Sydenham High School: 130 years of being fearless

Sydenham High School GDST – a dip into the archives

1887-2017 This year Sydenham High celebrates 130 years of educating girls to exceptionally high standards.

1990s The school opened its doors on 22 February 1887 with just 20 pupils in the former Longton Hall Hydropathic Hotel.

1895 The school’s logo may have changed but its original moto, ‘Nyle Ne Drede’, later ‘Nyle Ye Drede’, is still very much at the heart of the school’s ethos in educating its students to have the courage to try new things and the self-belief to see them through.

2000

1987

2012

1888 whole school photograph The whole school including a smattering of boys

Mrs William Grey

Miss Mary Gurney

The Mothers: Founders of the Girls’ Public Day School Trust These four ladies championed the unfashionable cause of education for women.

They founded the Girls’ Public Day School Trust in 1872 and opened Sydenham High School in 1887.

They overcame considerable opposition on grounds of religion, social status and gender as well as a lack of funds like the endowments that supported the famous boys’ public schools of the time.

Miss Emily Shirreff

Lady Stanley of Alderley

“It would be an illusion to suppose that the children of fashionable people would be found sitting down with the daughters of their grocers and bakers” The Bishop of Manchester “Learning in a woman is not only unnecessary but undesirable” Unknown

Staff 1915

Staff 1950

School prefects Circa 1900

School prefects 1950

The aim of the GPDST was to offer middle class girls the sort of education given to their brothers in the public and grammar schools.

It needed to provide an alternative to the Schools Inquiry Commission view of girls’ education (see opposite).

The GPDST aims were modest but viewed as radical at the time. Its aims were to provide an academic grounding, first class teaching and an environment that developed character and personality..

Schools Inquiry Commission 1868

Defects in the system of education of girls Want of thoroughness and foundation; want of system; slovenliness and showy superficiality; inattention to rudiments; undue time given to accomplishments – and these not taught intelligently or in any scientific manner.

The Entrance Hall of the Longton Grove (West Hill) site

The first site of the school, was number 72, West Hill – which later became Westwood Hill. It was opposite our current site on the corner of Longton Grove, where the flats now stand.

Longton Grove site ‘THE DUNGEON’ C.1915 Cycling to school was a popular mode of transport Originally, the bike shed (known as ‘the dugeon’, were Turkish Baths when the building was a hotel

The Dining Hall (Longton Grove) A two course lunch was served to pupils by uniformed maids

Current Dining Hall in the 1950s, which was also the gym!

Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll and daughter of Queen Victoria was a champion of liberal causes in contrast to her mother’s staunchly conservative views on the role of women.

Princess Louise corresponded with Victorian feminists including Josephine Butler and Elizabeth Garrrett.

She was the most creative of Queen Victoria’s and Prince Albert’s children. Paintings and sculptures by her are still in existence today.

The first Royal visit - 1891 By 1890 the school had expanded to 300 pupils and the Kindergarten had moved to Fairlight on Longton Grove.

The GPDST built a new school hall on the old playground. It was opened by Princess Louise in 1891.

The Houses were founded in 1907 and originally they were named Grey, Gurney, Stanley and Louise.

Classroom Circa 1912

Geography lesson 1963 (in one of the English classrooms)

Science lab pre-1934 Longton Grove site

Biology lesson 1950s

Biology lesson 1970s

The art studio Circa 1912

The art studio 1960

1902 Hockey match: Sydenham High v. Blackheath High It’s unusual to have action shots from this era

In the 1950s Miss Chadwick, who was one of the first 20 girls to join the school, recounted a memory from 1900 when she came face to face with an escaped elephant in Sydenham!

The elephant, Archie, had escaped from Sanger’s circus in Crystal Palace when one of the other elephants, Charlie, killed a keeper who mistreated them. Archie was finally tracked down on Hayes Common a day later. He was eventually coaxed back to the circus by the other elephants who were brought to have their lunch with him on the common.

The school orchestra Circa 1908

On the whole the behaviour of the girls has been good ‌ In one way only have I found them unable or unwilling to follow my advice and that is in their immoderate use of slang, a modern weakness of both boys and girls. I do not see why it is necessary for boys to talk an almost unintelligible language, but modern weakness it is a great pity that girlsAshould feel it necessary to follow their example and use comparatively few words that are in the dictionary, or rather, if they use them, employ them not in the sense in which the dictionary says they should be used.

1913: Miss Sheldon’s annual report to parents Source: Newscuttings 1887-1937

Elaine Garbutt in gym uniform 1912

Hall and gymnasium (Longton Grove site) Old girls remember the relief when this gym uniform was changed

Dance lessons 1950 in what is now the Westwood Theatre

1905 The Hockey First Eleven in their long skirts

1917: The Junior department dressed up for Sports Day at Fairlight, their previous site

So much have the times changed that in the early days of the Schools’ existence a Mistress considered it necessary to obtain permission to ride to school on her bicycle. Now, in 1919, a member of the staff arrives on a motor cycle, and another member of the staff has permission to come by aeroplane.

History of the School 1887-1919

Source: School magazine 1918-1919

‘Quality Street’: the staff play in 1926

The working days at the school were Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and on those days girls should not be distracted by parties, journeys to town, telephoning to friends and other amusements.

Miss Sanders annual report to parents 1921 Source: Newscuttings 1887-1937

1934: Sydenham High moves into Horner Grange Originally built as a diamond merchants’ residence

School sets out not only to teach certain subjects but to be the centre of a life lived in common. The education which it gives is the ‘culture which survives the forgetting of facts’. And that culture is the outcome of all sides of school life, not only of the academic.

Miss Smith annual prize giving address 1938

Source: Newscuttings 1887-1937

Miss Sheldon, who had retired, returned to the school to lay the foundation stone for the school’s new hall (which became the Music Suite and now Westwood Theatre) to mark the school’s 50th anniversary.

A Jubilee Register was published with a summary of alumnae and their lives after school.

Twelfth Night in the amphitheatre

Miss Smith and staff

Sports Day making use of the grounds

Sixth Formers

1937-1939: There was only a short time to make the most of the school’s new space before the threat of war changed school life.

The war years A short evacuation to Brighton along with Streatham High School ended when France fell and Brighton was no longer deemed safe. School life continued at Westwood Hill but by the end of the war only 25 girls remained in the school.

‘Indoor’ and’ outdoor’ bomb shelters

The Critic Staff play 1947 A critical review written by a brave student “The first act tended to be a little tedious…. The play was beautifully presented and produced … In Act 1 there was a tendency to rather fussy by-play between Dangle and Sneer….”

Review by A Lynn

Source: Magazine 1947

70TH BIRTHDAY DINNER 1957

Lino print, produced by a student in 1957

The cedar tree was hit by lightning in November 1957 and in the aerial view of the school in 1958, it is missing. A replacement must have been planted, as it appears in the photo from the 1984 Summer fair and can be seen outside, fully grown today!

Space was an issue as the school expanded after the war. Sixth formers used caravans as study rooms, until a temporary Sixth form block (below) was built in the 1960s and eventually the new Sixth form centre in 1975.

1962: 75th anniversary

Sydenham High alumnae, author and playwright, Winifred Ashton, known as Clemence Dane returned as guest speaker for Speech Day and attended the OGA celebrations for the school’s 75th anniversary.

A service of thanksgiving was held in a packed Southwark Cathedral attended by staff, students and parents.

Girls’ qualities and womanhood are ‘frustrated and wasted’ when they are educated to follow intellectual pursuits and the country is squandering millions on trying to make women into imitation men.

Sir John Newsom The Public Schools’ Commission 1968 I would like to take him to visit he homes of any of our old girls who are most efficient and charming wives and mothers and able also in many cases, to hold down a professional job … This was not in spite of but because of the education they received.

Miss Yardley Speech day 1968

The world was changing. … but not everyone was happy

Reporting Speech day 1967

Headmistress, Margaret Hamilton in a bulldozer, helping to dig the foundations of the Centenary building in 1987

1984 The Gym – now Longton Hall

‌ to be continued