitchen" in Hackney, offering a delivery service catering for offices and team lunches. In 2020, Aadit hopes to open the first permanent residence for Atcha.

T Platt (The Head Master’s 2007 3) won second prize in the prestigious Kathleen Ferrier Awards for singing in 2019.

A Urosevic (The Park 2007 3) was appointed Advisor in the Austrian Federal Chancellor's Strategy Unit in February 2020 and will be covering foreign policy matters.

Dr LE Smith (West Acre 2008 3) graduated with a PhD in American History from the University of Mississippi in May 2019. She is an active scholar in American political history, writing op-eds published in The Washington Post and teaching American Politics at Canterbury Christ Church University. In October 2020, she will start a second doctorate in American History as part of Oxford University's DPhil programme. In her spare time, Laura enjoys kickboxing and trains with an intermediate to advanced group.

CHW Short (Rendalls 2009 3) is making his West End debut in The Prince of Egypt at the Dominion Theatre in London in 2020.

£50 purchase Will purchase this

VML Vunipola (Bradbys 2009 3) played in his second Rugby World Cup for England.

At number 8, Billy formed part of the back row who were fundamental in England’s success in the tournament. Despite sustaining an ankle injury in the third game against Argentina, Billy was able to play in the quarter-final against Australia.

In total he achieved 42 tackles with an 89% success rate throughout this World Cup.

2010s MWJ Glerum (Druries 2010 3) is currently studying for a PhD in Chemistry at Jesus College, Cambridge, after gaining a Master's degree at the University of Bristol.

ET Hardy (Druries 2010 1) has built a significant digital media platform where he discusses current political issues and hosts a weekly podcast, The Hardy Report, which provides listeners with informative content through long-form interviews with a range of activists, campaigners and politicians from across the political spectrum. The 54 episodes in Season 1 featured interviews with Barack Obama's longest-serving Senior Adviser Valerie Jarrett, then-Secretary of State for Scotland David Mundell, former US Ambassador to Denmark Rufus Gifford, and many more.

Guests set to appear in Season 2 include high-profile figures at all levels, from senior officials to candidates running for office and elected politicians.

CH Kung (The Grove 2010 3) and two other scientists from Imperial College London co-founded Matoha Instrumentation, a start-up creating material analysis devices for the recycling industry and beyond.

Their devices combine near-infrared spectroscopy and machine-learning technologies in a low-cost, small and robust package, allowing low-skilled workers to identify and sort visually identical but chemically different plastics.

A recipient of the 2019 Institute of Physics Business Start-up Award, they are also developing fabrics analysis tools for the fashion and textile industry, as well as an OEM module for integration into consumer devices for the mass market.

AC Robinson (Lyon’s 2010 3) was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the US Marine Corps in June 2019. Austen acknowledges that it was his time in CCF at Harrow that sparked his interest in serving in the military.

GAD Haggerty (Newlands 2010 3) entered the 2019 US Golf Open and finished runnerup in his qualifier, which meant he was a reserve for the second and last qualifying round. He also competed in the 2019 World Long Drive in Oklahoma, making it through to the last 54. George finished overall in 34th place, ahead of the British number one, who has a world ranking of 12.

W Lane (The Park 2010 3) and ES McGovern (The Knoll 2010 3), with their company Indigo Theatre Productions, showcased their new production The Man at the 2019 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The Man is a sketch comedy and one-man performance piece from the side-splittingly funny Patrick McPherson, returning to Edinburgh after the 2018 five-star Fringe sell-out Camels.

Coming off a run in London's West End,The Man showcases Patrick's brilliant characters for an hour of brave and thought-provoking comedy. Supporting The Movember Foundation, the show discusses what it means to be "the man" in society today.

WEM Bryant (Druries 2011 3) released his debut single Be Mine in March 2020. It is now available to stream on all platforms.

Z Ali (West Acre 2011 3) is currently finishing his next single, which is due to be released by the end of May. The track is named Fading and comprises a fusion of western, Arabic and oriental styles of music. The single will be released on all major music platforms.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

M Asir (Bradbys 2011 3) was listed on Forbes 30 under 30: Law and Policy. He founded The Legal Bullet during his freshman year at the University of Chicago, a company that makes legal services accessible and affordable for immigrants.

After finishing at Harrow, Matthew took a gap year to pursue his passion for service by founding the non-profit Bombs to Books, which collected books and reading material from libraries across the country to distribute to Syrian children in refugee camps in Turkey and Jordan. With his sister, he founded the Matthew and Rachel Asir Foundation to raise funds to empower and inspire disadvantaged youth in our local communities to achieve their goals of academic achievement and physical, moral and spiritual growth.

28

LK Pittalis (Rendalls 2013 3) climbed Mount Kilimanjaro in September 2019 with fellow OHs HS Rattan (The Knoll 2013 3), GCT Grassly (The Knoll 2013 3) and JA Burgess-Adams (West Acre 2013 3). Throughout the four-day trek, Luca shot a film for Rotary International about the effect of climate change on Kilimanjaro's summit. The film, Kilimanjaro: The White Mountain, has attracted interest from Sir David Attenborough and is a topic that has not been explored in documentary film before.

D Hare (Moretons 2011 3) founded the digital agency Rhubarb with Old Etonian Fred Parry. The company is focused on delivering ed-tech solutions to help companies such as BT deliver interactive educational content.

OM Itoje (The Grove 2011 3) competed in his first Rugby World Cup, achieving the second-highest number of tackles of the tournament. With a success rate of 92%, Maro’s 71 tackles made him the most successful of the England team. In the semi-final match against New Zealand, Maro’s performance won him Mastercard Player of the Match.

MJ Harman (The Grove 2012 3) was announced as the alternative lead role in the West End production of Dear Evan Hansen, playing Evan at certain performances.

S Shashoua (Rendalls 2012 3) signed for CD Tenerife for the 2019–20 season after eight years with Tottenham and a successful season on loan to CD Atlético Baleares, where he made 38 appearances and scored six goals.

NR Kuznetsov (Moretons 2013 3) climbed Mt Elbrus (5,642m) in Russia in support of Great Ormond Street Hospital Children's Charity in July 2019. It took five days to reach the summit and the most challenging part of the expedition was the second acclimatisation trek from base camp to Pastukhovo Rocks when, two hours into the trek, he was hit by an ice blizzard with winds of 50kmph.

A Shashoua (Rendalls 2014 3) was promoted to the Tottenham Under-23 squad for the 2019–20 season. In January 2020, Armando went on loan to Spanish Segunda División B side, Atlético Baleares.

CFMMT Vunipola (The Knoll 20143) started his first Premiership match for Saracens in May 2019.

SD Reffell (Newlands 2015 3) made his first Gallagher Premiership start for Saracens against Wasps in February 2020.

SC Crean (The Park 2016 3) made his debut for England Under-20s against Wales in March 2020.

AS Ademuwagun (Druries 2017 3) has been selected as a full-time senior academy player for Wasps in the 2019–20 season.

Corporate Events Old Harrovians, did you know that you can host a corporate event and welcome your colleagues to share the history and traditions of your School?

Out of term time, Harrow School offers a portfolio of meeting rooms, reception spaces, conference venues, award ceremonies, sports, team away days and facilities for small and large-scale dinners.

SPECIAL OFFER: State your HOUSE and your YEAR when you book to receive a complimentary glass of sparkling wine for your guests.

events@harrowschool.org.uk

harrowschoolenterprises.com

+44 (0)20 8426 4638

WEDDINGS | RECEPTIONS | PARTIES | DINNERS | PERFORMANCES | CORPORATE EVENTS

Special discount for OHs

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

31

ENGAGEMENTS RFH Kilgour (The Knoll 1985 3) and Miss Katharine Pottinger: January 2020

NAFS Manduca (Newlands 2001 3) and Miss Zoe Faulkner: April 2019

GNM Williams (Newlands 1995 3) and Miss Camilla Conrath: June 2019

HR Kemble (Druries 20023 ) and Miss Laura Gillingham: April 2020

PE Keun (The Park 1995 3) and Miss Victoria Jowett: October 2019

MCM Dickinson (Elmfield 2002 3) and Miss Katharine Selmon: September 2019

EM Robinson (The Park 1995 3) and Miss Marina Gore Browne: July 2019

SJH Greenly (Elmfield 2002 3) and Miss Sarah Hatchard: July 2019

Major CRGD Turner (Rendalls 1996 3) and Miss Miranda Keymer: October 2019

NGN Green (The Grove 2002 3) and Miss Rosie Pope: 25 August 2019

RA Buxton (Elmfield 1997 3) and Miss Alice Currey: January 2020

HD Wentworth-Stanley (The Grove 2002 3) and Miss Cressida Bonas: August 2019

The Hon ENT Fairfax (The Head Master's 1998 3) and Miss Antigone Quirini:July 2019

SMD Fane (The Knoll 2002 3) and Miss Viktoria Kirkova: December 2019

MC Wilson (The Head Master's 1998 3) and Miss Alice Clarkson: February 2020

AMcK Robertson (Moretons 2002 3) and Lady Isabella Hill: October 2019

CBM Ward (The Grove 1999 3) and Miss Clare Radcliffe: July 2019

GMF Newton (Druries 2003 3) and Miss Olivia Shaw: September 2019

JNE Talbot-Ponsonby (The Head Master's 19993) and Miss Agnes Morrell: November 2019

FJA Fife (Elmfield 2003 3) and Miss Antonia Dodson: November 2019

HA Sampson (Druries 2001 3 ) and Miss Lily Bristow: August 2019

BL Sewell (Elmfield 2003 3) and Miss Alice Hobden: January 2020

RJW Shearer (Elmfield 2001 3) and Miss Emma Shenkman: August 2019

DGA Savin (The Head Master's 2003 3) and Miss Constance Read: September 2019

JF van Zeller (Elmfield 2001 ) and Miss Kirsty Smith: August 2019

JRO Lambert (Druries 2004 ) and Miss Caroline Kay Louise Quinton: April 2019

HRH Prince D P Karageorgevitch (Moretons 1991 3) and Ms Valerie DeMuzio: 25 May 2019

AC Short (The Grove 2001 3) and Miss Beatrice Chew: September 2019

HJD Gilbert (Moretons 2004 3) and Miss Camilla Elphick: February 2020

JRL Cottingham (The Head Master's 1997 3) and Miss Frida Johansson: 24 August 2019

AAW Brown (The Head Master's 2001 3) and Miss Charlotte Hammond: July 2019

J A Leslie-Melville (The Park 2004 3) and Miss Amelia Camamile: September 2019

BJ Figgures-Wilson (Newlands 1999 3) and Miss Claire Mogorrian: 14 September 2019

JA Jackson-Stops (Moretons 2001 3) and Miss Patience Wootton: November 2019

Dr L J L Williams (Rendalls 20043) and Miss Emma Phillpot: May 2019

DAR Howells (Newlands 1999 3) and Miss Andrea Maria Solomou: 6 June 2019

RJ Litherland (Moretons 2001 3) and Miss Jennifer Smith: October 2019

W R E Fox (Elmfield 20053 ) and Miss Phoebe Jervis: October 2019

TCE Gamborg (The Grove 2000 3) and Miss Sophie Holborow: 3 March 2018

HM Taylor-Restell (Moretons 2001 3) and Miss Catherine Le Druillenec: November 2019

L G Garvin (Elmfield 2005 3) and Miss Katherine Lin: December 2019

RA Smith (The Head Master's 2000 3) and Miss Claire Morlock: 24 May 2019

3

3

KL Kwong (Druries 20053 ) and Miss Tyra Lam: 29 March 2020.

MARRIAGES CP Latilla-Campbell (The Grove 1973 3) and Miss Elizabeth Edwards: 17 May 2019 S Hatteea (The Head Master's 1984 3) and Miss Jemma Hines: 2 August 2018

CA van Straubenzee (Elmfield 2001 3) and Miss Daisy Jenks: 4 August 2019 AHW Troughton (The Grove 2001 3) and Miss Katherine Westmacott: 13 July 2019 PD Boyle (Druries 2002 3) and Miss Elizabeth de JosĂŠ Payne: 7 September 2019 RML Taylor (The Head Master's 2003 3) and Miss Joanna Calver: 28 September 2019 OFA Ayodeji (Rendalls 2003 3) and Miss Tara Ojora: 21 December 2019 W Brightman (Druries 2004 3) and Miss Francesca Malti: 22 July 2017 KL Kwong (Druries 2005 3) and Miss Tyra Lam: 29 March 2020 HR Kemble (Druries 20023 ) and Miss L Gillingham: April 2020.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

32

BIRTHS JW Eynon (Bradbys 1982 3) and Laura, a son, Oliver Richard William: on 3 December 2019

GOF Pepys (Moretons 1995 3) and Rosemary, a son, Alexander Henry Christopher: on 26 November 2019

OHT Van der Wyck (The Knoll 2000 3) and Charlotte, a daughter, Aya Ines: on 24 April 2019

S Hatteea (The Head Master's 1984 3) and Jemma, a son, Sebastian Alexander: on 28 March 2020

CD Rutter (Newlands 1995 3) and Georgina, a daughter, Eva Beatrice Iris: on 12 July 2019

O Spindler (West Acre 2000 3) and Anne, a son, Alexander: on 23 March 2020

RHA Lewis (The Grove 1988 3) and Daisy, a daughter, Nancy Virginia Annabel: on 3 November 2019

EHW Macfarlane (The Park 1995 3) and Alice, a daughter, Charlotte Anna Kay: on 16 April 2019

CA van Straubenzee (Elmfield 2001 3) and Daisy, a daughter, Clover Kitty: on 26 February 2020

RSN McColl (West Acre 1990 3) and Alba, a son, Francis Thomas: on 2 January 2020

S Venkataraman (West Acre 1995 3) and Krystal, a daughter, Araya: on 19 March 2019

EGC Monckton (The Grove 2001 3) and Emma, a son, Ludovic Gilbert Angus Colyer: on 23 December 2018

SPM Beckwith (Elmfield 1992 3) and Jessica, a son, River William John: on 28 January 2020

NJ Strachan (Elmfield 1996 3) and Lydia, a daughter, Isobel Sofia: on 14 March 2019

AP Crutchley (Moretons 2001 3) and Rosanna, a daughter, Ida Sybil Daisy: on 2 March 2020

Dr HD Rosemont (West Acre 1992 3) and Helen, a daughter, Mary Eloise Abbott: on 12 October 2019

SA Morgan (The Grove 1996 3) and Laura, a daughter, Edie Florence: on 12 May 2019

NAFS Manduca (Newlands 2001 3) and Zoe, a son, Austin John Falzon Sant: on 2 November 2019

EM Barrow (Bradbys 1993 3) and Sao Mai, a daughter, Rosie Alexandra: on 17 March 2020

J N Murray Wells (Moretons 1996 3) and Lottie, a son, Jasper Simon: on 17 March 2020

HAJ Francklin (Bradbys 20023 ) and Chloe, a son, Edward Thomas Philip on 29 October 2019

SJde Meo (Elmfield 1993 3) and Geri, a daughter, Sophia Mary: on 28 July 2019

D A K Stoddart-Scott (The Park 1996 3) and Lauren, a daughter, Marguerite Carolyn Mary: on 15 August 2019

CJP Woodhouse (The Grove 2002 3) and Lydia, a son, Ludo Ziggy Powys: on 9 April 2020

MAS Jameson (The Grove 1993 3) and Hatti, a son, George Hugh Stewart: on 26 November 2019

GAH Wilkins (The Park 1996 3) and Sally, a son, Jack Adrian Alexander: on 22 September 2019

CEG Bailey (The Head Master's 2002 3) and Lindsay, a son, Finn Connor: on 10 June 2019

GJ White (Rendalls 1993 3) and Louisa, a daughter, Eliza Grace: on 3 September 2019

RJC Cunningham (Elmfield 1997 3) and Sophie, a daughter, Cecily Rose Sophia: on 23 June 2019

IJ Ruggles-Brise (West Acre 2002 3) and Alexandra, a daughter, Lily Rose: on 6 November 2019

MJ Whitson (Druries 1994 3) and Kristine, a son, Thor James Øyås: on 23 March 2019

JPG Sewell (Elmfield 1998 3) and Amelia, a son, Ludo David Ingham: on 23 June 2019

TC Batting (The Park 2003 3) and Sophie, a son, Arthur Peter: on 20 June 2019

JA Strachan (Elmfield 1995 3) and Honor, a daughter, Annabel Grace: on 2 March 2018

OC Hicks (The Grove 1998 3) and Rose, a son, Brough John Ernest: on 9 November 2019

W Brightman (Druries 2004 3) and Francesca, a son, George Percy: on 25 January 2019

OCB Gerrish (The Grove 1995 3) and Zuleika, a daughter, Emerald Cicely Lefebure: on 18 May 2019

EJ Mulderrig (The Head Master's 1998 3) and Melissa, a daughter, Margot Bea Victoria: on 23 November 2019

Emerald Cicely Lefebure Gerrish

EBM Bradley (The Head Master's 1995 3) and Alexandra, a son, Jack: on 3 April 2017 and a daughter, Rose Alexandra: on 27 August 2019

NE Defty (Moretons 1998 3) and Louise, a son, Max Frank Stanley: on 9 September 2019

OE Craven (The Head Master's 1995 3) and Hiroko, a son, Archie Martin: on 27 September 2019

ETS de Quelen (Elmfield 1999 3) and Catherine, a son, Louis Tristan Olivier: on 24 March 2020 L Oldfield (The Head Master’s 1999 3) and Victoria, a son, Louie Ralph: on 12 March 2020 MRH Shannon (Bradbys 2000 3) and Alexandra, a son, Theodore John Sebastian: on 19 September 2019 TCE Gamborg (The Grove 2000 3) and Sophie, a son, Fin: on 9 April 2019

33

DEATHS PA Mann TD (Moretons 1933 2) 24 February 2020

HS Mellor (The Park 1949 3) 6 December 2019

LWD Sharp CEng FIEE (Moretons 1935 3) 17 January 2020

TJE Lardner (Rendalls 1949 3) 14 November 2019

AG Hensher (The Knoll and Small Houses 1937 2 ) 10 July 2019

TJ Benn (The Head Master's 1950 2) 9 October 2019

NW Powell (The Knoll 1941 1 ) September 2019

JF Edmond (Elmfield 1951 1) 16 January 2020

RJ Gluckstein (Moretons 1942 ) 25 March 2020

T Holdsworth (Druries 1951 2) 25th May 2019

MJ Boxhall (Druries 1943 ) 10 April 2019

PJ Mitchell (Rendalls 1951 3) 29 June 2019

DJ Braham (The Grove 1943 ) 3 February 2017

RE Melville (The Knoll 1952 2) 21 March 2019

Group Captain A A Ramus (The Grove 1943 3 ) 28 August 2019

RI Dick (The Park 1952 3) March 2020

DW Taylor (The Grove 1943 3 ) 25 June 2016

JA Kitchen (Rendalls 1953 1) 4 January 2020

JFD Burn (The Grove 1944 1 ) 25 June 2019

RW Barton (Bradbys 19533) 11 June 2019

MJS Charles (Elmfield 1944 ) 25 June 2019

JM McCririck (The Head Master's 19541) 5 July 2019

JA Farmer (The Knoll 1944 ) 19 October 2019

WG Bancroft (Bradbys 19543) 3 February 2019

WRB Jack (The Park 1944 ) 26 May 2019

PJ Maydon (The Grove 1955 3) 20 June 2019

2

3

3

2

2

2

ID Gordon (Bradbys & Small Houses 1944 ) 10 April 2020

MC Walford (Elmfield 1956 3) 6 February 2020

MR Reynard (Elmfield 19443 ) 24 February 2020

Lt Col AJ de Lukacs Lessner (The Park 19563) 6 December 2019

3

Dr NGA Gracey (The Head Master's 19443 ) 29 June 2019 JGC Lander (Bradbys & Small Houses 1945 1 ) May 2019 A Falcon (The Grove 1945 3) November 2019 Lt Cdr JG Lucas RN (The Park 1945 ) 10 February 2020 3

GV Ravenscroft (The Park 1945 ) 2 May 2019 3

JDB Smart CVO JP (Rendalls & Small Houses 1945 3) 12 August 2019 EP Balcombe (Bradbys 1946 3 ) 8 April 2020 JH Ainsworth-Taylor (Newlands 1946 3) 6 June 2019 KW Huddart (Bradbys 1947 2 ) 23 June 2019 GC Ranald (The Park 1947 2 ) 23 November 2019 RC Boxhall (Druries 1947 3 ) 13 December 2019 MTF McClelland (The Grove 1947 3) 21 February 2020 GR Hobday (Moretons 1947 3) 6 September 2017 RHB Neame CBE DL (Moretons 1947 3) 15 November 2019 H Robinson (Newlands 1947 3) 22 May 2019 DS Craven (The Grove 1948 2) 1 September 2019 GM Challenor (Rendalls 1948 2) 4 February 2018 Captain PA Foxwood (Druries 1949 2) 11 October 2019 KP St G Fisher (Elmfield 1949 2) 19 February 2020 Professor DL Wingate (The Head Master's 1949 2 ) 31 March 2019 RJL Sidley (Bradbys 1949 3 ) 28 January 2020

PND Broadhead (West Acre 19563) 2 April 2020 CTB Gilbart-Smith (The Knoll 1957 2) 26 December 2019 SG Harris (The Grove 1958 2) May 2018 AW Grotrian (Newlands 1958 2) 24 June 2019 Dr JR Stoneham FFARCS (The Park 1958 2) 31 July 2019 SAA Seligman (Bradbys 19652) 24 March 2020 NCM Somerville (Rendalls 1966 2) 15 February 2020 AG Burton-Page (The Knoll 1967 3) 18 November 2018 JM Thompson (Newlands 1967 3) 19 December 2019 RE Dimpfl (Bradbys 1968 3) 22 July 2019 The Marquess of Aberdeen (Moretons 1968 3) 12 March 2020 MTA Seligman (Bradbys 1969 2) 17 April 2020 ET Isaac (Moretons 1971 2) 29 March 2020 WP Ledward (Druries 1972 2) 3 April 2020 MT Schueppert (Moretons 1979 3 ) 7 June 2019 RJG Bowman-Shaw (West Acre 19793) 1 January 2020 JS Green (Moretons 19843) 10 August 2019 JA Gray (Newlands 19853) 10 August 2019 AN White (Moretons 19873) 14 April 2019 JR Hill (The Head Master's 2000 3) 21 November 2019 MH Keffer (Moretons 2010 3) 11 October 2019

HARROW BEAKS AND FORMER STAFF EP Balcombe (Bradbys 19463 ) Director of Harrow Development Trust (1986–1995) 8 April 2020 AWD Sankey Master at Harrow (1962–1996) and House Master of Bradbys (1976–1988 ) 25 February 2020

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

OH BOOKS

34 RB PACKARD

(The Head Master’s 19602 ) Although surgery for cataract has a history going back thousands of years the most important advances in this story have taken place in the last 70 years. History and Evolution of Modern Cataract Surgery covers the earlier historical period but brings the reader right up to date with the latest techniques and technologies with a list of international contributors who have in no small measure brought this to pass.

Another rich mix of books written by you.

WEF SAMUEL (Druries 1954³)

An Accidental Bookseller: A Personal Memoir of Foyles is a very personal

memoir of his relationships with his family business, Foyles Bookshop, and with two extraordinary people: William and Christina Foyle. It is full of anecdotes and should appeal to all those who have an affection for what has been, and arguably once more is, one of the great bookshops of the world.

THE MARQUESS AP DONEGALL

(Elmfield 1965³) Claud Chichester, the 4th Baron Templemore (Elmfield 1928¹) was the author's grandfather. He was a typical representative of the Anglo-Irish landowning families. Born at the height of empire, his motto, if he had one, could have been "For family. king and country". He was scrupulously loyal to all three. The 4th Lord Templemore is an account of his life, a life devoted to those three entities, even if it was not always clear which country he had in mind. He seems to have loved England and Ireland equally, often a precarious position to hold.

VL SANKEY (The Park 1962³)

Co-written with Katey Lockwood, The Way: Finding Peace in Turbulent Times is a combination of philosophy,

psychology and spirituality and challenges leadership, government, organizations and, of course, individuals to become aware of what is happening in our world, why it is happening and the various ways we can address these problems, which are all entirely manmade. The Way has been generously endorsed by some eminent academics, doctors and professionals.

PROFESSOR CH CARR

P de F HICKS (Druries 1954³)

In this well-researched and engaging book, The Litchfield Law School: Guiding the New Nation, Hicks makes a convincing case that the Litchfield Law School provided the most innovative and successful legal education program in the country for almost fifty years (1784-1833). A recent history of the Harvard Law School acknowledged, “In retrospect, both Harvard and Yale have envied Litchfield’s success and wished to claim it as their ancestor.”

(Moretons 1965² ) The era of globalisation brought waves of consolidation in business ownership alongside Leviathon-like state actors.

Digital disruption too can leave market power in a relatively small number of hands. Global Oligopoly: A Key Idea for Business and Society focuses on global oligopolies, starting with an analysis of global concentration and profits in all sectors, before moving on to illuminate the geographical spread and global strategic orientation choices and performance outcomes of global oligopoly. Presenting empirical data on strategies and performance outcomes, the book covers a range of industries to provide practical, research-based guidance for more effective global business strategies and policy perspectives.

35

SW BRADLEY

DR N GUPTA (Bradbys 1997³)

Mike Brearley was one of England’s most successful cricket captains, renowned especially for turning probable defeat into remarkable victory against Australia in 1981.

(The Head Master’s 1979¹) In 2016, at the end of the promotional tour for his latest film, writer-director Stephen was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. Shooting and Cutting:

The Wall with the Wooden Plank

Cricketing Caesar: The Biography of Mike Brearley looks at the many facets

A Survivor’s Guide to Film-Making and Other Diseases explores Stephen’s

MCG PEEL (Druries 1970³)

of an interesting life and, with many contributions from former team-mates, evaluates the qualities which made him such a superb leader.

The Hollow Crown: England Cricket Captains from 1945 to the Present

explores the changing nature of the England cricket captaincy from the post-war amateurs to the present and explains the pressures that go with the job. Each captain is individually assessed, and special attention is given to the few who have really left a mark.

journey through life-changing treatment, provides war stories from his 20 years in the film and TV business, and documents his attempts to return to film-making and a comparatively normal family life once over the worst of the cancer treatment. Honest, moving and often devastatingly funny, Stephen’s story shows that, even for a seasoned film-maker, life can often out-do the most outlandish of scripts.

As a string of unexplained murders rock the small town of Old Harimoti, Inspector Daniel and Officer Kay are kept on their toes. As they try to unravel the reasons behind the killings, each more gruesome than the last, the killer strikes again. Things spiral out of their control when the town's most powerful man has his close aide murdered.

And then there is Sophie!

DR OL DUKE (Newlands 1999³)

How to Be a Dad:The ultimate guide to pregnancy, birth and dirty nappies RJ FAIRER (Newlands 1979³)

John Galliano for Dior opens with

DJ WILLIAMS (The Grove 1975³)

Ghastly Holidays: things my father never told me… consists of short comic-poems

that are both personal and relatable accounts of mishaps experienced on holiday. The poems are a witty take on his worst holiday moments. Brits driving abroad, accidentally deleting all your holiday photos and his son being chased by a buffalo are just some of the hilarious events that Williams shares. Aside from the humour, Williams also includes a poignant piece, 'Hummingbird', which sheds light on his experience dealing with his father's dementia.

an essay on John Galliano’s work. The book unfolds chronologically, covering a decade of showstopping designs, from 1998 to 2010, and revealing previously unseen behind-the-scenes moments that capture models, hairdressers, stylists, makeup artists and John Galliano himself at their most creative. Robert’s stunning and high-energy photographs convey the drama, glamour and wild imagination that defined Galliano's Dior shows.

CA LLEWELLEN PALMER

(Elmfield 1980³) The Beaufort Hunt Diaries: 1901–1913

is a history of The Beaufort Hunt before the First World War, through the eyes of the hunting diaries of Allen Llewellen Palmer who followed when he could. It is a fascinating journey into Edwardian England, glamour and rural England on the eve of war.

is the first doctor-written guide to fatherhood. Oscar combines his medical knowledge as a healthcare professional with his real-life experience to provide an honest, humorous and engaging book that takes you on a journey from baby scans to birthing pools and beyond.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

36

The OH Shaftesbury Enterprise Society (OHSE), named after and inspired by the 19th-century reformer and philanthropist Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury (The Head Master's 1813³ ), has attracted interest from OHs all over the world. It is hoped that the work of the OHSE will involve both fundraising and the implementation of charitable projects, particularly working with the School’s existing Shaftesbury Enterprise partners, including the Harrow Club.

OHSE SOCIETY SPOTLIGHT

THE OHSE PROVIDES A PLATFORM FOR OHs BOTH

to support the work of Shaftesbury Enterprise and to work together in order to meet other philanthropic aims.

There is the potential among OHs to change society for the better, and the OHSE would like to attract OHs who are keen to work together to use their capacity, talents and resources for the benefit of others.

This year, the work of the OHSE will be focused on supporting those worst affected by the Coronavirus crisis. The London Borough of Harrow appears to be one of the worst-affected regions in the UK. Our capacity to support our wider community at an unprecedented time of difficulty and our concern for the most vulnerable members of our society is significant; our strong relationships ensure that we are well placed to deliver focused and impactful provision. At the moment, we are focusing particularly on educational programmes for looked-after children and young carers, but there are many other projects. OHs are able to contribute through the offer of skills, contacts, resources or financial help, which would be aimed at supporting vulnerable people to navigate the fallout from the crisis.

The OHSE will also continue to organise fundraising events and, after the success of the first Long Ducker Bike Ride from Harrow to Highclere and the Shaftesbury Estate, the main event planned for this year is the Long Ducker Bike Ride 2020, on Sunday 6 September 2020.We very much hope that OHs, family and friends will be able to take part in a fully guided and supported ride starting and finishing at Harrow School.

Timothy Dalton (Newlands

19923 )

Director of Shaftesbury Enterprise

Karim Wilkins (The Knoll 1984³) was one of the brave riders to take part in the inaugural Long Ducker Bike Ride last year: 15 September 2019 witnessed the inaugural Long Ducker Bike Ride from the Hill to the Shaftesbury Estate in Dorset. For those unable to pound the pavements on foot or swim any sort of distance without drowning in the traditional Long Ducker events, this was the perfect way to contribute to the charities and have rather a lot of fun and cramp in the process. Never had Bill Yard seen so much Lycra. The mental images of 38 mostly middle-aged men (plus some younger more athletic women and men) wearing so much of the stuff will forever haunt those brave souls who traded a Sunday lie-in to wave us all off.

The long route was anything from 185–200km (depending on which satnav you were following) down to Wimborne St Giles, with 1,661m of climbing (1,845m if you missed the lunch stop by two miles and had to cycle back!). For those who were more time deficient or, as we refer to them with hindsight, “smarter”, the shorter route was a 99km ride (687m climb) finishing at Highclere Castle (aka Downton Abbey), which also served as the halfway point for the longer ride.

Raising money for the Harrow Club, Shaftesbury

37

Enterprise projects and Spear Harrow, 22 riders opted for the shorter route and 16 for the Full Monty.

“Big Rog” Uttley (whose 70th birthday was four days earlier) was road captain for the ride and was ably assisted by an entourage of past and present beaks and even a Governor.

The weather couldn’t have been any better for a long bike ride, Goldilocks-like if you will. And once we had cleared the 29 sets of traffic lights on the Uxbridge Road and taken in the sights of 12 of Slough’s finest roundabouts, it was plain sailing down to Highclere.

Traffic was relatively light and so there were plenty of opportunities to ride two-a-breast and catch up with old friends/beaks (in some cases after 30 years!).

A terrific spread had been laid on at the village hall but Lord and Lady Grantham were no-shows.

The first couple of miles after lunch were all uphill; it took its toll and split the riders into three groups.

But after a few punctures, a broken chain and four more hours in the saddle, all riders arrived safely in the centre of Wimborne St Giles where some very patient helpers had set up a gazebo and sorted out some food too.

They’d even bought a cake for Big Rog. “I hope it’s not chocolate cake. I hate chocolate cake”, he said. Luckily for the rest of us, it was chocolate cake, otherwise we may not have got a look in. Get your own cake next year Rog…I mean Sir!

What a day! Over £25k was raised for the charities and big thanks must go to Tim Dalton, the sponsors, all the unsung heroes at Highclere and Wimborne, and all those behind the scenes who helped make the event a reality.

If you’re reading this and thinking, “I’d like to do that”, then you should definitely do so this year!

The ride this year will be on 6 September and will probably have three distances (40, 70 and 100 miles) so that more people of all riding abilities can take part.

The ride will also start and finish on the Hill (already looking forward to that last climb…joy!).

The Long Ducker Bike Ride is an event for all friends of Harrow, so please feel free to invite your friends and family.

Knowing that every mile you ride is helping raise money for children of those charities makes every bit of cramp and every bead of sweat worthwhile!

We’re aiming for 100+ riders in 2020. Please be one of them!

If you are interested in taking part in the Long Ducker Bike Ride 2020 or helping more widely with the OHSE, please contact Tim Dalton (tmd@harrowschool.org.uk) if you would like to find out more.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

38

The Old Harrovian Wellbeing Society (OHWS) was set up by Alexander Gray (The Head Master's 1994³) earlier this year, to harness the collaborative power of all OHs who are interested in wellbeing: their own, that of other people and of the planet. This is explored through mental health, physical fitness, spiritual discipline, personal growth and professional development. The OHWS is also keen to protect the planet through sustainable practices and Earth-conscious behaviour.

At the time of writing, April 2020, most of the world is in lockdown, so it seemed apt to launch the OHWS during this time and see how OHs might respond. We caught up with Alexander to discuss where the idea came from.

SOCIETY SPOTLIGHT

It has been about a year since we first discussed setting up a new society – remind us how it started.

Yes, quite a year! It has been interesting trying to launch a society from a state of unknowing–a sort of Being rather than Doing. My background is business development and communications in travel and tourism.

I’ve always enjoyed connecting people, representing brands and trying to get the best out of those around me. However, I was tired of doing the same thing, call it an early midlife crisis, and decided to change career.

So, since 2016 I’ve been retraining as a psychotherapist, trying to work part-time while studying, and volunteering as a therapist to build up my hours for accreditation.

Leaving travel and tourism has been hard; it’s where all my professional contacts and experience lies, so I was wracking my brain trying to come up with ways to network within the mental health world. I was actually playing football with the OH Vets, talking with my old captain, David Mutter (The Head Master’s 1994 3 ), who runs a personal development company called Champion Academy and I wondered which other OHs might work in the sector. I listened to the HA Podcast with Dr Oscar Duke (Newlands 1999 3 ) speaking about his experiences of becoming a dad and then I knew there should be a conversation with the HA. From a personal point of view, I wanted the society to focus on mental health. I could see the networking going really well, meeting lots of people in the sector, and perhaps finding a route to a decent new career – the stuff all societies are made of, right? But having met with Adam and Perena, both in the City and at Harrow, to discuss a way forward, we agreed mental health was too narrow and we should expand the net to include other perhaps more niche professions and interests that were connected.

39 So how did the various elements come together and who has been involved so far?

So, some fitness, personal development and sustainability covered there. What about mental health?

Well, we looked at the HA database to see how many people listed themselves in wellness or something connected and we found 22 likely candidates from yoga instructors to psychiatrists, osteopaths and addiction specialists. Interestingly, none of them have engaged in the society at all! In the meantime, I set up some social media channels and started conversations with my peers to see who they knew might be interested in being involved.

I thought that might have come from me running a workshop on the concept around my practice, Garden of Eadon – nourishing your mind, body and soul through psychotherapy and Reiki. But Coronavirus put a kibosh on the event. However, isolation has had some positive effects. I had been speaking with Alexi Pitallis (Rendalls 2007 3 ) about the OHWS for a while. He had mentioned setting up Mind Field Pod looking at mental health but had not interviewed any OHs. I was on OH Connect and saw Vernon Sankey's (The Park 19623) post about his latest book The Way – Finding Peace in Turbulent Times.

Synchronicity? We certainly thought so and hurriedly put together a podcast, which is now part of the HA series, discussing his book and how we can all benefit from living in the present moment to avoid stress and anxiety around life events, such as Covid-19 at that time, or any other time.

We had a launch event planned just before lockdown.

The idea was for Tarka London, run by Rufus GordonDean (The Grove 1996 3 ), to host an event at one of their venues in Fulham. Tarka provides exercise designed to optimise a child's development, communication and confidence. We’d have OH parents dropping their kids off for classes and then engaging in networking with the other members. These included The Wandering Bear, aka Charlie Allman-Brown (Druries 1996 3 ), who was going to offer some self-defence sessions and sign up participants to an adventure trek abroad. We had Colin McKenzie-Blackman (Bradbys 19943 ), CEO of Trees For Life, who was going to give a lecture on rewilding Scotland and then, of course, we’d move onto drinks!

It seems like things are coming together, even if we can’t be together in person. So, what’s next?

Well, although this interview has been about me setting things up, I hope it draws some support out of the woodwork because I’d like this society to be a collaborative effort, much like the podcast. I need help running the society; we need to think about a launch event or smaller events for members. I’d like to see volunteers coming forward from outside the UK to help the society grow internationally and then see how the core team develops to shape what I think could become a really useful society to many OHs. Ideally, above and beyond the usual drinks, networking and career-based aspects of a society, all members will benefit from membership through offering each other discounts and special offers that can be accessed through OH Connect, our social channels and a membership card we hope to launch next year.

Current offers include 25% off eLearning courses from Barefoot, a company run by Robin Adda (Newlands 1962 3 ), and a retreat is being worked on by Thomas Joly De Lotbiniere (The Knoll 2004 3 ) whose company, Athelysium, run adventure training camps in Spain.

If you would like to be involved in the running of the OHWS, have something to offer or would like to collaborate in some way then please contact Alexander Gray at oldharrovianwellbeingsociety@gmail.com or follow and engage with the community through Facebook /ohwellbeingsociety Twitter @ohwellbeingsoc and Instagram @oldharrovianwellbeingsociety

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

40 My wife always asks me why I read the books I do.

In my mind, reading is first and foremost about learning.

My grandmother: who played a central role in my education, always stressed its importance. It was she who originally suggested Harrow to me, when I was 12 years old and at a London day-school. Until I arrived at Harrow, I had avoided reading unless I had a gun pointed at me.

Any juvenile protestations of boredom were swiftly given the same answer by my grandmother, “If you are bored, read a book!” Thankfully, it was her relentless encouragement of starting with the classics, coupled with Martin Tyrell’s inspirational teaching of 20th-century American literature, that opened my mind to the joy of reading.

LISTINGS

BOOKS Having graduated from the Courtauld Institute, Hugo Taylor (Druries 1999 3) set out on a career in the entertainment industry, winning a BAFTA for Best Reality and Constructed Factual in 2013, the same year he founded his first business, luxury goods company Taylor Morris. He now works in the film industry for Sony Pictures and, in the past year, has released Spider Man: Far From Home, Jumanji: The Next Level and Greed (which features a great cameo from fellow OH James Blunt (Elmfield 1987 3 ). Here, he recommends his five of his favourite books.

THE GREAT GATSBY

BY F SCOTT FITZGERALD

BRIDESHEAD REVISITED

BY EVELYN WAUGH

Somewhat predictably, the book which has had the most enduring appeal to me since I first read it bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at the age of 14 was The Great Gatsby. Young and impressionable, a story about a mysterious, mega-rich man who loved to throw parties in an effort to get the girl of his dreams connected with me.

Now, aged 33, I still love parties, love 1920s' tailoring and am still a hopeless romantic. Nick tells Gatsby, "You can't repeat the past". Gatsby replies, "Why of course you can". It would be years on from Harrow that I developed a profound respect for the descriptive style of F Scott Fitzgerald, but the wonderful thing about reading is that sometimes the right book comes to you at the right time in your life and weaves itself into the fabric of your personality.

I still look back at my five years on the Hill with entirely mixed feelings.

Not quite love and hate but, over the years, a golden glow has encompassed my memories and eradicated the countless darker moments of loneliness and isolation that were a part of every term. Thus, it was with great excitement I left in 2004 with four As at A level and a pact sworn with my peers never to return. I have since gone back five or six times.

So much for the word of a Harrow boy.

So, that beautiful summer of 2004, I set off on my gap year and started with a road trip around Italy. As Venice was my first stop, my father suggested I read Brideshead Revisited. Also set in part in the 1920s and with the most fabulous chapter set in the city, Waugh’s novel, with its nostalgia for the age of English aristocracy, helped me understand many of the boys I had gone to School with. In terms of the nearly overt homosexuality in the book, it does to this day make me question how it is that, of the 800 boys I knew at Harrow, I only have two homosexual friends from School. Perhaps times have changed but I do feel that bullying at Harrow (certainly when I was there) drove many to disguise or be less than than honest about their sexuality, which is very sad. Brideshead Revisited is a masterpiece. Essential reading for any Englishman. The Granada TV adaptation also rocks!

As I grew older, I gravitated towards autobiographies, books on history and books on self-development. There is nothing I love more on holiday than tackling the most intense of subjects!

Hence my wife’s incredulity at my often heavy choices. The following three books are the ones that stand out and have wide appeal.

41

LIFE

BY KEITH RICHARDS

RIDE OF A LIFETIME

BY ROBERT IGER

THE GIRLS

BY EMMA CLINE

Life by Keith Richards acts as my own life manifesto. Keith is my idol.

The Stones are my favourite band.

If you have not read this book, you can thank me later. It’s the most entertaining and passionate autobiography I have ever read.

Keith pieces together what he can remember and weaves it together with his profound love of music.

Keith is the most elegantly wasted man to have walked the earth. His utter disregard of the rules, his commitment to his art and his supreme sense of style dictate almost everything I do. Keith was the ultimate tonic during my time at Harrow and my way of putting two fingers up at the establishment. Life inspired me to start my first business, Taylor Morris Eyewear.

I am a Gemini: a man of two halves.

It’s thus no surprise that the next autobiography which shaped my life and is one of the most interesting reads comes from the former CEO of Disney.

About as un-rock and roll as you can get. Ride of a Lifetime by Bob Iger goes through his career from his days at ABC to his rise and domination of the global entertainment industry with Disney.

I myself now work for a movie studio, Sony Pictures, and can only dream of reaching the same heights. Much of the advice that he gives are lessons I previously learnt at Harrow. Strong leadership, kindness, fairness and talent are what you need to succeed. I remember the great David Elleray giving us a Druries half-time team talk during the final of the Harrow football competition on Founder’s Day. Those words echo in many of the books I read. Work hard, play hard and never give up!

We went on to win the game, crushing Moretons with a winner in the final minute. I can still smell the bird droppings and mud from the pitch!

Last summer, I had the pleasure of working on Quentin Tarantino’s latest masterpiece Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Set in 1969, in one crucial scene set on Spahn Ranch, we get to look behind the curtain at what life was like living with the Manson family.

Emma Cline wrote The Girls on the same subject, set from the perspective of a 14-year-old girl who joins the family. The book allows a man to enter the mind of a female teenager living in the USA during the summer of love.

It’s truly transportive, dark and honest.

I would, one day, like to make a film on the subject but fear it will only pale in comparison.

However, in times of self-doubt I remember my favourite quote: “It’s always impossible until it’s done”.

Wise words from Mr Mandela and perhaps more poetic than “KBO!”

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

42

A LIFE IN RUINS Although Alastair Dick-Cleland (The Park 1975³ ) studied sciences at A level, read Experimental Psychology at university and then spent ten years with the John Lewis Partnership in a wide variety of roles, his passion has always been for architecture and historic buildings – especially rescuing ruins. So, following a complete career change in the 1990s, Alastair has now worked for the Landmark Trust, one of the UK’s leading building preservation charities, for over 25 years. He is currently their Project Development Manager, on the hunt for new cases to take on and rescue. Here are some of his favourites.

THE LANDMARK TRUST Founded in 1965, the Landmark Trust has now rescued over 200 buildings. They were chosen because they were at risk in some way, were of architectural or historic interest and importance, and were deemed to be places where you would want to stay for a holiday. All are let all year round for stays from three nights up to three weeks.

They sleep from one up to 16 people and around half also allow dogs, so you can take your best friend. While the letting income runs the organisation and pays for the upkeep and maintenance, new projects are externally funded through a wide range of donors and benefactors.

CLAVELL TOWER KIMMERIDGE, NEAR WAREHAM, DORSET

2

Landmark has always had a soft spot for towers – and Clavell Tower, built for a retiring clergyman in 1830, was one of our most challenging projects. By the 21st century it was perilously close to the edge of the receding cliff and would definitely have fallen over in due course.

It was painstakingly dismantled stone by stone, each numbered and put into ex-Kodak packing crates. To everyone’s great relief, it was rebuilt, further inland and just as before but with all the missing decorative details put back. It’s a steep climb up, leaving your car in the bay below, but well worth it. There are quite a number of marriage proposals recorded in the visitors’ logbook!

43 THE GOTHIC TEMPLE

4

STOWE, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE

The gardens at Stowe rank as some of the finest in the world, and the Gothic Temple is perhaps the best of all the follies and temples in this magnificent landscape, moulded by such luminaries as Bridgeman, Kent and ‘Capability’ Brown. The gardens are now owned and managed by the National Trust.

Triangular shaped and built “to the Liberty of our Ancestors” out of a warm, iron-rich limestone, and with circular rooms inside, this quirky structure has a domed central ceiling of heraldic mosaics. The timber balustrade to the gallery above the living space once housed the rifles when it was used as Stowe School’s Armoury. Sheep graze almost to your door and the views from the top of the tower are to die for.

SADDELL ESTATE KINTYRE, ARGYLL & BUTE

4-13

Tucked away on the east coast of Kintyre, Saddell Bay looks out to Arran, and you can understand why the Bishop of Argyll might have chosen this delightful spot to build a castle on the shore, back in the early 1500s.

Landmark owns the entire Saddell Estate, which includes five other houses you can stay in, ranging from the lodge and a schoolteacher’s corrugated-iron cottage to Saddell House, a typical laird’s house with generously proportioned rooms and stags’ heads looking down from the dining-room walls. Those readers of a certain age will recognise the long white strand from a certain Paul McCartney video featuring the Campbeltown Pipe Band.

CROWNHILL FORT PLYMOUTH, DEVON

8

In the 1860s it was feared that the French might attack Plymouth from the land as well as by sea, and so Crownhill Fort was built to the north of the city. It is one of the best-preserved forts in the entire country. The central parade ground is surrounded by barracks, magazines and miles of tunnels, ramparts, gun emplacements and mortar pits. It is perfect for testing out your memories of CCF drill. Originally built to house up to 300 men, the part you now stay in is the Officers’ Quarters, built on the south side and so furthest away from the anticipated incoming fire. Your children will love exploring it as much as you – and it has the only working example in the world of a Moncrieff Disappearing Gun.

THE RUIN

2

HACKFALL, GREWELTHORPE, NORTH YORKSHIRE

Some rescues don’t come easily and it took 15 years finally to acquire and restore this little pavilion perched above a steeply wooded gorge. The picturesque 18th-century woodland garden at Hackfall was built by the Aislabie family, who also owned nearby Studley Royal. Here, a romantic ‘Gothic’ garden was created with waterfalls and all manner of follies including a Rustic Hut and a Hermit’s Grotto. Seen from down below, the Ruin appears to be just a triple-domed, Romanesque ruin, but from the other side you arrive at a tiny banqueting house, where the Aislabies’ guests would have taken tea and where you now stay in three rooms, linked by a quick dash across the terrace.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

44

TIBBETTS

4

LUNDY, BRISTOL CHANNEL, DEVON

Lundy is one of the jewels in Landmark’s crown – a car-free island just three miles long and half a mile wide, rising up 400 feet out in the Bristol Channel, where it has claimed many a wreck.

There are 23 different properties to stay in here, ranging from the lighthouse-keepers’ quarters of Old Light on the highest point of the island to Millcombe House, an elegant seat built for the Heaven family in 1836, and hence Lundy becoming known as ‘The Kingdom of Heaven’. But for those who really want to get away from it all, Tibbetts is over a mile and half outside the village and is as remote as you could wish.

It is the only Landmark without electricity, and it is said that you can see 14 lighthouses on a clear night.

ASTLEY CASTLE NUNEATON, WARWICKSHIRE

8

More fortified manor house than castle, by the time Astley came onto Landmark’s radar, it was in a truly perilous state. The walls were actively collapsing and it counts as one of the least safe buildings we have ever worked on. Gutted by a fire in 1978, it was on the cusp of being lost. Being beyond conventional restoration, a competition was held to find a more modern, contemporary solution for such a vulnerable building. The winning scheme cleverly stiches the new into the old, and it was awarded the 2013 Stirling Prize for Architecture, the Oscars of the built environment. It has won over many converts – and I like to think even the little old lady who always seemed to be there to tell me just how much she didn’t like it.

WINSFORD COTTAGE HOSPITAL HALWILL JUNCTION, NORTH DEVON

6

I have always had a soft spot for the Arts & Crafts period, and for the work of C F A Voysey in particular. Here was an architect who could design not just your house but the furniture, light fittings, fabrics and wallpapers too. Winsford was the only hospital he built, designed in 1899 at the height of his powers.

It provided for the needs of the rural parishes that surround it at a time when people needlessly died of treatable conditions for want of proper facilities. Built in his domestic style, it was much admired from the very beginning, with the leather-bound Visitors’ Book containing comments such as ‘I’m determined to be ill’. It looked after soldiers during WWI and, in due course, was absorbed by the NHS until no longer wanted. It has now been lovingly restored, keeping all the Voysey features including three of his specially reprinted curtain fabrics.

45 THE GRANGE

8

RAMSGATE, KENT

Augustus Pugin is rightly regarded as the genius of the Gothic Revival. When the Palace of Westminster burnt down in 1834, Charles Barry won the competition to build it anew. The problem was that it had to be in the Gothic style – and Barry was a Classicist. So, he recruited Pugin to do all the detailed design, and it was here in the library of the house that he built for himself that Pugin produced the myriad drawings it needed.

He was dead by 40, exhausted and mad, having achieved more than most will in twice those years. After exhaustive research, including reprinting the bespoke wallpapers that Pugin had specially designed, the rich Gothic interiors have been recreated to enable you to enjoy “the delight of the sea with Catholic architecture”.

DOLBELYDR

6

TREFNANT, DENBIGHSHIRE

This modest house, hidden away in a valley in North Wales, was the home of a remarkable man – one Henry Salesbury, a scholar who was fluent in Greek and Latin as well as English and Welsh. It was here that he wrote his Grammatica Britannica in 1593, which gives Dolbelydr claim to be the birthplace of modern Welsh at a time when Henry VIII had banned its use in government and court circles. There were those who thought the house beyond saving with its collapsing walls, lack of any roof at all and huge trees growing up inside. But such rare features as its original windows and cyclopean doorhead made it well worth saving. It stands in a secluded and peaceful valley, and you may well spot deer grazing at either end.

VILLA SARACENO FINALE, VICENZA, ITALY

16

There are many larger Landmarks that make the perfect venue for those important milestones in life – birthdays of note, family gatherings to celebrate anniversaries, or just an excuse to get away with the best of friends. The Villa Saraceno is one of the largest Landmarks and is one of a small number outside the UK. Here you have the real thing – an unspoilt rural villa built c1550 by Andrea Palladio, who inspired the entire architectural movement of Palladianism in the 18th century.

You can dine in the loggia or raise a glass in the grand sala surrounded by lively frescoed friezes.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

46

© James Wild Sculptures

JAMES WILD

BIG PICTURE

Inspired by the form and movement in nature, James Wild (Elmfield 2004 3 ) began sculpting out of scrap metal at Harrow in 2009. Since then, he has been evolving his recognisable style and sculpting techniques to master his medium.

After leaving Harrow, James worked as an apprentice to a blacksmith, which gave him the traditional skills of working metal and allowed him to develop and refine his unique, self-taught style, which relies largely on welding, grinding and the hammer.

James, like many others, has always been drawn to the wild stretches of the planet, both personally and as a source of creative inspiration. Over the last decade, a lot has changed, not least the amount we know about man’s impact on planet Earth. James’ creative ambition is for his sculpture to act as a portal through which people can reconnect and consider the wild. In a world where we are growing further away from nature, James wants his work to tell a story of a moment in the wild. His work is an amalgamation of waste metal worked into a raw, natural lifeforce with a personality and spirit.

“I aim to build awareness and appreciation for the wild stretches of our planet and the life that inhabits them.”

In 2019, after two years in the workshop, James unveiled his work at his first major exhibition, O N E W I L D. It is a collection of ten bronze sculptures of vulnerable and critically endangered species, sculpted in scrap metal and cast in bronze. Twenty percent of the proceeds from the sale of each sculpture will be donated to support the charity Fauna & Flora International in their work in safeguarding the future of each species. To date, O N E W I L D has raised just shy of £11,000.

James has completed many private and public commissions, some of which have been for international clients. He also recently installed a life-sized orangutan in the Eden Project’s rainforest biome, to highlight the pressures that palm oil agriculture is exerting on this species.

© Emily Whitfield-Wicks

“This exhibition aims to bridge the gap that has evolved between man and nature, and to encourage people to reflect on our impact on the world and the extreme pressures the wilderness faces.”

47

Left: Orangutan at the Eden Project. Below: Hammerhead sculpted from scrap and cast in bronze (edition of 12).

To see some of James's work visit www.jameswildsculptures.co.uk @james_wild_sculptures

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

EVENT REPORTS Peter Walker (The Park 1962 1 ) Memorial Dinner

The Boot and Flogger London – 26 April 2019 A dinner was held in memory of Peter Walker who died unexpectedly in 2016 aged 67. The event, which is held annually on or around Peter’s birthday, was co-ordinated

by Colin Liddell (The Park 1961 2 ), who organised an excellent evening and a fitting tribute to Peter. Harry Walker, Peter’s son, flew over from Hong Kong especially for the dinner, returning the next day.

48 OH Property Club Dinner

Brooks’s – 11 June 2019 On Tuesday 11 June 2019, 70 members of the OHPC, and special guest Head Master Alastair Land, gathered at Brooks's in St James's, courtesy of Andrew Graham (Newlands 19643 ) for their biennial dinner. Guest speaker for the evening, James Seppala (Druries 1992 3 ), Senior Managing Director of Blackstone Europe, gave a very eloquent after-dinner speech about his fascinating career to date. The Head Master also gave the OHPC members gathered an update from the Hill.

10 Years On – 20043–20093 Leavers’ Reunion

Market Hall Fulham – Thursday 11 July 2019

Other OHs present included Pierce Brunt (The Head Master’s 1962 1 ), Tony Haslam (Druries 1962 1 ), Chris Nichols (The Park 1962 1 ), Peter Tawell (Moretons 1962 3), and Johnny Walker (The Park 1965 1). Songs were sung and many tributes were made to a great OH.

HA Career Networking Evening Finance, Law, Property and Tech

Oriental Club – 2 September 2019

The Byronics Summer Party

St Paul’s Church – 6 June 2019 The summer drinks party was a success overall with more than 100 LGBT+ alumni and their guests attending from the four schools involved; Harrow, Eton, Radley and Winchester.

49

OHAFC Jubilee Cup

OH Technology Club Networking Evening

Charles Alcock Pavilion, Harrow School – 7 September 2019

Banked – 11 September 2019

The eighth edition of the annual Festiphil Tournament once again proved a huge success, with nearly 60 schoolboys and OHAFC players combining in a four-team round-robin tournament on the Philathletic Ground. After three hours of hard-fought competition, it was the Blue team, led by veteran David Lederman (Newlands 19883 ), who prevailed, winning all three of their matches, two by a penalty shootout.

September 2019 marked the third OH Technology Club event since its inception in 2018. Hosted at the offices of Banked and including an Untitled presentation from Phillip Gajland (Druries 20103) (KTH University), the turnout was great, even with few OHs aware of the actual content of the talk. After some networking and drinks, OHs were able to exchange tech and start-up stories, Phillip did very well at intuitively explaining the real title of his talk (Homomorphic Encryption and Secure Multi-Party Computation) without a single page of maths, making it accessible and educational for everyone in the room.

Indeed, the squads were so well organised by Dan Firoozan (Rendalls 2009 3) that three of the sides could not be separated in normal time. The Reds, led by Ed Nicholson (Elmfield 2007 3), pipped Firoozan’s Greens to second place, with Jonny Lalude's (Bradbys 2006 3) Yellows finishing bottom. Raef Tanner (Bradbys 20153) was awarded the Young Player of the Tournament.

Given the good turnout, we are looking forward to our next event whenever the climate allows. If you would like to join us, please look at the OH Technology Club group page on OH Connect or talk to the HA.

At the conclusion of the tournament, the Head Master, Alastair Land, spoke briefly, as did Fred Woolley (West Acre 1957 3), one of the driving forces behind the Festiphil competition, before the medals and trophy were handed over to the winners.

PETER HEDLEY ( WEST ACRE 2008 1 )

DAVID LEDERMAN ( NEWLANDS 1988 3 )

OH Players – Richard III

Speech Room – 14 and 15 September 2019 Last year saw another stellar production in Speech Room.

The exams have been moving earlier in the Summer term, and the School were very busy putting on Twelfth Night at the Globe, so we chose a new time in the School calendar for the Old Harrovian Shakespeare play.

Adam Cross our Director was very imaginative in his use of the new Tiring House and set the stage with a circle of chairs from which the actors would emerge when needed in a scene and retire when not. It left us permanently on show and gave a real energy and tension to a play that explores the darker side of power and ambition. The audience reaction was suitably electric.

We had two extraordinarily good leads in Jack Firoozan (Rendalls 2015 3) as Richard and Tom Thacker (Rendalls 2015 3) as Richmond, both new OHs and new to OHP. Four current Harrovians gave reality to the ages required of certain roles, and several members of staff, parents and people from the local community rounded out the usual body of OH players. We always welcome new players from any part of the greater Harrow community.

Credit must go to the cast, crew and director who, with only seven rehearsals, gave such a tremendous performance.

LOUIS KUNZIG ( DRURIES 1983 3 )

OH Shaftesbury Enterprise Long Ducker Bike Ride

15 September 2019 Read Karim Wilkin's (The Knoll 19843) write up on page 36.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

50

OH Real Tennis and Rackets Association Dinner

The Queen’s Club – 18 September 2019 The OHRTRA Annual Dinner was held at Queen’s on a balmy Wednesday evening. We had an excellent age range of OHs, from last year’s leavers to some who left in the 1950s. John Eaton and Tom Elphinstone kindly accompanied seven boys from the current School rackets team – it really makes the evening having them present.

William Landale (The Grove 1978 3) updated us on the refurbishment of the Old Rackets Court, which will be completed by the time of our next dinner on Wednesday 16 September. Thanks must go to The Queen’s Club for hosting us and, as always, making it a very enjoyable evening.

SIMON ROUNDELL ( NEWLANDS 1989 3 )

Rendalls House Dinner

Cavalry and Guards Club – 3 October 2019 Many of the great and good of Rendalls, past and present, gathered for their triennial dinner at the Cavalry and Guards Club. There were 116 diners spanning a 68-year time frame. The dinner, as ever, had a good representation of fathers and sons, along with families that have been associated with Rendalls for many generations.

A drinks reception in the spectacular Peninsular Room kicked off the evening. Dinner was held in the Coffee Room which, being full to capacity, made for the most fantastic but also intimate atmosphere.

Our guests for the evening were Simon Taylor, House Master since 2012, along with Mel Mrowiec (House Master 2000–04) and William Church, current House Tutor.

Grace, given by The Revd Andrew Anderson (1958 2), was followed by a delicious dinner; the wine flowed freely to the extent that it ran out, and all was followed by port and coffee. The Toast to the House was proposed by Charlie Smith (1979 1 ) reminiscing about the old days and reminding some of the more embarrassing moments of their time on the Hill. In response, Simon Taylor gave us all an update about the state-of-play at Rendalls.

OH Hong Kong Dinner

The Hong Kong Club – 23 September 2019 Around 40 Hong Kong-based OHs welcomed a large contingent from the Hill to their annual dinner at The Hong Kong Club. Newly appointed Head Master Alastair Land gave a stirring speech highlighting his vision for the School in the coming years, bringing some much-needed positivity to a city troubled by social and political unrest for much of the year. Also in attendance were former House Master of Moretons Philip Evans and Director of Music David Woodcock, as well as Douglas Collins, Will Landale (The Grove 1978 3) and William Young from the Harrow Development Trust. It was a jovial evening with plenty of laughter and impressive singing.

ARNOLD WONG ( THE PARK 1987 3 )

It became clear that Rendalls is at the top of its game, performing well academically and in the many co-curricular activities the School has to offer. Andrew Bishop (House Master 1973–88) always described Rendalls as the “happy House” and it is clear that this attribute still prevails. Rendalls is in fine fettle and hats off to the House Master, and all the boys, for creating a House that is the envy of many others.

Dinner was followed by Songs. The put-ons, ably organised by Guy Chambers (1982 1 ), caused much amusement and allowed for many of the old favourites to be sung, maybe not in tune but with great gusto.

The formal part of the evening complete, Jeffrey’s Bar was kept very busy for many hours with Rendallians having the opportunity to catch up with old friends and tell tales filled with camaraderie and nostalgia. A very enjoyable and memorable evening was had by all.

WILLIAM EMUS ( 1978 3 )

51

EVENT REPORTS OHGS Golf Day

New Zealand Golf Club – 8 October 2019 Now in its fifth year on the OH Golfing Society’s fixture list, the Harrow Association day again returned to the New Zealand Club. NZ members Huw Jenkins (Bradbys 1967 3), Christopher Hopton (Druries 1970 3 ) and John Macpherson (The Grove 1980 3) hosted the event and another excellent day’s golf ensued.

Handicaps ranged from two to 24, with 44 players in teams of four. Special mention should be made of ‘Team Buxton’, led by Christoph (Elmfield 1954 2) who was supported by his three sons. ‘Team Connell’ was again only one family member short of a full house.

While most players were OHGS regulars, it was good to welcome a number of new faces under the Harrow Association banner.

A little gentle pressure from the Hon. Sec. William North (The Knoll 1962 2 ) saw these HA players “converted”.

In truth, it’s not a difficult sales pitch, with OHGS membership offering, for a mere £20 p.a., a fixture list including such golfing gems as Muirfield, Brancaster, Sandwich, Sunningdale, Royal Porthcawl and The Berkshire.

The Stableford format for the day saw the teams competing off full handicap (max. 24), with the best three players to score on each hole – and all four on the short par 3s.

With ten of the 11 cards already in the hands of Society Statistician George Hartley (Elmfield 1996 3), it seemed that Matthew Gibbens (West Acre 1984 3) might need to enlarge his already impressive trophy cabinet. However, in the nick of time, Louis Kunzig (Druries 1983 3) and his team of rank outsiders finally made it off the course and, with a little help from their maximum handicap allowance, stormed into pole position by a comfortable margin of five points.

An equally popular (and some would say surprising) prize-winner was “Big Rog” Uttley, whose lusty tee shot on the 18th was deemed to be the longest drive, after an even longer effort by Jerome Ponniah (The Head Master’s 2001 3) trickled into the first cut. However, these heroic feats were not enough to claim the day’s top accolade, as it emerged that George Munton (The Head Master’s 1989 3) had holed in one on the 10th – a feat celebrated by all with a glass of the club’s best white Burgundy.

During the excellent lunch, all were welcomed by the new OHGS captain David Blackburn (The Park 1963 2), who extolled the pleasures of the society’s fixture card and encouraged any non-members to sign up and join in the fun. Prizes were then presented as follows: Winners (118 points) Louis Kunzig (Druries 1983 3), David Stephens (Druries 1983 1) Nick Lambourne (The Head Master's 19833 ), Karim Wilkins (The Knoll 19843) Runners Up (113 points) Caspar Hill (Elmfield 1987 3), Alastair Hill (Elmfield 19843), Matthew Gibbens (West Acre 19843), Mike Keenan (West Acre 1962 3) Nearest the Pin Sam Ponniah (The Head Master’s 1998 3) Longest Drive Roger Uttley

It is hoped that the HA/OHGS Golf Day 2020 is to be held at New Zealand GC on Tuesday 3 November 2020.

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

Arrow Trophy 2019

11–12 October 2019 Once again, the traditional Arrow Trophy challenge was contested in the Solent in mid-October. This year the OHSA put out a crew of nine. Luckily, owing to some late cancellations, the boat was able to welcome three ‘ringers’, two of whom had made a Herculean effort and flown in from Tel Aviv.

The racing, as is so typical of the Solent, was made no easier by the unpredictability of the weather and, after what looked like a promising start to the weekend on Friday, the wind dropped away to almost nothing on Saturday morning, with just enough to race on Saturday afternoon. On Sunday morning, conversely, there was too much wind to race.

house. This is an excellent venue and a very good evening was enjoyed by everyone.

The afternoon session on Saturday saw the Harrow boat compete in four races of a windward/leeward course. After a shaky start that saw us come mid-field after race one, we had a slight change of start tactics. This initially proved very successful until we were pushed over the start line early by a non-competitive boat being allowed to ‘go round’ with the racers. We had to go around and restart in last place but finished the race a very creditable mid-field once again. The subsequent two races saw us finish mid-field as well and, as such, we finished the day.

Following a nice team-building supper at Coast in West Cowes on Friday evening, on Saturday, after a welcome ‘après voiles’ visit to the bar, the regatta dinner for all competitors was held at the Cowes Yacht Haven club

On Sunday morning, we put to sea, but it very soon became apparent that racing was not going to be possible as the wind speed indicator started to show gusts of approaching 50 knots. Racing was cancelled and we headed back to Port Solent.

Although somewhat disappointing from a racing aspect, the weekend as a whole was great fun, with much ‘banter’ with other crews and among ourselves, good food and far too much time spent in The Anchor on Cowes High Street.

We are always looking for crew members for this light-hearted weekend that offers the chance of some thrilling close-quarter racing. The 2020 regatta sees Sunsail providing a fleet of new yachts, so there is extra excitement and to look forward to. We plan to arrange an out-of-season dinner and, if you would like more information about this, please get in touch.

THOMAS HOLTBY ( THE HEAD MASTER’S 1976 1 )

Rugby Lions Reunion Lunch

Harrow School – 2 November 2019 Thirty-one Old Lions gathered on the Hill for a reunion to celebrate the fact that they played rugby for the School in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The Harrow Association organised the event and the Old Lions, joined by the Head Master, enjoyed an excellent lunch in the Masters' Room.

It was a great opportunity to renew old friendships – some hardy souls travelled from quite a distance: Peter Webster (Moretons 1963 2) from New York, Mark (Elmfield 1965 1) and Johnny Dickinson (Rendalls 1971 3)

from Northumberland and Ricky Needham (Bradbys 1965 3) from Wales. Some of the forwards present had put on a little weight, matching, as one wag put it, their counterparts of today.

It was a huge pleasure to all that both Sir Alan Outram and Ed Gould were able to be there on the day – both looking rather fitter than the old boys!

Despite England losing to South Africa in the World Cup that morning, everybody enjoyed a very special day reliving events of 50 years ago.

53

EVENT REPORTS

Remembrance Sunday

Harrow School – 10 November 2019 Edward Monckton (The Grove 2001 3) returned to the Hill to give the address on Remembrance Sunday.

OH Marmots Dinner

Harrow School – 9 November 2019 The Marmots Society (founded in 1929) is probably the oldest Harrow Society and is dedicated to mountaineering, skiing and hard rock climbing. The Marmot (a hibernating ground dwelling rodent and occasional climber) is the original representative mascot, so it was very gratifying to witness some 30 or so OH Marmots being tempted out of their burrows to attend the 90th-anniversary dinner.

This was a chance to share stories, pictures and fading memories. It was also an opportunity to sport some ancient clothing and equipment from a bygone age, for example a baby-blue balaclava and bright orange anorak – hemp rope wrapping – topped off with a battered wooden ice axe! The pre-dinner talk was given by Neil Gresham, who provided inspiration for the possibilities of life in the vertical plane. Other climbing heavyweights were present including Johnny Dawes, who has been assisting with Marmots’ climbing trips for the past ten years.

DR MARTIN ROBERTS, HEAD OF ENGINEERING AND MASTER - IN - CHARGE OF MARMOTS

Harrow football pre-season tour and season

Melrose RUFC – 16–17 November 2019 The season started with a bang with the now ubiquitous pre-season tour. Melrose RUFC, at the behest of Ian MurrayJohn (Bradbys 1980 1), kindly lent us a pitch. It was large, flat, grassy and free of deep, cloying mud, which gave a tremendous advantage to the young, fit and fast Harrovians over the more anatomically correct (round) OHs. Harrow football was the winner that day, and was followed by lunch in the club and the chance to see Melrose beat a Highland team in the grandstand, before drinks at Alastair Barr’s and then dinner and Harrow Songs in a local restaurant.

I was lucky enough to field a team for the start of the season proper against the Outcasts on 11 January. The more familiar Hemstall fields’ mud (the old Farm fields) favoured the guile and cunning of the OHs and saw a rare win for the old boys against any School team.

My next outing was for the Tim Lawson-Cruttenden (The Head Master’s 1968 2) Memorial XI footer game up on the Hill on 1 February, organised by Pierre Ali-Noor (West Acre 2001 3). Again, a good number of OHs were in attendance, including Tim’s brother Rick (The Head Master’s 1970 2 ), but the School were now wise to our tactics and even a turtle was not enough to turn the tide.

Chris Mann has worked tirelessly to encourage young and old OHs to return and play the School XI or the Outcasts every week in the season. Founder’s Day was well attended with games against every House.

Unfortunately, the dreaded Covid-19 curtailed our season and prevented the final games being played and the endof-season dinner and Songs. We all look forward to the next tour and season when true footer can be played again. Please get in touch and come join the fun.

LOUIS KUNZIG ( DRURIES 1983 3 )

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

54

EVENT REPORTS

OH Sydney Dinner

Royal Prince Edward Yacht Club – Sydney Harbour 23 November 2019

OH Singapore Dinner

Freemasons’ Hall – 20 November 2019 In November, a group of Old Harrovians (and two intrepid wives) gathered at The Mason’s Table restaurant, located in the historic Freemasons’ Hall building, for the annual formal gathering of OHs in Singapore. With familiar faces around the table, the mood was light and jovial. The menu of a selection of pan-seared seabass, spareribs and spring chicken was greatly enjoyed by all present. Thereafter followed an extended demonstration of exuberant Harrow Songs, much to the bemusement of the Freemasons outside the restaurant, as we made our way through the stalwarts, starting with Here, Sir! and October, before closing off in time-honoured tradition with Forty Years On and Auld Lang Syne.

Nick Ridehalgh (West Acre 1974 3 ) and his wife Sue hosted the Harrow Association dinner for OHs living in Australia. Ian Mackinnon (West Acre 1961 2 ) kindly arranged for us to hold the dinner at his club, the Royal Prince Edward Yacht Club on Sydney Harbour. Fourteen OHs and their guests met for dinner and Songs at this beautifully situated venue. We were joined by Mick Stracey-Clitherow (The Head Master’s 1954 2 ) and Tim Fulton (Elmfield 1987 3 ) from New Zealand, Bruce Ingram (Newlands 1986 1) from Hong Kong and Tim Badgett (West Acre 19643 ) and Gay from the UK, who were in Australia visiting friends. Alexander Roche (The Knoll 19443 ) was the most senior OH at the dinner, and the youngest, Alex Rose-Innes (Newlands 1995 2 ) gave a fine rendition of Five Hundred Faces. Other guests were Andrew Dick (The Park 1975 3 ) and Sally, Trenham Weatherhead (West Acre 1990 3 ) and Michelle, Josh Hollway (Moretons 1987 3 ) and Kirsty, Suzanne Benson from Victoria and Susie Myers from New South Wales. Unfortunately, we didn’t manage to get a group photograph as there was a power outage at the end of the evening.

The 2020 dinner will be held in Melbourne and all OHs visiting or living in Australia are more than welcome to attend. Please contact Suzanne Benson suzannabenson@gmail.com if you are interested in receiving the invitation. Details will be sent out later in the year.

PASCAL DEMIERRE ( THE HEAD MASTER’S 1987 3 )

Guest list John Friedman (The Head Master’s 1997 3 ) David Maxwell (Rendalls 1976 2 ) Andrew Lea-Cox (Druries 1997 3 ) Andrew Lau (The Knoll 1977 3 ) Edward Barrow (Bradbys 1993 3 ) Jamie Coventry (The Knoll 1979 1 ) Jamie Richardson (The Knoll 1987 3 ) George Oliver (The Grove 2003 3 ) Rory Barclay (The Knoll 1997 3 ) Wen Tan (The Knoll 1986 3 ) Henry Derenzy (The Knoll 1997 3)

Forty Years On – 19793 –19802 cohort

The Cavalry and Guards Club – 26 November 2019 The Harrow Association announced the Forty Years On dinner for the 19793–19802 entry in June 2019, after which followed the race to mobilise friends and colleagues. A challenge from former Head of School James Squire (The Knoll 1979 3) to Ben Stephens (Rendalls 1980 1 ) and Tom Barrow (Elmfield 1979 3 ) raised the bar and contact was made around the UK and across the world.

There were 41 attendees on the night. They were joined by William Landale (The Grove 1978 3 ) on behalf of the Harrow Association. Facial recognition of contemporaries not seen since those distant days on the Hill has its challenges. The evening began with drinks and a group photo before the call to dinner with grace, said by Lt Col Stephen Segrave (The Knoll 1979 3). A welcome was provided by James Squire (The Knoll 1979 3).

Those present remembered OHs from 19793–19802 no longer with us: James Tapsell (Bradbys 1980 1 ), Alistair Warde-Norbury (Rendalls 1979 3 ), David Dick (The Park 1980 1 ) and Julian Brock (Newlands 1979 3 ).

It is with regret that subsequently the deaths of Simon Rivett-Carnac (Druries 1980 1 ) and Robert BowmanShaw (West Acre 1979 3 ) were announced.

Songs were expertly compered by Christopher Swan (Newlands 1979 3) and the energetic and talented pianist was Christopher Shell (Elmfield 1980 1), with several songs followed by Auld Lang Syne and the National Anthem. As a footnote, The Knoll won on numbers, with Elmfield a close second and Rendalls and The Grove in third. A re-run will follow in 2024.

Our thanks to the Harrow Association for the arrangements and to Christopher Shell for his invaluable skills at the piano.

TOM BARROW ( ELMFIELD 1979 3 )

Harrow Association Christmas Carols St Stephen Walbrook – 9 December 2019 Following the hugely successful inaugural year of the Harrow Association’s Christmas Carols in 2018, around 200 OHs gathered in St Stephen Walbrook in the City of London for an evening of carols and readings.

Led by Fr James Power, Chaplain to Harrow School and Vicar of St Mary’s Harrow on the Hill, the occasion was the perfect opportunity for OHs to come together to renew acquaintances, make new friends and share in the spirit of Christmas. Alongside readings by OHs and staff from the School and Harrow Association, a new addition this year was a specially formed OH XII, put together by OH and former beak Oliver Gooch (Newlands 1991 3). Accompanied on the organ by Nick Robinson (The Head Master’s 1984 1), 12 singers, spanning three generations came together to sing two solo carols – a setting of the traditional English Sussex Carol and Michael Head’s touching The Little Road to Bethlehem.

A highlight of the evening was a performance by Ed Lyon (The Knoll 1992 3), the highly regarded operatic tenor who has won plaudits both in the UK and abroad for his charismatic interpretations of a wide-ranging repertoire.

Underneath Sir Christopher Wren’s lofty dome, he gave an unforgettable rendition of Adolphe Adam’s O Holy Night.

It was wonderful to see so many OHs coming together to celebrate Christmas and to share a passion for singing, something which has united Harrovians across the generations. It was particularly fitting that the service opened with a traditional Bidding Prayer written by Eric Milner-White (Moretons 1898 2) and Dean of King’s College, Cambridge, and concluded with Ding Dong Merrily on High, with words written by George Ratcliffe Woodward (Druries 1863 2).

With seasonal refreshments at the end, the occasion was the perfect ‘Harrow way’ to celebrate the start of the Christmas season.

OLIVER GOOCH ( NEWLANDS 1991 3 )

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

56

The Park House Dinner

Cavalry and Guard Club – 30 January 2020 Old Parkites gathered at the Cavalry and Guards Club to meet their friends, renew old acquaintances and enjoy family gatherings. It is a tribute to the popularity of the event that over 136 attended and there was a waiting list.

Once grace was said, with panache, by Simon Douglas Lane (1960 3), there was a buzz in the atmosphere which was reflected in the enthusiastic singing of Songs, ably led by the House Master, Ben Shaw, with James Mooney-Dutton (1999 3) on the piano.

Toasts were proposed by John Batting (1972 2), Chairman of Governors, and by the Head of House Harry Kyd (2015 3).

Ben Shaw updated us on life, and success, at The Park, as the Head Master Alastair Land, did for the whole School.

Always much appreciated by their year groups was the attendance of former House Masters Rob Collins and Peter Hunter.

DAVID BLACKBURN ( 1963 2 )

OH Lodge Dinner Report

Old Harrovian Lodge – 4 February 2020 Twenty-four Old Harrovians and guests gathered for the 287th meeting of the Old Harrovian Lodge in the splendid setting of the Worshipful Company of Wax Chandlers in the City. The evening had a special feel as we welcomed two new joining members in an exceptional ceremony, sang songs with gusto, if not necessarily harmony, and raised

a substantial amount of money to further our charitable goals. The Lodge is in full planning mode to celebrate the important milestone of its centenary in 2024 and would be happy to welcome any OHs, beaks or governors who would be interested in masonry.

JAMES SKEGGS ( THE HEAD MASTER’S 1997 3)

EVENT REPORTS

Founder's Day

Harrow School 9 February 2020 It was great to welcome so many OHs back to the Hill for Harrow football despite it being a very wet and windy Sunday.

57

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

The Grove House Dinner

Royal Automobile Club – 27 February 2020 The Grove House Dinner held in The Mountbatten Room at the Royal Automobile Club was both a splendid and special occasion. Splendid as, with 240 Grovites attending, it was the largest number of Old Harrovians gathered at any House Dinner to date, and special as we celebrated the 200th anniversary of The Grove officially becoming a boarding House of Harrow School. We were honoured to welcome as our principal guest the Head Master Alastair Land, as well as past House Master Peter Bieneman (2000–12) and the current House Master Christopher Tolman. Another honoured guest who graciously attended was Alexandra Treasure (Bradbys 19843), representing her father, past House Master Geoffrey Treasure (1973–88).

A bust made in tribute to GRRT was on display and will be donated to The Grove in due course. It was, as always, of particular poignancy to see many families represented by multi-generational attendees.

Harrow Association Songs 1970 3–1975 2

Speech Room – 5 March 2020 Reviving memories of halcyon days, 100 unwavering OHs from the 1970s ascended a blustery Hill to sing ten uplifting songs in a resplendent Speech Room on the first day that Covid-19 cast its shadow over the United Kingdom. The return for some was literally 40 years on, but for others whose sons have benefited from a Harrow education the “symbolic [walk] through the War Memorial building, with its echoes of the School’s past” was more familiar.

It was a huge pleasure to reunite with auld friends and join the assembled School, who were looking magnificent in tails and gowns. The Director of Music designed an admirable programme around four classics from the Edward Bowen and John Farmer stable. We began appropriately with When Raleigh Rose, which triumphantly reminds us of the founding of Harrow in the first Elizabethan golden age. Melodious Victorian tributes were interspersed with relevant readings and a 21st-century welcome, Home to the Hill. The new Head Master impressed us all with his address, in which he ably demonstrated how the School remains the finest of its kind.

EVENT REPORTS

59

As we were called in to dinner, James de Broë-Ferguson (1981 3) had the task of bringing the assembled throng to order and welcoming our guests; a grace was offered

by Sir Jeremy Greenstock (19563). As the wine flowed, a hearty menu of game terrine followed by roast rump of lamb was finished off with sticky toffee pudding. During dinner, the Head Master told us of developments and the vision for the School today. He was followed by Christopher Tolman who reported on the House. As speeches finished, current Head of School Andrew Holmes (2015 3) rose to propose a toast to Her Majesty The Queen, followed by a toast to the School. Current Head of House Ire Ajibade (2015 3) proposed a toast to the House, after which Songs were ably led by William Landale (1978 3). As The Grove was gifted to the School by E E Bowen whose songs, in particular Forty Years On, have been sung by generations of Harrovians, it was fitting that by singing them with such gusto we were able to “cap” him too.

JAMES DE BROË-FERGUSON ( 1981 3 )

We concluded, as always, with resounding renditions of Forty Years On, Auld Lang Syne and the National Anthem, which led some of us who had grown “shorter in wind, as in memory long” to shed a tear or two.

In the OH Room, chatter increased to a crescendo as ‘splendid cricketers’ mingled with ‘scholars of marvelous force’. We reminded each other of the boisterous pranks we played and the forgotten nicknames that hadn’t been heard for decades. We mourned those who were lost, and we admired those who had survived. The 1970s was a pivotal decade with huge pressures on the Governors.

There is not space to reflect on what Harrow gave to us, but our era saw the renowned Head Master of 18 years, “Jimmy” James, hand over to the gallant Normandy veteran “Brian” Hoban. The latter introduced one of the most significant changes to Harrow life, central feeding, and so it was very apt to end with an ambrosian supper in the pioneering Shepherd Churchill Hall, where we could thank the marvellous organisers of a wonderful evening, who so faithfully look after the interests of all OHs and keep us connected to one another.

RUPERT WIELOCH ( RENDALLS 1972 3 )

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

60

A YEAR IN PICTURES

61

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

&

CLUBS

62

SOCIETY UPDATES

HA R R OW WA N DERERS C RIC KET C LUB

2020 marks the club’s 150th anniversary and it is hard to accept the possibility of a season without cricket, given Covid-19’s tight grip on the nation’s freedom.

A varied and manageable fixture programme is in place, not least the Northern Tour, which continues to flourish thanks to the hospitality provided by Aysgarth School. Sadly, this season’s T20 Day at Harrow had to be cancelled and, disappointingly, last year’s event was rained off without a ball being bowled; the Gemini game had to be abandoned due to bad weather and, annoyingly, the Butterflies cried off at short notice.

Despite a shortened season, the Speech Day game and the Goose Match were enjoyable occasions and the club acquitted itself well against strong School opposition.

For the Goose Match, five of the triumphant 2019 Lord’s side turned out for the Wanderers and it is hoped that they and their fellow leavers will wish to play for the club for many years to come. The fixture list is expanding at a sensible rate as a result of current players’ commitment and a group of hard-working match managers eager to ensure that every game is a memorable experience, played to win and always in the true spirit of the game.

At the AGM in April, Ernest Crump (The Head Master’s 1960 3 ) was elected a Vice-President in recognition of his enormous contribution as an officer of the club for

more than 25 years. Andrew Cox (The Head Master’s 1992 3 ), was elected Chairman.Three years in the School XI, Andrew has served as a committee member since leaving school 23 years ago and will be supported by a well-established team of officers. Mumtaz Habib (Bradbys 2003 2) and George Reid (Moretons 2012 3 ) have been elected Cricketer Cup Captain and Vice-Captain respectively.

They had assembled a strong squad of players for this year’s campaign when it was announced that, sadly, the competition had been cancelled as a result of Covid-19. The enthusiasm and commitment of these players will be rolled forward to 2021.

Inevitably, the Covid-19 pandemic has an effect on our 150th anniversary schedule. Nevertheless, we remain very focused on the club’s prestigious Dinner in the Lord’s Long Room, currently planned for Thursday 15 October 2020. The Dinner Committee will continue to meet regularly under the chairmanship of Matthew Fosh (The Head Master’s 19712 ). We will also keep members updated regarding the event.

Fred Woolley

(West Acre 19573)

For further information about the club, contact James Gillions (Elmfield 1987 3) at james.gillions@virgin.net

63 OH GOLFING SOCIETY

Between 30 and 40 OH golfers attended the Spring Meeting at Royal St George’s and the Autumn Meeting at The Royal West Norfolk Golf Club at Brancaster, and over 40 played at the Association Day meeting at New Zealand in November.

Meetings are held in Scotland, Wales, the Midlands, indeed in most parts of the country, and courses featured include Muirfield, Dunbar, Luffness, Royal Porthcawl, Blackwell, Denham and Ashridge to name a few.

Please contact the match managers if you see a meeting in which you would like to play or sign up via the website.

As the OHGS moves towards its centenary, the society maintains its original purpose to provide a team for the Halford Hewitt, founded in 1924; this provides a schools competition at the highest level, so the OHGS is always looking for OHs who can play competition golf of this standard.

The same applies to the Grafton Morrish, for which qualifying is needed.

Jeremy Fricker (Elmfield 1972 3 ) is the manager for both competitions so please contact him, or the President of OHGS Jamie Warman (The Grove 1969 3), if you would like to be considered. Harrow has a great pedigree in these competitions.

Schools competitions encompass all age groups so the Bernard Darwin, Senior Darwin and Veteran Darwin cover ages between 55 and over 75.

Harrow reached the finals of the Bernard Darwin and are the defending champions in the Veteran Darwin. Andrew Alwyn (Moretons 1960 3) is the manager for the Darwin events. Please get in touch if you would like to play.

The committee is aware that it can be hard for younger OHs to spare the time and meet the cost of playing. Consequently, OHGS is raising money to enable it to pay the expenses of the younger participants for the Halford Hewitt and other competitions. For many OHs under 30, the cost of entering events is subsidised so you can have rounds of golf with your friends at a reduced cost. We would love to hear from you, so please contact us if you have any questions.

OHGS has sponsored some coaching at the School and some comments

by Jerome Ponniah (The Head Master’s 2001 3 ) show how links can be developed. In Jerome’s own words: “For just over a year now, I have been coaching the School golf team with a primary focus on improving the technical skills of each golfer. In addition, I am helping to develop other talented golfers who hope to become part of the team squad in the future.

Much of this work takes place on the School course, where we work on short game improvement and course management.

My secondary focus, but arguably more important, is to make Sixth Form golfers and imminent leavers aware of the many wonderful opportunities that await them as OH golfers.”

The time, and effort, put in by the committee members and match managers is enormous.

A specific word of thanks goes to Thomas Olesen (Rendalls 1967 1), Hon.Treasurer, for implementing the new website.

David Blackburn

(The Park 1963 2 )

OH ASSOCIATION FOOTBALL CLUB END OF SEASON REPORT

Despite the Arthurian League season inevitably being curtailed by the onset of the Coronavirus pandemic, the OHAFC had already enjoyed a relatively successful campaign, with both the 1sts and 2nds securing their highest league finishes for a number of years.

The 1st XI, led for the first time by goalkeeper Fraser McGuinness (The Head Master's 20033 ), finished seventh in the Premier Division, having won five and drawn five of their 18 league games. The season will undoubtedly be remembered for three superb performances against the Old Etonians, with four points gained from the two league games in addition to a magnificent 3-0 win in Berkshire in the first round of the Arthur Dunn Cup. James Breeden’s (Moretons 2008 3 ) goals continue to prove invaluable, the youngster scoring 23 times in 15 appearances.

The 2nd XI, under the continued leadership of Geoff Taunton-Collins (Bradbys 20013), finished fourth in Division Two despite a superb start of six consecutive league wins that saw the Blues top the table until early December.

Disappointingly, a lack of goals saw results suffer after the winter break: a last-minute 1-0 extra-time defeat to the Old Columbans in the semi-finals of the Junior League Cup proved especially hard to stomach.

Meanwhile, the 3rd XI recovered from a tumultuous turnover of players midway through the campaign to guarantee safety in Division Four ahead of next season. Ed Nicholson (Elmfield 2007 3) kindly stepped up to provide invaluable leadership and organisation of a young group of players.

Match reports from all the club’s games are available on the website: www.ohafc.com David Lederman

(Newlands 1988 3 )

FOLLOW UP! • COMMUNITY

64

HARROW AVIATION CLUB

Aviation throughout the world has hit a unique period in 2020 with major airlines alongside small operators taking a significant hit and giving rise to well publicised redundancies and job losses. Most members of the HAC have found themselves well and truly grounded.

Those who are cargo pilots find themselves as active as usual, if not more so, as aircraft are an essential lifeline for the UK to bring in and export goods elsewhere.

Club Chairman John Steel QC (Rendalls 1967 3 ), was flying his Cessna 172 until lockdown started and is now working as advisory counsel leading the team concerning the upgrading of Fairoaks Airport in Surrey to an aviation centre of excellence. He is also engaged in advising on other airport and aviation matters in relation to Elstree Aerodrome, and is legal advisor to the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Aviation. He is also the Chairman of the Air League, which now offers more scholarships to potential aviation professionals than any other organisation. It is also conducting online webinars, including one with Major Tim Peake, the UK’s first ESA astronaut on the International Space Station and former Army Air Corps pilot.

Ben Uttley (Moretons 19913), an intrepid film producer, completed the Silver Spitfire project in December by taking a Spitfire around the world. He is currently working on projects involving the American Mustang flown in WW2, and an aerial tour of Europe filming major cities affected by Covid-19.

Adrian Wood (Rendalls 1966 1 ), Treasurer of the Lake Amphibian Club in North America, has completely re-fitted his aircraft’s cockpit and engine while re-scheduling the club’s arrangements for 2020.

Rupert Thornley-Taylor (Rendalls 1959 3 ) works for both London City and Dublin Airports, advising them on acoustic issues. This work is being scaled back during the crisis but will return with vigour once the airports are fully functioning again. He is also an expert witness for clients such as the MoD for compensation claims.

Rodney Blois (The Head Master’s 1955 3) as Chairman of the Federation Aviation Internationale (FAI), has been busy rescheduling the organisation’s 2020 competitions due to the crisis. FAI are responsible for all world airsports including parachuting, microlighting, hot air and gas balloons, aerobatics, hang gliding and model flying.

He did manage a trip to Morocco with fellow OHs in his own aircraft in September last year.

Will Quilter (West Acre 2009 3 ) was flying his DR400 around the UK prior to Covid-19, building his flying hours and amazing passengers with his navigation prowess. Rodney Blois’ grass strip in Suffolk is keeping his “bush flying” skills up to date and he hopes to join Rodney on a trip to South Africa for the FAI World Navigation at Stellenbosch at the end of the year.

Iain Ruggles-Brise (West Acre 2002 3 ), the Club Secretary, has been setting up his company’s offer to the UK Government for aid under the Helicopter Aid to Civil Aviation, a scheme to help back up the logistics chain during the crisis.

The HAC has no current plans for a meet up in 2020 but we may look to fit something in where we can after restrictions are eased.

New members are always welcome; no previous experience is required, just a passion for aviation. Do get in touch through the Harrow Association.

65 THE SILVER SPITFIRE "The expedition has never been done before for a reason: it's incredibly challenging and dangerous.

You will be away from your family for at least four months, and we can't pay you very much…"

On reflection, it wasn't really a great invitation from Matt Jones, my friend and chief pilot of The Silver Spitfire Expedition. However, context is everything.

Three years later, I would be loading my camera equipment into a single prop plane, hugging my loved ones close and embarking on an adventure that would not have been out of place in the golden age of aviation.

Modern aviation disconnects passengers and crew from the extraordinary experience that it is. You take off in one place, land in another, with everything in between replaced by an iPad screen or a book. We soared at only a few thousand feet over polar ice caps, oceans, mountains, sky-scrapers and some of the most iconic landmarks in the world: the Statue of Liberty, the pyramids and the pagodas of Myanmar.

All of this on the wingtip with the hero of this story, G-IRTY: otherwise known as The Silver Spitfire.

G-IRTY is the most original flying Spitfire in the world (a mark IX), painstakingly restored over two years and stripped of her military markings.

Scratches and dents and even some initials etched onto her wing (perhaps an Old Harrovian!) hold secrets and stories of the pilots who flew her in 51 combat missions in WWII. Those pilots had to ward off an almost never-ending stream of enemy bombers and fighters. It certainly put our challenges of weather, fatigue and arduous paperwork into perspective and spurred us on when it felt impossible.

The Harrow Aviation Club had kindly let me join them so I could get some much-needed experience before the trip. Despite this, I felt massively underprepared when taking off on a short grass runway at Goodwood Aerodrome with a plane full to the gunnels with equipment and supplies. An emotional goodbye from my wife and two daughters weighed on me. Only moments later I was opening the door on our Pilatus-PC12 and filming us depart, escorted by a Typhoon fighter jet! Exciting is one word; out of my depth and terrified might be another way to put it. Four months later, the sight of a fighter jet alongside us or hanging out of an open door at 200 knots over vast forests, oceans and cities would become my new normality.

There were many highlights and incredible moments from the 27,000 miles and 26 countries we travelled through, which will be in our feature documentary and photographic exhibition. Still, coming home will be one of them. Perhaps it was the White Cliffs of Dover or the Red Arrows escorting us. Maybe it was the memory of those who flew this remarkable plane and fought for our freedom, or perhaps it was simply knowing that I would soon have my girls back in my arms. Louis Armstrong was right all this time: “What a Wonderful World”.

Ben Uttley (Moretons 19913 ) www.stamp-productions.com

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

66

The problem with Pen (aka Rupert) Hadow, who joined The Park in 1975, is where to start. Is it that he is one of 25 Hadows to have attended Harrow or that his forebears include Douglas (Small Houses and Home Boarder 1860 2 ), who made the first ascent of the Matterhorn in 1865, ‘Frank’ (Home Boarder and Mr Watson's 18683 ), who won the Men’s Singles at Wimbledon in 1878 or Walter (Home Boarder and Mr Rendalls 18611 ), who played 97 first-class cricket matches, many alongside W G Grace?

67

It is our duty to show leadership and shoulder the world’s challenges.”

THE REAL McCOY Describing himself as the "quintessential explorer", adventure runs in Pen’s blood; brought up in Scotland’s Ochil Mountains, his nanny was Enid Wigley, whose first charge was Sir Peter Scott, founder of the Worldwide Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF) and son of South Pole legend Captain Scott. The softly spoken spinster, Enid, then in her seventies, raised Pen on tales of “The Antarctic Boys” like Shackleton, Amundsen, Mawson and the Belgian, de Gerlache.

“They felt like uncles”, he said, “my childhood heroes”.

At Temple Grove, a prep school with a frightening and punitive regime, Pen sought refuge in its grounds, identifying flora and fauna taught him by his mother, while his father passed a passion for duck, geese and swan to the schoolboy, thus nurturing Pen’s life-long interest in the natural world.

At Harrow, in 1977, the future Head of School was, remarkably, the first pupil ever to complete Long Ducker.

Of the Hill, he grows reflective, painting an image of a compassionate boy with boundless energy whose character, after captaincy of the School’s Harrow football XI and rugby XV, was forged as much through defeat as victory.

“In my final year, we were a brave but dangerously young team”, he said, “As captain, I learnt that sport is about playing your very best game and, however improbable the victory, to ignore the judgement of those who just cite a score line.”

Pen Hadow leading Arctic Mission, a voyage of exploration into the international waters surrounding the North Pole (2017).

Photo: connormcdonnell.co.uk

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

68

The famous 'Harrow Hadows’, all sons of P&O Shipping Company chairman, Patrick Douglas Hadow (Home Boarder 1823 ): (from left) AdeS Hadow (Home Boarder 18723), Pen Hadow’s great-grandfather; CM Hadow (Home Boarder and Mr Watson's 1871 2 ), Major RC Hadow (did not attend Harrow), PF Hadow (Home Boarder and Mr Watson's 18683 ); EM Hadow (Home Boarder and Mr Rendalls 18763 ), WH Hadow (Home Boarder and Mr Rendalls 18613 ); and AA Hadow (Home Boarder and Mr Watson's 18663 ).

Their oldest brother, DR Hadow (Small Houses 1860 ) had been killed before this photograph, aged 19, on the Matterhorn in 1865.

“Unlikely as it might seem, I’d never felt any special draw to the polar regions, until one day in 1988,” he continued.

“I occasionally spent lunch hours in the Lowther Room at the Royal Geographical Society. The 19th-century glorydays of the place had long since gone by then; it was a forgotten corner”, he joked. “One day, the librarian, having tramped upstairs to unlock the room, asked what title I was looking for. I hadn’t come for a book, I’d come for any book. I picked the first cover I touched. It was as random as that.”

No one had ever read My Life Amongst the Eskimo by the German Arctic naturalist and explorer Bernhard Hantzsch, who died on expedition to Baffin Island – Pen had to cut the pages open.

Completing the ascent of Sudbury Hill, Parkites in their Sunday tails join Hadow for the finish to The Park (4 December 1977).

“Riveted from the first page, I decided to honour Hantzsch’s death and re-visit the comprehensive study he had made of the island’s habitat a hundred years on.

It was my Damascene moment,” he said. “I resigned from my sports agency that afternoon and never looked back.”

Next, Pen placed an advert in The Adventurer for a radio operator.

“That was how I met Vaughan Purvis,” he said, “a surreally intelligent man, and subsequently an award winning radio producer, who had considerable experience of the Arctic. “Let me first teach you how to operate in remote and extreme environments”, Vaughan said and within weeks we were hauling sledges on the sea-ice channels between the islands of the Svalbard archipelago, cheek by jowl with polar bear.”

In 1995, Pen set up The Polar Travel Company, a pioneering initiative that led guided trips on the Arctic Oceans sea-ice cover. Two years later, he organised the McVitie's Penguin Polar Relay, the first all-female

Pen Hadow (centre) with Alex Budworth (The Park 19761) (left) and Simon Marsh (The Park 19761 ) (right), who accompanied him back from Marble Arch, outside The Park immediately after completing Long Ducker (4 December 1977). Hadow holds the pence/mile pledges of Boys totalling £103.45.

69 Photo: connormcdonnell.co.uk

The first all-women North Pole expedition team outside No 10 (Hadow, centre, back row), following a celebratory reception hosted by Prime Minister Tony Blair in their honour (July, 1997).

Arctic Mission’s two vessels sailed 600 miles north of Alaska’s north coast encountering almost no sea ice (Summer 2017).

The tents alone cost £40,000 each.

The surveys cost around £6.5 million, but the bow wave of publicity they generated for the environmental issues we were researching was valued at nearly £100 million over the four years.” expedition from the coast to the North Geographic Pole, with family friend and businesswoman Caroline Hamilton.

“It was ground-breaking,” he said. “So many women have since told me the Polar Relay was their inspiration.”

“I was alone for 75 days”, Pen said of that final trek.

I tried to imagine the physical and mental effort required as he talked of four hours or more, day after day, sealed in a voluminous dry-suit, swimming between the ice floes, never knowing when, where or even if it would be possible to climb out from the sub-zero sea water.

Pen explained that, thanks to those 15 years, he bonded with the sea-ice, witnessing how human activity was changing the colour at the top of the planet from arctic white to ocean blue. It was a bond that led him to develop a new direction in life, beginning with a series of scientific surveys to assess the state of the Arctic’s sea-ice, enabling him to transfer the knowledge and experience gained over a decade and a half tramping the ice floes to a new purpose of public benefit, exploration.

Pen deployed teams of explorers from several countries to carry out long-range surface surveys far out on the Arctic Ocean, manually drilling through the floating ice, often in atrocious weather. By the end of the first survey in 2009, Pen had drilled cumulatively through eight kilometres of ice; the extracted data was fed back to Cambridge University for detailed analysis.

The surveys’ findings added significant weight to satellitederived evidence that by 2050 sea-ice will disappear almost completely from the Arctic Ocean during the summers, and increasingly during spring and autumn too; a major deterioration, he told me, that will degrade the protective heat-shield created by the reflective sea-ice, and will result in a catastrophic loss of the region’s floating ice-reef ecosystem and associated wildlife. ➤

Photo: Chip Cunliffe

But it would take 15 years and three attempts before Pen achieved his burning ambition to become the first person to trek, alone and without resupply, across the sea-ice from Canada to the North Geographic Pole – a feat which is most probably impossible today as climate change has thinned and reduced the sea-ice cover, creating greater expanses of open water and increased fog, making air support difficult at best.

“The idea was the easy bit,” Pen said. “It took six years before we teamed up with Catlin, the Bermuda-based reinsurance operation; Catlin's involvement was vital, enabling us to build the world’s only research facility on sea-ice, used by a rotating cast of scientists from the US, Europe and Australia. The tents alone cost £40,000 each. The surveys cost around £6.5 million, but the bow wave of publicity they generated for the environmental issues we were researching was valued at nearly £100 million over the four years.”

Catlin Ice Base was only non-military research facility in the world positioned on floating sea ice.

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

Take the Greenland shark, which can live for 500 years – the longest lifespan of any vertebrate on the planet. Some swimming about today were alive in the reign of Henry VIII.” “But the legacy of the surveys continues today”, Pen said, heartened.“They helped create much needed sources of corporate funding for natural science research, the establishment of ocean education resources for schools, and even ocean-based studies within the GCSE curriculum.”

In 2017, Pen set out yet again for the North Pole. Arctic Mission appeared, on the face of it, to be a genteel venture in comparison to his previous forays as two gentlemanlyhulled 50-foot sailing vessels, Bagheera and Snow Dragon II, left Nome, Alaska, on a 3,500-mile-round voyage. The vessels, however, had been especially built for high latitude waters.

Hadow’s mission, though couched in scientific objectives, was almost Elizabethan – go as far north as possible.

“We sailed to within 600 miles of the Pole itself”, he said. “Those yachts were the first vessels in history to enter the international waters surrounding the Pole without an ice-breaker. If a couple of small sailing vessels can travel that far north, imagine the consequences when commercial shipping starts to exploit the area for trade routes, fisheries and resources? We had made our point.”

Pen went on to explain that the Central Arctic Ocean’s sea-ice is host to one of the world’s most delicately balanced ecosystems.

“It is a habitat, just like the Amazon rainforest is a habitat”, he said. “Animals live above it, on it, in it and beneath it. So the loss of the sea-ice represents the loss

Pen Hadow training near Resolute Bay, Canada for the open water crossings between the Arctic Ocean’s ice floes, before becoming the first person to reach the North Geographic Pole from Canada, solo and without resupply in 2003 - a feat that has never been repeated.

70 of a unique and vast habitat, where wildlife has adapted in extreme ways to live and breed. Take the Greenland shark, which can live for 500 years–the longest lifespan of any vertebrate on the planet–some swimming about today were alive in the reign of Henry VIII. The females breed at around 150 years old. Given the length of the shark’s breeding cycle, if a factory fishing fleet were let loose in those waters, it could decimate the species in a matter of months.”

“I remember a beak once said, “With privilege comes social responsibility.” Harrow, whose education prepares us to excel in whatever field we choose, amplifies that potential. It is our duty to show leadership and shoulder the world’s challenges. For me, that duty is the protection of the Arctic’s fragile ecosystem, which sits within the wider movement to create a sustainable future for generations to come. And what a testament to our great School, with a Harrovian as the driving force to establish the North Pole Wildlife Reserve - the largest protected natural sanctuary in the world, safeguarded by international treaty guaranteeing the sanctity of the Arctic for eternity.”

Harry Bucknall (West Acre 1979 1 )

To find out more, or to support Pen Hadow’s 90North Unit, please visit penhadow.com or email pen@penhadow.com

Harry Bucknall’s new book, A Road For All Seasons, chronicling his 6,500 mile journey through Britain, will be published by Little Brown in March 2021.

Photo: connormcdonnell.co.uk

Architects of New Build Houses & Extensions

Why not book a taster day‌.

01206 580528 info@ftanda.co.uk www.ftanda.co.uk

COLOM 72

It is no exaggeration when we say the OH community is a global one and OHs seem to remember their home on the Hill even more when they're further away. OH Connect helps to keep this worldwide community closer, as demonstrated earlier this year when Michael Phillips in Colombia contacted us through the platform.

OHs WORKING ACROSS THE GLOBE

MBIA 73

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

RICHARD MCCOLL (West Acre 1993 3) FREELANCE WRITER

74

Did I always harbour desires of opening businesses in a colonial backwater in a politically fractured country, long troubled by conflict and condemned to suffer a perceived stigma of violence for generations? No, but the challenge of moving beyond one’s comfort zone in a somewhat philanthropic manner is something which I have relished.”

There is, as difficult as it may be to believe, a town on Colombia’s Caribbean coast where a family have taken to stringing their beloved grandfather up a tree, for his own wellbeing. The image of an elderly gentleman being trussed to his favourite rocking chair and hoisted into the boughs of a Ceiba – for his safety due to the rising waters of the Magdalena River–smacks deliciously of fictional tales, Macondian in style, pulled from the opuses of Colombian-Nobel-Prize winning author Gabriel García Márquez.

I suppose I could have stayed in Argentina or Brazil but, as a journalist, Colombia always offered far more work, principally because of its wholly justified and at the same time unjustified reputation. Did I always harbour desires of opening businesses in a colonial backwater in a politically fractured country, long troubled by conflict and condemned to suffer a perceived stigma of violence for generations?

No, but the challenge of moving beyond one’s comfort zone in a somewhat philanthropic manner is something which I have relished.

García Márquez didn’t draw me to Colombia, but his stories, which, over time, one realises are quite ordinary occurrences in parts of the country, have kept me here.

Grist for the mill, as people in literary circles are wont to say.

Sometimes the work is mercenary, seeking out clients with whom to fill the hotels, just as I harangue editors impressing upon them the importance of whichever article I am working on. In other instances, I can be fielding calls from news outlets requiring a freelancer to cover something at that precise moment, or am called up by a travel agency representing visitors to Colombia seeking an authentic experience and need an expert in the history of the conflict and the details of the 2016 peace accords. No two days are the same, something for which I am immensely grateful, although upon occasion, the jobs can be bizarre, such as being contracted to explain the machinations of the cocaine trade to a European internet genius who had just made millions selling his online pornography channel.

It was partly due to this, my quest for Garcíamárquian myth and legend as a freelance journalist on assignment, combined with a desire to sink my teeth into the meatier project and new challenge of setting up a guesthouse, that led me to purchase a dilapidated colonial house in the UNESCO World Heritage backwater town of Mompós: That was back then, now, 14 years later with my Colombian wife Alba, we own and have restored three colonial houses in Mompós, La Casa Amarilla www.lacasaamarillamompos.com being the first, La Concepcion, and the new San Rafael hotel www.sanrafaelmompox.com which was completed in 2019.

What can I say about Mompós? It is hard to pin down but, as a city-dwelling freelance journalist specialising in Latin America, I enjoy the schizophrenic change in pace between my life in the relative comfort of cosmopolitan Bogotá and then my other existence in rural Colombia with views over the legendary Magdalena River in the heartlands that inspired Gabriel García Márquez.

How did I get here? I suppose it was a convoluted route which saw me at news desks in London, some time at an environmental NGO, then organising social projects and expeditions in South America, but the one overarching constant was that Latin America always remained as a key focus in mind. My Spanish beaks at Harrow, Messrs Sankey and Strong, certainly bear some responsibility, but my family had pursued interests in Mexico and Brazil previously, so the seed was most definitely sown from early on.

However, my studies, knowledge and experience have dove-tailed conveniently to complement one another and the life that my family and I have carved out here is to be envied. Colombia is most certainly home.

Richard McColl is a freelance writer, academic and political analyst in Bogotá. He would spend more time in Mompós if he could, but, for now his life is mainly in Bogotá with his wife Alba and their sons James and Francis.

His weekly podcast, Colombia Calling, was awarded Best English Language podcast 2019, by Latin Podcast Awards and can be downloaded from wherever you get your podcasts. www.richardmccoll.com He is also seeking a publisher for his book about Colombia which has the working title The Mompós Project.

75 MICHAEL HC PHILLIPS (West Acre 2003 3) D I R E C T O R AT B R I T C H A M C O L O M B I A

I have had the pleasure of living in Colombia since 2012, after moving as a recent graduate from the University of Bristol with a degree in Spanish and Portuguese.

What awaited me was very different from what we had read in history books or seen in TV shows portraying Colombia as a war-ridden nation blighted by decades of civil war and a sinister past. The Colombia I know and love tries very hard to dissipate these unfortunate truths and welcomes you with the magical realism of its rich biodiversity, the opportunities for business and investment, the openness of its people, and the cultural history that makes it one of the most exciting countries on the planet.

My adventure started seven years ago, as I left the UK with a one-way ticket and one piece of hold luggage containing a dictionary and a pair of football boots. Just the drive from the airport to the Candelaria, the historical centre in the capital Bogotá, is an experience. You are met with buses flying from side-to-side of a four-lane highway, picking up passengers where and however they can, cars not using indicators, but rather their horns, and men, women and children selling fruits never even heard of in Europe and for which there is no translation.

In almost eight years, I have lived through two Colombian presidents, two football World Cups (one of which ended for Colombia with a magnificent yet tense penalty shoot-out defeat against the English), the signing of the historic peace agreement with the FARC, and an Amazon Cup, an ‘international cricket’ tournament in which I represented my adopted country against the likes of ICC members Peru and Brazil (It is worth noting that each of the three teams had an Old Harrovian representing their adopted countries: for Brazil, Freddie Brunt (The Head Master’s 1999 3) and for Peru, Alex James (Elmfield 1999 3 ).

The Colombia I know and love tries very hard to dissipate these unfortunate truths and welcomes you with the magical realism of its rich biodiversity, the opportunities for business and investment, the openness of its people, and the cultural history that makes it one of the most exciting countries on the planet.”

Winning the Colombian rugby championship with Barabrians Rugby Club

For the last three years, I have been the Deputy Director at BritCham Colombia, the British Chamber of Commerce within the British Embassy in Colombia. We support British businesses entering the Colombian market, and support Colombian exporters selling their products in the UK. The biggest challenge is to convince the UK that Colombia is no longer the country it once was, and that the exciting opportunities in the country are enhanced by the growing middle class, large swathes of the country that are no longer off limits, and the exceptional human resource that has produced entrepreneurs, doctors, artists, musicians, engineers and Bogota’s first-ever female mayor in 2020.

There are huge opportunities for UK companies and investors in sectors such as infrastructure, IT and tech, food and drink, and others.

The Colombian economy hopes rest on the incredible tourism offer. For years, large parts of the country have been too dangerous for locals and visitors, but the historic peace agreement signed by Juan Manuel Santos’ government in Havana in 2016 opened up new opportunities, and the only South American country with both Pacific and Caribbean coasts, Andes mountains, the famous Sierra Nevada in Santa Marta, and a large portion of the Amazon rainforest, is now very much open for business.

My father, Robert HC Phillips (West Acre 1967 2 ), finally agreed to a visit in 2018, and was left pleasantly surprised.

He is testament to the Colombian government’s tag line of “The only risk is that you want to stay”.

Colombia is a magical country that is maturing and growing into its new reputation. I cannot recommend highly enough the wonders of the country that has accepted me so warmly in my time here.

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

OHs IN SUSTAINABILITY & WILDLIFE CONSERVATION

76

77 SECTOR SPOTLIGHT

Whether filming seminal climate change series such as Our Planet – Alastair Fothergill (Moretons 1973 2), undertaking pioneering explorations of the Arctic – Pen Hadow (The Park 19753) or leading the way with sustainable start-ups – Jack Scott (Elmfield 20042) with Dash Water; Alexander Olesen (Rendalls 2008 3 ) with Babylon Farms and Will Brightman (Druries 20043) with UpCircle, all featured in previous issues of FollowUp!, OHs have been concerning themselves with sustainability for some time. Here we focus on some others with apologies to the many of you whom we have inevitably been unable to include.

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

78

My greatest single inspiration to work with nature was Mike Thain, without whose inspiring teaching I doubt I would have won a place at Oxford to study Zoology.”

N AT H A N I E L PA G E

VICE PRESIDENT FAUNA & FLORA INTERNATIONAL ADRIAN WILSON (THE PARK 19632) In 1992, Adrian established Conservation Zambezi www.conservationzambezi.org, which continues to conserve critically endangered biodiversity and wilderness in the Zambezi Valley, Zimbabwe.

Since 2004, Adrian has also worked with the world’s oldest conservation entity, Fauna & Flora International (FFI) www.fauna-flora.org to secure the integrity of strategically important wilderness. A Vice-President of FFI, Adrian sits on the boards of conservation projects ranging from Brazil’s Southern Amazonian Forest (Cristalino Conservation Society)to the Mesoamerican Forest Corridor in Belize (Golden Stream Conservation Group) and the Choco Pacific Forest in Ecuador (Fundacion Flora y Fauna). Alongside the highly regarded OH conservationist Matt Rice (Rendalls 1981 1 ), he is a board member of FFI’s unique and remote Chuilexi Conservancy in Niassa, Mozambique. Adrian is also teamed with OH ex-diplomat and conservationist Nathaniel Page (The Grove 1967 1 ) of Fundatia www.fundatia-adept.org in Nat’s inspired ‘high nature value floral landscape’ programme in Transylvania.

CO-FOUNDER ADEPT FOUNDATION NATHANIEL PAGE (THE GROVE 1967 1) "My greatest single inspiration to work with nature was Mike Thain, without whose inspiring teaching I doubt I would have won a place at Oxford to study Zoology". After graduating, Nathaniel worked in the Foreign Office for 15 years.

In 1995 he returned to his original farming and nature conservation interests. He bought a small 120-acre organic livestock farm in the west of England, which he converted immediately to organic.

This was a springboard to the role he has played in the 25 years since then: following his last posting in Romania, with some Romanian friends, he co-founded the ADEPT Foundation, dedicated to supporting small-scale farming communities and working with them to protect the high biodiversity farmed landscapes which they manage.

The highest species diversity found anywhere in the world, measured at a certain scale (2x2m2), is in Transylvanian haymeadows. Wolves, bears, eagles and rare bird and butterfly species that have been wiped out by farming in western Europe flourish in these farmed landscapes. ADEPT Foundation combines tradition and innovation to link nature, farming and community prosperity, has brought biodiversity-linked support to hundreds of thousands of small-scale farmers, and acts as a constructive bridge between farmers and conservationists. www.fundatia-adept.org

PROFESSOR OF ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY JOHN PLANE (THE KNOLL 19751) John read Natural Sciences at Cambridge from 1979, followed by a PhD in Physical Chemistry in 1983 and a research fellowship at St John’s College, Cambridge from 1982 to 1985.

He was then an associate professor at the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science in Miami, Florida from 1985 to 1991, before moving to the University of East Anglia, Norwich from 1991 to 2006 and then to the University of Leeds in 2006 as Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry. He investigates phenomena in environments ranging from planetary atmospheres to dust formation around stars, and is a worldleading expert on the chemistry of metals which ablate from cosmic dust particles in upper atmospheres. He has also made significant contributions to understanding interactions between chemistry and climate change in the atmospheres of Earth and Mars. He was elected a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union in 2017 and the Royal Society in 2020.

79

MANAGING DIRECTOR LITTLE GREEN CONSULTING LTD KIT WELLS (NEWLANDS 19793)

CEO AND FOUNDER PINCKNEYS GIN CHARLES PICKNEY (THE HEAD MASTER’S 19763) Pinckneys have been distilling spirits for more than two centuries, so it was natural for Charlie to follow in his ancestral footsteps and start Pinckneys Gin as a distinctive spirits brand, supporting British jobs and sport in the process.

The company crafts a collection of seven original gins, for which it has won Gold and Silver Medals at IWSC 2018.

Increasingly important for Charlie is the health of the environment, and thus his mission is to grow Pinckneys Gin both as a successful and sustainable enterprise.

To this end and inspired by his relationship with his parrot Anna, Charlie has been quietly nurturing his land as a special place for wildlife, having planted some 10,000 trees and three miles of new hedgerows over the past decade.

The next phase is to raise enough funding to build a new whisky distillery at the heart of the farm, demonstrating how business and nature can work in harmony together, each supporting the other in a virtuous circle of mutual benefit.

So, when Charlie states he is crafting his spirits in a sustainable manner, he means it and hopes many OHs will enjoy the great aromas and sterling flavours, glad in the knowledge that in supporting Pinckneys you are also supporting jobs, sport and wildlife in our great British Shires. www.pinckneysgin.co.uk

In 2008, Kit set up Little Green Consulting Ltd to bring together the skills gained within the food and drink sector with the desire to develop greater environmental awareness and help organisations plan to survive major incidents.

As a business, Little Green Consulting Ltd is involved in a number of different disciplines.

These include developing and auditing environmental, energy, quality and asset management systems, assisting organisations meet their compliance obligations, environmental project management, and identifying energy efficiencies.

Initially with a background in the food and drink industry, the company has expanded to encompass retail, road haulage and renewable energy sectors as well as food and drink.

Kit has also been responsible for the Environmental Statements for 12 anaerobic digester projects, with a 100% record of achieving planning consent, that generate energy, bio-fertiliser and remove large tonnages of road haulage from the road network.

PARTNER CONSERVATION CAPITAL MATTHEW RICE (RENDALLS 1981 1 ) Matt is considered one of Africa’s leading conservation management professionals with over 30 years’ experience across the continent. With practical and in-depth knowledge of all aspects of conservation area management, Matt cut his teeth in Namibia with grassroots community conservation work. This work was a critical component in laying the foundation of the community conservancy movement and establishing one of the most successful conservation programmes in Africa that today represents 86 conservancies covering 166,000 km2. He later applied this experience in building Northern Rangelands Trust, an equally successful community-based conservation model covering in excess of 30,000 km2 of the rangelands of northern Kenya.

Whilst conservation at scale has been one of the hallmarks of Matt’s career, including the development of Chuilexi Conservancy within Niassa Reserve in northern Mozambique – at 7,300 km2, Africa’s largest tourism holding under private management; and initiating a new conservation programme for Fauna & Flora International in South Sudan, he has also been involved in projects in a number of other African countries. Today, Matt works for Conservation Capital and leads its engagement in public-private partnerships over conservation areas and its focus on a major new pan-African initiative geared towards the acquisition and management of wildlife concessions.

80

MUSICIAN SOUMIK DATTA (BRADBYS 19973)

DIRECTOR WORLD BUSINESS COUNCIL FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT JULIAN HILL–LANDOLT (THE PARK 19913) I made a lot of mistakes to get where I am today. I chose science A levels in order to study Medicine, but ended up reading Law at UCL after leaving school. The law did not take kindly to me and so I joined a small software business, where I worked in a number of different roles including marketing and strategy. Fifteen years after leaving school, I finally figured out what I wanted to do, and got a place on Imperial College’s Environmental Technology MSc. It’s an interdisciplinary course providing students with a grounding in a range of different subjects, from ecology and climate science to policy and economics. My specialist option was Business & the Environment. During my thesis, I was offered an internship at Toyota’s European headquarters in Brussels, and that led to my first job at the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. WBCSD is an international organisation that brings together some 200 multinational companies – Toyota is a founding member – to work on sustainability challenges in pursuit of a world where more than 9 billion people can live well, within planetary boundaries. I started as the manager of the President’s Office, setting his speaking schedule and writing his speeches. Since then, I’ve been lucky enough to lead WBCSD’s work on sustainable lifestyles and our annual forecasting study. I am now directing our second Vision 2050 project, defining a common agenda for sustainable business for the decade to come.

HEAD OF FUNDRAISING & ENGAGEMENT TREES FOR LIFE

Soumik is a musician, composer, television presenter, and 19-stringed sarod player who has collaborated with many highprofile musicians to bring ancient Indian music into the global arena.

Soumik's latest album, Jangal, is a response to the world’s imminent social and ecological crisis. Blending ancient and digital aesthetics, the tracks roar and howl in protest, aiming to spark conversations and raise awareness about climate change.

Jangal (the original Urdu word for jungle) is a vivid blend of Indian sarod, Latin percussion, tabla and electronica played live in concert against projected images of rainforests, busy motorways, the collapsing shells of greying buildings, and heavy downpours of rain. It seeks to shine a light on and protest against deforestation and climate-change.

Accompanying the album and live show is a bespoke music video directed by Soumik’s brother, award-winning filmmaker Souvid Datta (Bradbys 20043). The film offers an intimate story set within the enchanting jungles of India’s Sunderban delta, a climate change hotspot and an area once renowned for its biodiversity.

Soumik comments, that, “As an artist, I have to believe that we have a duty to rage on, to create, against all odds, against resistance. I’ve never had the courage to make music in protest of anything before.”

COLIN MACKENZIE-BLACKMAN (BRADBYS 19943) Colin has worked for charities, and not-for-profits such as the NSPCC, Royal Opera House and Shakespeare’s Globe. His current role is Head of Fundraising & Engagement at the Highland-based rewilding charity Trees for Life. Trees for Life has a vision of a revitalised wild forest in the Scottish Highlands, providing space for wildlife to flourish and communities to thrive. In his role, Colin leads and manages the fundraising, marketing and community engagement teams.

As a professional fundraiser, throughout his career Colin has been able to use his skills, expertise and knowledge to support a range of different types of organisations both ‘in-house’ but also alongside companies and philanthropists as they make their giving decisions.

Colin’s role is now focused on engaging new audiences with rewilding the Scottish Highlands. Rewilding holds the answers to many of today’s most pressing challenges, not least the climate crisis and biodiversity collapse.

Ultimately, rewilding is about working with nature, rather than against it.

As an artist, I have to believe that we have a duty to rage on, to create, against all odds, against resistance. I’ve never had the courage to make music in protest of anything before.”

S O U M I K DAT TA

81

ECO-CONSCIOUS DESIGNER AND FOUNDER LOVE BRAND & CO OLIVER TOMALIN (THE GROVE 19973) Oliver studied Architectural Design before deciding to swap designing buildings for board shorts and following his eco-beachwear dream. As a laidback summer brand, Oliver still gets serious about sustainability and his brand's mission. Since day one, they have donated a percentage of revenue – not profit – to elephant conservation and have evolved some highly commendable eco-credentials to boot. Their classic swimming trunks are now made from recycled plastic, together with a range of vegan men's summer staples, linen shirts, shorts and polo shirts, all manufactured in Europe. With recycled and certified organic materials, recycled trims and packaging, his localised European supply chain is focused on reducing carbon footprint, waste and chemical and water usage. Oliver is also closing the loop, enabling customers to return their old recycled swimming trunks and recycle them again.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR ARKSEN FOUNDATION OLLY HICKS (THE GROVE 19983) Olly, perhaps better known for his solo ocean expeditions, rowing and kayaking oceans, has recently taken up the post of Executive Director of the Arksen Foundation – combining his love of the sea and his extensive experience in fundraising.

The Arksen Foundation is the not for profit arm of Arksen a leading marine adventure company which brings together the worlds of tech, boat design and construction to create a more sustainable model of yacht ownership.

The Arksen Foundation was founded by tech entrepreneur and venture capitalist Jasper Smith and is changing the way ocean conservation is funded. The foundation is in the early stages of building a super-fund for the ocean to increase the levels of philanthropic funding for the world’s largest ecosystem, which currently receives less than 0.5% of charitable giving, a systemic flaw that blocks the path to a sustainable future ocean.

DIRECTOR OF CLIENT SERVICE CUSTOMERFIRST RENEWABLES TERENCE DE PENTHENY O’KELLY (NEWLANDS 19983) Terence de Pentheny O’Kelly is Director of Client Service for CustomerFirst Renewables (CFR), where he leads CFR’s team throughout their client consulting and advisory work.

CFR supports corporations and institutions who want to incorporate renewable energy into their electricity supply. Based in Denver, Colorado, Terence leads this boutique consulting firm's client service and client acquisition in the western half of the US. Terence has over ten years' experience in project development in the renewable energy industry, including origination, procurement, permitting, financing, negotiation and implementation. Terence started his career developing a biomass energy business in Liberia, utilising agricultural waste products to produce a fuel for power generation in the under-energised West African country. Subsequently, Terence was Vice President of Development for a private energy investment firm based in Canada, with responsibilities for sourcing and developing power projects in North and Central America.

Today, Terence is motivated by helping large corporations and institutions do their part to decarbonise their footprints by moving their existing energy supply into one that is predominantly fuelled by renewable energy. Terence helps these organisations translate sustainability commitments into real action and transforms the make-up of the energy that these organisations buy and consume.

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

CONSERVATIONIST JACK BAUCHER (THE HEAD MASTER’S 20003) Jack’s conservation roots began when he moved to Nepal in 2009. He spent five years living in Asia, learning the relevant field skills to become an accomplished conservationist: tracking tigers, guiding botanists, working with mahouts and domesticated elephants, fine tuning the art of camera-trapping snow leopards, studying scats with analysis to determine prey species, maintaining habitat and grasslands for sufficient herbivore densities, interacting and living with communities, and working with government officials to enable effective national park management.

After five years of working in the field, Jack now owns and operates the specialised travel agency and tour operation Tears for Tigers–Travel & Consultancy, which introduces donors and clients to the best conservation practices across the globe, offering clients an opportunity to engage in conservation and become hands-on about the realities to saving endangered wildlife from extinction.

Aside from the travel business, Jack also is the founder of Music Against Animal Cruelty, an organisation that leverages the voice and influence of the music industry to raise funds and awareness of the Earth's dwindling biodiversity.

Given the circumstances, our 2020 focus is on understanding diseases that originate in wildlife, how they may transfer wto the human population and how to apply outcomes in a practical way.

SUSTAINABILITY CONSULTANT GEORGE HARPER (NEWLANDS 20023) George is a sustainability consultant with over seven years’ experience supporting private sector organisations excel in their environmental performance.

He focuses on the design and implementation of ESG strategy, helping companies progress from achieving basic environmental compliance to positively differentiating themselves in the marketplace through enhanced data management, ambitious target-setting and effective reporting. George recently returned from a stint in Argentina, where he spent 18 months developing a sustainability programme and communications campaign for a carsharing start-up in Buenos Aires. This included guiding the organisation in securing certification as a B-Corporation and recognition as a ‘Sustainable Tourist Provider’ by the Argentinian government.

George first developed an interest in the sustainability sector during his undergraduate studies at Durham University, prompting him to complete an MSc in Environmental Technology at Imperial College London. He has just been offered a place on the IESE Business School MBA programme, which he will start in September 2020.

ASSOCIATE SYSTEMIQ SAM STEWART (THE GROVE 20043) Sam’s route into environmental services hasn’t been the most conventional. After graduating with a Spanish and Portuguese degree in 2014, he moved out to Mozambique to work for a start-up company involved in the exploration side of the mining sector. Moving from a bush camp in northern Mozambique to a gold mine in western Kenya and then finally to Katanga province in the Democratic Republic of Congo, he witnessed the fragility of the relationship between people and the environment. As a result, he became interested in alternative approaches to managing natural resources, ones that benefited local communities, businesses and the natural environment.

In 2018, he moved back to the UK to start a Masters degree at UCL in the Policy and Economics of Sustainable Resources and focused his thesis on sustainable land-use initiatives designed to tackle deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Sam graduated in September last year and now works on developing sustainable food and land use systems at SYSTEMIQ.

83

SUSTAINABILITY AND CLIMATE-CHANGE CONSULTANT TASSILO VON HIRSCH (THE PARK 20043) Tassilo has worked as a sustainability and climate-change consultant for over three years at PwC. Based in London as part of a team of 100 sustainability professionals, he works with a variety of businesses and clients to deliver a wide array of projects. Highlights to date include helping French luxury goods company Kering value the impact of their total operations using an ‘Environmental Profit and Loss’ accounting system, co-authoring a report for the World Economic Forum on how the loss of nature and biodiversity creates hidden, systemic risks for economies and business sectors worldwide, and co-developing a framework for banks to help them manage credit risk in their loan books due to the impacts of climate change and nature capital depletion on their clients’ operations.

Other areas he has worked in during his time at PwC include carbon markets, ESG reviews, analysis of climate transition risks, sustainable forestry, deforestation-free commodities, and even delving into overseas business integrity and anti-corruption advice for UK exporters.

Before joining PwC via a six-week internship process, Tassilo studied German at Oxford University, and completed his Masters in Environmental Technology at Imperial College London. Here he specialised in Business and the Environment, driven by the belief that while business is the cause of much of the damage we are doing to our planet, it can and must also be the solution.

CO-FOUNDER MATOHA INSTRUMENTATION JAMES KUNG (THE GROVE 20103) While a physics undergraduate at Imperial College London, James founded a start-up with two friends. Matoha Instrumentation designs and produces small-scale infrared materials identification and analysis instruments for the fabrics and plastics recycling industries. By enabling unskilled workers to identify and sort visually identical but chemically different plastics and textiles, James hopes to improve waste sorting and recycling in manually operated material recovery facilities around the world, especially in places unable to afford complex automated sorting lines.

As the team's combination data scientist and media specialist, James enjoys the challenge of using both his technical and artistic skills to help make the world a better place, one piece of waste at a time. www.matoha.com

Designed for Explorers Made for Adventure Arksen designs the ultimate vessels for ocean adventure, exploration and research.

+44 (0)23 8001 0017 tellmemore@arksen.com arksen.com

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

84

CAREERS ADVICE

ARE YOU FUTURE PROOF? Careers Advisor Michael Wright, employed jointly by the School and the Harrow Association to increase and improve careers advice provided for Harrovians while they are at the School and to offer careers advice and support to members of the OH community, shares his insight into the important career considerations of the moment.

In 2015, researchers at Oxford University and Deloitte found that around 35% of jobs in the UK were at risk of computerisation over the next 20 years.

Five years on from that study, we have already seen this start to happen across many sectors. More recent surveys conducted by the Bank of England have shown that, although 90% of employees believe their roles would not be affected by automation or computerisation, 90% of CEOs felt their workforce would be affected in some way. As young OHs enter the workplace, we need to ask an important question. How can we prepare these young people to be future proof?

Firstly, we need to look at what jobs will be most affected by the growth of technology, we then need to look at sectors that, because of their nature, are less likely to be compromised.

We should also explore the concept of key skills' development and how it can improve someone’s chances of becoming future proof.

Increasingly, the term "zombie jobs" is being used to describe roles that are seen to be alive and dead simultaneously: roles that seem highly likely to be seriously affected by the

growth of new technologies. Many of these roles reflect the ability of computers to complete certain tasks more quickly and accurately than humans can. Based on several studies and articles published over the past year, the following jobs are being labelled as high risk ‘zombie’ jobs:

to any of the following questions you are at low risk of becoming a victim of computerisation.

Accountant Lab technician Surveyor Librarian Mortgage/loan advisor Pharmacist Translator Financial analyst Driver Receptionist

• Does the job take place in an unpredictable or quickly changing physical environment?

Although technology will continue to develop to support all employment sectors, some will be less affected in terms of jobs being lost to computerisation. This stems from the nature of the sectors themselves; they usually require either high levels of social interaction or the ability to develop new ideas. These are skills that computers cannot perform in the same way as humans and therefore these sectors should be affected less by artificial intelligence and computerisation: Design (engineering, fashion, product etc.)

Healthcare Marketing and advertising Education Human resources Creative industries (film, theatre, TV, art etc.)

Events, hospitality and restaurants Armed forces Journalism Sport awd leisure

The question remains, how do we make ourselves future proof? I believe the key is to think ahead when making career decisions. If you can answer ‘yes’

• Does the job require interaction with people and use social or emotional intelligence?

• Does the job require you to come up with new ideas or designs to solve problems?

Central to anybody’s quest to become future proof should be a desire and drive to develop key employability skills that can be beneficial across all sectors. Developing your social and emotional intelligence, your teamwork skills and your overall ability to communicate will support your employability in every role within every sector. At a time when young people are increasingly interacting digitally, the ability to explain your ideas, build rapport and communicate face to face are vital key skills, especially as growing numbers of employers report that graduates are lacking these skills when they enter the workplace.

The ability to generate and develop new ideas is also a key skill that will become more prized in this new age of technology.

Even in sectors where many jobs will be lost to computerisation, strong managers (communicators) and exciting innovators will always be needed and will always thrive. My advice to any young OHs would be to think about your future career path and to take any opportunities you have to develop your communication, creativity and flexibility to set yourself up for a strong career in the future.

Contact Michael Wright via the Careers Help and Advice Groups page on OH Connect where he posts useful careers information and resources.

85

CAREERS CONVENTION 2020 Every year in January, many generous OHs, parents and friends of the School give up a Sunday evening to offer their advice and insight to boys in the Fifth and Sixth Form along with students from local schools, at the annual Careers Convention.

The boys and the School are hugely grateful for this, but don’t take our word for it; here’s a report from The Harrovian.

Would you like to help next year?

Contact the HA if you would like to volunteer your expertise at the next Careers Convention or give a careers talk to the boys on a weekday evening. OHs willing to help with work experience, mentoring and careers support can also register their support on ohconnect.org.uk.

The Harrovian • Vol CXXXII • No 15 • 1 February 2020 On Sunday 19 January, the School hosted the annual Careers Convention in conjunction with the Harrow Association. The event took place at the Shepherd Churchill Hall and was a real success.

The convention allowed boys and, for the first time, some students from other schools, to talk to over 100 advisors from different fields of work. These career advisors are all very experienced in their professions and speaking to them enabled us to discover different career paths in more detail.

At a time when many of us are making important decisions such as A level choices and university options and courses, speaking with these experienced advisors becomes increasingly valuable.

Many of us carried out research before the event so that we knew exactly which advisor to look out for when we arrived. Some of us discovered a new field of work of which we were previously unaware, while others who already had a clear employment goal focused their conversations with those relevant advisors.

There were representatives from a variety of careers and all of them, including OHs, current parents and friends of the School, had reached the highest levels of their careers. Many of the School’s beaks were also present, giving valuable advice on careers that link with their subject as well as offering advice to Oxbridge and potential US university applicants.

The advisors were helpful and engaging throughout the event, answering questions based on their own experience and providing useful advice for us to take home. For example, one of the finance advisors recommended that we do internship programmes to increase our employability chances, and another explained the context of his work and the intellectually challenging aspects of finance to us. He also mentioned that quantitative skills, albeit useful in the profession, are only part of the main business. Soft skills such as the ability to persuade and work as a team are also required. Not only did they give us technical advice, they also provided us with more general advice on being a real investment banker – someone who has passion for what they are doing and has a "flame" in their heart and mind to achieve something. “Most importantly, do not enter the finance industry just because you want to make money!” he told us.

Last, but not least, the School’s Oxbridge and US advisors and counsellors were also present to answer our numerous questions. They gave useful individual feedback on course selections, and answered general enquiries about the lengthy and gruelling process of applying to US universities.

This ensured that we had a better idea of what further steps we needed to take to achieve a place at these universities.

The messages that the advisors gave us were repeated by the Head Master Mr Land in Speech Room: that we should seek the most fitting jobs for ourselves and take actions to make ourselves more employable people.

86

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

HARROVIANS MEET OHs ON THEIR TOURS OF US AND CANADIAN UNIVERSITIES The higher education landscape in the UK is changing fast and the same can be said about Harrow. Even though some things have not changed on the Hill for centuries, the boys’ university aspirations most certainly have. Today, more and more Harrovians opt to study abroad, mostly, but not exclusively, in the US. Last autumn, 28 Harrow boys successfully matriculated as undergraduates at some of the top-ranked US universities, including six Ivy League institutions and at other renowned universities such as Stanford and University of Chicago.

Encouraged by this success, 35 Upper Sixth boys applied to universities in the United States or Canada in 2019–20, securing over 50 offers between them.

Overall, nine of the US applicants have been offered a place at universities ranked among the top ten globally, and 27 of this year’s offers are from universities ranked among the top 25.

There have been some notable individual successes too. One Harrovian was admitted to the prestigious BFA acting programme at the Juilliard School, widely considered the finest performing arts programme in the world, and a further two were admitted to two prestigious programmes at McGill university: the Desautels School of Management and the Faculty of Arts. On the sporting front, one boy has been recruited to play rugby at UC Berkeley. Some of these amazing offers came with generous scholarships.

These hugely successful outcomes are a result of enormous efforts by the applicants themselves – the vast majority of them apply to US and Canadian universities alongside preparing UK applications, including to Oxbridge.

The preparation process for US applicants starts from the first week in the Lower Sixth and takes almost two years, with several hoops that need to be jumped through before receiving congratulatory letters from their chosen universities.

Luckily, they are not on their own. The School accompanies them at every stage of this complicated process, not just by preparing all the necessary documents and providing them with the required

letters of recommendation, but also by running special in-house ACT/SAT and SAT Subject Test preparation courses, in addition to timetabled ACT/SAT Maths and English classes, essay writing workshops and interview practice, just to mention a few aspects of the process.

Last Autumn term, we hosted admissions directors from almost 30 US and Canadian universities on the Hill, providing the boys with the opportunity to find out about what they had to offer.

We also organised two separate tours of US universities, one to the East Coast in April 2019 and one to Chicago and the West Coast last December, each lasting six days. Those who took part in both trips visited 25 universities in total. During these visits, the boys had a chance to talk to admissions officers dealing with UK applications and to see the life on campus for themselves.

However, what made our university visits really special were our meetings with the OHs who are currently studying there.

It was great to see them all settled down so well and thriving in these new surroundings and to have at least a cup of coffee, if not lunch or dinner with them.

They proved to be an invaluable source of the kind of information that one cannot find in any of the glossy brochures, and we remain immensely grateful to them for all their advice. By all accounts, they also enjoyed meeting us and hearing all the gossip from the Hill. We hope that, having read about the boys’ successful conquest of US universities, they feel that by responding to that unexpected email from Mrs Fletcher and by spending an hour of two with us on campus, they also played their part in this success!

Kasia Fletcher, Master in Charge of North American Universities

Former Head of School and Outstanding Talent Scholar Carlo Agostinelli (The Head Master’s 20143) was one of eight soccer players to be recruited

by Stanford Cardinal, the sports team that represents Stanford University, for their 2019 season.

Stanford has won three of the last four NCAA (National Collegiate Athletics Association) titles and 23 consecutive NACDA (National Association of Collegiate Director of Athletics) Directors’ Cups, which are awarded annually to the most successful university sports programmes in the US.

“At Stanford, my days have been equally split between class time, soccer practice and homework, but I did have an added chunk of free time, which took some adjusting to!”

GO

87

STANFORD!

Travelling across the Atlantic to study in the United States of America was always a dream of mine, and one that became a reality last August as I had the incredible opportunity to attend Stanford University in order to pursue both my education and soccer career on the West Coast.

My first year at Stanford, whilst cut short, will be one that I will remember forever.

Not only have I already made friends for life, but the experience both on and off the pitch has reached far beyond my expectations.

Coming from Harrow, I knew it would be difficult to feel busier than I had felt for the last five years of my life. At Stanford, my days have been equally split between class time, soccer practice and homework, but I did have an added chunk of free time, which took some adjusting to!

Stanford follows the Liberal Arts programme, which means that every student has around two years to take any class before choosing what they want to major in. I, therefore, took time this year to explore many different areas of interest including psychology, history, economics and politics, all of which have been extremely inspiring. Not only do the professors show passion in what they teach, but being surrounded by students who are eager to learn and are not afraid to show it has been motivating. I was a little sad that the spring quarter was moved online as I had planned to enrol in a class taught by Francis Fukuyama, which I am sure would have been life changing, but I look forward to enrolling in many more classes over the next three years with equally inspiring professors.

Whilst the classes have been inspiring, it is in the world of sport that I have been pushed to my extreme limit. I remember finding it hard to adjust when I first arrived for pre-season in mid-July last summer.

Until that point, I had become accustomed to Harrow where we trained three times a week at most, in rainy cold weather.

Stanford does it slightly differently.

Training is every day of the week under the blazing hot sunshine,

with added time for treatment and film work together as a team. I would say I spend on average three to four hours of my day in the soccer and athletics department.

I usually arrive at 2pm, in order to check in with our team’s athletics trainer, to make sure I am healthy and fit for training. The team then meets at 2:30pm in the locker room, where we spend time bonding, listening to music and getting ready for training or going through film work with the coaches.

The high-intensity training sessions usually last about an hour and a half, after which the team usually gathers in the ice bath following showers – as you can see we are treated extremely well even as we are pushed to become the best players we can be.

The best part of being on the soccer team are game days. Interacting with the dedicated fans and playing in front of passionate big crowds ranging from 2,000 to up to 15,000 is what dreams are made of for many soccer fans, and certainly for every young player. It is a privilege to do what one loves whilst bringing so much joy to others.

Growing up, I never thought I would be able to do so whilst continuing my education at the highest level, but this is exactly what the United States of America has to offer – a top education hand-in-hand with elite sports.

Having been through the process, I sympathise with all Harrovians who believe the path to American universities is too arduous. Doing SAT and ACT tests repeatedly can be challenging and frustrating. However, with the benefit of hindsight, I can safely say that the hassle is more than worth it. Whether you are a student athlete or a student with other passions, the experience seems to be unmatched. I can only thank Harrow for having guided me the right way, and giving me the opportunity to fulfil my dreams.

Whether it was help with my academic applications or help in preparing for my sports career, Harrow prepares you the best way possible in order to thrive once you do get across the Atlantic. It is a lot of hard work but it does pay off!

Stet Fortuna Domus

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

88

GAME, SET, MATCH TO PRENN HUE WILLIAMS

THE PRENN HUE WILLIAMS COURT As it has been completely rebuilt, the ‘Old Rackets Court’ no longer exists. Consequently, the School has announced that the court will in future be known as The Prenn Hue Williams Court.

This step is an entirely fitting tribute to two Old Harrovians, John Prenn (The Head Master’s 1966 3) and Charles Hue Williams (Bradbys 19562), who were not only master players in their day but have been faithful supporters of the game for many years.

RACKETS AT HARROW Harrow was the first school to play rackets following the game’s inception in the country’s debtors’ prisons in the mid-18th century. The School had easy access to the basic requirements of the game: a flat piece of land and a high wall (in Bill Yard), which enabled the most skilled players to hit the ball at speeds of up to 160 miles per hour.

Old Harrovian Sir William Hart-Dyke (The Grove 1851 3 ) was the first rackets champion at Harrow and was largely responsible for the construction of the first closed and covered court at the School in 1865. Following a century of many championship victories, a second court was built in 1965.

By 2010, a Harrow School pair had won the Schools Doubles Championship on 31 occasions, a record of success that continues to this day; in recent decades, Harrow has won more titles at the Public Schools Rackets’ Competition at Queen’s Club than any other school.

The tradition of employing a rackets coach also goes back to the earliest times and Harrow has been very fortunate in its “pros”. The Crosbys, father Fred and son Roger, occupied the post for 70 years, from 1922 to 1976. John Eaton, the School’s current Rackets Professional, has held the post for 24 years and has overseen the great success of the game at Harrow today.

89 THE RACKETS PROJECT 2019-20 The rackets and fives courts are located half-way up the 100 Steps and since construction of the Ryan Theatre 30 years ago, are inaccessible by vehicle.

Owing to the deterioration of the Old Court and much of the rackets area, a complete renovation was started in spring 2019. As the Old Court was in a dilapidated condition and not standard competition-level dimensions, it has now been magnificently rebuilt to a size enabling us to use it for inter-school tournaments. In addition, the rackets lobby has been redesigned to create a more attractive welcome area with exhibition space for boys and visitors. Meanwhile, the changing rooms (shared between rackets and fives players) were also extended, bringing them to a standard suitable for hosting tournaments. Nevertheless, the inaccessibility of the site proved an incredible logistical challenge.

In total, over 200 tonnes of waste material was excavated by hand to form foundations for the new perimeter walls and a new concrete floor.

Foundations for the new internal court wall are an average of two metres deep.

Over 80m3 of concrete was used to form the new foundations for the internal walls and the new court floor.

“Harrow has a proud tradition at rackets, going back over 150 years. Now I think the work we’ve done on the court redevelopment, and the rackets and fives area generally, will be a launching pad to help push forward rackets at Harrow over the next 25 years.

Boys still get a great thrill from playing rackets, which is a major reason for my optimism.”

JOHN EATON, RACKETS PROFESSIONAL AND COACH SINCE 1996

Over 3,000 concrete blocks were carried by hand into the court to form the new court walls.

The waste material was carried by conveyor belt out of the building and down the 100 Steps where an excavator lifted the waste into lorries.

This hard labour was completed within ten months.

Lalit Bose (The Head Master’s 20083), John Eaton, Rackets Professional and Robbie White (Moretons 2009 3) – National Schools Doubles Champions 2013.

THANKS TO A FUNDRAISING CAMPAIGN supported by

these two OH rackets players, the Harrow Development Trust was able to raise over £800,000 from a number of generous OH and parent supporters, which allowed this project to take place.

John Prenn (The Head Master’s 19663), Roger Crosby, Rackets Professional and Charles Hue Williams (Bradbys 19562) – Winners of the Noel Bruce Cup.

“I played on the new court within a few weeks of its reopening and it was a complete thrill. I am so happy at what everyone has achieved in getting it built; it is a tremendous achievement.”

FORMER WORLD CHAMPION HARRY FOSTER (Druries 1988 3 )

Join the

40 Years On Society and leave a lasting legacy for future generations

Bequests have been enormously important to Harrow since its earliest years. As we look ahead to the 450th anniversary of Harrow’s foundation, leaving a gift in your will is your opportunity to help secure Harrow’s future and support the education of future generations.

Visit harrowschool.org.uk/leaving-a-legacy to find out more Harrow Development Trust 5A High Street, Harrow on the Hill, Middlesex HA1 3HP +44 (0) 20 8872 8500 supportharrow@harrowschool.org.uk

91 L O O K I N G F O R WA R D

HARROW DEVELOPMENT TRUST Plan 450

Much has happened at the School in the past year and is planned for the coming decade, thanks to the continuing generosity of OHs, parents and friends of the School.

Looking ahead to the 450th anniversary of the foundation of the School in 2022, the Governors have set an ambitious development programme involving significant investment in our School buildings and facilities as well as the considerable expansion of our bursary provision.

Over the next five years, the Harrow Development Trust aims to raise over £100m to help fund the following projects:

DINING HALL

CURRENT CAMPAIGNS

c£23m

HOUSES

£8m

BURSARIES

£5m RAISED SO FAR

2021 ONWARDS

HERITAGE AND HOUSES

£10m

Bursaries and Churchill Places Over the next decade, the School is aiming to grow its bursary funds in order to attract able boys to Harrow, including the sons of OHs, regardless of financial means. By 2025, the aim is to have 30% of boys on awards averaging 50% of the fees while greatly increasing the number of high-level bursaries. A key part of the overall strategy, and in honour of our greatest alumnus, is the introduction of Churchill Places. The aim of this new bursary scheme is to find, nurture and produce ‘Churchills’ of the future – boys who, in their own way, demonstrate ‘Churchillian’ characteristics of personal courage, wide-ranging thinking and a global outlook, and who may one day change the world for the better.

SCIENCE BUILDING

£40 m

SPORTS CENTRE

c£30m c£50m

BURSARIES

£20m

Capital Projects Amongst the School’s immediate priorities is the refurbishment of the Shepherd Churchill Dining Hall, and the construction of a new state-of-the-art science building providing an inspiring learning environment for Biology and Chemistry.

Later phases include a new Sports building, and a scheme providing safer, more direct thoroughfares across the east side of the Hill shifting the pupil centre away from the busy High Street.

Furthermore, the School also has a rolling programme of renovations to modernise each of our of boarding houses on the Hill, currently these are The Grove and Druries.

Heritage Old Schools, the original School building constructed in 1615, now requires attention. In addition to a general external and internal refurbishment, the existing Old Armoury room is set to be repurposed as a state-of-the-art Teaching, AI and Learning Hub. This space will be used for experimental teaching practices, including the use of AI, teacher training and research and boys' independent study - a exciting fusion of the ancient and modern.

Visit the Support Us pages of the School website (harrowschool.org.uk/supportharrow) to find out more about these and other projects or contact the Harrow Development Trust team at hdt@harrowschool.org.uk / +44 (0)20 8872 8500.

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

92

FORTY YEARS ON THE HARROVIAN IN 1980 1980: Ronald Reagan was elected, John Lennon was assassinated, and we all wondered who had shot J R Ewing. We listened to Pink Floyd’s Brick in the Wall and watched The Shining and The Empire Strikes Back.

Mr Shaw retired after 52 years of selling sweets to generations of Harrovians; a memorial in St Mary’s churchyard was dedicated to Lord Byron’s daughter Allegra; and last but certainly not least, ‘the 1st XI recorded its first win against another school’.

The pages of The Harrovian suggest that, in 1980, Harrow boys were experiencing something of an existential crisis.

In the 1 March issue, a piece entitled ‘Herga Insula Est’, argues that a Harrow education is perhaps not the best preparation for life in the “big wide world”: ‘Once here, the contact with the world at large is minimal. We play our matches against other schools, whose existences are much the same as our own. We are taught by masters who are themselves part of the same set-up…It is therefore hardly surprising that many Harrovians have a multitude of toils and tribulations in the "big wide world" when they are finally released from their insular and narrow existence, which has offered them almost total security and sanctuary…After such heavy restriction for so long, the freedom proves too difficult to handle …he will often be convinced that, because he has been a pupil at one of the top public schools in the world, he must necessarily succeed.

He merely has to utter the magical name of "Harrow," and his prospective employer will welcome him with open arms. Sadly, this is not the case.’

For the author of ‘How will it seem to you?’

(6 December) it is not the brainiest or brawniest who get the most out of a Harrow education, but those who ‘play the system’: ‘…you get more out of playing the system, by cajoling and outwitting it, than you do out of fighting it. Indeed, the perfection of blending conformity and harmless ruleAT HARROW, VETERAN SHOPKEEPER

bending provides the key to immense reward, invaluable experience, and a way to survive and, moreover, to enjoy school life. For, they are not always the heroes of the rugby pitch and the great intellectuals of pen and ink, who profit most from their Harrovian years.’

In a letter of 8 March, ‘V. Frustrated’ suggests a more pragmatic approach to preparing boys for their post-Harrow life: ‘If the average Harrovian is to be truly prepared for his place at university, then he should at least have some experience of the people he is likely to encounter. I am, of course, referring to the female sex.’

Also raging in the pages of The Harrovian in 1980 was a debate about the very existence of public schools.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, there were more voices raised in their support than otherwise. The writer of ‘All Animals are Equal’ (18 October) argues that: ‘The Universal Declaration of Human Rights confers, I believe, the right of the parent to choose an education for his children…Therefore, the right of Bertrand Russell to found his own school based on a principle of no discipline must be defended. That the result of his plan was disastrous is not surprising, but at least he had the right to put a new educational scheme into practice…One day somebody might invent an entirely new, much more desirable system of education than any we have today: none of us would wish to deny that system the chance of a trial. All of which brings me to the crux of my argument – that diversity is essential in issues of political influence such as education. The dead hand of uniformity is to be feared above all, and we must fight for our right of choice’.

Even more vehement in his support of the public school is the author of ‘Just You Dare, Comrade

93

Kinnock!’ (22 November): ‘Because of…inherent faults in the educational system no one has no right to abolish the private sector nor nationalise it. For a start, that would be unconstitutional... Secondly, if the government were to be consistent in its aims in destroying those things that the rich can benefit from and others cannot, then they would be bound to enforce a command economy, where all goods were doled out in equal amounts – education, health, food, everything. It would be hypocrisy to say that private sector education is being abolished because only the rich can afford it and not also enforce the abolition of fillet steaks for the same reason’.

£50 PURCHASE £50 PURCHASE

A more sceptical voice can be heard in ‘A Matter of Life or Death’ (15 March): ‘Has it ever occurred to you that at some time in the remote and misty future you may wish to send your children… to experience for themselves those long-lost days that you left behind you at Harrow…But will such happy refuges of traditional English eccentricity as Harrow and those other self-confessed Public Schools still be around for you to send your little darlings to?...Will that great spring tide of change that has for so many years swept past the sand-castle that is the Hill we live on, gradually eat away its foundations and finally send it toppling to the ground, there to lie for ever? But perhaps, as the great Candide discovered, 'all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds’….perhaps it would be best for Society in general and for its future consolidation, if Public Schools were no longer to exist. Such 'change for the better' may not seem to be so to those who experience it at the time, and it is often only later that people recognise it as a Good Thing…I often wonder whether Jesus, if he had arrived in Harrow in 1980 instead of in Judea 1,980 years ago, would have been treated with the suspicion with which traditionalists view the new and 'radical', rather than welcomed with open arms and asked to take over as Head Master.’

In ‘Our Tomorrow's Yesterday’ (28 June) Harrovians are warned that the School’s most cherished, but outdated, traditions are not only adding fuel to the fire of those who oppose Harrow’s existence but are actually putting Harrovians themselves in danger: ‘Not surprisingly, the hat and tails are little more than a large arrow pointing to each Harrovian as a symbol of social status and, of course, wealth; and however false the arrow's direction may be, a symbol may often become a target of abuse due to what it stands for...We can disguise our identity one evening to avoid immediate violence, but the following morning we will all be there again, flaunting our elegant headwear for the sake of Harrow's heritage and for the sake of a time-wearied tradition. And yet tradition may be a form of antagonism which is causing more harm than good to the well-being of each Harrovian in a time when tradition becomes a red blanket to anger the bull of the State educated younger generation and indeed rub salt into the sore of hated class distinction itself ’.

Interesting, however, are the voices raised in support of these apparently despised and dangerous traditions.

It is an American boy at Harrow, Marc T. Dancer (Newlands 1979 3 ), who wrote (5 July): ‘But surely it would be a shame to see Songs, tails, or even hats go. Yes, some changes have to be made, but Harrow is built on such marvellous traditions they should stay with them. I came over to Harrow for the education and primarily the experience. (Not for an A-level grade.)

At Harrow I have not only learned of the school system, but also of the English way of life. I can think of no other place to have had this unique experience.’

Mosimann’s Invites the Old Harrovians As an Old Harrovian, we would like to invite you to take up membership at Mosimann’s, with the advantage of the initial joining fee of £250 waived.

Annual Full Membership at Mosimann’s is £800.

Additionally, we would like to offer younger Old Harrovians to apply for the M Club Membership aged 35 and under with the additional benefit of the joining fee waived. Annual M Club Membership is £300.

To take up either of these exclusive opportunities Please contact our Membership Manager, Roshni Thakker by email membership@mosimann.com

WWW.MOSIMANN.COM 0207 592 1628 | membership@mosimann.com

INSTANT HIRE

We are able to supply an extensive range of HIRE and SALE equipment for all your outdoor and indoor needs and requirements.

15 Depots Nationwide HARPENDEN/HERTS./BEDS. Tel 01582 767945 Fax 01582 462697

BIRMINGHAM Tel 0121 325 8686 Fax 0121 328 7475

HAYES/W. LONDON-H/THROW Tel 020 8573 7717 Fax 020 8561 2215

LIVERPOOL/N.WEST Tel 0151 546 9988 Fax 0151 546 9922

S.E.LONDON/N.KENT Tel 020 8303 7711 Fax 020 8303 0359

ASHFORD/S. KENT Tel 01233 616999 Fax 01233 626788

STRATFORD/E. LONDON Tel 020 8555 8100 Fax 020 8519 6316

BRISTOL Tel 0117 304 1588 Fax 0117 955 6290

N.W. LONDON Tel 020 8207 7050 Fax 020 8207 3213

BASILDON/ESSEX Tel 01268 722280 Fax 01268 722289

KENTISH TOWN/N. LONDON Tel 020 7267 4320 Fax 020 7267 3007

SOUTHAMPTON/HANTS. Tel 02380 743777 Fax 02380 743770

CRAWLEY/SUSSEX Tel 01293 617766 Fax 01293 619981

BARKING/ESSEX Tel 020 8526 8470 Fax 020 8526 8479

WANDSWORTH/S.W. LONDON Tel 020 8870 2424 Fax 020 8874 6893

Nationwide Service Open Hours Mon to Fri 7.30am to 5.30pm

www.cwplant.co.uk 1st Class Products

1st Class Service

1st Class Expertise

“Everything from a 21 Metre Telehandler to a 1/2" Drill”

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

Major A T Casdagli (The Grove 19201) 10 April 1906–1 December 1996

Alexis Casdagli, known as ‘Cas’, was born in Salford in Greater Manchester to a wealthy Greek family of cotton merchants. After leaving Stanmore Park Preparatory School, he entered Harrow, where he excelled both academically and at sport. He was a Monitor and Head of House. On leaving Harrow, he joined the family business, Emmanuel Casdagli & Sons of Manchester and Cairo. In 1939, on the outbreak of World War 2, Casdagli enlisted in the Royal Ordnance Corps of the British Army.

On 1 June 1941, he was captured in Crete and spent the next four years as a prisoner of war in Nazi Germany, where he started embroidering. His first war embroidery, F*** Hitler, has become world famous.

During the war, at great risk of reprisal, he kept a secret diary, now published as Prouder Than Ever. The only other diary he kept was during his first year at Harrow in 1920. A delightful day-to-day account of a schoolboy’s life, it is to be published shortly as Loyal to the Hill. The Old Speech Room Gallery has mounted two very successful exhibitions about Cas; the first, in 2015, was of his experiences as a prisoner of war and the artefacts he created during that time. The second, also called Loyal to The Hill, celebrates the centenary of his first day at Harrow and tells the story of his life-long love of the School. Known for his defiance, his humility and humour, his meticulous record-keeping, exquisite embroidery and his unfailing delight in people and life, Cas is an inspiring example of resilience in extreme adversity and of making the best of every second of life.

The Loyal to the Hill exhibition in the OSRG has been extended into the Autumn so we hope you will be able to visit when the School re-opens.

Loyal to the

Hill

97

‘HAVE HAD A VERY HAPPY 1920’ – so Alexis

Theodore Casdagli concludes the last diary entry at the end of his first whole year as a Harrovian in The Grove.

Along with other written records, photographs and artefacts which he carefully preserved, the Casdagli collection gives us probably the most complete record we have of any Harrovian’s life in the early 20th century.

He writes with the Great War still casting a shadow over the Hill: Cas would have attended the laying of the foundation stone of the War Memorial.

His life as a new boy is dominated by sport; and he is a keen participator – talented, too, as in his second year, aged only 15, he is chosen to play footer for the House versus old Grovites several years his senior.

Sporting heroes are gods, carried aloft on the shoulders of their winning teammates.

Sometimes he notes that he’s had a “slack” time; occasionally a corps parade is a bit “sweaty”; and his fagging duties loom large when he notes he is yet again

“on boy”. On the whole, however, Cas presents himself as a happy and contented schoolboy. Somehow the magic thrall got into his bloodstream; and the small boy who notes the comings and goings of the Monitors he has to serve will end up one day as Head of House himself.

In later life Cas invariably wore a Harrow Association tie, and his loyalty to the Hill was woven into his being as strongly as the blue and silver threads he incorporated into his embroidery while incarcerated in German POW camps.

He paints a happy picture of a leisured and comfortable family home in Manchester, where holidays are spent playing sports with friends, having neighbours for meals, skating at the Ice Palace, watching cricket at Old Trafford, and visiting the theatre and the opera – with Parsifal twice in a week! He comes across as a balanced young man with wide interests. However content a Harrow schoolboy he appears to have been, no fewer than three diary entries anticipating the taxi that will take him home for the holidays show a yearning for family life. ➤

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

At School, conditions would have been more austere: a coal strike in October means that the boys only get their washing back once a fortnight. His fagging duties can have him rolling puttees and collecting abandoned footballs from the fields; they take him on errands all over the Hill, delivering work to Masters and on one occasion a message to every other House, but he is not a complainer.

He admits to the occasional skew, once being awarded 200 lines for an undisclosed offence in a cover lesson taken by Mr Prior (which his House Master Mr Pope sympathetically commutes to 100).

He occasionally notes the punishment of other boys, but rarely mentions the offence, an exception being when his brother Emmanuel assumed privileges to which he was not yet entitled. Harrow then was a very hierarchical society and we learn that it was as well to know your place!

The rewards given to the sporting giants, the Coats, Caps and Flannels”, are noted carefully by Cas, and perhaps gave some focus to his own ambition and that of many of his young contemporaries.

Food looms large and it is revealing that boiling an egg, opening a tin of sardines or even making coffee is, for a new boy, a treat worth recording. Of course, there is still some rationing after the war-he has coupons for sugar. One red-letter day he is sent foie gras! (Where was it kept? – Or was it all consumed straight away?)

98 The diary is a fantastic guide to the teashops and cafes of the Hill in 1920, which must have done a roaring trade with Harrow boys “finding” (as in the still-used terms Finds Room or Finds Dinner) extra supplies to eke out the meagre School fare.

He learns to waltz – on ice! Less glamorously, he is vaccinated (sore arm!) and gets his flat feet attended to. As a teenage boy, he experiences some of the rites of passage which might still echo today – having cider for lunch – as well as experiencing magic moments no longer known to Harrovians, such as the marvellous day when you can wear a tailcoat rather than a “bumfreezer”.

The reader who thinks his Harrow vocabulary pretty rich with “yarder, bluer and eccer” will now find out about playing “fug” and “Harder” and imagine what it was like to be “up to Inky” for “‘Tique”. He is “skewed” by “Cokie” (Mr Coke-Norris, the model for Terence Rattigan’s “Himmler of the Lower Fifth”, Mr Crocker-Harris in The Browning Version). It is nice to hear he wore a wristwatch and motored down to Wales. Does the modern Harrovian need translations?

England of 1920 is not exactly a foreign country to us; but they did things differently. Here we learn that you could send a letter simply addressed to ‘7 The Peak, Hong Kong’ and expect it to arrive at the Millikens’ house.

Top left to right: Cas’ telegram home on being awarded his flannels; Cas, 1924, in The Grove; Cas’ last entry in his Lett’s School-boy Diary, 1920; Cas, far right, in match against the Old Boys’ XI, 1921.

This book reflects the extraordinary eye for accuracy and detail which Cas passed on to his daughter, Alexis Penny Casdagli. She has walked in his steps and tracked down the shops, houses, hotels which he knew and visited. She has immersed herself in the period and brought her father’s Harrow career to life in a book filled with copious illustrations.

Her research has been impeccable and she helps us share this experience which is so often so close to one we know and recognise from our own time on the Hill. In addition, to share more about Cas, his unique Harrovian albums, artefacts, letters and his fascinating Old Harrovian life, on 25 September 2020, Alexis Penny will launch an online A T Casdagli archive created especially by SDS Heritage at: atcasdagli-archive.co.uk This is a wonderful and enjoyable account. Those who have read Prouder Than Ever know with admiration about Cas’s later experiences in the German prisoner camps and will recall his famous F*** Hitler sampler.

This book and exhibition take us back a century and we are soon steeped in a Harrow that seems both close and distant. Again and again snatches of songs come to mind to illustrate the moment: Hark the swelling note is knelling/Who can disobey the call?…Just the ankle I hurt before… Trials are over the term is done… the splashing and the spray.

They are all there; and at the centre is a giant of old.

Cas with his prisoner of war number 3311; Cas’ first war embroidery F*** Hitler.

The exhibition features the first use by the OSRG of QRs, like this. Hover your phone over it to see Cas’ magnificent Harrow Lions embroidery and read its story too.

WORDS PETER HUNTER ( HARROW MASTER 1985–2018 )

For more details of Loyal to the Hill and Prouder

Than Ever please visit www.cylixpress.co.uk

(The Grove 1920 1)

‘The A T Casdagli Collection gives us probably the most complete insight we have of any Harrovian’s life in the early 20th century or indeed of any period.’

Peter Hunter (Harrow Master 1985-2018)

The A T Casdagli Archive goes live on 25 September 2020 @ atcasdagli-archive.co.uk The A T Casdagli Archive, created by SDS Heritage, presents this collection of documents, albums, photographs, embroideries and other artefacts that Cas so carefully preserved, many of which have never been seen before.

Easily accessed, entirely searchable, fully indexed, with a dropdown timeline available at any time, visitors to the Casdagli Archive are invited to explore the Archive for themselves or take curated paths within it.

The Archive also includes a full catalogue of Loyal to the Hill, this year’s extremely successful exhibition about Cas at the OSRG.

Swallowtail Embroidery, 1954, by Casdagli

The Archive of A T Casdagli

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

THE VAUGHAN LIBRARY SPEECH ROOM

&

In 2022, Harrow will celebrate 450 years since the granting of the Royal Charter by Queen Elizabeth I and the foundation of the School.

In last year’s issue and over the next three issues of Follow Up! we will be taking a fresh look at some of the Hill’s most familiar buildings, exploring the part they played in Harrow’s development over the centuries. This year we look at two icons of the Victorian era.

WORDS PETER HUNTER ( HARROW MASTER 1985–2018 )

100

101

Plan from the 1850s for a library linked by a cloister to Old Schools.

TWO VICTORIAN ICONS THE VAUGHAN LIBRARY AND SPEECH ROOM

illustrate the transformation of Harrow during the middle of the 19th century and express its supreme confidence as the School’s size and reputation grew under Charles Vaughan (1845-59) and Henry Montagu Butler (1860-85).

When Vaughan arrived there were fewer than 80 boys in the School (Geoffrey Madan noted that the Vicar of Harrow advised Vaughan to “dismiss” the lot of them); by the end of the century there were over 600. A new library to commemorate Charles Vaughan’s reign was the brainchild of his successor, H M Butler.

A library had been founded in the Old Schools in the 1770s, to which Byron had donated his Greek texts; but only Monitors had a key the genesis of the ceremony still performed on the first day of each new academic year.

The original plan was to make the Vaughan available only to 100 “approved” boys. Already conscious of the problem of fitting the whole School into one secular building, Butler intended the library to double up as a speech room. ➤

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

In the 1850s there had been plans to build a library over four form rooms linked by a cloister to the Old Schools.

When a preferred site over the road was considered, Clutterbuck, the publican of the Crown and Anchor, refused to give up his stabling and there was a prospect of the new building being squeezed into a narrow site next to The Head Master’s. (During the tenure of a Mr Bliss, the pub had been known as “The Abode of Bliss”. Bliss’s moment of glory came when he presented Byron’s fag to George III: “The Duke of Dorset, Your Majesty!”). By 1861, however, a deal had been reached, with financial inducements being met personally

by Dr Butler, and the “unsightly houses were cleared away”, as The Builder noted.

The architect chosen was George Gilbert Scott RA, a pupil of Pugin, whose designs can still be seen in the tiled path.

In June 1861 Dr Butler wrote to a friend: ‘The long-expected work of demolition here at last has begun. When Scott came down on Saturday, I told him the open space with its view of Hampstead would be so beautiful, that everybody would cry shame upon him for venturing to profane it with a building, however well.’

“I should be shamefully ungrateful to a place of peculiar enjoyment if I forbore to mention the library at Harrow…Its delicious bow window looking towards Hampstead was my favourite resort.

I used to read there for hours.”

THE RT HON. GEORGE RUSSELL ( HOME BOARDERS AND BRADBYS 1868 1 )

Although the view today is made even more beautiful by the terrace gardens (created with topsoil from the Speech Room site in 1871), Lord Frederic Hamilton (Rendalls 1870 3 ) recalled a far less attractive view over ‘the uncompromisingly ugly vegetable garden and rows of utilitarian cabbages and potatoes’.

On Speech Day, 4 July 1861, the 79-year-old prime minister, Lord Palmerston (Harrow 1795 ), arrived on his white horse and, under an umbrella held over him by the Head Master, laid the foundation stone ‘with a few artistic flourishes of the mallet’, riding back straight away to take part in a parliamentary debate, thus missing ‘the déjeuner for 200 persons of rank’.

The Harrow Gazette recorded the presence of a galaxy ‘of fashion, wealth and beauty such as the old town had rarely seen’.

The prime minster later referred to the Vaughan in the Commons while expressing his preference for the ‘Italian style’ of Scott’s proposed Foreign Office buildings.

He waived his well-known objection to Harrow’s (indeed, all) Gothic, owing to the library’s proximity to the Chapel, built in similar style.

102

Architectural sketches for George Gilbert Scott’s Vaughan Library 1861-63

Butler’s vision of the Vaughan was not just as a place to house books, but also ‘a temple in which all memorials of deep interest to Harrow would eventually be deposited’. He looked forward to its holding portraits and busts of famous Harrow men and he was delighted that the first treasure would be a portrait of Palmerston,

by OH Francis Grant (Harrow 18141 ) (soon to be knighted and elected President of the Royal Academy).

For a century the Vaughan was the School’s principal repository for its various treasures such as the Byron Collection. Can a school have too much Byroniana?

Perhaps it could, as Dr Wood (Head Master 1898–1910) instructed the Librarian BP Lascelles to reject the offer of a bust on the grounds that Harrow ‘already had sufficient mementos of that noble but not first-rate poet’.

(Lascelles, nearly seven feet tall, could remove books from the highest shelves without a ladder and had the disconcerting habit of looking over the door of his form room before entering.)

Sir John Mortimer (The Grove 1937 1 ) recalled how he ‘fell in love with Byron at school. We were not exact contemporaries, but his Turkish dagger and slippers were in a glass case in the library at Harrow. I tried to write poetry by the grave where he lay to write.’

The Vaughan gave inspiration, perhaps, to another OH author, Sir Terence Rattigan (The Park 1925 2 ). In his day there was on the shelves a copy of Robert Browning’s translation of the Agamemnon of Aeschylus. Was it that book, or the graphic representation in the stained-glass windows of Clytemnestra standing over the murdered body of her husband, that inspired him to write his drama of school life, The Browning Version?

Crocker-Harris: Then why do you invent words that are simply not there?

Taplow: I thought they sounded better, sir. More exciting.

After all, she did kill her husband, sir. (With relish) She’s just been revealed with his dead body and Cassandra’s weltering in gore.

Crocker-Harris: I am delighted at this evidence,Taplow, of your interest in the rather more lurid aspects of dramaturgy, but I feel I must remind you that you are supposed to be construing Greek, not collaborating with Aeschylus.

103

In 1939 Philip Bryant (The Knoll 19163 ) paid special tribute to the Vaughan: ‘The Vaughan has been to many Harrovians the most blessed abode in Harrow…The atmosphere of the Vaughan is a strange combination of privacy and good fellowship…Here one is in the heart of Harrow.’

Clytemnestra over the dead body of Agamemnon designed by J C Bell (Moretons 18753 )

An early view of the Vaughan: part library and part ‘temple of Harrovian memorials’

The 1998-2000 refurbishment brought the Vaughan back into the heart of Harrow: Scott’s original open plan was recreated; the catalogue was digitised; stonework was cleaned; the lower floors were connected by a new central staircase; and professional staff were appointed.

After its refurbishment, the boys’ use of the Vaughan rose from fewer than 4,000 per term to 73,000 in the year 2001–02.

Speech Room, too, has played its part in being a “temple” to Harrovian achievement: you can still see the brass plaques on the pillars where the VC banners were once proudly displayed. In the 1930s a Heraldry Committee commissioned a series of coats of arms of distinguished OHs. An ingenious device was employed to raise funds: Harrovian Privy Councillors paid for the prime ministers; bishops paid for Archbishop Davidson’s arms and so on - an interesting reflection of the role played by Harrovians in the Establishment 100 years ago.

In a whimsical dialogue between Speech Room and its younger sister, the Physics Schools, Mark Warman and Jeremy Lemmon’s 1971 song The Centenarian captured the spirit of the building by imagining its quiet emptiness:

When stilled the song and turned the key, Banner and panel speak to me And tell their own undying stories Of human glories.

We are so familiar with Speech Room. Remind yourself of your first day as a Shell, gazing round with awe at the magnificence of your new school and with some trepidation at its personnel. The architect was William Burges who had a reputation for going over time and over budget. It is curious to consider that it might have looked rather different had the original plans come to fruition. Bitter arguments broke out between Butler and beaks over the purpose of the building.

In one scheme, behind the amphitheatrical seating was to be a row of form rooms built into the shape of the curve. Later amendments had the form rooms added behind the choir stalls. A balcony was considered and rejected. The towers were to be magnificent; but lack of funds meant that their foreshortened appearances were not finalised until 1925.

Early photos show the organ pipes placed dead centre of the choir stalls. ➤

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

When Churchill was at Harrow, he was taught Maths by CHP Mayo in a form room contained within the north tower. Unheated, it was accessed by an iron ladder and a trap door. Even the editor of The Harrovian of 17 December 1892 complained about the constant playing of the organ which ‘make the Speech-Room Towers absolutely untenable. It is hardly creditable to the School that they should be used for class rooms’.

He goes on to suggest that visitors are never shown such rooms: ‘No! there is no time. They go and look at the Vaughan Library…and come away struck with the happy lot of the Harrow Boy.’ The 17-year-old Churchill wrote a witty sketch about the classroom: Scene: Interior of lofty pinnacle, recently converted into a class room. A Master is endeavouring to instruct a Form in Algebra.

Master (faintly): "Now, if we square both sides the equation becomes…"

1st Voice: ''Please, sir, can we have a window open?''

M: "I'm afraid you can't."

2nd Voice: "Please, sir, can we have some more light?"

M: "I'm afraid you can't."

3rd Voice: "Please, sir, can I have a desk to write upon?"

M: "I'm afraid you can't."

(At that point there come) “sounds as of a steam engine getting to work, followed by the resonant tones of the organ playing a jerky chant”.

All the Voices: "Please, sir, can we go down and stop them playing the organ, sir?"

M: "I am afraid you can't."

All Voices (decidedly): "Then we can't work."

M. (desperately): "I'm afraid you can't."

Exeunt down the "stairs" to break their necks.

104 Right: William Burges’ plan for a tower that was never built.

Far right: A recent view of the Speech Room roof space.

Bottom left: Architectural drawing of a proposed scheme for Speech Room.

105

Like the Vaughan, Speech Room continued the celebration of the School’s intense awareness of its heritage by continuing the tradition of carved names on the backs of the chairs, once the space in the Fourth Form Room had been used up.

It is impossible to consider Speech Room without recalling the great events which took place there: the Shakespeare play, of course. Ronnie Watkins had been inspired to recreate the conditions of the Globe after an incendiary bomb lodged in the roof of Speech Room in October 1940. The “Wooden O” (or “D”) was reborn.

Jeremy Lemmon (The Knoll 1949 3 ) who performed in and produced many plays there, practising the celebrated “Harrow method”, created a world he describes of ‘delighted discovery, tremendous enjoyment, occasional despair and laughter unlimited’.

For beaks wishing to mount traditional plays in “Speecher” (when was that term last heard?) a sort of “box set” could be constructed by suspending heavy velvet curtains (still stored in the window seats!) from scaffolding poles which were attached to steel cables.

You then took a dozen Shells up into the roof space via a precarious ladder within the organ pipes and got them (simultaneously, if possible) to turn the handles of a dozen winches to lower the wires. Health and safety has put a stop to that.

Above all, Churchill Songs. Field Marshal Lord Guthrie (Newlands 19523 ) recalls ‘the greatest old Harrovian singing enthusiastically, dabbing his eyes with a large handkerchief - indomitable and uncompromising’.

Until recent years, qualifying to be hung as a portrait in Speech Room required the OH to be very distinguished, but dead. Among ‘the Good and Great who trod the Hill before us’, Lord Guthrie of Craigiebank and Lord Butler of Brockwell (Druries 19513 ) happily live to see portraits displayed in their honour as simultaneously heads of the country’s military and civil services.

“Speak to the portraits!” the young actor Robin Butler recalls being urged by Ronnie Watkins.

“I never thought I’d end up as one”, he commented at the unveiling.

This attractive new tradition matches last year’s construction of a new Shakespearean “tiring house”

by Penny Wilton to replace the Watkins original in breathing new life into Speech Room.

Harrow celebrates its Victorian heritage, yet ensures it serves the boys well in the 21st century.

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

HARROW LIVES

The cliché that boys enjoy books about adventure, crime and war is true, in my experience.

MARIE STAUNTON HEAD OF LIBRARY AND ARCHIVE

106

107

Marie Staunton is a local girl. The youngest of three children, she was born and brought up in Stanmore.

Her family were all keen readers and she was passionate about books from an early age.

Her elder sister, in particular, encouraged her, giving her books and acting like a teacher to her. Her family were also enthusiastic storytellers and there were regular evenings of ghost stories and folk tales.“That is what I grew up with”, said Marie, “so I just love the art of storytelling. It takes you to different worlds and on different adventures.”

WHEN SHE LEFT SCHOOL , Marie embarked on an

extended period of travelling. She travelled solo around Europe and stayed for a year in the US, working as an au pair in upstate New York and then taking a variety of casual jobs on the West Coast. Her final destination was Mexico, before a lack of funds forced her to return home.

Back in Stanmore, Marie decided to go to university, where she studied English and American literature, partly because her travels in the US had given her a love of the American way of life. When she finished her degree, she wasn’t sure what to do next but “I knew I didn’t want to be a teacher or work in a school.”

An assortment of temporary jobs followed, including waitress, lifeguard, photographer, finance assistant and (a low point) sales assistant in the Harrod's cosmetics department. “They did make me realise that I liked working with people and I wasn’t cut out for regular office work!” She thought about social work but decided that it was wasn’t for her. Finally, she saw an advertisement for a job as a library assistant in Golders Green. “They wanted someone who enjoyed reading to children, so when they offered it to me, I decided to take it.”

After a brief period as temporary Library Manager in Golders Green, she decided to study for a post-graduate qualification in Library and Information Studies at Ealing College. She was soon promoted to Children’s Librarian, then Assistant Librarian, working at most of Barnet’s libraries before making the move to Ealing as Reference Librarian at the new Ealing Central Library.

A couple of years later, she became Librarian in Charge at Marshalswick Library in St Albans. This was the start of her 20 years with Hertfordshire Library Service, during which she worked her way up to District Librarian for Watford and Three Rivers District, in charge of a group of seven libraries. “Those were really happy, lovely times,” Marie says. “Hertfordshire was a very good local authority to work for. They offered lots of training around literacy and were particularly strong on developmental work: for instance, if I wanted to, I could start teenage reading groups or run book groups for adults. We started opening libraries on Sundays because we thought there was a need. ➤

F O L L O W U P ! • C A R E E R S A N D E M P L OYA B I L I T Y

108

I was involved in a £1 million development of South Oxhey library, as well as other projects with European funding, which meant I got to travel to different European cities and to meet librarians from other countries. It was really good fun.”

But this type of project was becoming rarer and, although Marie enjoyed the variety of work, she found managerial tasks were taking up more of her time leaving her fewer opportunities for doing work she really enjoyed: “My first love is literature and the development of reading, and I felt my book knowledge was decreasing. I’m also a big film fan so I was in various film societies, but I was moving away from this in my job, which was more and more concerned with admin, restructuring and downsizing staff.”

So, in 2011, after 25 years in public sector libraries, she decided it was time to do something different. She initially thought of working in a university library, but a friend persuaded her to look at the recently advertised post of Head of Library and Archive at Harrow. “I was vaguely aware of Harrow but didn’t really know much about it.

I thought at first that the job of running a school library was a bit small for me – I was used to managing several libraries and 120 staff – but the Vaughan job sounded as if it would be quite fun and working in a school was something I had not done before. I loved the Vaughan building and could see that there was still lots of scope to do more, around reading for pleasure and displays for instance. I was also curious to see what it was like working in a boys’ school.”

1863 THE VAUGHAN

LIBRARY OPENED

Marie arrived at the start of the Summer term and was immediately plunged into the frenzy of Speech Day. “I really didn’t understand why they were making such a fuss about it. It took me a few weeks to realise what a big day it was and how much work was involved.”

There is a steady stream of boys coming in during the day. “Sometimes I supervise classes here when beaks aren’t available. I also take each division of Shells for a reading session once a week. We introduce them to a range of books: mostly fiction but we also teach them about current affairs using newspapers and magazines.

Sixth Formers come in throughout the day for study periods. They are usually very good company, but they feel that the library belongs to them and get cross when they find other people here. You never know what each day will hold as the Vaughan is open to so many different visitors: prospective parents, guests of the Head Master, visiting speakers and academics and groups of teachers, as well as the regular School tours. School societies also hold their meetings here in the evening.

ITEMS OF STOCK

4,071

BOOKS

ISSUED

ANNUALLY

200-250

VISITS DAILY DURING TERM TIME

40,224 VISITORS ANNUALLY

5

LIBRARIANS

Nine years on, the fuss around Speech Day remains the same, but a typical day in the Vaughan starts at 8am when the doors open and the first boys appear.

“It’s usually boys from Newlands and West Acre who will come here after they have had breakfast.

There is a sociable and lovely atmosphere in the mornings, except for the boys who haven’t done all their prep and don’t know how to do their printing.”

32,000

800 BOOKS ORDERED FOR SPEECH DAY PRIZES

OPEN 60 HOURS OVER 7 DAYS PER WEEK

109

Particularly notable is the wide variety of book displays at the Vaughan. “We create regular thematic displays in support of what is going on at the School, for instance we had a display of Gothic literature when Lyon’s and Moretons were performing Frankenstein, or to mark important events, such as the end of the First World War. We also try and have displays that are topical, for instance Halloween or Valentine’s Day. It’s fun to find themes that will inspire the boys or that they might find interesting, and the boys sometimes suggest themes themselves.

We are lucky at Harrow that we have the opportunity to work with individual boys. You can spend time with them finding books that they might like and that will inspire them to read more. The cliché that boys enjoy books about adventure, crime and war is true, in my experience. When you drill down a bit, you find they quite like dystopian novels, murder mysteries and horror. There are always crazes – when I arrived it was The Hunger Games, and Philip Pullman is having a bit of a revival at the moment. Television series and films will create a buzz around books, and we’ll use that to promote reading. For instance, if there is a new Bond film, we’ll do a display on thrillers and spy novels.

Luckily, the boys often enjoy the books and authors I really love: Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh, John Wyndham. There’s a lot of good contemporary fiction and they are very willing to try the books you suggest.”

Marie is also enthusiastic about the work she can do with every part of the School. “We put together our summer and winter reading lists because we love to hear what other people are reading and have books recommended to us: people think we have read every book that has been published, so it’s always great to find something new.”

There are some things that have changed in the Vaughan since Marie first arrived there. Most notable is the way in which boys use IT. “When I arrived, there were 38 computers in the Vaughan and beaks would book lessons there for whole divisions. Now boys can work anywhere with their Surface Books and most of the PCs have gone. One downside of this new way of working is that the boys are always on their computers now when before they would have been reading a book or a magazine. But boys seem to find the library a congenial place to be. Sometimes it’s extremely busy in here in here. Boys like the environment and, of course, it does have comfy sofas.”

“ I loved the Vaughan building and could see that there was still lots of scope to do more, around reading for pleasure and displays for instance.

I was also curious to see what it was like working in a boys’ school.”

Marie feels there is still work to do in the Vaughan: she would like to explore ways of encouraging boys to read more widely, and to read for pleasure, and is keen to do some research on why boys often seem to lose interest in reading while girls are more likely maintain that enthusiasm.

On a personal level, Marie would like to indulge her passion for travel, and to work more widely with reading support and development. “Most librarians really want people to enjoy reading. We are not teachers, but we teach by stealth, and that’s what’s great about it.”

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

110

FIVE HUNDRED FACES RECOLLECTIONS OF 67 YEARS ON

111

"I did enjoy my recent visit to Harrow and meeting you all in 5A the following day, and lunch too. I don’t suppose you can imagine the impact singing Five Hundred Faces in 1953 had on my life.

For example, if Edmund Howson had not written Five Hundred Faces in 1883, I would not have been the soloist 70 years later or met Sir Winston Churchill, neither would I have reconnected with Harrow 50 years later in 2003. Most importantly, I would not be enjoying the very pleasant friendship that I like to think I enjoy with you all in 5A now.

Stet Fortuna Domus Noel Bolingbroke-Kent (Moretons 1953 3 )

“This year I am a 14 yearer. More than any of you can say. It is astonishing how quickly time seems to go. I do remember coming down here in a rather tragic moment in our lives, in 1940, and it was suggested that we sing a few songs to keep up our spirits, and I have always found in the Harrow songs a great source of inspiration.”

Sir Winston Churchill (The Head Master's 18882 )

F O L L O W U P ! • H E R I TA G E

I entered Harrow in September 1953; two months later in November, I sang the traditional new boy’s solo Five Hundred Faces at Churchill Songs to mark the 79th birthday of Sir Winston Churchill.

1953 was an important year for Churchill. He was prime minister for the second time, attended the young Queen’s Coronation, was created a Knight of the Garter and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

In November 1953, Sir Winston Churchill was the most famous man in the world.

I took an interest in music at an early age. The headmaster of my prep school wrote in my report for winter 1952: ‘It has been a delight to hear Noel sing.

He has been a great help in the choir and has a good treble voice.’ On Sundays, the whole school walked to the local church for Morning Prayer, which was followed at the end of the day by Evensong at the school. Quite often, I was asked to sing a solo at the Sunday morning service so, when I left, I knew most of the traditional hymns and singing solo to an audience held no particular terrors for me.

Having found out about Five Hundred Faces, I knew immediately that I was in with a chance, but it was only at the last moment that Hector McCurrach, the Director of Music (1946–1967 ), awarded me the new boy’s solo in place of another boy, who was the son of a distinguished Conservative politician. The Daily Express reported the change in an article, ‘Solo Change’, on Friday 27 November, the very day of Churchill Songs: ‘in the final tests yesterday young Noel Bolingbroke-Kent of Westerham was chosen.’ The article went on to record that Westerham was not far from Sir Winston’s country home.

Noel Bolingbroke-Kent's Harrow School Song Book, Churchill's signature on Noel's Song Book, Programme for 1953 Churchill Songs.

Sir Winston Churchill as a Schoolboy at Harrow.

Harrow songs are the legacy of one of Harrow’s Head Masters, the Revd Montagu Butler, who was Head Master from 1860 to 1885 and oversaw the building of Speech Room.

Butler’s conception of a ‘bond of brotherhood’ led to the writing of 50 songs between 1864 and 1897.

To the present generation of Harrovians, School life without these songs would be almost unimaginable and three principal ideas form their basis. The first relates to the history of Harrow: Queen Elizabeth (1875), St Joles (1885) and Byron Lay (1884). The second group of songs were written in praise of sport: Willow the King (1867) and, of course, Forty Years On (1872). The third group were about common experiences of Harrow life: The Voice of the Bell (1870) and, more lastingly, Five Hundred Faces (1883), which expressed the emotions of the timid new boy in strange surroundings. The words were written by Edmund Howson (Harrow Master 1881–1905), Montagu Butler’s son-in-law. In 1883, there were 500 boys in the School; 70 years later, in 1953, there were about 570 and I was that timid new boy.

Sir Winston Churchill was at Harrow from 1888 to 1892. In My Early Life, published in 1930, he wrote, ‘Headmasters have powers at their disposal with which prime ministers have never been invested’. Sir Winston felt the power of Harrow songs from an early age.

Churchill Songs at Harrow are said to have originated in 1940 when Jock Colville (The Head Master's 19283), himself an Old Harrovian and Churchill’s assistant private secretary, heard Churchill singing St Joles in his bath and arranged for him to visit the School for Songs.

By 1940, even before the bombs fell, the flow of pupils had almost dried up and Harrow was facing collapse.

113

event of the year, and this is his 14th visit.” Dr James then congratulated Sir Winston on “the signal honour of being created a Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter”.

He finished by saying, “And now we shall get the boys to sing some of the Songs which he and all Harrovians love, and if they sing well enough we hope they will get a reward a lot better than the proverbial supper – a few words from Sir Winston himself”.

Noel Bolingbroke-Kent 29 November 1953.

The number of boys was down to just over 300, only slightly more than when Joseph Drury (17852 –1805 2 ), who educated five of Harrow’s seven prime ministers, became Head Master 150 years earlier. West Acre had closed in 1939; Rendalls and Bradbys closed in 1942.

Many of the younger staff were away at the war. It was against this background that Sir Winston made this first of a series of annual visits to Harrow for what became Churchill Songs; Colville and his brother Jack, together with four cabinet ministers, were in attendance.

The visits continued until 1961 and Churchill Songs have for 80 years now been one of the highlights of the Harrow calendar.

On the day of Friday 27 November 1953, I remember feeling a sense of awe at the impending arrival of the Great Man, only eight years after the end of World War II. His entrance to Speech Room was greeted with a roar of applause, which continued long after he had taken his place on the stage between Lady Churchill and Dr RL James (1953 3–1971 2 ), the new Head Master. Also seated on the stage were distinguished Old Harrovians and former members of the cabinet, including Leo Amery (West Acre 18873) giving support to his illustrious junior of nearly 70 years before, and Field Marshal Earl Alexander of Tunis (The Head Master's 19061 ), the victorious Commander-in-Chief of North Africa, whose younger son had entered the School the year before.

The Head Master introduced Churchill with these words: “You have not come here tonight to hear me speak. You have come, as I have come, to welcome and acclaim the man who has in the fullest possible sense won imperishable fame and is Harrow’s greatest son.

His annual visit, starting in the dark days of 1940, is the

The presentation of Churchill songs in 1953 was not as sophisticated as it is now. The programme of events was typed out on a single sheet with nine songs together with Auld Lang Syne and God Save the Queen. Five Hundred Faces was the third song. Being less than five feet four, I was dressed in an Eton jacket and Eton collar, the “bumfreezer” for shorter boys which was discontinued about 15 years later. I did not have to learn the words by heart and sang them from my Song Book, which was signed with my name, the letters RCl (Remove Classical) and OGB, the initials of my House Master Oliver Bowlby (19423–19542 ). I do not recall feeling nervous, although The Harrovian reported: ‘The new boy of the day, N M Bolingbroke-Kent, Moretons, did full justice to Five Hundred Faces; clear and tuneful he managed to give, perhaps without difficulty, that hint of nervousness which is an essential part of the atmosphere of the song’.

Before the last two songs, Sir Winston made a speech comparable to his great wartime speeches which began, “This year I am a 14 yearer. More than any of you can say.

It is astonishing how quickly time seems to go. I do remember coming down here in a rather tragic moment in our lives, in 1940, and it was suggested that we sing a few songs to keep up our spirits, and I have always found in the Harrow songs a great source of inspiration”.

After Songs, Sir Winston always walked to the Head Master’s house, as I did on this occasion. Following a conversation between my mother and the policeman outside the front door, I found myself standing in front of the Great Man. He was sitting in a chair in the corner of the drawing room holding a glass of something in his hand. I clearly remember what he said. He growled, “In my day I felt like a waif before the wine”, a reference to the third line of the first verse. The climax of the meeting was that Sir Winston signed my Song Book ‘Winston S Churchill’ in bold handwriting right across the page under OGB. It is a truly remarkable coincidence that E E Bowen wrote the words of Giants in 1874, the year of Sir Winston Churchill’s birth. How could Bowen have known that in that year was born the greatest Giant of them all – a man who served as a cavalry officer, actually on a horse, in Queen Victoria’s army before ushering in the nuclear age during his last term as prime minister, champion of democracy, saviour of the free world, subject of more than a thousand biographies, perhaps the greatest single figure in British history? One hundred years hence, barring the end of the world or the abolition of public schools, Harrow will still be celebrating Churchill Songs and remembering the man who, in the words of Dr James in 1953, ‘won imperishable fame and is Harrow’s greatest son’.

FOLLOW UP! • SECRET HARROW

114

DOORS

BEHIND CLOSED Some of these doors will be etched in your memory as deep as the carvings in the Fourth Form Room, and some of you will remember Custos’ door better than others! Others may be a little harder to pinpoint. Remember to come and visit us at No 19 when you’re next visiting the Hill.

2

3

1

8

9

4

6

5

7 10

1 The Chapel 2 The Vaughan Library 3 The Ryan Theatre 4 Custos 5 The Chapel Crypt 6 The Old Etonian 7 Modern Languages Building 8 Art Schools 9 Old Schools 10 Shepherd Churchill Hall 11 Speech Room 12 St Mary's Church 13 The Maths Building 14 No 5 The Bursary 15 The Old Shop on the High Street 16 Billing's & Edmonds 17 The Fourth Form Room 18 Harrow Association and Harrow Development Trust Office 19 The Old Music Schools

17

18

19

14 15 11

16 13 12

115

FOLLOW UP! • OH PROMOTIONS

116

20% DISCOUNT

free consultation

40% DISCOUNT

MASON & SONS

C&W WEALTH MANAGEMENT

Mason & Sons was founded by David Mason and later joined by his son Elliot (The Head Master’s 20063), established to satisfy the sartorial needs of gentlemen of all ages across the world who appreciate British style. The company aims to bridge the gap between old-school craftsmanship and modern technology, offering personal service and excellent products, along with a simple ordering process and convenient delivery.

After almost a decade of Pension and Wealth Planning, Alexander Wheeler (The Knoll 1999 3) launched C&W Wealth Management last year, a financial advisory firm.

The company specialises in pensions, protection and Inheritance tax planning, servicing clients across London and the Home Counties.

Call 020 7437 7007 or visit www.masonandsons.com and use code HARROW20 at checkout to claim discount

20% DISCOUNT IKARIA FOOD

To claim your free consultation and discount, email Alex directly on Alexander.Wheeler@sjpp.co.uk noting that you are an OH

on pizza orders for over fifty guests for 2021 bookings

30% DISCOUNT

HAPPIZZALY EVER AFTER

Nick Mostrous (Moretons 1996 ) went back to his Greek roots, travelling around the country with his wife Marlous.

Healthy, Greek-islands inspired food, drinks, award-winning coffee, bread, honey and much more!

3

Old and current Harrovians, get in touch and come by if you are in Amsterdam to claim your discount and a very warm welcome!

Having trained at the Savoy Grill, Gregory Schaad-Jackson (The Park 1991 3) went on to open Gordon Ramsay’s first restaurant at the London Hotel in NYC. He is now Executive Chef at family-run catering company Sissi Fabulous Food which caters for all manner of events from charity fundraisers to intimate dinner parties, and offers cooking lessons.

Quote OHPIZZAOFF! when you submit your enquiry at www.sissifabulousfood.com/#enquiry

20%

10%

DISCOUNT

DISCOUNT

FERAGAIA

STABB INTERIORS

Scotland’s first alcohol-free spirit founded by Jamie Wild (Elmfield 20043). Distilled, bottled and hand blended in the Scottish Lowlands, made from land and sea botanicals.

Feragaia brings together fourteen botanicals to create amber-hued spirit with citrus top notes, a herbaceous body and warming finish.

James Stabb (The Head Master’s 19863) is the Founder, Owner & Managing Director of Stabb Interiors, who specialise in commercial interior design and refurbishment projects.

We devote our time to delivering top quality design and a fast-track, turn-key service for office occupiers and building owners in Central London and the South East. Stabb Interiors is offering OHs a 10% discount on all refurbishment and commercial furniture quotations.

Use code WILDEARTH at checkout www.feragaia.com to claim your discount

In order to claim the discount please contact info@stabb.co.uk quoting OH Discount Offer

ECO BUILDERS David Brace (The Knoll 19863) founded Eco Builders, spurred on by the appalling service the public receives from residential construction companies in London. Eco offers genuine trusted guidance and professionally managed projects. Years of experience in residential construction has given Eco the knowledge and tools required to confidently return building projects to what they should be, but sadly are so often anything but.

To claim your 20% discount off the price list on all works required, email your project details (however small) to david@ecobuilders.co stating you are an OH, or create a request online at www.ecobuilders.co

20% DISCOUNT

117

PROMOTE YOUR BUSINESS TO FELLOW OHS IN THE BUSINESS DIRECTORY FEATURE ON OH CONNECT ohconnect.org.uk/business-directory

10%

discounted investment opportunity

DISCOUNT

STAMP FREE LIMITED

CIDENTRO CIDER HOUSE

Stamp Free Limited is developing a digital postage solution for the global postal market. Part of that solution is the Stamp Free™ mobile app which allows users to send letters without needing to use physical stamps. You write your letter, use the app and then post the letter in your nearest letterbox – Stamp Free!

There is a funding round in Q2 2021 at a £5m valuation.

There will be a limited seed funding round at a discounted valuation of £2.5m inQ2 2020 for selected investors and OHs.

Cidentro Cider House, founded by Matthew Cook (Bradbys 1982 3) and his wife, produce a unique range of ciders created from English cider apples. Inspired by tradition and a time when English cider was a distinguished drink, they aim to bring a modern approach to cider for enjoyment in the same way as wine. Cidentro ciders only use 100% pressed juice from heritage apples, with no added water or artificial sweeteners. The company’s range includes still cider, sparkling cider and a rosé cider created from a blend of English cider and English Pinot Noir wine.

Any OH interested can contact Hugh Craigie Halkett (Moretons 1982 1) by email at hugh.ch@stampfree.co.uk

Visit www.cidentro.co.uk and use code harrow at checkout to claim discount

30%

10%

DISCOUNT

ON SHARES IN HORSES

OLD GOLD RACING

TOASTABAGS Guy Unwin (The Knoll 1966 2) invented the Toastabag around twenty years ago, and it has sold successfully across the world since. With his company Planit Products Ltd, Guy invents and refines new products and brings them to the market.

The products are manufactured at the Planit Products Ltd factory in Malvern, not far from Malvern College where Harrow relocated to during WWII. To claim your discount, enter code Harrow at checkout on www.toastabags.com

Old Gold Racing, co-directed by Edward Seyfried (The Head Master’s 1980 3) and George Waud (The Park 1980 3), is a racehorse syndication business which offers the thrill and experience of owning a real racehorse for a fraction of the normal price and, with shares starting at £60, making a fantastic present for the racing lover. The company has ambitious growth plans and will seek to raise a second round of funding in Q3 or Q4 of 2020 in line with its plan to build a community of 75,000 syndicate owners over the next three years. OGR is delighted to offer OHs a 10% discount on shares in its horses.

To claim your discount, simply use the promo code FollowUp when completing your purchase on www.oldgoldracing.com

20%

special offer on 2021 holidays

OFF RATE CARD

NEXTSHOOT

OFFBEAT SAFARIS

Dominic Sutherland (The Park 1986 ) is Managing Director of NextShoot, a full-service video production company based in London working with global clients that include Bloomberg, the National Gallery and the RSC. NextShoot have been helping businesses and organisations tell their stories through video since 2009 and are experts in every aspect of corporate video production, from concept and script development to filming, graphics and post-production.

3

For 20% off rate card, email mail@nextshoot.com and quote SFD2020 to claim your discount until the end of 2020. www.nextshoot.com

Offbeat Safaris operate some of the most unique and authentic safari camps and lodges in Kenya, with properties in the Maasai Mara, Laikipia and the Great Rift Valley, all with only six to eight rooms or tents. We also run some of the most exciting horse-riding safaris on offer. If any OH would like to know more about our safaris in East Africa please contact Piers Winkworth (The Grove 19903) at piers@offbeatsafaris.com. He would be delighted to help organise your trip of a lifetime – whether honeymoon, family safari or retired couples.

To claim your special offer on 2021 holidays, quote The Grove in your email. www.offbeatsafaris.com

LOVE BRAND & CO LOVE BRAND & Co. is the British luxury men’s swimwear brand committed to helping save elephants and other endangered species. Marrying the passions of founder, Oliver Tomalin, the brand focuses on summer lifestyle, sustainability and a promise to elephants with the initiative Trunks for Trunks, donating a percentage of company revenues not profits - every year to wildlife conservation.

To claim your 20% discount use code OH20 when you checkout at www.lovebrand.com

20% DISCOUNT

FOLLOW UP! • UPCOMING EVENTS

118

At the time of going to press, the Covid-19 situation has meant that far fewer events have been planned for the Harrow Association calendar than usual. Although some of the events below may well have to be postponed, we hope we will be in a position to schedule more events soon.

If you would like to hear more about developments to the events programme, keep an eye on OH Connect and our social media pages and please ensure we have your current email address. Email oldharrovians@harrowschool.org.uk to update your contact details.

LONG DUCKER BIKE RIDE

HA SONGS FOR OHs 1975 3–19802

HARROW WANDERERS 150TH ANNIVERSARY DINNER

THURSDAY 1 OCTOBER 2020 6.30PM

THURSDAY 15 OCTOBER 2020

SUNDAY 6 SEPTEMBER 2020 OHs, family and friends of the School are invited to take part in this fully guided and supported ride starting and ending at Harrow School.

Contact Tim Dalton (Newlands 1992 3) at tmd@harrowschool.org.uk for further details

THE KNOLL HOUSE DINNER THURSDAY 12 NOVEMBER 2020 7.15PM FOR 8PM

Ironmongers’ Hall, Shaftesbury Place, Barbican, London EC2Y 8AA

Speech Room, Harrow School

The Long Room, Lord’s

Songs will be followed by a drinks reception in the Shepherd Churchill Room and buffet supper in the Shepherd Churchill Hall.

Book today for this special anniversary dinner via ohconnect.org.uk

UPCOMING

EVENTS

HARROW ASSOCIATION CHRISTMAS CAROLS

HARROW SCHOOL CAREERS CONVENTION

MONDAY 7 DECEMBER 2020 7PM

SUNDAY 17 JANUARY 2021

Harrow School St Stephen Walbrook, 39 Walbrook, London EC4N 8BN

OHs are invited back to speak to current boys at the annual careers convention.

Join us at this breathtaking church in the City for a unique evening of Christmas carols followed by some festive fare.

Contact Michael Wright, Harrow School Careers Advisor at WrightMD@harrowschool.org.uk if you would like to help.

HOW TO BOOK FOR EVENTS Sign up to ohconnect.org.uk and visit the events section.

SAVE THE DATE 15 November 2020

FOUNDER’S DAY SAVE THE DATE SUNDAY 7 FEBRUARY 2021

CONNECT WITH THE HA Sign up to ohconnect.org.uk and connect with the global OH community.

Email ha@harrowschool.org.uk

Email haevents@harrowschool.org.uk

Telephone 020 8872 8200

Telephone 020 8872 8186

Visit harrowschool.org.uk/oldharrovians to:

Write to Harrow Association, 5A High Street, Harrow on the Hill, Middlesex HA1 3HP

LONG DUCKER

• View the regularly updated events calendar • Read the latest issues of The Harrovian, Follow Up! and the Harrow Record

• Access The Harrovian, Harrow Record

and Contio digital archives, the World War I memorial and the Harrow families websites

FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA harrowassociation

@oldharrovians @oldharrovians Harrow Association

HARROW SCHOOL ONLINE Discover a world-leading sixth form education, available online.

This online A Level school, for girls and boys aged 16-18, is specifically designed for effective full-time online learning.

PERSONALISED LEARNING

TEACHING EXCELLENCE

UNIVERSITY PREPARATION

Study from home, on a flexible timetable, with a proven digital learning platform.

Live taught lessons, in small class sizes, with peers across the world.

Preparing pupils for the world’s top universities, and beyond.

Welcoming academic and ambitious pupils for September 2020. Limited spaces.

www.harrowschoolonline.org/followup

No one has spent more time travelling on the Arctic Ocean's sea-ice than explorer, Pen Hadow (The Park 1975 3 ). He now leads an international ocean conservation campaign to create the North Pole Wildlife Reserve – the largest reserve in the world – to protect the wildlife dependent on the sea-ice habitat, and all the marine species to the south for whom the world’s coolest waters will likely become the refuge-of-last resort.

Photo: martinhartley.com

Read more on page 66.