Keble College, Oxford - the Clapton Years

by Chris Meakin [Nov 2005]

In 1970, Keble usefully published a Centenary Register with brief self-written biographies for everyone who had attended the college during the first hundred years from its foundation in 1870. Those connected with KES, after the 1930s, are shown below in their year of entry, or 'Matriculation'.

Throughout the Clapton Years, Keble probably ran second only to The Queen's College at Oxford for the number of Old Edwardians it admitted. The Register is very revealing: Bert Towers' arrival at KES in 1946 appears to have triggered something in its success at the college, while Nat Clapton's arrival four years later led to even more.

The record also gives the lie to intermittent suggestions that boys were force-fed at KES and then faded with poor degrees at university. The Register shows that of 34 KES degrees recorded, there were three Firsts, 25 Seconds, four Thirds and two Fourths. About 10% Firsts was normal for Oxford in those days, Fourths were at least as rare but the KES achievement in Second Class degrees was significantly above average; probably only half the degrees awarded by the university generally were Seconds.

1932 Robert Nigel Towers Magdalen College School, History Exhibition, Class II in History 1935, Class II in Geography 1937.
Master at KES from 1946 and Senior Geography master for most of it.
1932 - 1947 None No Old Edwardians are recorded as entering Keble and very few before 1932.
1947 Derrick Cantrell KES, Music Scholar. No degree stated. Cathedral organist
John Bryan Arnold Burridge Bristol Grammar School, Class II in History 1951.
Chooses to omit all reference to his time as a History master at KES.
1948 John Dickens KES, Science Exhibition Class II in Chemistry 1952
Peter Douglas Clare Points Taunton School, Class II English in 1951,
KES Senior English master 1958-63
1949 Peter Burton Buckroyd KES, Class III in Law 1952
1950 Peter Hadfield Wreghitt KES, Class IV in Languages 1953.
John William Hersee County Grammar School Lewes, Class I in Maths 1953,
Master at KES 1954-60
1951 Dennis Godfrey Brooke KES, Class II in Chemistry 1955
1952 William Ferguson KES, Class II in Chemistry 1956
John Saville Hill KES, Hon Scholarship 1954, Class II in Physics 1955
1953 John Bernard Brown KES, Class III in History, 1956
Ian James Gautier Marshall KES, Class IV in English 1956
David Pincombe Clayton Pearce KES, Class III in English 1956
1954 John Newell Robinson KES, Class II in PPE 1957
1955 Alan Raymond Jinkinson KES, Class II in History 1958
David John Heywood Senior KES, Class II in Languages 1958
John Wrigley Manchester Grammar School, Class II in Languages 1958,
Languages master at KES from 1964.
1956 David Malcolm Downes KES, History Exhibition, Class II in History 1959
Norman Lewis Glass KES, History Scholarship. Up for one year only.
Peter Thomas Holgate KES, Class I in Languages 1959
Roger Thompson KES, Class II in Law 1959
1957 none from KES
1958 Anthony Ernest Grant KES, Gomm Scholarship , Class II in PPE 1961
Graham Neal Ward KES, Languages Scholarship, Class II in Languages 1961
1959 Ronald Edward Bardgett KES, up for four terms only.
Michael Butler Hill KES, Class II in Languages 1962
Philip Howard Palmer KES, Class II in Law 1962
John Goronwy Robinson KES, History Scholarship, Class II in History 1962
1960 Peter William Cave KES, Geography Scholarship, Class I in Geography 1963
John Michael Haslam KES, Science Scholarship, Class II in Biochemistry 1964
Robert Randall Kershaw KES, Class II in History 1963
1961 Anthony Aidan Kelham KES, Geography Scholarship, Class II in Geography 1964
Roland Hedley Smith KES, Languages Scholarship, Class I in Languages 1965
1962 John Christopher Howard Meakin KES, Class II in PPE 1965
Paul Roderick Whyman KES, Languages Scholarship, Class II in Languages 1956
 Charles Hadman Cameron Baker Bromsgrove High School, from Leeds University for a Dip Ed.
RE Master at KES from 1963. School Librarian, scoutmaster, became Chairman of the Sheffield Association of Assistant Masters from 1967.
1963 James Michael Booth KES, Class III in History 1966
Christopher Martin Dolan KES, Music Scholarship, Class II in Music 1966
John Harold Kirkman KES, Class II in Geography 1966
1964 John Kenneth Baker KES, Class II in Languages 1968
Ian James Ford KES, Class II in Languages 1967
David Gordon Parrish KES, Class II in Geology 1967
1965 David Charles Winter KES, Class II in Geography 1968
1969 Thomas Peter Holt KES - the closing year of Keble's Centenary Register.
1970 David Thomson Bishop of Huntingdon (2008 - )