Archivist’s Account

Archivist’s Account Founder’s Day

Without the charitable impulses of individuals our older schools and colleges would not exist, and it is customary and proper to commemorate these founders. Benefactors sometimes liked to give their names to the foundation and host an annual day of commemoration – in colleges usually associated with a feast.

A BUST OF STEPHEN PERSE, LOCATED IN THE MAIN HALL OF THE UPPER SCHOOL. IN HIS HANDS LIES A PERSE CAKE, GIVEN TO ALL ON FOUNDER’S DAY.

David Jones joined The Perse in 1974 as a history teacher and was House Tutor at School House until 1982. He retired from teaching in 2008, but has continued at the School in his role as Archivist. S tephen Perse placed responsibility for his several benefactions upon his college, and also the carrying out of his wishes for commemoration. The accounts of his charities were to be displayed and examined in Gonville and Caius College on his mortuary day – that is, not the day he died but the day his will received probate, 14 December. There was to be a feast on that day, with a sermon preached the day before (in which Perse no doubt expected to be mentioned). The Perse Feast and Sermon continue to this day. But what of the School? After all, it was Perse’s chief benefaction, listed first in his will. The Ordinances of 1623 required that Perse be mentioned and thanks given in prayers at the start of each term, but there is no record of a Founder’s Day. That changed when the management of the school was reformed in 1841. It was laid down that 14 December should be kept by the School as ‘Dr Perse’s Day’ and should be a holiday. How far this was maintained is unclear but it may have lapsed, for in 1955 the words ‘Founder’s Day’ appear in the school calendar on 14 December, as if being revived. Nothing in The Pelican or the Governors’ minute book explains this. Perhaps some older readers might remember the circumstances of its reintroduction. Founder’s Day disappears from the calendar after 1970, although Perse continued to be remembered in the Founder’s Prayer, used at the start and end of term. The occasion was revived in 2009 but with a different date – and no holiday! A new date was required because the end of the Michaelmas term was congested with events, and the choice of 25 March followed a similar decision by Caius College, which also remembered Perse on that day. The date was the beginning of the New Year until the reform of the calendar in 1751, and was the time for presenting annual accounts. The financial year still observes this timing, and so the college moved the audit of Perse’s charities to be in accord with it. The Feast and Sermon were similarly rescheduled.

The School also instituted a Founder’s Day lecture, but alas no feast – school numbers were too great. Instead, a new tradition was invented, and on Founder’s Day the School can enjoy the Perse cake, distributed to all.

Stephen Perse was one of the most significant benefactors of the town, funding buildings at Caius College; improving roads (Maid’s Causeway) and water supply (Hobson’s Brook); and relieving destitution with almshouses and gifts for the poor. Above all, the founding of the Free Grammar School, linked to his college by scholarships and fellowships, was of the utmost importance in attempting to bridge the gap between town and gown. It provided a complete avenue of social mobility for the sons of poor townspeople whereby, for example, the son of a barber, Jeremy Taylor, could become a bishop. It is thanks to Stephen Perse that generations since have been helped to become useful, even distinguished citizens. A Founder’s Day is certainly his due.