Schools - 3

The Preparatory School for Boys

School Moto:  Seek Higher Things

Mr.G.R.Burnett the founder of Boys Preparatory School wrote the following for the 50th. anniversary issue of the school magazine in 1948 - The Seagull.

“At Seascale in September 1897 with its attraction of sea and mountain, good sands for bathing, and satisfactory road and rail communications, and within reach of my family connections I seemed to have found the right spot. Therefore having secured a suitable house, which now as the Lodge is again part of the school premises, in September of that year I made a start with half a dozen boys.

In January 1898 there was only one new boy, John Forster. I give his name because he is now well-known as Sir John Forster, K.C. For the summer term of 1899 I had an entry of eight, and by the end of that year the numbers had risen to over twenty, and anxiety as to the future was greatly reduced.

By the end of 1899 the question of accommodation had become a serious problem, because numbers having risen to about forty, it was no longer possible to carry on with boys scattered in three different houses lacking space and equipment essential for school purposes. There was no suitable building available. To build seemed the only course open to me. So I had to take another and deeper plunge. A loan was affected, an overdraft arranged with the bank, my savings added and the new school built. In September, 1901, we moved in. It was a bit of a scramble, for work inside the house was far from complete when the boys arrived. This building was to become Burnett House.

The next few years passed successfully and uneventfully the school comfortably full with about 40 boys. In 1903 I was married and celebrated by two operatic performances, the first a party in the village and the second for parents and friends. I was fortunate in my staff to whose loyalty, efficiency and friendship it pleases me to pay grateful tribute, and as terms went by I realised how important, how vital is the part which the headmasters wife can play in running a private school.

In 1906-7 we suffered a serious set back following a puzzling epidemic. A number of boys were seriously ill and one died the only death at school in 50 years. Numbers declined and it took some terms to recover. Before this period of depression, need for further accommodation had arisen. I wanted to add Manx View, the house in which the school had started, to the school premises but the then owner having refused an offer of considerably more than the actual value of the house, I found myself, reluctantly, obliged to build and so ” Lakenhow” was erected on the opposite side of the road overlooking the school playground. In addition to providing accommodation for myself and family it was planned to house about a dozen boys, and so enable me to increase the numbers when applications were received.

There were about 50 in 1914 when the first world war began and during the next year or two they rose to 55. I do not think that catering was quite so difficult or complicated as it became in the second world war. But it was far from easy. My wife was much helped by Mrs. Bulman, an able woman who owned and ran the principal shop in the village, and made a big success of it. Staffing was a difficulty. My mathematical master - a most valuable assistant, joined up at the beginning, and a junior man, also valuable, went rather later. I was dependant to a considerable extent on lady teachers and right well they did their job. One of them, Mrs. Carnett, a Dublin B.A., proved herself one of the best mathematical teachers I ever had. A man named James, rejected for Army service, was a useful allrounder, and took on the Scout troop which had been founded by C. Johnson is 1912, and ran it very well. But he had to leave on account of illness and was succeeded by H. Makin who remained on the staff till he finally retired. He died a few years ago.

During the war years our thoughts were filled with apprehension for the Old Boys who were serving, and with deep sorrow for those who lost their lives. Many of the 15 who died were dear friends. One could not but share the sorrow of those near and dear to them.

The end of the war in November 1918 was followed by an anxious term -Lent 1919; that virulent type of influenza [the spanish flu] which gripped the whole country was particularly bad in our part. Boys, domestics and teaching staff all went down with it, and there were some cases which caused much anxiety. I think only three escaped. I was one of the three. For some time it had been agreed that when I saw my way to retire my brother Frank—then a housemaster at St. Bees—should succeed me. When it came to the point I realised that I really enjoyed my work, or at any rate the teaching hours and close contact with the boys. I should have been content to carry on for some time longer, but my brother was feeling that for him it was desirable to make a start without undue delay. And so it was arranged that he should take over the school management, and that I should continue the teaching that I had been accustomed to do. Since at the same time I had a succession of Old Boys to coach for Matriculation and other exams my time was well filled. And so it continued till early in 1925.

The School lost 24 Old boys in the 1914-18 war. The memorial was unveiled on half term Saturday, June 17th.1922.

May I end up on a personal note. Fifty years is a very long time in prospect - in retrospect much shorter. It is a pleasure that I am able to keep in touch with the School, still full and flourishing in its 51st year.

The new factory at Sellafield, for Atomic research has caused a certain amount of uneasiness, and may eventually make a great deal of difference to the school’s life. Already there are plans to enlarge the population of Seascale, and about 200 houses are to be built in an area roughly centred on the village school. This is officially known as the “Extension of Seascale” and there is a “Further Extension” to follow, but all details are vague, and apparently subject to all sorts of variations without rhyme, reason, warning or anything else. So far as we can learn the Golf Course is to be retained, but I have heard that in the second extension there is a road across the field where we now play games. All the land to be built on is good farming land although there are a good many barren acres in the neighbourhood that would, so far as one can see, do just as well. What the planners do not seem to realise is that their work is permanent, whether right or wrong. I fear, too, that by the very nature of the factory we will he deprived of that beloved happy hunting ground of so many generations of us Seascale boys, the Calder. “Solitudinem Faciunt……”
All we can do is to hope that before a long time scientists will find some simpler way of producing this new ” blessing.”

G.R.Burnett handed over the running of his school to his son Roger Burnett & his wife in 1947. The running of the school changed from a family concern to that of a charitable trust in December 1967

Taken from The Cumberland News.July 26th 1968.

“HISTORIC LANDMARK” AS SEASCALE PREPARATORY SCHOOL STARTS NEW LIFE.

A plan which has assured the future of Seascale Preparatory School was outlined by Mr.John L. Burgess, chairman of Cumberland Newspapers Ltd., when old boys and parents honoured the headmaster, Mr. Roger Burnett on Friday night.

Mr. Burnett, principal, and member of a family which has guided the school for over 70 years, was presented with a pair of silver candlesticks by the Lord Lieutenant of Cumberland, Mr.J.C. Wade.
Presiding over a large gathering, Mr. Burgess said that in honouring Mr. and Mrs. Roger Burnett they also honoured the a memory of his uncle and aunt father and mother; the school had been in the family since 1897, and now an historic landmark had been reached in its history.

For the Burnett family were no longer proprietors of the establishment, which was starting a new phase in its life.

The all-important link connecting the old with the new was that Roger Burnett, headmaster for 21 years, was staying on and there would be a board of governors to support him.

When Mr. Burnett realised that his son, Ridley, had chosen a career other than private school mastering he had to look forward to the time when he wished to retire, said Mr. Burgess. Then, he would have to seek somebody with the necessary money to purchase the school.

“Quite often, but not always” he added, people who have money are not always the people best qualified to be headmasters. Mr.Burnett foresaw this and, with his dedication for the welfare of the school and for young boys, he decided to invite some old boys to form a Charitable Trust which would purchase the physical assets of the school from him and then, when the time came for him to retire, the governors could select a headmaster on his capabilities as a master and as guardian of young lives”.

Himself an old boy of the Preparatory School, Mr. Burgess said the successful arrangements included provision of necessary facilities under the new regulations for prep schools.

Mr. Wade said that while he had not had the privilege of attending the school, he had many friends whose sons had been pupils and he was happy to claim Mr. Roger Burnett as a close friend.

“You have the admiration and respect of all who know you, Mr. Wade told Mr. Burnett as he handed over the gift.

Mrs. Burnett received a bouquet from the head boy David Nattrass and Mr. Burgess received a buttonhole from Timothy Moss.

 
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