Tulse Hill School

Tulse Hill School was a large comprehensive school for boys in Upper Tulse Hill, in the London Borough of Lambeth in south London, England. The school spanned eight floors and had almost two thousand pupils.[1] It opened in 1956 and closed in 1990. Notable alumni included Ken Livingstone, the former London Mayor.

Tulse Hill School
Address
Upper Tulse Hill

London
,
Lambeth

England
Coordinates51°26′44″N 0°06′58″W
Information
MottoAd unum omnes
(All to a man)
Established1956
Closed1990
GenderBoys
Age11 to 18
Enrolmentc.2000
HousesOriginally 8, later replaced by year group pastoral units
Colour(s)Blue   and white  

History

The school was opened on 11 September 1956[2] under the headmastership of Mr. Clifford Thomas.[1] Student management was originally based on public school lines employing a house system, and having prefects (both school and house). Originally, there were upper and lower schools, and within the sixth forms upper and lower sixth, with the lower sixth being called the remove, similar to its close neighbour Dulwich College.

Later, the school moved away from a house system, replacing it with pastoral group units. The school operated this system until its closure in 1990. Changing population figures for the area have been given as the reason for closure.

Education

Originally, the school had a very broad curriculum providing for the normal grammar school academic courses, including Latin, Greek, French, physics, chemistry, biology and other general subjects.[2] These subjects were taken to the advanced level (A-level) of the General Certificate of Education examination.

Special facilities were also provided for work in engineering, building, art, music and commercial subjects to prepare boys for industry, commerce and the professions. Pupils were also prepared for student and craft apprenticeships.[2]

Catchment

The school drew from South London suburbs, including Streatham, Brixton, Herne Hill, Clapham and Brockwell Park.

School badge and motto

School badge
Tulse Hill School badge

The school badge depicts paschal lamb supporting a cross atop a strip of blue and white wavy lines. In itself atop a shield decorated with blue and white wavy lines. The top half of the emblem (the lamb on the strip of blue and white wavy lines) is borrowed from the crest of the London Borough of Lambeth in which the school was situated. The only difference being that the Lambeth crest has a Pennon flowing from the cross, whereas Tulse Hill School's emblem has no pennon. The lower half (shield decorated with blue and white wavy lines) is the bottom half of London County Council's arms.

The blue and white wavy lines represent the River Thames (with which the borough has considerable frontage); the paschal lamb with cross has always formed part of the seal of Lambeth (be it the late vestry or the Borough Council), and in heraldic terms is a "canting" or punning reference to the name of the borough.[3]

School motto

The Latin Ad unum omnes was employed meaning All for One; One for All.

Uniform

Thomas's of Herne Hill and Clapham South, and later Temples' of Brixton and Streatham, presented themselves as outfitters to the school offering bespoke tailoring linked to exclusive craftsmanship. The school badge could be bought as a single item and then sewn to a proprietary blazer although this was hated by Mr Thomas as he claimed it looked more like a wolf than a lamb.[1]

In the 1960s, the 6th form tie was dark blue decorated with multiple images of the school emblem and the upper school tie was royal blue with diagonal stripes, the stripes being dark blue with a white centre. One striking feature of the early years of Tulse Hill School uniform was the house colours displayed on school caps. When the school first opened the boys had to wear a black school cap with the school badge on the front section and the house denoted by a coloured button at the apex of the cap. In later years (c.1958), the cap was redesigned with the rear section in one of eight house colours.

All students were expected to wear school uniform with the exception of sixth formers (who in later years (after 1966) were allowed "modest discretion". House prefects had a measure of disciplinary control over pupils in the same house and were distinguished by small oak leaves sewn under the school badge. School prefects had greater authority and wore large oak leaves. In the late 1950s, school prefects also wore a short gilet style gown with blue facings around the school. This gown was worn by school prefects until at least 1966.

Houses

Games and social activities were originally organised on a house system, with boys being allocated a house on entering the school and thereafter being guided by a housemaster.[2] It was the housemasters' job to get to know their individual house members and there were often house meetings after morning assembly. Inter-house sporting fixtures were another feature of school life, together with house outings and social activities. The house system at Tulse Hill was eventually replaced by pastoral group units.

The eight school houses were named after eminent men, and a woman, who had associations with the borough of Lambeth. At the time of the school abandoning the house system (circa 1987), there were only five houses with Wren, Temple and Faraday having been retired some years earlier.

Each house had its own colours:

House Founded Colours Named after
Blake1956 Light blue William Blake, poet
Brunel1956 Pink (later dark blue after Faraday was retired) Isambard Kingdom Brunel, engineer
Dickens1956 Green Charles Dickens, author
Faraday1956 Black until about 1959, then dark blue Michael Faraday, scientist
Temple1956 Yellow William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury
Turner1956 Maroon J. M. W. Turner, landscape artist
Webbs1956 Grey (later yellow after Temple was retired) Matthew Webb the first to swim the English Channel (a painting depicting this hung in the school hall)
Wren1956 Brown (1956–79) Christopher Wren, architect

Cadet forces

Unlike most comprehensive schools, Tulse Hill established detachments of the Army Cadet Force and the Air Training Corps. The Cadet Corps had regular weekend training and annual camps away from the school grounds. Initial accommodation in the school was non-existent but a permanent building was erected at the end of the cycle sheds in 1962 with each unit occupying half.

The Army Cadet Force unit was established as 23 (City of London) Company, affiliated to the Royal Fusiliers. After 1968, this changed to 74 Company South East London ACF and the regimental affiliation was changed to the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers. The first Officer Commanding was Captain A J "Jerry" Hall who was also a German language teacher in the school.[1]

Buildings and grounds

To house in excess of two thousand boys attending the school, its buildings were necessarily large, the main focus of which was a large glass clad building of eight floors, served by four lifts. Until the late 1970s a lift operator would press the desired floor button for the students.[1] In an attached annexe was the administration block which also contained the kitchens, teaching staff room and the Great Hall. Morning assembly was held in the hall which had an entirely professional stage lighting system by Strand Electric. Off this hall were a number of music rooms equipped with an orchestra of instruments. The massive ex-Rose Hill Gaumont Cinema organ, a two-manual Compton which had such entertainment effects as drums, cymbals and whistles removed before re-installation, had pride of place in the Great Hall and provided a unique musical experience as it blasted out items including the "Trumpet Voluntary" and the school song. Cracks which developed in the rear wall of the building were thought to have been caused by enthusiastic use of the lower registers on the instrument.

In addition to the main educational building there was a gymnasium block, containing six gymnasia, and a workshop block where woodwork, engineering and building trades were taught.

The main building suffered from serious structural subsidence in the 1980s and it was necessary to install huge wooden props at the Great Hall end to stabilise the structure. (Actually wooden props in the Great Hall were in place in the early to mid-1960s and were there in 1966 due to severe cracks in the building. It was a common rumour amongst the pupils that the original design was for two four-storey buildings but cost led to them being combined as one.) The buildings were demolished in the early 1990s. Following demolition, the site was bought by a housing association and homes for 160 people have since been built on the ex-school site, most infamous as the estate from which Jean Charles de Menezes emerged on the day of his fatal shooting. In 1997, the school entrance and the caretaker's cottage remained on site. House builders on site said that the school building basement (plant) level remained, as it had simply been "filled" in.[1] After the school had been demolished in the 1990s, excavations revealed an early Saxon settlement which included eight sunken-floored buildings.

Sporting facilities

Sport was seen as an important component of school life from its very inception even though the restricted size of the site did not allow for the provision of the required facilities for field sports. The school had six gymnasia, extensive paved grounds, coach transport to Priest Hill Playing Fields at Ewell, and use of a boathouse at Putney. An on-site swimming pool was mooted in the early 1960s but that proposal never matured as the headmaster somewhat controversially devoted fund-raising efforts towards the purchase of the school organ. For a time in the 1960s, the school used the National Sports Centre at Crystal Palace for swimming and also held sports days there. Herne Hill cycling stadium was also used for sports days. Sports played included football, cricket, hockey, tennis, field sports, rugby union and athletics and even fencing.

Off-site activities

Tulse Hill School displayed a commitment to off-site activities. School trips around the UK were common and there were other trips to various parts of Europe and even to the Caribbean and the United States, for cultural, sporting, artistic and social purposes. Chief sites were Priest Hill Sports Grounds at Ewell, The Croft at Etchingham and Davos in Switzerland.

The Croft

The Croft was Tulse Hill School's study centre situated in the village of Etchingham in Sussex. It was a former hotel, converted in 1971 during Ray Long's time as head for the school's use and stood in 14 acres (5.7 ha) of its own grounds. Every Monday in term time a party of up to 30 boys with one or more teachers would leave the school to spend up to five days at the Croft on specially designed study courses. Activities for first-year students included visits to Bodiam Castle and Hastings, visits to farms and route-finding exercises using the Croft's own resources, which included an assault course. Cycling enthusiasts at the school would bike the 50 miles (80 km) to the Croft and back some weekends. The Croft continues in operation as a Lambeth Council initiative.[1]

Trips abroad

Tulse Hill School sent pupils to a number of foreign locations for sporting, educational and recreational/cultural activities. The school sent a cricket team to Jamaica (where they lost every game of cricket but won every game of football played as an unofficial addition to the trip), a rugby XV to the United States, and a drama production to Berlin when the school's version of The Tempest, adapted as a Caribbean musical, was selected to represent Britain at an international youth arts festival in that city.[1]

Other locations included Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, France, Norway and Belgium.

Alumni

Former teachers

References
  1. Tulse Hill School Website
  2. London County Council, Secondary Schools: Division 8, April 1962, page 24
  3. civicheraldry.co.uk
  4. "BOOKS / Great Brain Spotter: The list of past members of Philip". The Independent. 28 February 1993. Retrieved 22 September 2017.
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