The Old Radleian 2024

the Old Radleian 2024

The Maeving RM1. Maeving, co-founded by Seb Inglis-Jones (2004, E), manufacture fully electric motorbikes with removable batteries. Find out more in Redefining Urban Travel on pp. 30-35.

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Radley’s Robotics Team at the 2024 National VEX Robotics Championships at the Telford International Centre. Team Polaris won their division and narrowly missed overall national victory in the UK grand final.

LETTER FROM JOHN MOULE, THE WARDEN

Dear ORs,

Radley is often described as a traditional place. Of course, in many ways that is entirely understandable... and right. We are proud of our traditions – current boys especially – and it is often the most long-standing ones that are at the very heart of what they and we would describe as quintessentially ‘Radley’. Chapel, gowns, cocoa, boarding, boys; we have, as all good institutions do, the strong foundations on which all else depends.

I hope, however, that we are not hidebound by tradition. Two things should always be true. We should have the confidence in ourselves and our roots that allows us, indeed compels us, to be ambitious and innovative. We know that the core is sound and the foundation solid; we do not need to worry so much about them and so have the freedom to develop and build on them. Secondly, if we wish to preserve the traditions that matter, we have also to adapt constantly... to use again my favourite phrase of my favourite political philosopher, we have ‘to change in order to preserve’ (Edmund Burke).

This is why the theme of this year’s Old Radleian magazine is so exciting. It is full of stories of creativity and entrepreneurial drive, demonstrating all too clearly how Radleians are at the cutting edge of technology and innovation. It is uplifting. It is salutary too: a reminder that we have to be producing young men who are ready to face the world as it is, not as we might wish it to be. That said, I hope we can avoid the permacrisis mentality that stalks so much of our public debate and rather that we can develop minds that are optimistic, collaborative, curious, wellgrounded, ambitious and civic in their outlook: realistic about the world and ready for it. As I read the magazine, I am encouraged.

I am encouraged too by what I see day to day at Radley. I seem always of late to have to write or speak about headwinds – whether political, social or economic – that plague us and there is, of course, no doubt that we face real challenges in the next few years. It would be easy to be weighed down by them. But rather as I seek to avoid a sense of permacrisis in the world at large, so I think we should as we analyse the problems that face us as an

independent boys’ boarding school. We could be downcast... or we could choose to be optimistic and believe in the value and enduring nature of what we do.

There are reasons for that optimism: say it though I shouldn’t, the College is in rude health. Whilst not necessarily the accolade that I would want to be the only summary of our success, it was lovely – and an honour - to be recognised by Tatler Magazine as their ‘School of the Year’. Despite the market showing signs of decline, admissions numbers are up at all entry points. We continue to attract excellent new staff. I am delighted to have been able to oversee a successful restructuring of the management team following the retirements of two great servants of the College, Steve Rathbone and Ben Holden. As we begin to draft a new strategic plan, we are excited about the future.

But, of course, it is what the boys have achieved that matters most. The best performing robotics team at the world championships in Dallas. The ESU debating winners. The national J15 rugby and J16 rowing champions. Musicians and golfers reaching the final rounds of national competitions. A record number of boys getting into top US universities. To say nothing of a pleasing set of exam results with significant improvement at both A*-B and 9-7 percentages at A Level and GCSE respectively. It was a year of significant headline successes. And we must remember that behind all that goes the hard work that drives the College day by day: dedicated staff,

talented boys, supportive parents and a culture of ambition.

However, as the year came to an end, it was not headline successes that came to mind as I spent time talking to departing 6.2s at Gaudy. It was rather that, yet again, it struck me that we had managed to nurture a decent, fun, kind, sociable, motivated group of young men. And as we think about the future that needs them to be the best that they can be, that matters most.

As I come to the end of ten years as Warden, it is an obvious time to take stock. Looking back to 2014, I think that we have managed to achieve my two main goals: to maintain and strengthen the foundational principles of a Radley education and yet, at the same time, to embrace change. I say to Old Radleians of past generations who return as prospective parents that I hope two things are true: that they recognise the College that they knew and loved but at the same time see it as a dynamic, relevant and vibrant school for the present day. Achieving both is the Holy Grail of running a school like this. As you reflect on your time or connection with the College, and as you read this magazine, I hope there is a nostalgia for the past, a confidence in our foundations and an excitement about the future. All three matter.

John Moule Warden

The Warden with 2024 Leavers at the Leavers’ Dinner, May 2024.

DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR’S REFLECTIONS

A cherished tradition on Old Radleian Day is the Chapel service, a moment that resonates deeply with all who attend. Over 150 Old Radleians, spanning multiple generations, gather each year to rekindle memories of their school days, seated as they once were during Evensong, singing hymns and taking a quiet moment for reflection. This year was no different. As the soft, golden glow of the late afternoon autumn sun poured through the stained-glass windows, the familiar strains of Jerusalem filled the Chapel, evoking a powerful sense of unity. In that moment, it felt as though 700 boys were singing, just as they had in years past. It’s in moments like these that I am reminded why so many Old Radleians feel the irresistible pull to return to Radley. These sacred minutes, seated in the heart of the Chapel, offer a bridge back to their boyhood – a connection to a cherished time that has shaped who they are today.

Later that evening, I overheard an Old Radleian share how, while singing Jerusalem, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. His words struck a chord with me, reminding me of the profound value of looking back, of treasuring those fleeting, nostalgic moments that tie us to our shared history. Nostalgia has its place, but it is only part of the story.

While the Radleian Society has long brought Old Radleians together through dinners and social events, it is vital to recognise that we must go beyond nostalgia. Our mission today is to serve the broadest Radley community possible in a meaningful and dynamic way. To that end, we have expanded our offerings to include social, sporting, professional, and business networking opportunities. By doing so, we ensure that the Society remains a relevant and vibrant part of the lives of Old Radleians and their families. Each year, we carefully review our efforts, striving to reach and serve our global community, whether they are here in the UK or abroad.

The Development Office, which unites the Radleian Society and the Radley Foundation, continues to play an essential role in the future of the College. While each operates independently, they are bound by a shared purpose: to preserve the strength of

Old Radleian Day 2024

Radley, both as a flourishing community and a financially secure institution. Both are crucial to Radley’s future. Together, we explore new ways to prepare our boys for the challenges that lie ahead while forging lasting, meaningful connections with Old Radleians, whose interests and needs evolve over time. In doing so, we carry the responsibility of safeguarding Radley’s legacy while laying the foundation for future generations.

Reflecting on the past year, I’m proud to highlight some of the many successes: meeting members of our Radley community in North America and Scotland, hosting thought-provoking networking events on topics such as Artificial Intelligence and Careers in Investment, celebrating the Rugby Gala Dinner, the Friends of Radley Lunch, and the Rowing Dinner, which honoured the 2024 Olympic rowers and John Gearing’s remarkable contribution to Radley Rowing. Additionally, the Foundation celebrated its most successful fundraising year since its founding nearly 25 years ago.

As we look to the future and reimagine the work of the Development Office, one thing is clear – we cannot do this alone. To remain relevant for generations to come, we will continue to evolve to meet the changing needs of our community. Your input is invaluable, and we will reach out to seek your thoughts in the near future.

Effective communication is the first step in maintaining a strong connection with the Radley community, and I hope you enjoy this edition of the Old Radleian. Thank you to all who have contributed and shared their news. We look forward to seeing you in 2025!

Elisabeth Anderson Development Director

A FAREWELL AND A NEW FACE IN THE FOUNDATION TEAM

I have only been at Radley for five years, which has flown by in a flash. Sometimes I like to ponder if that counts as a full Radley education.

I have certainly experienced a tremendous amount… filming on the roof of Mansion… playing with Beagle puppies… getting lost in the cellars… being blown away by the roar of singing in Chapel, to name just a few highlights.

Most importantly, however, I have had the privilege to get to know so many members of the wider Radley community. I have never failed to be charmed by your stories, your memories and your unwavering commitment to our mission.

When I first arrived in 2019, there were 64 boys at Radley on a meanstested funded place. Now there are 120. This is only possible thanks to you, and I feel privileged to have witnessed this tremendous change.

I am leaving to work for Every Youth, a charity which aims to give 16 to 25-year-olds facing homelessness mental health support, life skills and employability qualifications to help them access the best start in life possible. It will certainly be a different world to Radley, but I am excited to take all the wonderful things I have learned at Radley into the wider world. I can say, without a doubt, that Radley has shaped who I am.

So, I suppose yes – I have received a full Radley education. I only hope I can be as kind, caring and compassionate as Old Radleians are.

Thank you to everyone in the Radley community for the tremendous impact that you have made, that you are making and will continue to make, on the lives of countless young people. Whether your contribution has been big or small, every penny donated has made an incredible difference. Thank you and farewell!

Henry Cosh, former Associate Director, Radley Foundation

We are delighted to welcome Hasna Bloore, who joined the Foundation in September as our new Head of Philanthropy. With her impressive background in Academic Relations at the High Commission of Canada, the Canada-UK Foundation, and most recently in the Development Department of the Oratory School, Hasna brings a wealth of experience and a global perspective to the team. In this newly established role, she will lead our key fundraising campaigns, helping to engage and inspire the entire Radley community. Her leadership will be invaluable in strengthening our initiatives and fostering deeper connections with Old Radleians, parents, and friends. We are thrilled to have her on board and look forward to seeing the positive impact she will make in shaping the future of the Foundation.

CHAIRMAN’S WELCOME

As we explore the theme of ‘reimagining the world’ in this year’s Old Radleian, I’m reminded that the Radleian Society has been reimagining, refining, and adapting to better serve our community. The groundwork we’ve laid in recent years is now bearing fruit, forging new connections between Radleians, Old Radleians, and Radley parents.

Many of you are familiar with our monthly e-newsletter and events bulletin, which has been central to our communication strategy. These updates have been invaluable for keeping our community informed and engaged. Your generosity in sharing advice and expertise reflects the success of our approach and helps to ensure RadSoc remains relevant and connected in our fast-paced and changing world.

Our digital platforms – Radley Connect, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, and the RadSoc Hub (our website) – are thriving as vibrant spaces for networking, news, and content. Whether exploring the Radley Archives online, catching up with contemporaries, or expanding your professional network, these platforms offer something for everyone. I encourage you to get online and explore what RadSoc can offer.

Despite these digital advancements, we still delight in meeting old friends and celebrating Radley’s traditions. This past year provided numerous reasons to return to the College. In May we gathered to celebrate the life and impact of Diana Silk and in March we celebrated Radley Rugby at the Rugby Gala Dinner. In September, we said farewell to John Gearing, Rowing Coach, and toasted the Radleians who represented Great Britain in the Olympics. These occasions remind us of the deep connections shared with the College across generations.

EDITOR’S NOTE

Don’t reinvent the wheel. It’s a fair warning, but improving the world we live in requires innovation, and paradigm shifts are rare. Instead, iteration is the driving force of progress – small, but important adaptations add up. They can turn an electronic calculator into an iPad. A single celled lifeform into the vast and wonderful array of life on Earth.

The theme of this year’s Old Radleian is Reimagining the World. It looks at Old Radleians who have turned challenges into opportunities to make our society, and our world, a better place.

The spirit of sport remains a unifying thread for many Old Radleians after they leave, with the OR Sports Clubs not just offering opportunities to continue playing but also fantastic chances to network with ORs of all ages. This year, we deepened ties with these clubs, helping to boost engagement and recruit new members. We also hosted our first Sportsman’s Social in London, an event we are looking to build on over the coming years.

The RadSoc committee continues to guide all of these initiatives and to help us to keep our strategy relevant. To maintain our adaptability, the committee must be dynamic in its composition: over the past year, we’ve welcomed new members who bring fresh perspectives and expertise, while bidding farewell to key contributors whose dedication has been invaluable. I’m deeply grateful to all our committee members, past and present, for their time and commitment. Learn more about the committee changes on pp. 7-9. I am also delighted to announce an exciting new addition to the Committee, Richard Greed. He has graciously agreed to join us as President; in this role he will help raise the profile of our work and ensure people better understand the value of what we do.

Looking ahead, we are committed to reimagining how RadSoc can further strengthen ties within the Radley community. Whether through mentorship, sharing expertise, or reconnecting at an event, your involvement is crucial. When we ask for help, know that your contributions, no matter how small, are greatly valued.

Thank you for your continued support. Together, we will ensure that the Radleian Society thrives in the years to come.

We will hear from Antony Turner (1966, B) who makes complex and impenetrable climate data engaging through creative visual storytelling, bridging the gap between science and society to inspire change. James Taylor (1993, D) & Ed Warner (1993, G) tell us how we can reimagine our spaces so that they are truly inclusive, allowing everyone to participate and thrive in our corporate world. And Seb Inglis-Jones (2004, E) shares his vision of a city of the future, where air and noise pollution are a thing of the past, and your daily commute is affordable, sustainable, stylish and enjoyable.

We should never be afraid to question the status quo. As you explore this edition, we hope you will be inspired to look at the world around you and ask: what can be reimagined next?

Sophie Torrance Engagement Officer and Editor of the Old Radleian

Sam Melluish (1976, B) Radleian Society Chairman

WHAT IS THE RADLEIAN SOCIETY COMMITTEE?

The RadSoc Committee focuses on delivering the Radleian Society’s mission:

“To

connect the Radley community, helping to build life-long social and professional networks for students, Old Radleians and parents.”

The Radleian Society office (located at the top of Mansion) relies on the RadSoc Committee as a crucial sounding board for its work. To ensure we achieve a balance of perspectives, the Committee includes a cross-section of the Radley Community, including Old Radleians of various ages, Radley parents, dons and Development staff.

We actively recruit experts in key areas that align with RadSoc’s strategic aims, with a special focus on helping Radleians in their early careers. This includes professionals with specific industry experience in emerging fields e.g. artificial intelligence, but also those who bring valuable workplace skills such as leadership, mentoring, and diversity and inclusion.

The Committee meets three times a year to support the Society’s mission and objectives to:

1 Bring the Radley community together through social events, sports clubs, and societies, and help people stay connected through our events and communications programme.

2 Promote and support a thriving business network to help all Radleians achieve their potential in the world of work.

3

Preserve, gather and share the incredible heritage of the College and its traditions through the Radley College Archives and your stories and memories.

THE RADSOC COMMITTEE

NEEDS YOU!

We’re looking for three engaged and motivated young Old Radleians (aged 20-35) to join our Committee and represent the perspectives of early career job seekers. We want a fresh take on how we engage our community and support young Old Radleians in their early careers.

We are particularly keen to hear from those with digital marketing skills, and those who have entrepreneurial experience.

WHY JOIN?

Make an Impact: Influence the way our society connects and supports young alumni, especially those starting their early careers.

. Strengthen Your Network: Build valuable connections with ORs across industries and age groups, both on the Committee and at our events.

Enhance Workplace Skills: Gain experience on a Committee and help develop a range of engagement strategies.

Time commitment: Three meetings a year (two in London, one at Radley) with some preparation beforehand.

Interested? Email Caroline Monaghan, Radleian Society Associate Director, at radsoc@radley.org.uk and we can organise a chat.

RICHARD GREED

(Former Radley don)

President

We are thrilled to welcome Richard Greed (RMCG) as the new President of the RadSoc Committee. With 29 years of experience at Radley, serving as a don, Tutor, and Master in Charge of Rugby, Richard has deep connections to the Radley community. As President, he will serve as a dedicated ambassador for RadSoc, working to foster stronger ties, engage the community, and highlight the importance of RadSoc’s mission.

MEET THE RADSOC COMMITTEE

SAM MELLUISH MBE

(1976, B)

Chairman

Years on committee: 35

Expertise: Investment management – managing funds and client service in public and private equities.

It's great to be continually involved with the school and meet old friends and new across the many events that we organise. The whole community has benefitted hugely from the Radleian Society and being involved with that makes me very proud.

WILL BAILEY

(1968, D)

Years on committee: 35

Expertise: Events, OR Sports

I like staying in touch with Radley and being part of the RadSoc ‘family’.

PADDY LANGDALE

(2013, A)

Treasurer

Years on committee: 2

Expertise: Accountancy, Sports

After five brilliant years at Radley, it’s great to give something back to the College and support the Committee as independent education navigates its way through some challenging times ahead.

MAX BLANSHARD

(2004, B)

Years on committee: 8

Expertise: Academia, Life Sciences, Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

Staying engaged with the College and OR community is brilliant, and I enjoy supporting at events across London.

ROSIE JENKINS

(Radley Parent)

Years on committee: 1

Expertise: Recruitment, HR

I have enjoyed meeting the members of the RadSoc Committee and finding out firsthand how RadSoc is supporting ORs and current boys aged 16- 25 with networking, work experience, internships and supporting the boys with their early careers.

PATRICK McMEEKIN

(1999, B)

Years on committee: 8

Expertise: Entrepreneurship, Sports, Technology

JAMES PRICHETT

(2001, F)

Years on committee: 1

Expertise: Marketing, Communications, Business

The Commitee is an interesting and dynamic group of like-minded people and the meetings are enjoyable. I first got involved with Radley for Life, a LinkedIn group to try and help ORs and the younger generations. Now I’m part of RadSoc, that’s exactly what we do, amongst other things, but we have much more focus and ability to deliver on these objectives.

It's great fun keeping connected to College whilst living vicariously through the various sports societies, empowering them to flourish & grow deeper roots within the OR community.

SIMON PERKINS

(1978, E)

Years on committee: 1

Expertise: Real Estate

I like hearing more about the wide range of interesting activities that RadSoc is now engaged with.

JO ROOTH

(1985, E)

Years on committee: 11

Expertise: Strategy, Governance, Business

It's been highly fulfilling to play a part in the development of the Radley Business Network, from its inception in 2008 as a LinkedIn group through to its current programme of events, mentoring and networking opportunities.

HENRY MORRIS

(1996, E)

Years on committee: 5

Expertise: Public equity investing

It's brilliant to have the chance to meet so many friendly and interesting people and to reconnect with Radley and hear the really great work that College and RadSoc are doing.

JOANNA THOMPSON

(Radley parent)

Years on committee: 1

Expertise: Investment, Fundraising, Entrepreneurship

I love the confluence of ideas, the robust debate and the honest reflection. I enjoy the entrepreneurial approach taken in these meetings, challenging existing ideas and beliefs, and exploring new opportunities to serve the diverse needs of the community at different ages and stages of their lives.

STRUAN RIDGWELL

(1984, B)

Years on committee: 8

Expertise: Global Markets, International Community, Business

It's great to have the opportunity to discuss and develop events and structures that allow Radleians and parents to socialise, network and help the alumni to succeed in life after Radley.

RADSOC COMMITTEE

MEETING & AGM

Radleian Society Committee Meetings were held on Saturday 20th April and 1st October, and the Annual General Meeting was held at Radley in April. Following the meeting and AGM in April, Committee members were joined by the Warden, VPs, and Honorary Members of RadSoc for a lunch in Mansion. To hear more about the Committee, turn turn back to pp. 7-9.

FRIENDS OF RADLEY AND OUR WIDER COMMUNITY

The RadSoc community stretches much further than Old Radleians, and this was shown at three gatherings this year which brought familiar faces and good friends back to the College.

In April, the Radley Foundation held a lunch for Friends of Radley, bringing together around 70 widows of ORs, former staff, and former Radley parents who have supported Radley and remain closely connected to the College. At the lunch, guests were introduced to some of the many boys at Radley supported by gifts to the Radley Foundation.

On 3rd May, around 200 guests came to Radley to attend a thanksgiving service for Diana Silk, the wife of former Warden Dennis Silk. Diana, who passed away on 19th January, had a huge impact on the boys and staff of Radley, dispensing hospitality, supporting all around her, and giving her time, enthusiasm and energy to the College and its community. The number of those who gathered in Chapel is testament to the deep affection so many held for her.

On 5th October, family and friends of Donald Paine, Radley Precentor from 1959-78, gathered in Chapel for a beautiful thanksgiving service celebrating Donald's huge contribution to the College, both musically and spiritually. Guests included many former colleagues and pupils.

RADLEY TOURS

In March, Radley went on tour visiting locations across North America for the first time in over a decade. Our Radley representatives from the Development Office travelled a combined total of 22,767 miles, and hosted nine events in eight cities. 230 members of the community, aged from 19 to 92, attended these dinners and drinks receptions, accounting for 1/3 of the ORs we know to be living in North America – an amazing and heart-warming show of support for Radley. Many travelled great distances to join us, coming from 34 US states, five Canadian provinces, the Bahamas, Bermuda and Cayman.

In May, Development Director Elisabeth Anderson travelled to Scotland to host a series of drinks receptions for ORs and others with a Radley connection in Dumfries, Aberdeen, Perth and Edinburgh. The welcome received in all these locations was incredibly warm, and we were able to see almost 40 people over the course of the week. The visit was rounded off in The New Club, Edinburgh, with a lively gathering of ORs of all ages.

Aberdeen

A Radley hymn book travels to New York

Dumfries

Los Angeles Cayman

Toronto

RUGBY GALA DINNER

On 8th March we welcomed over 180 members of the Radley community for a glamourous gala dinner at the College to raise money for Radley Rugby.

The evening began with a drinks reception in Mansion, giving the guests time to catch up with each other and inspect the 28 fantastic prizes on offer during the auctions and raffle. Boys from the RCRUFC mingled with the crowd, updating ORs on the current excellent form that Radley Rugby is in, and selling raffle tickets.

Once guests had enjoyed their starters, Wayne Barnes, international rugby referee, was interviewed by sports broadcaster Mark Pougatch and shared a number of reflections on his career, bringing plenty of laughter from the room. He gamely accepted a number of questions from the guests, some of them more challenging than others. Broadcaster Mark Durden-Smith (1982, B) roved among the tables in Hall with a microphone, ready to take questions from the floor.

The live auction included some much sought-after prizes such as tickets to Taylor Swift’s sold-out tour and a day of clay shooting with Mike Tindall on his Aston Farm estate. As the night drew to a close, the winners of the raffle and silent auction were announced, and there was time for some guests to join a photoshoot with the evening’s celebrities. Those who had a little energy left made their way down to the JCR to round off the night.

We extend a huge thank you to all those who joined us for this magical evening, particularly to those who made bids. A total of 28 prizes were donated by members of the community, helping us to raise a wonderful £37,000 for Radley Rugby, some of which was used to fund places on the Argentina Tour this year for boys who would not otherwise have been able to go.

The evening was a resounding success and we extend our sincere gratitude to our special guests, Wayne Barnes, Mark Pougatch, Mark Durden-Smith, the exceptional talent of auctioneer Johnny Gould, and the incredible support of Julian Sykes and all at Givergy, Andrew Eliot, Shane and Amber Renders, and Debbie Obied. The event was generously sponsored by Savills and Steppes Travel.

THE RADLEY ROWING DINNER

On 28th September, Radley College welcomed 170 members of the Radley community for a memorable Rowing Dinner, celebrating the achievements of Radleians who have represented Great Britain on the international stage and paying tribute to the outstanding career of John Gearing, who recently departed from Radley after many years of dedicated service as a rowing coach at the College.

The atmosphere was warm and particularly colourful (guests were dressed in their best Henley Stewards’ Enclosure attire, including one rower kitted out in his full RCBC regalia, down to a pair of RCBC sliders). Dinner was accompanied by moving and inspirational speeches that highlighted the successes of Radley Rowing, both past and present. John Gearing was reunited with many of his former VIIIs, heartwarming moments that illustrate the deep impact that John has had on those involved in the sport and the lasting connection they have formed. The presence of Olympians Charlie Elwes (2010, J) and Ollie Wynne-Griffith (2007, D/J), two Radleians who have competed at the highest level, added a special sense of excitement to the occasion, with Olympic medals from several Games being shared with guests.

Throughout the evening, speeches reflected on John’s significant contributions to rowing and his role in nurturing talent that has gone on to achieve great things on the water. We also heard from Charlie and Ollie, who shared their own experiences of representing Britain at world championships and the Olympics, and the role that Radley has played in their journey. They discussed the nature of ‘success’ being the discipline needed to reach the competition, rather than winning the competition. These were certainly inspiring words for the next generation of Radleian rowers, many of whom were able to join for the evening.

Thank you to all who attended this special evening, particularly to John and Hazel Gearing who sportingly travelled back from their new home in Australia to be there on the night. Thanks also to Charlie Elwes and Ollie Wynne-Griffith for sharing their experiences and inspiration. This was a night to remember for everyone involved in Radley Rowing, and we look forward to many more years of success on the water.

A photo album is available to view on Flickr: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjBL329

PARENTS’ SUMMER DRINKS

Around 380 parents joined us over three evenings in May & June for the RadSoc Parents’ Summer Drinks Parties which took place in the East India Club. Parents were able to catch up with their friends and make new connections across other Radley year groups, as well as hearing about how RadSoc can help their sons prepare for the world of work and navigate their early careers. It was delightful to see so many parents there and also to have so many come forward to answer the call for future speakers and panellists on forthcoming RadSoc Futures and Business events.

OLD RADLEIAN DAY –DECADE REUNIONS

Around 150 ORs of all vintages, from 28 to 83, returned to Radley on Old Radleian Day to celebrate their decade reunions. We were also joined by 40 current and former staff.

The day began with a drinks reception for our older ORs followed by tours of the College, led by current boys, allowing guests to revisit their favourite spots while also exploring new developments on campus. A highlight of the morning for many was a parade of the Radley Beagles, with ORs enjoying the chance to make a fuss of the dogs and quiz the Beaglers on the pack.

A visit to the Biology Department was enjoyed by our younger reunion groups, particularly when several alumni recognised some long-standing residents of the Radley Zoo. Holding pythons, geckos, and other creatures offered a hands-on trip down memory lane for many, and one OR was persuaded to come closer to Holly the python that he ever had while a boy at Radley, showing that boldness does not diminish with age!

Lunch in the newly refurbished Shop was a delightful three-course affair for the older years, while the younger alumni were treated to a sumptuous dinner in Hall. Both events were complemented by excellent speeches from the Warden and Prefects, sharing updates and recent successes from the College.

There was plenty of time throughout the day for Old Radleians to reconnect with each other and their former teachers, as they perused old school photographs, notebooks, and even the famous ‘naughty book’ of past transgressions from the archives, all while enjoying generous helpings of fizz.

The highlight of the day happened at the cross-over from daytime to evening, when all our ORs came together in Chapel for a special service. The congregation was in full voice, particularly during the rousing rendition of Jerusalem, bringing a tear to the eye of even the most irreverent of our 10-year reunion group, many of whom, despite being late to Chapel, were clearly pleased to be back in that familiar space.

Blessed with perfect weather, it was a wonderful day of laughter, reminiscing, and renewed friendship – a fitting tribute to the enduring Radley spirit.

“I don’t think I appreciated how there would

be such a strong feeling of meeting extended family.

I

was so impressed with all the amazing developments of the school since I left. The grounds were immaculate.

It was a really

Guy (1989, B)

lovely occasion.”

“It was such a brilliant trip down memory lane seeing old friends, dons and visiting all parts of College including our old rooms, JCR, Chapel, Hall … the list goes on. So many vivid happy memories were brought back and to share those with lifelong friends.”

Bertie (1999, E)

“I was very impressed with everything I saw from the upkeep of the buildings to the immaculate pitches, Bigside looked an absolute picture. The two boys from C Social who took me round were brilliant, very polite, very relaxed and chatty.”

Mark (1969, C)

OLD RADLEIAN DAY 2025 WILL TAKE PLACE ON SATURDAY 13TH SEPTEMBER, SO SAVE THE DATE!

While all ORs are welcome to attend, we will be sending special invitations to those celebrating 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 years since leaving the College, as well as all ORs aged 75 and over.

If you were part of the 1970-75, 1980-85, 1990-95, 2000-2005 or 2010-2015 cohorts, start gathering your friends from Social, sports teams and orchestra … it’s time to return to Radley!

RADLEY ARCHIVES EVENTS

Our Radley Archives events for 2024 spanned a fantastic array of Radley life: drama, sport, and the CCF.

We began in February with the Marionette Society, exploring its origins in the 1940s, with performances such as T H White’s The Sword in the Stone. By the 1950s and 60s, the Marionette Society became a highlight of College life, involving art, sculpture, set design, lighting, music, and acting, and drew in a wide community, including staff and families. We discussed key performances like 1956’s Black & White Blues by Peter Cook and Michael Bawtree, and 1971’s Potted Lobster. The event was led by College Archivist Clare Sargent, with insights from retired don, Hamish Aird.

In May, the Archives events continued with Radley Then & Now: Olympians, ahead of the Summer 2024 Olympics in Paris. This online gathering included three Olympians discussing Radley College’s connection to the Olympics, from the early days to the 2020 Tokyo Games. Archivist Clare Sargent led the event, building on earlier research by former don and rowing coach, Jock Mullard (1958, B). We learned about Theodore Cook (1881, B), an early IOC member, and about various Radley alumni who competed in fencing, rowing, and hockey, and even a Silver Medal for Prize Poem at the 1920 Antwerp Games. Joining us were three OR Olympians: David Lewis (1949, D) and Bill McCowen (1950, F), bobsleigh competitors at the 1964 Innsbruck Winter Olympics, and Mark Hayter (1963, G), part of the 1976 Montreal rowing Quad team. They shared memories of competing, offering insights into the preparation and camaraderie of the Games.

Our final 2024 event focused on the history of the Radley Combined Cadet Force. We traced its formation in 1909, beginning with a rainy field day on the Berkshire Downs. During WW1, the OTC (later CCF) played a crucial role, with members quickly advancing as officer cadets. We remembered the 219 Radleians, and 15 dons and staff who lost their lives during the war. The OTC thrived in the following decades, with visits from figures like Viscount Montgomery of Alamein. ORs shared their memories, particularly of challenging expeditions and the RAF section’s Grasshopper Glider, which occasionally achieved ‘flights’ of up to 10 seconds.

We’re grateful to our community for sharing their memories and participating in these discussions, which contribute to the ongoing oral history of the College.

SPORTS CLUB EVENTS

We started the year with a meeting of the Heads of OR sports clubs in London – the second meeting of its type. It was very valuable for ORs leading sporting networks to speak to each other, exchange tips for best practice, and update on their club activities. The links between the sports clubs and with RadSoc continue to go from strength to strength, better enabling our sporting communications and encouraging the cross-pollination of ideas.

Building on these cross-sporting links, this year saw the launch of our new event: the Sportsman’s Social. This event, open to all sporting ORs and those thinking about joining a club, was held at Sixes in Fitzrovia, London.

Sixes, known for its Social Cricket, provided a fun and lively setting. ORs had the chance to meet up with old friends, make new connections, and learn more about OR sports. Attendees enjoyed playing social cricket, a fast-and-furious batting game akin to bowling, and had burgers and beers to keep them energised and hydrated.

We hope to hold this event again in future years to build on its popularity and continue to offer ORs an opportunity to be introduced to sports clubs, and to each other, over an enjoyable and affordable evening in London.

EVENTS FOR YOUNG ORS 2024

Young OR Christmas Drinks

In December 2023, RadSoc held the annual Young OR Christmas Drinks in swanky South Ken venue The Other House. This event for ORs under 30 is an opportunity to usher in the festive season with other young ORs alongside some well-known dons.

Uni Supper: Bristol & Bath

In March a University Supper was held at the Green House in Bristol, offering young ORs studying at Bristol and Bath universities and living in the area the chance to meet up with some favourite dons. Despite having only very recently left Radley, several of the attendees said they were already missing the place, mostly because they are now having to cook their own meals! However, they were all in excellent spirits, and there were plenty of animated conversations around the pool table.

GAUDY – 2024 LEAVERS

We celebrated the many achievements of the 2019-2024 cohort at Gaudy on 6th July, where, after an emotional final service in Chapel, prizes and awards were given out by the Warden at the Leavers’ event. Summer showers could not dampen the spirits of all those who took part in this fantastic day. Bigside was awash with bunting, picnics, and Social colours for inter-Social cricket. Welcome to our newest ORs! We can’t wait to see what you do next!

BUSINESS NETWORK UPDATES

The Radley Business Network continues to grow and thrive as we expand our efforts to support Old Radleians in the early stages of their careers. At the heart of our success is our close collaboration with the Futures (Careers) department, which enables us to focus on empowering, connecting and upskilling students through the network, easing their transition from school to the wider world. The impact of this is most evident at our business networking events in London, where you can see the immense value of the interactions between experienced professionals and those just starting out.

Other initiatives this year include the launch of a mentoring program for Sixth Form students and young Old Radleians, alongside a drive to help students and young ORs gain more work experience. As we look to the future, we are excited to build on our momentum, creating even more opportunities for Radleians to connect, collaborate and thrive on their professional journeys.

Caroline Monaghan, Radleian Society Associate Director

2024 EVENTS

RadSoc hosts a variety of business networking events each year designed to bring together Radleians of all ages and stages to connect, share knowledge, and network.

Radley College 6.1 Careers and Networking evening

On 2nd July, we held our second Futures & Networking Evening at Radley, with speakers from industries like Renewables, Marketing, and AI. Over 150 students from Radley and OX14 Partnership schools attended, with great feedback. The event featured 25-minute ‘Introduction to Industry’ sessions, followed by student networking practice. A big thank you to the parents and ORs who contributed to its success!

“They gave me an idea into what industry I want to work after university and the paths I should take to give me the best opportunities. Thank you very much for such an enjoyable and insightful evening”

– Harry (6.1)

To speak at next year’s event please get in touch with Karen Rhodes on futures@radley.org.uk

Navigating Careers in Investment

This event was fully booked with over 130 alumni, parents, and current students in attendance – our most popular event yet! Generously hosted by Charles Palmer (1985, F) at FTI Consulting, the event provided valuable insights into careers in investment, spanning asset management, venture capital and wealth management. Philip Guest (Radley parent) and Founder of Oxford Strategy, served as moderator, guiding the panel to share practical advice on applying for roles, essential skills for success, and standing out in a competitive market. The discussion also highlighted timely topics, including the impact of AI and the growing focus on ethical and socially responsible investing.

AI in Action

How can human employees stay indispensable in the AI age, and what new AI jobs are emerging for career starters? These were key topics debated at this event, attended by nearly 100 members of the Radley community at Savills HQ in London. Simon Shaw (1978, A), Savills CFO, generously hosted the event, with Chris Hill (former Radley parent), investor, board director, and former CEO of DispensaGroup plc, moderating the discussion.

The expert panel began by charting AI’s evolution since the 1950s and its future trajectory.

“If there’s one piece of advice I can give you in your careers, it is: embrace the tools that you can use to help you accelerate yourself and become superhuman, by increasing your productivity in your day-to-day work.”

– Prof Andy Pardoe

The panel fielded questions on human skills for the future workforce, legal and copyright concerns, AI’s impact on transport, and its limitations in the workplace. After the panel, attendees joined group networking sessions, each led by a panel member.

The session was followed by small group networking sessions and open networking.

“It

was fantastic connecting with experts from finance and investment – a great reminder of how important it is to keep your network strong!”

– William (2014, F)

With thanks to our speakers: Alan Vaksman (Radley Parent), Founder & Managing Partner, Launchbay Capital VC; Tom Holbrook (2006, D), Portfolio Manager, Cazenove Charities; Max Bullen-Smith (2004, E), Investment Director: Head of M&A, Ardonagh Specialty; Alex Bowden (1986, F), Managing Partner at Evelyn Partners

Visit our YouTube channel to watch previous events: https://bit.ly/ RadSocBisVid

Volunteer as a speaker, or just come along and network!

With thanks to our speakers: Andy Pardoe, Founder & Group CEO of the Wisdom Works Group and Chair of the Deep Tech Innovation Centre at the University of Warwick; Charles TowersClark (1983, C), Author of The WEIRD CEO, Forbes contributor and former Chairman and CEO of Pod Group; Andrew Yeoman (Radley parent), Founder and CEO of Concirrus; Robert Bassett Cross (Radley parent), Founder and CEO of Adarga.

Beyond Radley Talks & Podcasts

HOW TO LAUNCH A STARTUP WITHOUT LOSING YOUR MIND - CHARLIE LASS (1994, A)

“You don’t have to become a billionaire to be a successful entrepreneur”

Launching a startup is an emotional roller coaster filled with risks, uncertainties, long hours, and a steep learning curve. Charlie Lass, a seasoned entrepreneur and founder of Dallas Inc. and Humble Inc., offered valuable insights on how to navigate this challenging journey. The discussion was led by fellow OR and entrepreneur Rory Codrington (2006, E), Founder & CEO of Trust Keith.

HOW TO BE MORE SUCCESSFUL IN YOUR LIFE AND CAREER – OLI CHRISTIE (1984, D)

GET INVOLVED

Get in touch if you have a topic to share

Oli Christie, CEO of Neon Play and an Executive and Personal Coach, delivered an inspiring talk on achieving balance and fulfillment in life. He emphasized the importance of regular self-evaluation and the power of cultivating good habits. Oli was interviewed by current student, Blake (6.1, A).

Listen on Spotify or watch on YouTube: https:// spoti.fi/3Q0pz45 and https://bit.ly/ BeyondRadley

The

Old

Radleian Property Dinner

The OR Property Dinner is a flagship event in the RadSoc calendar, held biennially in London. This year’s dinner was once again a sellout, with 64 attendees representing decades of experience across the property sector. It provides an outstanding networking opportunity for young Old Radleians entering the Property industry.

UPCOMING BUSINESS EVENTS

We currently working on two more business networking events for 2025:

Made in Britain – A spotlight on the innovative manufacturing sector, highlighting the benefits for businesses and the nation by supporting domestic industry and strengthening local supply chains.

Careers in Law – An in-depth exploration of early career paths in law, offering insights into the various entry points and opportunities for young professionals. This discussion will include the key changes expected to reshape the legal industry over the next 5 years.

OR CAREER PROFILES

Our latest career profiles feature founders of an ethical painting business, a surf school, a wallpaper design company, and more, showcasing the diverse paths Old Radleians pursue after school.

GET INVOLVED

“Be curious and persistent; keep asking questions. If something interests you, pursue it, you might reach a point when you realise it isn’t for you, but at least you tried.” – Phil Robinson (1985, D)

Share your career story

LIFTING THE LID ON RADLEY CONNECT

Radley Connect is our online platform designed to provide networking opportunities and career support for Radleians as they navigate the early stages of their careers - and beyond.

We are often asked by ORs, ‘Why use Radley Connect when most people are on LinkedIn?’ It’s a great question, and our answer is always: use both! LinkedIn is the go-to platform for professional networking and job hunting, but Radley Connect is uniquely designed to support those in the early stages of their careers,

particularly between the ages of 16 and 25. What sets Radley Connect apart is its transparency – you can see exactly how each member is willing to offer help, and you can approach them with confidence, knowing they’ve already agreed to provide support.

With over 2,337 on the platform, and more than 70% offering their support, this graph demonstrates exactly how they are willing to help and the topics they are most open to being approached on.

MEMBER RESPONSES TO 'WILLING TO HELP' QUESTIONS.

IN SIXTH FORM (16 – 18)

. University and course research

. Finding work experience

Support for degree apprenticeship applications

AT UNIVERSITY (18 – 23)

Advice on career paths

. Interview practice

. Internship application guidance

EARLY CAREERS (23+)

. CV development

. Graduate job search

. Working abroad insights

OLD RADLEIANS SEEKING NEW DIRECTIONS (ALL AGES)

Career change pathways

. Networking opportunities and introductions

. Entrepreneurial advice

Explore Radley Connect for targeted advice

Radley Connect www.radleyconnect.org.uk

“I’m in the sixth form at Radley and exploring my early career options. I’m particularly interested in Degree Apprenticeships as an alternative to university and would appreciate your thoughts. Also, what steps — such as work experience, courses, or volunteering — would you recommend to strengthen my application?”

– Archie 6.2, pursuing a degree apprenticeship

THE MENTORING ADVANTAGE

BUILDING SKILLS AND CONFIDENCE

Launched last year, one of the three objectives of the Radley Business Network programme was to ‘create an experiential understanding of the world of work, through business events, talks, career advice, mentoring and opportunities for work experience’.

To support this, RadSoc is in the early stages of introducing ‘Threemonth Mentoring Modules’ for Sixth Form students. These are

SIXTH FORM MENTORING CASE STUDY

Archie L, current 6.2, is interested in pursuing a degree apprenticeship in finance, but he was uncertain about which area of this complex industry to focus on and the skills he needed.

Old Radleian Charlie Huntingford (2008, A) generously agreed to mentor him for three months to guide him through the potential career paths in Investment Management. He also helped him to identify the key skills needed to stand out in applications for such competitive apprenticeships.

During their regular Zoom discussions, they explored a variety of topics:

Different Paths in the Investment Industry: They examined the pros and cons of various routes available in the field.

Current Industry Trends: They discussed emerging themes and trends affecting the industry, including the impact of AI on finance.

more than just sharing career advice - they are about building a relationship where experienced mentors help mentees develop essential skills, gain confidence, and navigate the complexities of potential career paths. They create space for personal growth, networking, and the chance to explore opportunities that may not have been visible before, all within a supportive environment that fosters learning, reflection, and development.

Mindset for Application Processes: Charlie encouraged Archie to apply widely and to not take rejections personally.

Crafting Cover Letters: To assist Archie, Charlie shared examples of his own cover letters for reference.

. Interview Techniques: They talked about researching companies, anticipating likely questions, and Charlie recommended that Archie regularly read the Financial Times for insights.

. Work Experience: When a week of work experience became available at Charlie’s company, he offered to guide Archie through the application process.

. Networking Opportunities: Charlie was eager to introduce Archie to his connections in various areas of Investment, expanding his professional network.

Both Archie and Charlie felt their mentoring relationship had been a great success at the end of the three months.

GET INVOLVED

Update your profile on Radley Connect to say that you are willing to offer mentoring!

Archie shared, “Working with Charlie has been incredible. I now have a much clearer understanding of the path into investment and feel far more confident about my upcoming degree apprenticeship applications.”

Charlie also enjoyed discussing the industry with someone who shares his interests, saying, “I’d be happy to support Archie again in the future if needed. It’s great to know I could make a difference for someone just starting out.”

WORK EXPERIENCE: BUILDING REAL WORLD SKILLS

Alex Ledger (1997, A), founder of adventure sports company SkySchool, has mentored three Old Radleians through his business with a focus on content creation, photography and film – they have also learnt how to fly paramotor along the way!

His guidance has been life-changing for those just starting out, helping them develop essential business skills such as effective workplace communication, managing workflows, and meeting deadlines.

“At SkySchool we are constantly in need of film makers and photographers to document the various adventures we get up to. In June we were commissioned by the British Government to run a flying trip in France to commemorate the 80th Anniversary of the Normandy Landings. We were joined by Lt Col Hugo Collis (1988, E), who is not only an Old Radleian but also the parent of a current pupil at Radley and a passionate Paramotor Pilot. We were blessed with perfect flying weather, which allowed Oscar Manville-Hales (2009, H) to produce his fantastic film.

I have found that Radley Connect is a great way to not only unearth new talent but also give something back. In exchange for their services we have taught them how to fly as well as provide opportunities for further employment. After connecting with Oscar in 2020 he has gone on to found his own production company, Farr Films. He has found his niche in the Adventure Sports industry as a specialist film maker, which is great to see.

We hope to continue our connection with Radley Connect as we can see the mutual benefit to both parties.”

Alex Ledger (1997, A), Founder and MD of SkySchool

We urge others to offer work experience if they can, either through Radley Connect or by contacting radsoc@radley.org.uk

GUS NEATE (2008, E), CO-FOUNDER & CEO OF WILSON AI

WilsonAI is an AI-driven platform designed to streamline legal operations for businesses. It helps teams manage legal requests more efficiently by using AI to triage, answer common questions, and automate workflows.

Can you tell me a bit about your career journey since leaving Radley?

After Radley, I went to Oxford, where I studied engineering at Somerville College for three years and spent my final year on exchange at the National University of Singapore. I then studied entrepreneurship and innovation at the Saïd Business School in Oxford, and then transitioned into law. Clifford Chance sponsored me through law school in London, where I completed both the GDL and LPC. While at law school, I founded my first company, Auxilian Tuition, a tutoring company. We hired about 40 tutors and served around 30 clients across the UK and Asia.

FOCUS ON:

currently fundraising in San Francisco to fuel our next phase of growth.

How do you think AI will impact the legal profession, particularly in the next five years?

Afterwards, I joined Clifford Chance as a private equity lawyer, working on large-cap M&A deals with clients like Blackstone and Partners Group. During my time there, I also worked with in-house legal teams and a fast-growing cloud computing company.

How did you become a Founder in Residence for Entrepreneur First's startup Incubator programme?

I’d always been interested in technology, particularly legal tech. Around two years ago, with the rise of large language models, I saw an opportunity to improve how legal teams work. There’s so much that can be automated. Earlier this year, I left Clifford Chance to join Entrepreneur First, which is a program that brings together top talent from across Europe. It’s a bit like “Love Island” for entrepreneurs —you team up with different people to test potential co-founder partnerships. It’s intense, but you really get to know how different working relationships function. They also provide excellent advisors, many of whom have started companies worth hundreds of millions or even unicorns. The application process for EF is competitive. They’re looking for people who have exceptional talent, not necessarily academic, but in any area where you’ve shown high performance or potential. There are multiple interviews, but once you’re in, the experience is invaluable.

We incorporated my start-up, WilsonAI, about three months ago. We’ve launched our pilot product and are currently onboarding more customers. Entrepreneur First provided us with pre-seed funding, and we’ve also attracted strategic angel investors. We’re

I think we’re going to see a big shift in how legal work is done. I expect AI will handle the first 30% to 70% of many legal tasks, with the more complex, high-value work being passed to human lawyers. This will likely reduce the overall volume of work for lawyers, but it’ll make the remaining work more satisfying and engaging. For businesses, this also means faster, more affordable legal services.

There’s also a growing number of tech-focused roles in law. Lawyers don’t just have to practice law; they can be part of building the technology that supports legal work, and that’s an exciting new career path.

What advice would you give to someone embarking on their early career now?

I’d say don’t expect your career to be a straight line—often the experiences that don’t seem useful at the time will turn out to be valuable. Building relationships is also key; the people you meet along the way will be part of your network and can support you later in your career.

In terms of skills, I’d recommend getting comfortable with AI tools. I’m already seeing people using AI to help with a lot of their work, from drafting to producing reports. AI is only going to become more prevalent, so being at the forefront of that will be a huge advantage.

FOCUS ON: TECH

INNOVATION IN FASHION

CHRIS MORTON (1995, F), CO-FOUNDER OF LYST

Lyst is one of the world's largest fashion technology platforms used by over 200 million people globally. The company uses data science and machine learning to partner with thousands of leading fashion designers and retailers globally, and has raised over $160m from investors including Accel Partners, Balderton, Molten, Fidelity International, and LVMH.

What is Lyst, and how does it stand out in the competitive world of fashion?

It is an online platform designed to make finding fashion easy, much like how Spotify consolidates music or Skyscanner aggregates flights. We bring together clothing from department stores, boutiques, and brands from all over the world into one convenient destination. What’s unique is that we help solve the problem many shoppers face—finding a specific item they’ve seen online but struggling to locate in stores. Instead of searching across multiple sites, Lyst gives them one place to find exactly what they’re looking for.

How did you decide to start your own business, and what led you to focus on fashion?

The decision to start a business was something I had in mind from a young age. My first taste of entrepreneurship came in school, when a friend and I spent a weekend planning a business for fun. It was exciting to imagine how it could all work. After university, I gained experience at a startup and in venture capital before launching Lyst. As for fashion, those who knew me at Radley will agree this was not my strong suit! The idea came from observing my housemates’ experiences. They would often have dozens of tabs open, searching for specific fashion items online. I saw an opportunity to build a data-driven business that could simplify that process. That’s how Lyst was born out of a need to make online fashion shopping more efficient and comprehensive.

What advice would you give to someone considering starting their own business?

My biggest piece of advice is that starting a company is more accessible than people think, so long as you have passion, because passion is the fuel will sustain you through the long hours and constant challenges. If you believe deeply in the problem you’re solving and are committed to bringing your vision to life, then go for it. Entrepreneurship is more accessible than people think, but it requires a relentless drive. If you believe in the problem you’re solving and are committed to bringing your vision to life, then go for it. It’s important to also surround yourself with people whose skills complement your own. No one builds a successful business alone.

What’s next for you after stepping back from Lyst?

After 12 years leading Lyst, I’ve stepped back to focus on my family and new ventures. I’m currently serving as an Entrepreneur in Residence with the Royal Society at the University of Oxford,

working with scientists and engineers on building businesses around cutting-edge technology. It’s a fascinating role helping to shape the next generation of startups.

How do you think AI will shape the future of entrepreneurship?  AI is already transforming industries, and its influence will only grow. In the next five years, I believe we’ll see AI assistants and tools playing a huge role in improving productivity and decisionmaking for businesses. It’s less about replacing jobs than it is about augmenting the way we work. Entrepreneurs who embrace AI will have a significant advantage, using these tools to identify market gaps, test products more efficiently, and even automate complex tasks. The possibilities are endless, and it’s crucial for anyone entering the workforce to understand how to leverage AI in their field.

REDEFINING URBAN TRAVEL

As urban commuting bounces back post-pandemic, the challenges of congestion, pollution and stress have returned for many. With the UN estimating that 68% of the world’s population will live in urban areas by 2050, a breakthrough is certainly needed to ensure that safe, affordable, speedy and environmentally friendly travel is possible for over 6.5 billion people in the world’s cities.

As UK authorities and organisations tackle the negative impacts of carbon emissions, noise pollution and a buckling infrastructure, Maeving, an electric motorcycle company co-

founded by Seb Inglis-Jones (2004, E), offers hope for a cleaner, quieter urban landscape.

After a challenging start to his schooling, Seb came to Radley without much motivation for academic study, but his outlook was entirely changed by transformative teaching during his five years at the College. English, in particular, was a subject that he became passionate about, leading the activities of the Poetry Society, and attending optional evening classes and talks.

Having grown up in London, Seb was keen for a change of pace, and moved to Durham to study English and Philosophy, going “in as an English Grad, and coming out as more of a Philosophy Grad”. Ethics, and the opportunity it offered for lively conversation and debate, was the focus of Seb’s interest at university, and he rounded off his degree with a dissertation on the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

During his second year, he met Will Stirrup, a PPE student sharing a common ethics module, who matched Seb’s energy for philosophical discussion. A few months and many vigorous debates later, Seb and Will had decided that their ability to reach amicable conclusions in the realm of ethics might translate well into the real world: in the future, they decided, they would build a business together.

Will Stirrup (L) and Seb Inglis-Jones (2004, E) (R)

THE PAINS OF URBAN COMMUTES

1

Traffic Congestion: In 2022, London won the unenviable title of the world’s congestion capital, with drivers losing an average of 6.5 days annually, and many five-mile journeys taking 30 minutes or more. This is a drain on productivity and a significant cause of stress; commuters report feelings of frustration and isolation, with repercussions for their personal and professional lives. The sedentary nature of prolonged commutes also takes a toll on physical health, with an impact on blood pressure, circulation and musculoskeletal health.

2

Public Transport: The reality of public transportation often falls short of promises made by local authorities. Limited coverage,

overcrowded services, and disjointed routes create a poor experience for many commuters. Reliability is also a concern, with delays, cancellations and strike action compounding existing problems meaning that reliance on public transit becomes an unattractive option for many.

3

Affordability: The financial burden of commuting is no small consideration. Escalating fuel costs, coupled with road taxes and emissions charges, weigh heavily on motorists. Similarly, public transport expenses are far from trivial. In London, a zone 1-6 travel card costs nearly £300 monthly, rising to over £430 for those travelling in from further afield. The UK’s average annual expenditure on same-day return train fares exceeds £2,600.

With a firm belief in this objective, but no immediate business plan, they both sought experience in the corporate world to build a foundation of skills and experience, Will at KPMG, and Seb at Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC where he pursued a role in sales and marketing. While both learned plenty from these early roles, Seb was keen to move on before he became too cemented into the corporate world. He was focused on building a business of his own, and his 70-hour weeks in the office and long commute were not affording an opportunity to dedicate any time to exploring options or developing ideas.

He quit, and began working freelance, juggling a number of revenue streams, including DJing among other activities. It was liberating and provided Seb with the time he needed to research market opportunities.

A friend of Seb’s introduced him to the e-bike revolution in China where, in 2015, legislation had prohibited the use of motorcycles in many urban centres as a pollution-reducing measure. This dictat forced, almost overnight, millions of Chinese commuters to move to electric options – mostly electric-assisted bicycles, e-scooters, alongside some electric motorcycles. At first, there were plenty of crudely improvised motorbikes on the road, powered by car batteries that could be charged at home, thereby overcoming the challenge that a lack of charging infrastructure presented. Innovation and R&D have since blossomed to supply this new demand, and in 2017, 22 million e-bikes were sold in China. 80% of riders there use electric vehicles, the highest rate of electric adoption in the world.

With the pressure to clean up cities in the West, and meet Net Zero targets, Seb felt sure a similar market was about to open up in the UK. Seb was already a keen biker himself, having purchased a motorcycle to combat the joyless congestion of his corporate commute. Joined by his university debating partner, Will, and buoyed by the exciting opportunity, they initially built a business plan to launch the European

4

Safety: Urban commuting presents a host of safety concerns from criminal activity and harassment to risk of accidents and targeted threats, pushing people back to the independence and security of their personal vehicles.

5

Environmental Impact:

The environmental ramifications of urban commuting are undeniable. Cars form 52% of domestic vehicle emissions in the UK and over 60% of those journeys are single occupancy; the inefficiency is obvious. These levels of consumption in our cities create a polluted, congested and noisy environment, and add to the overall issue of global pollution.

arm of a pre-existing electric bike manufacturer in China. This first endeavour didn’t work, but they had learned a lot about the market and technology, and before long they were ready to try again.

Their approach this time was not to import motorcycles from China, but to lean into the rich heritage of British motorcycle manufacture which includes BSA, Norton, Royal Enfield and Triumph. They set out to recruit the best UK engineers and start making Britain’s first electric motorcycle.

Despite their first round of investment-raising being interrupted by the pandemic, and with a renewed public interest in private transport to avoid the virus, Seb and Will secured their investment from a venture capital firm and some angel investors, and began hiring. Their aim was to create a vehicle which brings convenience, excitement and joy to riders’ daily travel, while simultaneously providing a sustainably responsible and affordable way to commute.

Maeving is based in the Midlands, with its headquarters in Coventry, the heartland of British motorcycling. It was in Coventry, in 1896, that the first motorcycle was made publicly available, a two-horsepower vehicle by Humber Motorcycle. Maeving draws inspiration from this national heritage, with 65% of parts for their motorcycles currently sourced from the UK, and an aspiration for this to increase to 100% (moving away from LG and Bosch) when UK battery manufacture improves.

Maeving launched the Maeving RM1 in April 2022, with innovative removable battery technology and a beautiful design based on the best of British motorcycles from the 1930s, 50s and 60s. Within a year it had become the number one selling electric motorcycle in the UK and since then, production has scaled quickly with hundreds of motorcyles produced and sold.

Inspired by iconic bikes from history: board trackers (1920s), café racers (1950s and 60s), and bobbers (slimmed down, streamlined bikes).

1 Battery

Removable technology, allowing convenient charging - any three-pin socket becomes a charging point.

Drop-in connector technology connecting the batteries automatically when inserted, meaning no connection cables or fiddly attachments.

The dual battery allow 80-mile range.

Charge fully for an average cost of 73p.

One weekly charge to full is enough for a week’s worth of commuting for many riders

2 Suitable for all

Agile and manoeuvrable, the RM15 weighs in at just 128kg.

Twist-and-go throttle makes riding easy for first-timers.

3 Tank

The traditional tank space provides 10l of built in, lockable storage which can be supplemented by stylish weatherproof panniers.

4 Two-wheeled agility

Feel more connected to the road and your journey.

Move through jams to avoid congestion.

Cut your journey time in half, making the city feel smaller and more accessible.

Explore narrow streets which offer shortcuts and undiscovered spots.

Wake up feeling excited about your daily commute

5 Hub Motor

No exhaust, no noise - enjoy a silent ride, meaning less noise pollution in our cities, and the chance to enjoy ambient soundscapes such as birdsong or the hustle and bustle of your surroundings.

No oil, no chain, no petrol - no mess

An electric motor is easier and cheaper to maintain and service.

A Dual Battery Control Module allows the Maeving RM1 to engage either a single battery, or two batteries running in parallel.

Range to up to 80 miles.

Since launching, Maeving have appeared at a number of esteemed shows such as Goodwood, Concours on Savill Row, EICMA (the global annual motorcycle show) in Milan, and Motorcycle Live. They’ve been featured on the BBC, in GQ, The Times and The Telegraph, have released a limited-edition vehicle in collaboration with luxury shirtmaker Thomas Pink, and have partnered with Manchester garment maker Private White V.C. to create the Envoy Poncho.

In 2023, Maeving expanded into Mainland Europe and the United States. They have also developed and launched a second model, the Maeving RM1S, which has a top speed of 70 mph, making it ideal for those whose commute takes them on dual carriageways and beyond the urban landscape. A hugely successful year was topped off with being awarded 3rd place in the Startups 100 for 2024, a list which celebrates disruptive new businesses and receiving the 2024 industry award for ‘Best Urban Electric’ for the RM1S, beating Kawasaki and BMW’s offerings which were launched at the same time.

Why ‘Maeving’?

Maven is an uncommon word in English, borrowed from Yiddish, which means ‘an expert’ or ‘enthusiast’. We felt this reflected the brand we wanted to build.

Do you consider Maeving to be a green tech company?

Yes, definitely. What we’re trying to do is get as many people as possible on to green, sustainable transport; that’s the primary objective. Ultimately, we have a climate agenda driving the business. By switching a proportion of the population to using two-wheeled transport you free up large parts of cities which currently accommodate parked cars for better uses such as shared green spaces. Noise pollution is also a blight on our urban environment – reducing the use of internal combustion engines reduces noise levels and allows us to enjoy natural ambient sounds like birdsong, and also stops people being woken up by a delivery driver revving outside their window at 5am. There are all sorts of benefits.

Is range anxiety still an issue for potential customers, and how do you overcome it?

Range anxiety is not so much about the mileage that a car or a bike can do, it’s about the infrequency of charging opportunities, and we just need to overcome the current limitations of charging infrastructure. It wasn’t that long ago that mobile phones had up to a week’s worth of battery but with the introduction of smartphones, suddenly you’re only getting two thirds of the day before you need to top up the battery. The reason that people don’t panic is that they have a charger in their office, a charger at home, one they carry in their bag. The increased

MAEVING TIMELINE

capability of a smartphone over an old ‘brick’ makes it worthwhile, and we’ve formed a new habit of creating ourselves a personal charging infrastructure. With a bike, you can’t increase the battery capacity by adding more and more cells because bikes need to be lightweight and manoeuvrable. But with a removable battery that you can take into the office or a café, or into your home, suddenly every three-pin socket becomes a charging point.

Our bikes aren’t intended for driving across the country on long recreational rides, but the average commute in the UK is under seven miles, and is done solo. Charging your Maeving battery once a week at the weekend is easily enough for most people’s daily commute. And it comes with benefits that an electric car can’t offer – moving through traffic jams, and easy parking in small spaces.

Affordability seems like a key factor for Maeving?

We wanted to make a Maeving bike purchased on finance less than the cost of an Oyster Card. You can finance a Maeving for as little as £95.00 per month and charging the battery fully costs around 73p. That means your battery charging costs for the UK’s average commute distance, 11.4 miles per day, is only £4.20 per month.

We commissioned a study to look at our environmental credentials and one of the results that was really interesting is that our bikes emit less carbon per person travelling than the London Underground. So, it’s actually cheaper and more environmentally friendly to ride a Maeving bike … there’s no excuse!

What’s the maintenance and lifespan like on a Maeving?

The benefit of removable batteries is that you can continually and easily upgrade as the technology advances, which is not the case with an electric car. So, theoretically, you could own one of our bikes for a long, long time and keep it up to date. Our batteries aren’t fast-charging (most customers simply charge them overnight at the end of the week), which helps to ensure the longevity of the battery. In terms of maintenance, electric vehicles have no moving engine parts to worry about, so riders really only need to worry about keeping their bike clean and keeping their batteries out of very extreme hot and cold weather.

How are developments in battery technology affecting your company? We’re certainly bringing out new batteries now which are better than the batteries we brought out last year or two years ago. But actually, battery density is not currently improving all that quickly – it’s slower and steadier. I’m sure everyone is hearing plenty of buzzwords in the media, about solid state battery technology, etc., and there will certainly be a paradigm shift at some point in the future, but until then, it’ll be gradual. All automotive companies are using broadly the same cells; we use the same cells in our bikes that Tesla do in their cars.

Do you see Transport as a Service (TaaS) being a part of Maeving’s future?

Generally speaking, I find it’s good to try and maintain a fairly narrow focus for your business in order to deliver the best product and service, and stay true to your values. We are focused on the technological and sustainability approach of our company and creating premium products for our riders – beautiful British design. At the moment, it’s about the individual rider, and their relationship with their bike, it’s about personal journeys, customisation, and individual travel. Since COVID we’ve seen plenty of e-scooter and e-bicycle shared services come and go, but Maeving is about owning a bike that allows you to rediscover and fall back in love with the city you live in, and make your daily commute feel like an adventure.

It sounds like you’ve known that you wanted to start your own business since you were quite young. Has it lived up to your expectations?

I think we both found the idea of starting a business appealing from the point of view of having full

creative control as it develops, and the sheer breadth of exposure and responsibility – be it finance and fundraising, manufacturing, managing people – is hard to match in the corporate world. We also thought that if you’re going to devote your life to building something, and be pretty stressed in the process, then it’s important to make sure that the business is doing something that matters to you. I loved my motorbike, but also knew that the biggest issue of our time is climate change. So, whatever our business was, it was in some way going to be part of the solution to that.

Starting a business is a tricky path, and it’s often glamorized. The truth is, most start-ups fail … many founders are exhausted by the end of it and burnout. It’s a lot less sexy than it’s portrayed; it takes a high tolerance for risk, resilience, and lots of determination and, perhaps, a level of lunacy, honestly. But we discovered a problem that we wanted to fix – something that we are passionate about.

What do you hope a city of the future might look like? What else might we reimagine?

My answer would differ drastically depending on the timeline, but looking to the immediate future (and thus ignoring the shared economy driverless car revolution and beyond), our mission is to show people that there is no faster, cleaner, more enjoyable, and more affordable way to get around cities than on an electric motorcycle. It is to impress upon people the notion that, given that most people live in cities, travel short distances (and most of the time solo), there is often no need for a car; electric or otherwise. A world in which car usage is reduced in favour of bicycles, scooters, and motorcycles (all of them electric) is quieter, cleaner, less congested, and full of people who actually enjoy their commute!

Want to find out more? Visit Maeving’s website at www.maeving.com, to see their motorcycles in detail. There are a number of fascinating blogs to read too, on everything from keeping cool while travelling in hot weather, staying safe on the roads, organising motorcycle insurance, and interviews with Maeving riders including environmentalists, actors, and musicians.

 Diagram of Power Jets' W2/700 jet engine, c. 1944. © Institution of Mechanical Engineers Universal Images Group North America LLC via Alamy

THE INVENTORS

WORKING OUTSIDE THE BOX

It is relatively easy to track Radley’s artists and writers through our records. Most work alone and often use these terms to describe themselves, their careers or their hobbies. The inventors and experimenters are harder to spot. Usually, they were working as a member of a much larger team, for example James Tinling (1915, E), who worked alongside Frank Whittle on the invention of the jet engine during the 1930s and 1940s. His own company, Power Jets Ltd founded in 1936, was taken over by the state in 1944.

The Longridge brothers, Michael (1859) and Cecil (1865), both proudly included their inventions in the fields of explosives in their Register entries: Michael as a member of the inventions department of the Ministry of Munitions, and subsequently serving on the General Board of the National Physical Laboratory, and Cecil as inventor of the base-fuel shell used in the earliest Royal Navy submarines. Cecil went on to become one the directors of the Daimler Motor Company in Coventry.

A precursor to Tinling in advances in aviation was Eric Bruce (1871) the inventor of the electric balloon-signalling system. Originally designed to allow British Army troops to signal within mountainous terrain during the Second South African War (1899-

1902), his invention became the forerunner of aircraft-to-aircraft signalling during WW1. Boys in Radley Officers Training Corps were trained in this method of wireless signalling in 1919, but it is not clear whether the Radley connection was known to them.

A more peaceful application of technology was the invention of the differential microphone and binaural electrical hearing apparatus, both designed for use by the deaf, by Harry Wharry (1905, G), a specialist surgeon. His name is still associated with some types of microphone.

Most celebrated of all Radley’s inventors is Charles Howard (1921, D), Earl of Suffolk and Berkshire, whose memorial can be seen in the Cloisters. He was awarded the George Cross for his work as a Scientific Officer during WW2, most notably as the inventor of bomb disposal. Although this research and invention was top secret during his lifetime, an even more secret aspect of his career was his work on heavy water and connection to the Manhattan Project: this is currently the topic of new research by Seamus Blackley, the 'father of Xbox' who visited the College last year.

Radleians have been involved in the development of computers since the 1960s, for example John Whittaker (1925, E) Administrative Officer to the Government Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency, Fellow of the British Computer Society, and Chairman of its Membership Board; John Mackarness (1933, G) who was appointed Secretary of the British Computer Society in 1965; John Marchant (1938, B) who became Senior Consultant at Bedford Computer Services Ltd in 1971. Dr Jeremy Tatum, physics teacher, was given access to a computer at Culham Laboratory for his personal research on astronomy in 1969 – he went on to become a professor of Astronomy in the USA and even had an asteroid named after him: Asteroid (3748) Tatum. And in 1981, Michael Crowley-Milling (1931, F) was awarded the Glazebrook Medal and Prize of the Council of the Institute of Physics for the development, design and construction of the multi-computer control system of the 400 GeV proton synchrotron at CERN.

At school, the inventors and experimenters became members of the Wireless Society which flourished throughout the 1930s into the 1950s, making good use of recycled components during shortages. It was building the wireless which was the attraction. The diary of a Shell, written during his first year in 1934, records many sessions happily working on his radio. A few years later, evacuee Alan Dodson was taught how to build a miniature crystal set by an unnamed Radley don during WW2. This laid the foundations of Alan’s own career in computers (and raises questions about the don’s possible covert activities).

In 1954 members constructed a 10-valve amplifier for the Marionette Society – a good example of sharing skill sets. In 1958 the Wireless Society was itself re-invented, becoming the Radio Club. Members worked on projects ranging from transistor amplifiers to cathode ray oscilloscopes, teaching themselves

Michael and Cecil Longridge in the 1867 Radley Choir

HM Wharry (1905, G) whilst serving with the RAMC during WW1.

Charles Howard (1921, D), 20th Earl of Suffolk and Berkshire

electronics under the guidance of science master, CH Barrow. In another collaboration with a different school society, the Radio Club embarked upon the construction of a radio telescope on the roof of the Science building, working with the Science Society. Crawley Technical College and a school in Liverpool were also cooperating in the experiment: ‘The scheme is to determine the electron density of the Sun’s corona by measurement of the attenuation of the radiation from the Crab Nebula as it passes through the corona. An interferometer aerial system will be used with government surplus receivers. The apparatus will be operating on approximately eleven metres.’ Nearly half a century later, physics classes under Kevin Mosedale could access the Faulks Telescope in Hawaii over the internet to study astronomy and photograph galaxies. When the Science building was re-designed in 2018 it had an observatory added to the roof. But the pressures of the exam

system meant that fewer and fewer boys were able to devote time to such extra-curricular activities and the Radio Club faded away. As technology moved away from extra-curricular clubs, the academic place for it became the Design Technology Department, with links to Physics. Design had been developing as a subject in schools during the 1960s but was still disregarded academically. At an inter-schools’ conference in the mid-1970s Radley’s Warden, Dennis Silk, urged: “When head and hands are working closely together we are coming somewhere near the true function of education. It is possible to train an aesthetic sense and to ally it to practical skills and the needs of people. Never has it been more important to do so.” It is perhaps no surprise therefore that it was Silk’s leadership that saw design facilities improve markedly both with the construction of the Sewell Centre and the appointment of specialist staff.

 Michael Crowley-Milling in the control room of the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron.

Credit: ref.: © 1975-2024 CERN (CERN-PHOTO-7512114X)

John Mackarness (seated on the right) with the 1st XI Cricket Team

FEATURES

ELECTRONICS

Max Horsey arrived at Radley to teach electronics in 1989. That year a new extension to the Design Department was opened in response to the introduction of ‘Craft, Design and Technology’ to the GCSE and A level syllabi which centred on electronics and mechanisms, with future plans to provide facilities for robotics and computeraided manufacture. The overall aim was to bridge the gap between Art, Design and Physics.

At the time, the government were considering whether Design should be made a compulsory subject to age 16 within the national curriculum. In 1986, Horsey’s textbook, Electronics in Practice was published by Blackwells, to be followed by many articles in journals, particularly Everyday Practical Electronics. In this, he joined the ranks of other Radley dons with published works.

By 1996, many boys were exploring electronics outside of the classroom in a similar way to the Wireless Society of the 1930s and the Radio Club’s radio telescope in the 1960s, helped by Horsey and his technician, Trevor Garnham. A number entered the national Young Electronic Designer Awards and the Young Engineer competition for the first time that year. Several of the boys published articles about their work in peer-reviewed journals.

In 1996, Philip Clayton was the first boy to introduce Radley to PIC – a new and revolutionary means of electronic control. This was well above A level and was the reason for Radley winning a number of electronics competitions for several years. In 1998, educating the boys came of age when ButterworthHeinemann published John Morton’s book PIC: your personal introductory course while he was still in the Sixth form: a first for the school. John Morton is now Professor of Nanoelectronics & Nanophononics at UCL and Director of the UCL Quantum Science and Technology Institute, and his work is helping to develop a new generation of quantum technologies including quantum computers.

Clare Sargent, Archivist

at Radley now use computer-aided design (CAD) in their Design Engineering classes.

 Electronics in Practice (1986) by Radley don, Max Horsey.

Pupils

REIMAGINING OUR SPACES

Following his life-altering diving accident leading to a spinal injury, James Taylor (1993, D) and his Radley friend Ed Warner MBE (1993, G) set out to create innovative and beautiful solutions to inclusive design. Their journey resulted in Motionspot, a RIBA award-winning consultancy which creates stunning inclusive and accessible spaces that redefine the boundaries of design excellence.

James and Ed were in the same class from their very first day at Radley and, throughout their time at school, they were teammates for rugby and cricket; they were dry bobs who emphatically never went near the river. Ed was head of his Social while James admits to being less studious.

James went on to Durham where he studied French and Economics and kept up his rugby skills, while Ed studied Geography at Bristol where he also played hockey.

After completing his degree, Ed initially stayed in Bristol and set up a drinks distribution business with a friend before moving to London to take up a sales and marketing role with Cadbury Schweppes. He moved from there to Nestlé, before joining an ethical water business called One Water. One Water uses the profits

from its worldwide sales to fund clean water projects in African countries such as Malawi, Ghana and Rwanda. It was Ed’s first experience of working for an organisation with social enterprise at its heart, and ignited a new passion for balancing business success with social change.

James had moved to London after finishing his degree and started a career in finance with UK investment bank Kleinwort Benson. He was enjoying his work and everything that London had to offer when, during a holiday in Portugal during the early 2000s, he broke his neck in a diving accident, leaving him with a spinal cord injury.

James spent the best part of a year at the National Spinal Injuries Centre at Stoke Mandeville hospital recovering and undertaking intensive rehabilitation, learning to live with his injury.

In his absence, a well-meaning healthcare professional had transformed 25-year-old James’s home in a bid to make sure his new and quite specific requirements were met. This left it looking rather more like the hospital that he had just left than the sort of space a young man would want to live in.

INNOVATING FOR INCLUSIVITY

A few fruitless attempts to source aesthetically pleasing and accessible furniture led to a frustrated conversation between friends James and Ed. They both felt strongly that a life-altering experience like James’s shouldn’t be compounded by removing all the usual opportunity for individuality and self-expression that come with creating your own personal space. They set out to find a solution to this problem.

They started small, with a narrow focus on physical accessibility in the home. Specifically, they aimed to create beautiful bathroom interiors which were suitable for the special requirements of

 The 1997 1st XV. Ed is on the far left of the middle row, and James is 5th from the right in the middle row.

wheelchair users, allowing customers to retain independence without having to compromise on style. Bathrooms, Ed says, are where the worst ‘design crimes’ tend to happen.

However, it soon became clear that the issue they had identified was far wider in scope. Having witnessed James’s experience, and noting an obvious gap in the market, Ed left his job at One Water, and, in 2012, together they founded Motionspot.

Motionspot started as a small team: an interior designer, occupational therapist, and a contractor who was already building beautiful accessible bathrooms.

“Our first client was an injured grenadier guard soldier who had just come back from Afghanistan as an amputee, and couldn’t get in and out of his own bath. We transformed his bathroom into a space that was accessible for him and that he felt proud to invite friends and family to use.

We started to understand the positive impact we could have on people’s lives through improving their independence and the effect that feeling proud about their homes would have on their social relationships.”

Galvanised by this success, James and Ed worked hard to build the company, creating an accessible bathroom business with national reach over the next three years. During this first phase of growth, they helped hundreds of clients to overhaul unattractive utilitarian bathrooms and replace them with appealing and inclusive spaces which matched both their personalities and requirements.

Over the last 11 years, Motionspot has evolved beyond private homes and is now a global award-winning inclusive design specialist consultancy.

“We work with clients from across all sectors: commercial workplaces, big hotel chains, education settings, retail, later living and healthcare, to help them understand what the challenges are within those environments. Not only the challenges for someone with a physical, cognitive, or sensory disability, but also how to design wider than that: to design for faith, ethnic background, culture and gender.”

Demand for their expertise is growing rapidly as companies, and society more broadly, understand the value in making spaces suitable for everyone, and enabling all people to engage fully in work and recreation.

Motionspot has expanded to a team of 22, and now operates globally from their office in Greater London. Their core message is this: inclusive spaces are about so much more than a wheelchair ramp at the entrance; only 7% of disabled people are wheelchair users. Inclusive spaces also need to be a supportive and welcoming environment for the other 93% of people with different requirements.

“I don’t think you can overestimate the importance of feeling comfortable and feeling included. Whether that’s at home, as the employee of a global company, as a student who is able to learn better because of the environment that suits them, or as a hotel guest who experiences a seamless journey from check-in to their accessible room, and to the dining room.”

Reports vary, but the World Health Organisation estimates that 16% of the population experience significant disability – that’s 1 in 6 of us, or 1.3 billion people worldwide.

If you are thinking that all this sounds lovely but doesn’t relate to you, think again. Not only will most people acquire an access need at some point – through illness, accident or age – but the benefits to your business can be quantified.

Research shows that designing spaces to be inclusive can increase consumer usage, improve customer loyalty, reduce operating and renovation costs, and even increase overall productivity. Thoughtful use of colour, construction materials and planting may not only meet the need of those living with dementia or neurodivergent people, but can also promote mental wellbeing more generally.

From attracting talented and diverse staff to your company, to reducing incidents of workplace accidents through careful design, there is plenty of commercial benefit to designing inclusively. Following their renovation of Clyde Campus in Glasgow, Former Director and Major Projects Delivery Lead at Barclays Ron Coghill stated that for every £1 they spent on inclusive design up to £100 was saved on retrofitting at a later date. Read more about Motionspot’s work with Barclays in the case study on p. 46.

“There’s a much greater awareness since the pandemic that actually we’re all vulnerable, and we’re all impacted by our own environment.”

The history of accessible design has been to meet the functional requirements of users, in other words the bare minimum of what

The Motionspot team in 2023.

a person needs to carry out their daily tasks. What we understand now is that the bare minimum is not enough for a person to live comfortably, express themselves, and be as productive as they have the potential to be. Truly inclusive design is about melding function and form to create spaces which facilitate and inspire. Importantly, Motionspot is advocating for a time when we no longer think about accessible spaces, but inclusive design as standard.

“Our vision for the future is that inclusive design becomes embedded in everything we do. That it isn’t special, or an alternative, but just good design. We’ve got probably a generation of hard work to get there, but we firmly believe that this principle should be part of the mainstream.”

Achieving this seismic shift in attitude is certainly a challenge, but James and Ed are optimistic. Their aim is to lead by example –

continuing to strengthen Motionspot’s position as global inclusive design leader, and to encourage new talent into this growing market. They will also continue to rigorously track their impact by measuring the quantitative and qualitative social change that is being achieved through their work.

In 2016, Motionspot won the RIBA Bespoke Access Award, and the company was recognised with an Innovate UK Inclusive Innovation Award. Between 2019-22, Ed acted as the Government Sector Champion for the Design of Products and Spaces, and this year he has been awarded an MBE for services to Disabled People.

The success of James and Ed’s business is a testament to their personal story and enduring friendship: using James’s own experience and frustration to fuel their drive to find a solution, and ultimately to improve the quality of so many people’s lives worldwide.

HOTEL BROOKLYN, MANCHESTER

Bringing unmistakeable New York style to Manchester, Hotel Brooklyn has 189 boutique rooms set across 10 storeys, plus conference rooms, a restaurant, bar, and mini cinema. Motionspot’s brief was to help embed accessibility in all areas of the hotel without compromising the design concept. Now often referred to as the most accessible hotel in Europe, the multi-award-winning Hotel Brooklyn has redefined how accessibility can be incorporated into luxury hotels. This included stunning industrial-style en-suite bathrooms and pioneering ceiling track hoists concealed in light fittings to support people with complex disabilities to transfer from their wheelchairs into bed. The result of making the hotel more welcoming for all guests has been an impressive return on investment for the hotel.

FEATURES

BARCLAYS, CLYDE CAMPUS, GLASGOW

Barclays aims to be the most accessible and inclusive FTSE company for all customers, clients, and colleagues. In 2018 Barclays commissioned Motionspot as their inclusive design consultant to create a welcoming, inclusive, and barrierfree campus for their 5,000 employees and visitors at its northern European headquarters. The vision was to create an environment that responds to people with physical, cognitive, and sensory needs, including designing for neurodiversity, with a particular focus on autism.

The 400,000 sq ft campus included regeneration of a vacant, brownfield site, three new buildings and two Grade B listed renovations, all set within three acres of re-greened, public realm land alongside the River Clyde. In 2023, Barclays’ Glasgow campus won The British Council for Offices (BCO) Award ‘Best of the Best’ category, highlighting the benefits it has delivered for both employees and the wider community through considered placemaking and social initiatives.

“Every

£1

we

spent on inclusive design saved us £100 in retrofits later. Plus, our inclusively designed offices have enabled Barclays to employ more disabled employees including autistic staff into technical roles. And our employees are reporting a greater sense of wellbeing, belonging and improved concentration in the workplace.”

Ron Coghill, Former Director, Major Projects Delivery Lead, Barclays

PICTURE THIS: BRINGING DATA TO LIFE

Real World Visuals, founded by Antony Turner (1966, B), reveals the invisible by turning data into meaningful images and animations to help everyone, from policymakers to the person on the street, make sense of environmental challenges.

A delicate, shimmering orb, balanced on the curved and uneven surface of Earth, casting a soft shadow over New Orleans and Houston. It looks ready, at the slightest vibration, to slip off, lost forever to the vastness of space. This is all the water on Earth. Not just all the fresh water, but all water. Accessible fresh water (the H2O that is in rivers, lakes and shallow groundwater – less than 750 metres below the surface) … that’s the tiny drop sitting on New York. The even smaller drop in the middle is all the water in the world’s rivers, lakes and soils.

It’s probably a lot less than you thought, and seeing it like this makes you realise just how precious water is (and perhaps worry if you left the tap running). The precariousness, the ease with which it looks like that precious drop could be shaken off the Earth also reminds us not to take such ecological wealth for granted.

This is the purpose of Real World Visuals, a company co-founded by OR Antony Turner: turning often impenetrable numbers or mindboggling volumes into relatable imagery – bringing data to life.

Inspired by Geology don, David Fielding, Antony left Radley with an A Level in Geology, but no immediate plan of what to do next. As a young man, he bounced between disparate roles: working at a hamburger bar on the King’s Road, on a deer stalking estate in Scotland, as a motorcycle messenger, and in a kitchenware shop in London.

At the age of nineteen he landed an office job in an entrepreneurial company supplying to the emerging offshore oil and gas market in the UK North Sea. He found he had a knack for selling innovative technical solutions and soon teamed up with a Finnish engineer and inventor as agent for a novel piping technology. Ten years later he became Marketing Director for the Finn, launching several technologies around the world, the last of which, Hi-Fog fire protection, is installed on 90% of the world’s cruise ships.

In his mid-40s, Antony hit what he describes as a bit of a midlife crisis. Looking to explore something with more depth of meaning, reflecting on his past enjoyment of being outdoors, and mulling over encounters with radical and environmental thinkers, he enrolled for a few courses at Schumacher College, located on the historic Dartington Estate near Totnes. Inspired by the economist and environmentalist E. F. Schumacher and founded by scholar and activist Satish Kumar among others, Schumacher College runs courses which challenge conventional thinking and focus on ecology and sustainability. This initial three-week course, which brought business people together to consider how sustainability and environmental responsibility could be brought into focus within the corporate world, chimed for Antony in a way that he had not expected. Just a couple of years later, in the late 1990s, he helped the College design a new programme called ‘Business and Sustainability’, this at a time when it was still unheard of to combine those two words.

 2014 Visualisations of greenhouse gas emissions from New York City – two tonnes per second. The central image shows a day’s worth, burying the Empire State Building, while one year’s worth towers over Manhattan. Watch the video at www.realworldvisuals.com/cv-projects/ new-yorks-carbon-emissions.

“I came out of Schumacher College realising that we exist, just like the bacteria on our skin, on a living planet. And I felt that climate change could be communicated in a better way. Throughout my career, whenever I’ve been selling things, I’ve used pictures, images – communicating in a visual way to tell a particular story. I made a decision to stop working for a brief period of time and focus on just investigating the science of climate change. I put together a slide deck, which I started to show people in businesses and organisations … and it just grew from there.”

Antony built these conversations into a pioneering consultancy called CarbonSense, and over the next five years he found himself presenting in the boardrooms of some of the world’s biggest companies such as TNT, and BT, arranging talks at HM Treasury, and helping with communication around the Honda F1 Earth car.

“I realised that a core reason why climate change had not been properly recognised was that greenhouse gases are invisible. It used to be that you’d see huge black plumes coming from vehicle exhausts as they went up steep hills, but particulate regulations mean you don’t see that now. But the CO2 is still there.”

Globally, 100 million tonnes of CO2 are emitted daily from the burning of fossil fuels. Spread evenly across the global atmosphere, that’s a layer around 100 microns thick – about the thickness of a standard sheet of 80gsm paper, so, each year, human activity is wrapping the Earth in over 3.5 cms of CO2. At current emission rates, that’s a layer nearly 3 metres thick over the course of a human lifetime.

“CO2 reflects heat back down to the Earth’s surface, trapping heat from the sun and our activities, which means that global temperatures are going up. A hotter planet means more intense rainfall and flooding in some places and means droughts in others. The natural heating and cooling systems of the planet and the ocean currents are seriously hampered.”

The 2008 economic crash meant smaller corporate budgets to dedicate to climate consultancy, ultimately leading Antony to wind down Carbon Sense. However, he had formed a joint venture with a science communication team which they called Carbon Visuals, and it was quickly being noticed by large American organisations. Under the Obama administration, Carbon Visuals worked with the Environmental Defense Fund and Google on a project to better communicate with the American public around energy and carbon emissions. One statistic from the report they were given as source material jumped out: New York’s yearly 54 million tonne CO2 output.

“At 15°C and 1 atmosphere pressure, a tonne of CO2 fills a 10-metre bubble. Our visual presentation, a video, opens with two of these bubbles popping up out of the pavement every second, before illustrating what the volume is over a day and then a year.”

The video was a huge success, being shown by Antony and his team to Obama’s Technical Director in the White House itself, at a conference in Austin, and then they put it on to YouTube. A few weeks later, Hurricane Sandy brought plenty of discussion of climate change, along with $68 billion of damage and 233 fatalities. Antony’s video went viral, and within hours he was being contacted by dozens of media organisations, all wanting permission to use the visualisation.

Since then, Antony and his team have worked with plenty of

 The world’s CO2 emissions, visualised as 10 metre spheres, flood New York at the actual rate we are adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere in the WBCSD-commissioned video made to demonstrate the value of carbon capture and storage. Watch the video here: https://www. realworldvisuals.com/cv-projects/the-worlds-fossil-fuel-use-and-emissions.

big names: BBC, Porsche, Somerset Wildlife Trust, the London Electric Vehicle Company, UN Environment Programme and many more. They’ve also expanded beyond carbon too, to tackle other social and humanitarian issues. It’s still a tricky business to be in, and is certainly not all plain sailing, but Antony is managing to balance running a successful business alongside taking on important projects for NGOs, and not-for-profit organisations who have smaller budgets to commit to these game-changing visual representations. Thanks to a generous grant from Innovate UK, the company is now developing a softwareas-a-service approach called Show Me that will enable instant production of high-quality imagery of anything that can be counted or measured.

Which is the most important element to a project – the client, the audience, the data or the story?

These are all key. When a company first gets in touch, we always have an initial call to discuss their proposed project. In the first five minutes I say there are four things we need: first, who’s the audience? Is it six guys wearing suits around the boardroom table, is it everybody in Sheffield or, is it the whole world? Second, what’s the story that you are trying to tell? Third, what data do you have? Importantly, data and the story are different things. We have to carefully check that the data being presented to us by the client are reliable, and not just anecdotal. The fourth question – what’s the budget? For a small NGO or community project we may be able to provide a limited deck of images for a low price, but if a large company want a really cool video, clearly that will be reflected in the cost.

What’s been your biggest project to date?

In 2014 we were asked by the World Business Council on Sustainable Development (WBCSD) to make a video to show how carbon capture and storage (CCS) can play in limiting global climate change. The video was to be shown to delegates at the

UN Climate Summit, New York. We were a little subversive in suggesting that the first part of the video showed the world’s consumption of coal, oil and gas, and CO2 emissions in real time. The film goes on to illustrate the speed that unmitigated CO2 emissions cause us to exceed the 2°C target for global warming, versus the impact when carbon capture is employed.

It’s kind of ironic that the funders of this video included many companies who are huge players in the fossil fuel industry, and big CO2 emitters.

I remember sending the final draft of the video to WBCSD for their feedback and they told us their members liked it but wanted a few changes to be made. One of their observations was that the oil depicted in the oil consumption portion of the video was “too black” – they wanted us to change the colour to soften the look of it, and even sent us photos of oil mixed with other substances so that it looked lighter. We drew the line at this and went back to them saying that we couldn’t make that alteration. They decided to proceed with the video anyway, and it made a real impact at the Summit. Sometimes you have to be open to working with people and organisations that you are not entirely aligned with, in order to work towards an ultimate goal – ours was getting this video seen at the Climate Summit.

Find out about WBCSD on their website: www.wbcsd.org

It sounds like you have checks in place to prevent companies commissioning projects which amount to greenwashing? We’re careful to avoid helping companies do greenwashing, but we’re not averse to working with anyone, provided we are using genuine data. We always insist on contextualising data too. For instance, we will not help a company tell a story about an improvement in their operational emissions without also showing emissions from their products. This way we can avoid oil companies using our work to disingenuously suggest their environmental impact is improving.

The visualisations we make are neutral in the sense that they simply show the data as it is. We do not make them ‘good’ or ‘bad’ or ‘scary’. The context in which they sit though can argue that the numbers are good or bad. I consider projects with companies like Shell and PepsiCo to be a step on a longer journey. Carbon offsetting is similar, really – climate activists

 In this image, all the accessible freshwater in the world is shown as a single sphere, balancing on South West England (this is part of a project for South West Water). Much of the world’s freshwater is locked up as ice or is buried deep underground. The water illustrated here is the water in rivers and lakes, in soil-moisture and shallow ground-water (up to 750 metres underground). It makes up 11.35% of all non-ocean water and just 0.31% of all water. View the project in more detail here: https://www.carbonvisuals.com/projects/sw-water

might not be happy with it, but it can still play an important role.

Have you experimented with other methods of conveying data to audiences, for example through sound or installations? Yes. We came up with the idea of putting a 10-metre balloon representing one metric ton of carbon dioxide outside the London headquarters of a global consultancy before the Paris Climate summit. We collaborated with several composers to create a pilot for a sonic landscape of energy and carbon use in buildings in Boston, USA. And we are currently working on a large sculpture depicting embedded carbon reduction for a major UK property company.

Are you optimistic about global emissions targets, for example Net Zero by 2050?

The best answer about climate optimism is from one of my gurus, Paul Hawken. He said, anyone who follows the science is bound to be pessimistic, but that is balanced by the amazing people around the world working to make a difference. It’s true that the emerging science is more and more troubling. When I first started, we were asking: what is going to happen to our grandchildren, or maybe our children? But the reality is that extreme weather events are happening, now, all over the world. Fixing that is going to be really, really difficult. One of the biggest challenges will be climate refugees because, in 30- or 40-years’ time, large swathes of the planet may be uninhabitable. People will be unable to stay in place and build a decent life.

The science is very troubling. Consider the number of tipping points that we’ve all heard about: accelerated melting of the polar ice sheets, changes in the behaviour and movement of the Gulf Stream. We are already seeing signs of these, and the UK is at risk just as much as the rest of the world. We can expect billions of pounds of flood damage per year in the short term. In the longer term, the UK is on the same latitude as parts of Siberia, Greenland and Canada – a significant change to the Gulf Stream may bring very cold weather and droughts to much of Europe.

But there are also positive social tipping points: the introduction of electric batteries, electric vehicles, renewable energy. The real problem is that some big corporate incumbents are holding things back and trying to maintain the status quo and their position in global markets.

What do you hope the world will look like in 500 years? The world will be physically changed for sure. But my hope is that we will have completely switched to renewables - primarily solar and wind energy. That countries will welcome climate refugees as citizens of the world bringing benefits not trouble. And that gross income inequality and burning fossil fuels will be a thing of the past. Homo Sapiens, I hope, will have finally lived up to the name and become wise.

Take a look at Real World Visuals via their website: www.realworldvisuals.com/

 This image shows the actual volume of carbon dioxide Radley College pumped into the atmosphere each day (on average) in 2010/11, compared to the aspirational reduction for 2035/36. The holes in the ground show how much carbon dioxide the College removed, and the aspiration for removal in the future by installing solar PV and land sequestration. Created by and published with thanks to the team at Real World Visuals.

OLD RADLEIAN CHARITY ENDEAVOURS

Members of our community did plenty of fundraising and charitable work for causes they care about in 2024. We are aware of over £184,000 being raised, though doubtless more has gone on unobserved by RadSoc. Here are some of the charitable endeavours from our community this year.

Arran Ryder (2012, H) and two of his Boodles colleagues abseiled down the Leadenhall Building (aka The Cheese Grater) raising £2,140 for The Lord Mayors Appeal Charity. www.justgiving. com/page/arran-ryder-1713355653795

Charlie Graham (2017, H) and his brother Angus completed the London to Brighton Ultra Marathon raising £2,015 for Macmillan Cancer Support. www.justgiving.com/page/charliegraham-1701102955399

George Beattie (2018, J) and Hector Copcutt (2018, B) delivered £150,000 worth of medical supplies to a hospital on the Ukrainian-Polish border and raised an additional £4,345 for UK to Ukraine on the way. https://gofund.me/9bf38f07

Harry Chisholm and Louis GiffardMoore (2015, J) took part in the Mongol Rally in their car Periwinkle in memory of Jack Chisholm (2015, A). They raised £21,100 for #JackTheLad Foundation and Cool Earth. https:// gofund.me/9468ae20

William Barratt completed the Namib Ultramarathon (250km across the Namib Desert), in memory of his friend Rupert Swift (1999, B), finishing 20th out of 120 runners. He raised £20,670 for the Pulmonary Vascular Research Institute. www.justgiving. com/page/william-barratt-1705191418284

Charlie Goodwin (2005, F/K) and Hector Bevan (2005, G/K) raised £54,922 for The Royal Marsden Cancer Charity in memory of Hugh Bevan (1975, A) who passed away in 2023. They completed the gruelling Yukon 1000 (the world’s longest endurance and survival paddle race, from Canada to Alaska). Read their story on pp. 56-57. www.justgiving.com/page/yukon-rangers

Adam Fowler (2018, E) ran the Manchester Marathon in aid of Sense, a charity which supports people who are deafblind or have complex disabilities. He raised £816. www.justgiving.com/page/ adam-fowler-sense1

Rowley Gregg (1997, C) and Ned Truman (1997, C) ran 100km in the South Coast Ultra Challenge raising £8,230 for Royal British Legion and £7,905 for Mountbatten Hospice respectively, as well as a further £4,000 offline for their chosen charities. www.justgiving.com/page/rowleygregg-1721637350551 - & https://theearlmountbattenhospice. enthuse.com/pf/edward-truman

Charles Larminie (2009, H) ran the London Marathon alongside his sister and a friend in memory of his father Oliver Larminie (1967, H) who died suddenly in January 2023 from complications related to cardiomyopathy. They raised £8,529 for Cardiomyopathy UK. https://2024tcslondonmarathon.enthuse.com/pf/charles-larminie

Jamie Heinrich (2007, G) completed a 3-day cycle from London to Paris, in aid of the Air Ambulance Charity, Lia’s Wings. He raised £1,200. www.justgiving. com/page/jamie-heinrich-1723287792129

Oswald Miller (2006, G) completed his first swim marathon and raised £1,827 for the Alzheimer’s Society. https://www.justgiving.com/ fundraising/oswaldoaguamarathon

Julius de Watteville (2013, F) and a group of friends ran the Vienna City Marathon, raising £2,592 for the Alzheimer’s Society. www.justgiving. com/page/george-watson-1710079483524

Robert Goldsmith (1991, E) and colleagues from Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, took on the 3 Peaks Challenge (climbing the highest mountains in Scotland, England and Wales in a single 24hr period). As a group they raised £25k for The Royal Marsden Cancer Charity.

Henry Morris (1996, E) cycled the length of the country, from Land’s End to John O’Groats as part of Threshold Sports Ride Across Britain: 980 miles in 9 days. Including gift aid, he raised £10k for The Outward Bound Trust. https://www.justgiving.com/page/henrymorris-1718802971161

Hannah Fraser-Mackenzie (1999, E) participated with Oz Clarke and Armonico Consort in a 230-mile charity bike ride over four days to raise funds for Memory Choirs in Warwickshire, raising £11,635. https://www.armonico.org.uk/bike2024/

KIT 4 KENYA

The last 12 months have seen plenty of activity for Kit 4 Kenya. We have been joined by a new cohort of student ambassadors, and they continue to drive our grassroots fundraising and awareness campaigns through events and social media. The money they raise supports the shipping of football kits to Kenya at a cost of £1 per full kit. Being an ambassador also offers brilliant personal development opportunities, developing communications, events planning and other skills.

We are pleased to have signed another football club, Southampton FC, who will join Arsenal, Roma, and Oxford United as kit providers.

Most importantly, we have shipped 4,000 kits to Kenya in the last year, despite the challenges that political unrest continues to pose, and these have been distributed to underprivileged children and slum football teams, helping to boost the morale and enjoyment of young aspiring players.

Looking forward, we have plans to run a Fantasy Football League next year, and a ‘golden ticket’ prize draw with specially designed pint glasses – these will both play a role in widening awareness of and participation in the charity’s work.

It has been great to partner with the Radleian Society as their Charity Alliance for 2024. Earlier this year, I visited the College and spoke to the Removes about Kit 4 Kenya and my career at Red Bull. Their enthusiasm for and interest in both was wonderful to see. It has also been lovely to have ORs reach out to me after they read about Kit 4 Kenya in the Old Radleian

Later this year, I will go out to Kenya to gather feedback from the local teams to make sure that we continue to support them in ways that are aligned with their needs. It also continues to be our long-term aspiration to build a football pitch over there, and visiting will provide me with an opportunity to undertake some scoping for this project.

I would love to hear from anyone in the Radley Community who is able to help with our work.

Tom Sweetnam (2014, J)

Find out more and support: www.kit4kenya.com Follow us: @kit4kenya on Instagram and TikTok

RADSOC CHARITY ALLIANCE 2025

MUSIC FOR AUTISM

We are pleased to introduce the Radleian Society Charity Alliance for 2025.

The Orchestra of St John’s Music for Autism (OSJ MfA) was founded by Mezzo soprano Christine Cairns, wife of OR John Lubbock (1959, E), in 2002, and has been led by John for over 20 years. Music for Autism was established to allow Christine and John to share their love of music with young people with autism and their families, and in response to the transformational impact music has on their own autistic son.

Music for Autism has delivered hundreds of workshops in special schools up and down the country and has touched the lives of thousands of young people with autism with the joy of classical music. Over 130,000 children and their parents, teachers or carers have participated in performances. Music for Autism runs an astonishing 70 days of workshops per year in special schools, both locally in Oxfordshire and further afield.

The impact of Music for Autism’s work is not only felt broadly across the country, but also deeply in the experience of individual

Christine & John Lubbock

families. Music has a profound impression on all who hear it and Music for Autism’s work gives performances which welcome the varied responses of their young audiences – from fidgeting and staring to movement and vocalisation. Through these private performances, Music for Autism ensures that the benefits that music brings to mental and emotional wellbeing can be enjoyed by children who would find sitting silently through a public performance impossible.

“We are very aware of the powerful impact that music has on so many of our children and young people. Finding musicians who allow our children to express themselves in their own unique ways is a challenge. These workshops are a fantastic way for our students to experience a concert that is truly for them, meeting their needs and touching them in a way that nothing but music really can.”

- Alison Norris, Deputy Head of the Kingfisher School, Abingdon.

Music for Autism workshops in schools incur absolutely no financial cost to the schools involved. For the past twenty years, John Lubbock has ensured that he could raise sufficient funds to enable this work to be provided to schools entirely free of charge.

Explore Music for Autism’s work and online resources at www.osj.org.uk/osj-music-for-autism and follow them on Instagram for updates and news: www.instagram.com/ orchestraofstjohns (@orchestraofstjohns)

29 years ago, our second son, Alexander, was diagnosed with severe autism which necessitated a change of life for us. Up until then we had both been travelling the world as a conductor and singer, but since Alexander’s diagnosis we have not been on a plane once. Although our son loves music, his behaviour precludes him coming to any public concerts.

So, Christine had the brilliant idea of starting a charity which would combine what was now the two things which dominated our life: music and autism. She launched the charity Music for Autism to take music to children in safe spaces where all behaviour is acceptable, and they can truly be free to react and to express themselves in any way they like. After the first concert, Alexander announced (in a manner familiar to any parent) that he wouldn’t come again: “Music with my mum and dad is embarrassing.” Despite this, Music for Autism continues to provide valuable musical performances to hundreds of children each year.

We take a small group of musicians from my orchestra, the Orchestra of St John’s, into schools for a day of interactive concerts, giving several performances to various groups. All the schools we visit have autistic children with varied learning and behavioural issues. Many of the children are non-verbal or have serious communication problems – there is nothing like music to reach them. It develops their social skills and considerably lowers the high anxiety levels which afflict many of these children. Tiny changes in behaviour which are unremarkable in ‘normal’ children, such as the twitch of a usually motionless hand, are monumental to the families of our audiences, and show the deep impact that live music has.

Since Music for Autism was founded, we have played to hundreds of thousands of children and their carers and teachers. We have received many letters from schools which are testimony to the wonderful effect the music has. Perhaps the greatest affirmation we get is that many schools ask us if we can come every day.

We are grateful for any support you are able to give to help us fund the important enrichment and relief that Music for Autism brings to schools across the UK.

John and Christine Lubbock

THE YUKON RANGERS

Paddling 18 hours a day to raise over £50,000 for prostate cancer research

Hector Bevan (2005 G/K) and Charlie Goodwin (2005, F/K) –known as the Yukon Rangers – have raised more than £50,000 for The Royal Marsden Cancer Charity by taking part in the Yukon 1000 – a gruelling 1000-mile paddle race from Canada, up into the Arctic Circle and finishing in Alaska, also known as ‘the World’s toughest survival and endurance race’. Such is the challenge, of over 4,000 people that apply to enter, only 30 teams are selected to compete and only 22 made the start line for the 2024 race.

Our route followed in the footsteps of early adventurers, immersing us competitors in the raw, untouched wilderness that few humans have ever experienced. More people have been up Mount Everest than have been beyond Dawson City (a point along the race route). It involves paddling 18 hours a day, in some of the most isolated and remote landscapes in the world. Competitors must be completely self-sufficient, be able to navigate the white water and ever-changing braided river and avoid the significant bear and moose population! Each evening, teams sleep rough where they stop, with a mandatory 6-hour standdown window until the next day.

Despite Hector snapping his paddle on day 1, we finished the 1,000-mile (1,600km) race in seven days, six hours and 25 minutes, and were the third canoe team to finish. It was a truly brutal test of each team’s physical and mental strength. We were one of 22

amazing teams taking part in this unique and epic challenge, and each team pushed themselves to the limit to complete the race.

We took on this challenge to raise money for prostate cancer research at The Royal Marsden, where Hector’s dad, Hugh Bevan (1975, A), was treated before he sadly died in 2023. Hugh was diagnosed with metastatic prostate cancer in 2015 and was treated by Professor Nick van As at The Royal Marsden. He died in September 2023, after eight years on treatment, including chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Hugh made the most of the extra years he was given. He lived life fully: climbing 5000m Himalayan peaks, sailing the Southern Ocean and cycling up mountains around the world. He was able to do all of that thanks to The Royal Marsden. Hugh died knowing we were taking on this challenge and his reaction to Hector was “you’re mad”.

Recovery from this epic adventure took well over a month, but we did so with smiles on our faces, pleased to have finished the challenge and raised such an incredible sum for charity, all thanks to the generous support we have received.

Charlie Goodwin (2005, F/K)

So far, Hector and Charles have raised over £54,000 for The Royal Marsden and are hoping to push this higher before finalising their fundraising efforts at the end of the year. Money raised goes toward a fund that is focused on shorter, better treatments for better longer-term outcomes, but with fewer side effects.

You can find out more about Hector and Charlie’s challenge and show your support by donating on the Yukon Rangers JustGiving page: https://www.justgiving.com/page/yukon-rangers

THE OPPOSITE OF LUXURIES

A concern for social justice and the expression of faith through good works lies at the heart of Radley’s founding principles. The College’s connection with its mission in Wapping, which began in the 1880s, lasted for nearly 80 years during which time donations from pupils, staff and Old Boys paid for the salaries of missioners, provided sports equipment, bought the land for a holiday camp and repaired a bomb-damaged hall.

In the year 2000, twenty people met for a dinner in London. As boys and men (and later with their wives) this group had been meeting together annually since 1934. This was to be their last dinner, as age and mortality had taken their toll over the years, but they still met in thankfulness for the people and the institution that had brought them together. One man, in particular, was remembered, Old Radleian Harold Pollock (1883, F) – ‘a man of God; a priest always and everywhere; showing you, in and through his priesthood, God’s love of you, God’s implicit trust in you, God’s need of you.’

This group had only known Harold Pollock for a few years at the very end of his ministry – a ministry that could be considered, in worldly terms, to be one of limited scope: an unmarried clergyman who served his whole life as an assistant curate in one very poor parish in the London docks, who never became a vicar in his own right. For forty-seven years he ran clubs for boys and men, he organised summer camps at the seaside, he constantly pleaded for help from his fellow Old Radleians, he fundraised, and he identified individual boys to be helped with education and accommodation. In 1916, The Boys’ Own Paper ran a series of articles about his work and others like him, alongside articles on war heroes.

Harold Pollock began his career at St Peter’s, London Docks, as a volunteer two years after he left Radley in 1887. He was ordained and appointed curate a few years later. But his connection went back to his time as a pupil. A Radleian visiting St Peter’s in 1933 reported ‘At the end, Father Pollock told us how he came down many years ago in the Dramatic Society to perform there, and was so taken with the place that he came again next holidays to stay permanently.’

So, what was the attraction? Wapping is an area on the north bank of the Thames, close to the Tower of London. In the 1840s, it became effectively an island connected to the mainland by bridges. The shifting population of the docks, the irregular work and the difficulty of access created an environment in which ‘all the elements of degradation – poverty and improvidence, drunkenness and prostitution, robbery and violence, ignorance and unbelief were active – while the police were both unwilling and afraid to interfere.’ St George’s Mission was established there in 1856 when Charles Lowder was appointed as priest-in-charge; the church that became St Peter’s was built soon after to house the rapidly growing congregation of new converts. This is credited as the first ‘Home Mission’ in England, i.e. a mission to serve the people of this country rather than overseas. The early history of the mission was turbulent: it was attacked by rioters, one curate was assaulted,

and Lowder’s own life was in danger as he faced down a mob who threatened to throw him over the bridge into the docks.

This was a new way of doing ‘church’ – a response to the urbanisation and industrialisation which had transformed British society by the middle of the nineteenth century as workers moved from the countryside into the towns. Traditional rural structures of community and governance organised around the squire and the clergyman became ineffective in heavily populated urban areas. Although some non-conformist groups were growing, religious attendance at Anglican churches was waning, giving rise to a fear that secularisation was rising among the working class and awareness that the established church was beginning to lose authority in urban areas.

Part of the problem was that the traditional parish structure was overwhelmed by the rapid growth. There were too many people in each parish. Urban development had also been ignored: basic infrastructure was lacking; new houses were built quickly, older housing stock was poorly adapted, slums grew. The Anglican church responded in several ways, but the primary ones were a sustained programme of church building and planting, the transformation of the role and duties of clergymen, including the abolition of multiple livings held by one man, and a move into providing social welfare, particularly in education. A new type of clergyman began to appear in response to these changes – men who now had to show that they had a calling and spiritual commitment to their role, and to be prepared to live among their poorest parishioners.

Schools such as Radley had already begun to educate boys to take on these roles as clergymen. One of the original four founders of Radley College was Nugent Wade who started the St Barnabas House of Charity in Soho, which ministered to prostitutes and St Mary’s Crown Street, an Anglo-Catholic centre in a slum district. He made St Anne’s, Soho, the pre-eminent gathering place for like-minded clergy in central London. William Sewell campaigned for Oxford University to establish lectures in Birmingham and Manchester, arguing that promoting education among the poor was essential to the university’s Christian ethos. By the 1870s, Radleyeducated clergymen were serving as vicars and curates in East Ham, Shoreditch, Bayswater, Bethnal Green and St George’s in the East in Stepney – the church which set up the mission in Wapping.

The idea of mission and charitable giving was constantly presented to the boys at Radley with a part of the offertory in chapel usually donated to individual missions. Work in Natal, Zanzibar and

Radley Mission Camp, 1936.

St Peter's Church Lads' Brigade Band, 1912.

Melanesia was the subject of regular annual presentations but there were also visits from the Bishop of Honolulu in 1867, a talk about Fiji in 1876, and the Indian sub-continent in 1882. Offertory donations were encouraged as part of education. Radley attempted to restrict pocket money in order to regulate access to ‘luxuries’, suppress obvious disparities in wealth, and teach financial management. The limited funds each boy had at his disposal supported school activities, including all sports and the library, all classed as ‘luxuries’. Giving to charity was the counterbalance: ‘it is the opposite of luxuries, entirely for other, not for self, without which we should be wanting in true religion.’

Although these high ideals were being presented within the school there was still great concern that this ‘true religion’ went no further than the pocket. Reform of education itself was needed: the rich and privileged must engage physically and spiritually with the real lives of the urban poor. Arnold of Rugby led the way when he preached a series of sermons to his school in 1844 – ‘men ..who have never thought seriously for what purpose they were sent into the world … who have allowed themselves to look with indifference upon poverty…’ ‘to us the abodes of the poor, and still more their sick beds, are a sight with which we are but little acquainted…’ but it was Edward Thring of Uppingham who established the first actual urban mission in 1869. Headmasters might have a vision, but it needs the boys to make it work. Following a talk by Rev John Foy about the work of clergy in the East End of London, the boys of Uppingham went to Thring and proposed their own project – to establish an Uppingham Home Mission, supported by their own chapel offertory. Uppingham’s mission in north Woolwich was the first to start in 1870, but Clifton and Winchester in 1876, Eton in 1880 and Radley and Marlborough in 1881 followed in quick succession. Oxford University’s settlement, Toynbee Hall, opened in 1884 as the first university mission. In 1885, the Bishop of London acknowledged the contribution of the public schools to the social, moral and spiritual welfare of poor communities in east and south-east London with a week-long series of sermons on the mission theme given by seven current and former headmasters. Among them was Robert Wilson, Warden of Radley. Wilson asserted that he wanted to shake his old boys out ‘of a self-satisfied, habituated, definitely limited and unprogressive morality and religion.’

Wilson was appointed Warden of Radley in 1880 when the school was at an all-time low. Poor staff salaries and dissension had led to thirty years of instability, the site at Radley Hall was not owned by the school, the school’s finances were so precarious that since 1858

it had been administered by a parent trustee, and there were just 70 pupils with a dubious ethos and discipline. Wilson’s task was to turn this around. In his eight years in the role, he reorganised the curriculum and more than doubled the size of the school. Radley’s East End Mission was to become part of that reform.

Wilson invited Robert Linklater to talk to the boys of Radley about St Peter’s, London Docks, on the 6th March 1881. Linklater had already visited several public schools to promote missionary work in the docklands, but he brought a specific challenge to Radley. Most of the children of the area had never seen the countryside or had the chance to play sports. He had raised £1,000 to buy the lease for a playground but had no money for its maintenance. Would Radleians raise the money for its upkeep? Like the boys of Uppingham, the boys of Radley rose immediately to the challenge. They agreed to his proposal with enthusiasm, immediately voted for funds to be raised by subscription and from the chapel offertory, began plans for an even bigger project, and sent an invitation to the recently formed Old Radleian Society to join in the work. Thus began a link which lasted until the 1960s.

In July 1881 the published accounts show that the school had raised £10 4s, with a further £3 2s from the dons. This munificent £13 6s was deposited in the Savings Bank waiting to be called on. This was the pattern for the next eighty years. The mission never had great funds to call on but successive treasurers responded to specific needs as they arose. Primarily the call was for action not money. The Old Radleian Society saw an opportunity for alumni based in London to give their time and talents in entertainments and in sports. Later this included a Band of Hope committed to temperance and the Church Lads Brigade and Boy Scouts, both of which were mirrored at Radley with the Officers’ Training Corps and a scout troop. Groups from the school visited regularly to perform evenings of music and theatricals, whilst individuals assisted with a range of sports including rowing, football and boxing. St Peter’s had more than twenty groups across all ages. Harold Pollock and his team of Radleians worked primarily with the teenage boys and young men. There was a marked similarity between the activities of the two institutions: any Radleian who visited would find his skills useful and when the Londoners came to Radley, they used all the school’s facilities for their own sports and entertainments. Collectively, the public school missions were responsible for the rise of the Football Association across the London Men’s clubs. It led to a shared sporting and cultural identity across the classes within the late-Victorian era.

Warden Robert Wilson with Common Room in 1887. Radley Mission Cookery School, 1937.

However, the primary concern of the vicar of St Peter’s was to relieve the material needs of his poorest parishioners. He rejected criticism that this was not his function: ‘Don’t suppose that a priest has done his duty when he has preached his Sunday sermon … Go into the homes of the poor, see their daily struggles … Rather you wonder ... that any goodness remains in them at all.’ After he preached at Radley in 1884, the chapel offertory included donations to a boys’ orphanage. By 1886 the school had ‘a scheme for boarding children from St Peter’s through the agency of the Waifs and Strays Society’. The appointment of Harold Pollock as curate allowed this to become more focused. As Pollock identified the needs of individual boys, the majority of the money raised for the mission was used to provide the costs of travel, lodging and education in the village of Radley for individual boys from Wapping. The first was Edward Ledsham whose education, accommodation and travel costs were paid fully by the school for the five years from 1889 to 1894. He was soon followed by others. Not all the names of those helped were recorded at Radley College but they were remembered in Radley village where the names of all who served in WW1 are inscribed in the parish church, including the boys from Wapping. It may seem to have had a limited effect on the world both of the school and the parish – but it must have meant the world to Edward Ledsham and his companions.

Radley College’s connection with St Peter’s underwent various metamorphoses, changes of name and management styles over the eighty years of its existence. A group of women associated with the school formed the committee to oversee work among girls and coordinated the mothers of Radleians to give spare and second-hand clothing, particularly anything suitable for smart school wear.

The mission also directly affected two other organisations. The first was Cheltenham Ladies College mission founded in 1889. This is the only known mission established by a girls’ school. Cheltenham Ladies College Guild was set up in 1884 as a means of staying connected to former pupils. It was dedicated to self-improvement and to personal charitable works but some in the Guild felt this was not enough and that they should be doing more to help the less fortunate. The idea of an urban mission came from former CLC pupil and teacher, Mrs Elizabeth Raikes, a close friend of Dorothea Beale. In 1885 she married Rev Thomas Raikes, Radley old boy, don and Tutor of D Social. Elizabeth Raikes was the first tutor’s wife to live at Radley. Her husband was the treasurer of Radley’s East London Mission from its foundation. The two of them were always present at entertainments in London and took the lead in welcoming the Londoners to Radley. Eventually the Ladies’ mission became St Hilda’s East, an organisation which saw the beginnings of social work as a profession. It still operates as an

educational and community hub in Tower Hamlets.

The other was the work of Old Radleian Selwyn Oxley (1904, D). Having participated as a boy at St Peter’s, he set up his own mission to work among the deaf. He also built a comprehensive library of books, ephemera and photographs which became the core of the Royal National Institute of the Deaf’s library, formerly housed at University College Hospital in London.

The long-term effects of the public school missions can also be seen in the creation of the Welfare State in 1948. Many of those who campaigned for it, including William Beveridge and Clement Attlee, decided on political careers informed by their experiences working with the missions. Not all pupils were committed. The schools and missions constantly called for volunteers. But the few who answered the call certainly made a difference.

Clare Sargent, Archivist

Note from a descendent of William Smith, one of the Wapping boys helped by Radley’s Mission.

“I cannot begin to tell you how excited I am to have just stumbled across Untold Stories, St Peter’s London Docks and Radley College Mission. William Smith was my grandfather! He was mixed race, he couldn’t read or write, he said he was ‘found’ as a young child and he always talked fondly about Nuns and a Father Pollock. I am now 74 and all my life have been trying to find out anything I could about my grandfather (particularly his ethnicity) with very little to go on. William married my grandmother, Olive Simmonds, who was in service at Radley and they lived locally in Cumnor until their deaths. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Radley College for the kindness that was shown to my grandfather and all the many boys who were helped when they needed it most.”

- Lyn Gillett

You can read more about this in Bright The Vision: public school missions from the Victorian Age. Ed. by Malcolm Tozer. Clare’s chapter on Radley tells the full story of St

Radley Mission League of Hope Gym Team, 1912. Harold Pollock stands second from the left at the back.

Peter’s, London Docks.

NEWS AND NOTES

A recent photo of Lily, his granddaughter, by photographer Dmitri Kasterine (1945, C)

Copyright: Dmitri Kasterine.

1940s

DMITRI KASTERINE (1945, C)

I am still doing photography every day: taking pictures, selling prints, exhibiting, or giving talks. I play tennis twice a week, or three times if I am lucky. Lousy food in nearly all restaurants these days, but very good in our house. The wine is excellent, especially Chardonnay and Riesling from the Finger Lakes.

Central New York State is a lovely part of the world. All are welcome to visit and hear about Radley 75 years ago if they want. Or otherwise, just to have a good time with the dogs and horses or come with me on a shoot.

CLIVE CARR (1947, C)

One of the joys of being an amateur artist is that there is no pressure to develop a recognisable, viable style, so I move freely between total abstraction and interpreted realism. However, I did hold one-man exhibitions in London galleries during the ten years from 2004, mainly for the

challenge. One popular theme was football, perhaps a bit odd for an ex-rugby player. It is a pleasant surprise to come across paintings in a home or elsewhere, which I had completely forgotten about. Nowadays, I have reverted to small watercolours - less space, equipment, storage, and less effort!

‘ Jo’ and ‘ Yellow Related Colours’ by Clive Carr.

DAVID GIRLING (1948,E)

Still surviving at 90, and enjoying life in Cornwall.

1950s

PETER CAROLIN (1950, D)

We have downsized to a flat last year and celebrated our 60th anniversary last month. After quite a busy retirement, I’ve withdrawn from College and professional life and hope to start some U3A courses in October. I’m still cycling around Cambridge but have given up sculling on the Cam.

DONALD LEGGET (1956, B)

I continue with my coaching advice at St Paul’s School Boat Club, which had their most successful season to date, winning Gold Medals at Nat Schools with their 1st, 2nd and 3rd VIIIs and going on to record their 4th win in the Princess Elizabeth Cup in nine years. I also continue to help with advice to Cambridge University Boat Club.

ANDREW BURNETT (1959, F)

We are continuing to travel as much as possible, though these days not abroad as a result of various health challenges. I enjoy singing in our local choirs, and helping with several local organisations including dealing with the many challenges caused by having HS2 built past our community and providing English education and other support for our Ukrainian community. And I still work part-time on projects using Microsoft Excel (www.logicarchitect. co.uk).

ROBERT GRANGE (1959, F)

I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s 24 years ago. This has had a major impact on my life having taken early retirement from Estate Agency in 2007. I now live in Devon with my partner, Jill, and try to keep as active as I can. I still enjoy bellringing and watching Somerset playing cricket in Taunton.

1960s

DAVID POUNTNEY (1961, D)

I got married (for the third time!) in June 2023 to Elena Mamchur. This year, I directed Smetana’s Dalibor in Brno, Weinberg’s The Passenger in Madrid and am currently in Warsaw directing Penderecki’s The Black Mask, so still

keeping busy. Warsaw prevented me from attending DWM Paine’s memorial, so I wanted to say how much I owe him for setting me off on my musical and theatrical journey.

WILLIAM GREIG (1969, C)

I am still enjoying reading and writing poems as well as ballroom dancing with my wife, Gill. I am grateful for this, thanks to having been diagnosed early with prostate cancer and having had excellent treatment. I hope all men over 50 years old will have annual check–ups even if they have no symptoms.

I recently bought a new Radley College 1st XI cricket sweater exactly 50 years after playing for the team, and which I am proud to wear, as is clear in this photograph – we hope to be judged the best-dressed couple at next year’s Valentine’s Gala Ball!

1970s

MARTIN FRYER (1970, C)

After a career spent mostly outside the UK (in the British Council) I now live in London and enjoy seeing friends, including many made during my years at Radley. I continue as a trustee of the Art Monthly Foundation. We publish Art Monthly, the UK’s leading magazine of contemporary visual art. The magazine celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2025.

NICHOLAS LAMBERT (1970, E)

After a career spent with the 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards and as a partner of both Cazenove & Co and Sarasin & Partners LLP, I have added to the degrees achieved by the 1975 Radley leavers which I followed by a Masters in History of War at KCL. I recently published a book on the WW1 service of a Worcestershire Regiment territorial battalion, To War with the Old Gent, an equivalent story from a different war to James Holland’s Brothers in Arms with similar levels of gallantry, suffering and successes, with two officers dying by their own hands afterwards while four were to gain knighthoods in later life (see the New Releases section for details). I cannot imagine that either of my History dons, Simon Langdale or Richard Morgan, would have believed there was a book in me, least of all a history book! Marriage to Fi (née Burn, sister of Henry Burn (1974, C)) produced one OR: Angus (2004, B) who now runs his health food cafes in Islington and Bishopsgate in the City, plus two daughters: one in racing and one working for the Halo Trust and, so far, two grandchildren.

RICHARD BUDGETT (1972, D)

After 18 Olympics (Summer and Winter) one in Los Angeles as a rower, 8 as Team GB doctor, 3 as London 2012 Chief Medical Officer and 6 as Medical and Scientific Director of the IOC, I’m retiring, but staying in Lausanne for the outdoor life in Switzerland.

ADAM LOWE (1972, C)

In collaboration with the Natural History Museum in London, the art workshop Factum Arte, founded by Adam Lowe, created Fern, a self-supporting bronze replica of the iconic Diplodocus carnegii 20th-century plaster cast skeleton. To make this massive weatherproof bronze sculpture, Factum Arte closely worked, over the course of three years, with London-based engineers Structure Workshop and the Madrid-based foundry Fademesa. The partners were selected by public competition in 2000 and worked alongside scientists from the Natural History Museum. One of Factum’s largest projects to date, in terms of scale and overall complexity, Fern is now installed in the new and refurbished museum gardens as part of the Urban Nature Project. The bronze Diplodocus and the Jurassic Garden is supported by the

William & Gill Greig, ready for the Valentine’s Gala Ball.

their projects, and their not-for-profit preservation organisation, the Factum Foundation.

JAMES NAIRNE (1973, F)

Kusuma Trust. Not taking into account the curves of its tail and neck, Fern is a 25m Diplodocus; a true blend of art, science and engineering. Visit www.factum-arte.com for more information about the company,

I have retired from full-time teaching (36 years) – my last post was as Director of Art at Cranleigh School. We have moved back to Oxfordshire (from Surrey), and I am looking forward to doing more of my own work (Instagram: @drawing_pad).

In September, I ran three short workshops with 6.2 artists at Radley on approaches to using oil paint.

TOM STUART-SMITH (1973, G)

Tom Stuart-Smith won Gold at the Chelsea Flower Show 2024. He designed the gold medal winning National Garden Scheme Garden which was themed around the concept ‘the edge of woodland’. The garden was conceived as a therapeutic

‘Summer Turn’ and ‘Open Doors’ (both water-soluble pastel on paper) Part of the ‘Reveal Drawings’ series by James Nairne, using remembered moments as a starting point for open-ended drawing.

Fern the Diplodocus, a 25m-long selfsupporting bronze replica of the Natural History Museum’s iconic plaster cast skeleton, made by Adam Lowe’s studio, Factum Arte. Credit: Percy Weston.

space for hospital patients and included reclaimed timber alongside droughttolerant woodland perenials. The garden was relocated to a Maggies Centre at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge. In 2023, Tom was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the Birthday Honours for services to landscape design.

RICHARD TAYLOR (1974, F)

Starting in a new company at 63 years old is a boon! I have joined Korn Ferry, who have had to develop a novel positioning as ‘the world’s premier organisational consultancy’ in order to describe themselves adequately. I have imbibed the Coolaid and believe the claim to be fair. The headhunters have used their superprofits to invest in becoming leadership and organisation experts. And never before have I met such a wide collection of dynamic, qualified and friendly people :-)

DAVID CHALK (1975, C)

David was elected as one of the two Sheriffs of the City of London for 202425 at Common Hall in Guildhall on Monday 24th June. He took office on 27th September and will hold the office for one year. The Sheriffs’ modern-day duties include supporting the Lord Mayor in their civic duties and serving as ambassadors for the UK-based financial and professional services industry by promoting the UK as a place in which to do business. On his election, David commented “To have been elected to the high office of Sheriff of London is a great honour, and I am deeply grateful

to everyone who has made this possible. As well as working to increase people’s understanding of how the Old Bailey and its judges work, I want to devote time to addressing an issue close to my heart and one of national importance, specifically, some of the funding issues around older people’s care, bringing financial services, policymakers, and care professionals together.”

ERIC LEMMONS (1975, F)

Retired. Living as a Trophy Husband.

1980s

RUPERT HARROW (1980, A)

Footprint Zero continues to grow at pace as Julian Pertwee (1977, F) and I strive to deploy renewable energy across the UK’s commercial roofscape. On the home front, Emily has left Bath and starts in London as a head-hunter, India has a third year from Edinburgh University at University in Taipei, and Mia starts at Oxford Brookes meaning Lise and I are empty nesters. Am I really that aged?!

JAMES THOMSON (1980, F)

I remain busy with housing, law enforcement and education. I have just stepped back as Chair of the City of London Police having reached my maximum fouryear term but remain on the Board. It marks my twenty-second year of involvement with the City Police, including over 12 years as a Special Constable. I was honoured to have the latest recruit to the City Police named after me: Police Horse Thomson. He is instantly distinguishable by being the only police horse in the country to retain

his feathers. Elsewhere, I have joined the board of the Serious Fraud Office and have become Chairman of MJ Gleeson plc, a leading builder of affordable homes for first-time buyers, after four years as Chief Executive. I am also on the board of the City Bridge Foundation, the 900-year-old and sixth-largest charity in the country. CBF owns, maintains and operates the five City bridges including Tower Bridge (its primary purpose) and it is also the largest grant-giving body in London supporting a wide range of London charities (its ancillary purpose).

HUGH RILEY (1981, D)

Hugh is a FRICS Chartered Surveyor specialising in residential property, and is the Head of Field Surveying at the GoTo Group.

ADRIAN THEED (1983, B)

Good summer of rowing successes with five different clubs. Off to HOCR, Boston, MA, as usual. Son at Radley, rowing

Tom Stuart-Smith’s garden designed for the National Garden Scheme won a gold medal at this summer’s Chelsea Flower Show.

David Chalk was elected Sheriff of the City of London in 2024.

Police Horse Thomson.

hard. Strong commercial forestry focus, and stone sales. Numerous building restoration projects on the go. Deep in wildlife conservation. Visiting Exmoor over the winter.

ANDREW BAIRD (1984, G)

Got published! Wrote an article in the Wild Trout Trust Journal on a rather magical chalk stream. We can’t control abstraction or pollution, but we can manage and improve the ecology. Did stuff! Now Chair of Trustees of Cambridge Online charity - trying to solve digital exclusion in Cambridge. We’ve got a great new CEO and are looking for funding and a new patron (Prof Stephen Hawking was our last patron). I’m still working ... well, there’s school fees to pay. I got made Sir! Inherited a baronetcy title from a cousin.

CHARLES CROFTON-ATKINS (1985, C)

Left the world of finance in 2020 and together with my mainland Chinese partner, we’re building China’s leading beef cattle genetics and ranching operation in partnership with Genus Plc and Beidahuang Group. Delighted to support young, determined ORs interested in China, regenerative farming, carbon markets, agtech and large-scale livestock production in Inner Mongolia.

ANDREW BALDING (1986, B)

Andrew Balding’s Park House Stables at Kingsclere have been the subject of a documentary on the BBC this year, Horsepower. The series comes highly recommended for any friends and contemporaries of Andrew, his father Ian Balding (Hon Member and Former Council), his son Jonno, or his sister Clare, who all make appearances. The

series is currently available to watch on demand via BBC iPlayer.

HAMISH MACKIE (1987, F)

It has been a busy year sculpting in my Oxfordshire studio. At RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2023 I met the renowned Interior Designer, Nina Campbell, who later commissioned me to make six life size wolves and a bald eagle for a client in America. It was an exhilarating project, and I enjoyed working with the client’s crack team of garden designers and landscapers. This project inspired me to sculpt a life-size moose, the first of which has been shipped to a client in America.

Closer to home, I have cast three new life-size roe deer, an octopus and hares among others, and am just finishing the clay original of a sculpture of three otters.

Last week I returned from the Isle of Mull, where I have been researching highland cattle and red deer stags. Looking forward to putting this research into clay over the winter!

1990s

JAMES WALKER (1992, H) & ED BOASE (1992, B)

The Young Film Academy, the UK’s leading provider of filmmaking courses, schools film making programmes, community filmmaking projects and filmmaking outreach for young people,

founded by James Walker (1992, H) and Ed Boase (1992, B), has been producing fascinating podcasts, interviewing industry experts about careers in TV and Filmmaking. Interviews have included ORs such as Eddie Hamilton (1985, D), Editor of Top Gun: Maverick and Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning, Daniel Konrad-Cooper (1996, D), Producer, and Production Manager of Dunkirk, and Jamie Campbell (1990, A), Director, Producer, and Writer of Sex Education. Listen to the podcasts via the Young Film Academy website: www. youngfilmacademy.co.uk/podcast/

‘Roe Deer’ by Hamish Mackie.

‘Octopus’ by Hamish Mackie

PETE HAWKINS (1993, H)

I am living and painting in the Suffolk coastal countryside. I put on various exhibitions throughout the year and my paintings are dominated by the themes of escape, using the structure of postage stamps. My paintings aim to take the viewer to another place, even if only for a brief moment. Visit www.pete-hawkins. co.uk or @phawkart on Instagram to see my work.

OLIVER BROWNE (1995, C)

I led two Himalayan expeditions this spring season in Nepal for my company True Summit Adventures (www. truesummitadventures.com). We climbed Lobuche East (6119m) and Island Peak (6165m) and are building up to our first 8000m expeditions - Makalu in 2025 before Everest in 2026. I also climbed Kilimanjaro for the 7th time in July on our “Family Special” for parents and their children. Everyone went to the summit and one of the guests, Kit, a Radley Remove, also from C Social, raised over £3,000 from the climb for the orphanage I support in Arusha, which was amazing.

HANNAH FRASER-MACKENZIE (1999, E)

I’ve enjoyed a really full year of performance opportunities including my first international concert since the pandemic. Highlights of the year included recording a CD of Francesco Scarlatti’s recently rediscovered setting of Daniel in Oliver Browne (1995, C) and Kit (R, C Social) at the peak of Mount Kilimanjaro.

‘ Egret’ and ‘ Sleep’ by Pete Hawkins

the Lion’s Den with Armonico Consort, which should be available to buy early in 2025; performing as soprano soloist in Carmina Burana at Royal Albert Hall in July; travelling to Peñiscola Castle near Barcelona to take on the role of Dido in Purcell’s Dido & Aeneas as part of the International Festival of Ancient and Baroque Music; and participating in a 230 mile charity bike ride over 4 days with Oz Clarke to raise funds for Memory Choirs in Warwickshirebringing the benefits of singing to people living with dementia (we are getting close to our £20k target!).

2000s

HUGO CAMPBELL (2005, F)

My fellow OR, Rory Robinson (2005, F) and I have created a new Instagram filter that’s become one of the most popularly used on the entire platform. It’s a little bit silly but we’re super proud of it. It’s called bunny ears and utilises augmented reality to impose rabbit ears and a nose onto a user’s face. We created it in our spare time, learning a lot and having lots of fun in the process and are currently thinking about a new one for next year!

HARRY GOSLING (2006, D)

Harry Gosling featured in the February 2024 issue of The Field

CHARLIE ELWES (2010, J), OLLIE WYNNE-GRIFFITH (2007, D/J) & TOM GEORGE (2008, G)

Paris Olympics, Charlie Elwes (2010, J), won a gold medal as part of the GB VIII, and Ollie Wynne-Griffith (2007, D/J) and Tom George (2008, G) paired up

to claimed silver as the GB coxless pair, narrowly defeated by the Croatian team.

MILO PINCKNEY (2009, H)

It has been great to catch up with my Radley housemates this year and see how everyone is doing. From moving to Asia to working as a freelance paragliding videographer, and from others further solidifying their careers in industries like lawyering and finance to being let go or letting go of old dreams, there seems to be general progression in life alongside a noticeable gap between wages and enjoyment of their career. Most often those coming in contradiction to each other.

Having spent three years working as a solo founder to now be on the cusp of

launch, I feel I can see this very clearly. Paid poorly but with lots of freedom to live and pursue what I believe to be a meaningful future – for our health, planet and society. That said, I estimate that I have been paid in the last three years roughly what an old housemate of mine- who is now a VC - was paid in the last six months.

In conjunction, others I know have spent years doing specialist exams to be highly qualified at very well-paid jobs, only now to feel trapped in a career that they don’t enjoy but have shaped their lives around. Where I often wake up craving for someone to tell me exactly what to do, I suppose they feel equally strongly in the opposite direction ...

I often think of the ice cube analogy in Atomic Habits: imagine a room at -4°C, slowly warming—up to 0°C, the ice cube remains unchanged. But once it reaches 0°C, the ice begins to melt, showing how gradual progress leads to visible results only after a tipping point is reached.

My first big cube is hopefully about to melt – and it’s been a b*tch. I founded Rollr - the natural & refillable deodorant - to make deodorising an experience to savour - looking, feeling and smelling more like a perfume than a bottle of dove. All of us use deo every day for 60 years of our lives - so why does it have to be boring, harmful, polluting and crap? We’ve won multiple design awards, some amazing launch retailers, world class backers and are set to launch in the coming months. To find out more, visit rollr.co.uk.

Ned Campbell performs in his production of BEATS.

The Field’s February 2024 issue, featuring Harry Gosling. Credit: Sarah Farnsworth Photography.

2010s

NED CAMPBELL (2010, E)

After a rather difficult period for all creatives dealing with the backlash of covid and the strikes, I decided to take matters into my own hands and put on a play at a small theatre in Islington. The play, which is called BEATS written by the astonishing Scottish playwright Kieran Hurley, managed to sell out and go on to be picked up and programmed for an extended run at the brand-new King’s Head Theatre. After numerous sell-out performances and 5-star reviews I am incredibly excited that the show will be returning to Riverside Studios in January 2025.

Rollr - natural and refillable deodorant, founded by Milo Pinckney.

WILL DODD (2010, D)

Well I have to say having a business is awesome, most of the time! Itchenor Boat Hire has had a great 2024 season and I thank all those who have supported me through my first year and those who have given their custom and unreservedly written ravishing reviews on google maps and other important places. The team look forward to welcoming you down on the jetty and preparing you for your exploration of the stunning Chichester Harbour :)

CHRISTOPH WALLENDAHL (2014, F)

After a year at London Business School, having read engineering at Magdalen College, Oxford, I’ve joined Goldman Sachs Asset Management as an analyst/ trader in their fixed income team. For anyone finding themselves in or around the City, feel free to get in touch - it’s always a pleasure to catch up.

CHARLES BATTY (2016, C)

While studying at university I created student a2z, the first university TripAdvisor. We have accommodation/night out reviews, events calendars, part-time jobs helpful information for international students, finances, transport and student top tips. We are now at over 20 universities across the UK, partnered with over 100 bars/ clubs/businesses at all our universities with thousands of weekly student users! The philosophy of the company is to attempt to

improve transparency of information for students and in turn, reduce the anxiety and its effect on mental health. Being able to provide new students and current students with all the information they need in one place has allowed us to be the 6th student app on the App Store as of Aug 2024 and gained 500 5* reviews in one year!

ALEX HARDY (2016, D/L)

Alex Hardy was part of the BBC Symphony Chorus at this year’s BBC Proms. Recordings of the performances are available online via BBC iPlayer.

CAMERON TASKER (2017, E) & NIKITA JACOBS (2018, K)

Congratulations to Cameron Tasker (2017, E) and Nikita Jacobs (2018, K) who won the US National Rowing Championships with The University of Washington in June.

Cameron says: I am currently in my third year rowing and studying at the University of Washington in Seattle. In my freshman year, I represented the University in the Varsity Eight, where we won silver at the National Championship race in New Jersey. Last year, we managed to do one better by taking the victory in the National Championship race, beating Harvard and California to take gold! Washington also swept the regatta, winning every single event. Alongside the rowing, I am enjoying studying Political Economy and Law. The American college experience has been amazing so far.

Cameron Tasker (2017, E) and Nikita Jacobs (2018, K)

Will Dodd owns a boat hire company in Itchenor.

OR LETTERS

Michael Meredith - A Belated Appreciation

Dark-haired and wearing rimless glasses, the energetic young teacher I remember as Mr Meredith can only have been about ten years older than us. He must have been twenty-six or so when we were taking non-specialist English at sixteen. But with exacting and scholarly Michael Meredith, there was really no such thing as nonspecial English, since literature was conspicuously both a passion and enthusiasm for him. He was lively, learned, intelligent and sharply intolerant of any self-indulgent idleness or misbehaviour. He fizzed with ideas.

It is strange to think that the person I am now writing about here was as I knew him around sixty years ago. Michael Charles Meredith was appointed as an English teacher at Radley College in the autumn of 1961. After Bancroft’s School, he had studied English at Balliol College, Oxford, and then taught in America at the

University of South Carolina. He returned to teach at Radley where he had previously been what was then known as a ‘student prince’, presumably on teaching practice.

Hard-working and meticulously well-prepared, he approached literature with a detailed understanding of its links to life and biography. He was widely read and open to fresh ideas and authors. Indeed, he was the most inspiring, enthusiastic and exacting teacher of English I have ever encountered but unfortunately, he never taught me for A Level English Literature. At fourteen I had chosen the Classical route (Latin, Greek and Ancient History) while he fed our wider literary interests and was enthusiastically inspirational in many ways.

Here are a few clear memories which time may have scrambled somewhat in retrospect. Others will be able to supply their own recollections. Mr Meredith introduced us to Walt Whitman and his poem ‘When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed’ on the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. That must have been in November 1963 when John F. Kennedy was killed in Dallas. Meredith was a literary and cultural historian and introduced us to American authors like Ambrose Bierce, Hart Crane and Carl Sandburg. I remember a striking poem by Sandburg, and I think it must have been ‘Four Preludes on the Playthings of the Wind’. MCM read us the beginning of The Diamond as Big as the Ritz and there were memorable short stories by H.E.Bates (‘Mowing’) and Joseph Conrad (‘The Secret Sharer’).

Plays involved Volpone and novels included Emma, Where Angels Fear to Tread, The Red Badge of Courage, McTeague by Frank Norris, Black Mischief by Evelyn Waugh and so on. The courses he devised were, in the more recent term, ‘literature-led’ and he made them as interesting as possible to adolescents. An aesthete himself with a strong sense of humour and irony, he could be sharp with boorish or philistine attitudes and his acute intellect protected itself with sparkling and witty words. If necessary, he had a marked asperity and was known to some as Spiky Mikey. He was also imitated for his precise diction and characteristic walk with a pile of books tucked under his chin.

I came to know Mr Meredith better when he was put in charge of the school magazine The Radleian and invited me to be the editor. He was full of ideas for it and I was worried that I wouldn’t even be able to pen an editorial. But he arranged a competition for a new cover, and, with the help of the exuberant Nicholas Colchester and others, articles somehow got written. He appointed Richard Paton as photographer and typically

 Roger Wagner (b. 1957), Michael Meredith (2022), oil on canvas, (FDA-P.601-2023).

Reproduced by permission of the Provost and Fellows of Eton College.

MCM set us off to research a literary supplement on Matthew Arnold which involved a joint cycle ride to Hinksey and then to the stripling Thames at Bablock Hythe.

Mr Meredith’s study in his rooms on the top floor of the Mansion contained a fine collection of books, and I remember in particular a first edition of Letters from Iceland by Auden and MacNeice because the words in the Faber typography were so big. In pride of place over the mantlepiece there was a strikingly large portrait of T.S.Eliot in pen and ink and in pinstripe trousers. ‘Do I dare to eat a peach?’

Mr Meredith ambitiously initiated us into ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ with its nervous self-consciousness and doubtful timidities, social embarrassments and suppressed desires embodied in this mysterious personage of the balding Prufrock. Formative years. I can still remember Mr Meredith saying,

‘I should have been a pair of ragged claws Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.’

For him, literature definitely did not stop in 1940, as did the Oxford syllabus. Although his main academic interests were Browning and Byron, on both of whom he was a young expert, he was fascinated by all literature of note. And as I soon realised he wrote extremely well himself, while encouraging us in our tyro efforts.

He also devoted hours of his time and considerable energy to drama and was, by all accounts, a brilliant and meticulous director of plays. I remember two in particular: Julius Caesar performed in Napoleonic costume and Ross by Terence Rattigan, but there may have been others. I clearly recall Julius Caesar because I was designated to mix the bowl of red paint with which to daub the faces and hands of the bloodied soldiers retreating at the Battle of Philippi. Mr Meredith was a connoisseur of plays and playwrights too. I remember him seeing Nicol Williamson in Waiting for Godot at the Royal Court and Ingrid Bergman in A Month in the Country by Turgenev. He showed us extracts from early films by Eisenstein and D.W. Griffith. Culture, art and significant artefacts fascinated him.

“He also devoted hours of his time and considerable energy to drama and was, by all accounts, a brilliant and meticulous director of plays. ”

I happened to be in his study when he took the phone call which head-hunted him for his next post. As I remember it, we were sworn to secrecy and in summer 1965 he left and spent the rest of his teaching career at Eton College, where he was successively Head of English, Housemaster (The Timbralls), and latterly the College Librarian for many years. I hope that others have chronicled his Eton years, but I do know that he was also inspirational to many aspiring pupils, scholars and writers there too. It would be interesting to read their tributes but even more his own memoirs, if he ever wrote any.

Inevitably, I knew less of him but have stayed in touch sporadically

over the years. I remember visiting him at Eton c.1973 when he showed me not only the Library and samples from its collection but a recent purchase of his own: a manuscript fair copy of Seamus Heaney’s early poems in a notebook. Yes, they were written neatly in longhand in pen and ink by the man himself. If I remember rightly, Michael said he had bought them from a dealer in Devon. As an impecunious admirer of Heaney’s work, I coveted that manuscript and still do.

“An aesthete himself with a strong sense of humour and irony, he could be sharp with boorish or philistine attitudes and his acute intellect protected itself with sparkling and witty words. If necessary, he had a marked asperity and was known to some as Spiky Mikey.”

Much later in life, I found a second-hand book for sale in the Rococo Garden, Painswick: The Enigma of Kidson: by Jamie Blackett (2017). Subtitled The Portrait of an Eton Schoolmaster, it pays tribute to and frequently quotes from Michael Meredith as ‘one of three great Eton beaks.’ I particularly enjoyed Michael’s witty and rueful anecdote in a Christmas card to Kidson in 2013, recalling a moment on founder’s day:

Overheard in College Library on St Andrew’s Day two weeks ago: ‘Is Michael Meredith dead?’ I was standing two yards away unrecognised. Hope time is being kinder to you.

Inevitably, for someone with such energy, acumen and wide interests, Michael Meredith has done much more than be a ‘great beak at Eton.’ A distinguished bibliophile, he is an honorary Vicepresident of the Anthony Powell Society, belongs to the exclusive Roxburghe Club, is on the committee of the Browning Society, and has published and edited on the Brownings (Robert and Elizabeth), Edward Marsh, Edward Gordon Craig, and written on Five Hundred Years of Eton Theatre, among many other things.

In the modern way, there are snippets of him on YouTube talking, for example, about VE Day on its seventieth anniversary in 2015. There he is again, fluent and white-haired, with his spectacles sparkling, as he says characteristically, ‘And so consequently …’ and recalls his childhood memories of ‘boiled eggs, beef and blancmange’ on that significant day of victory at last.

Here then are just a few of my youthful recollections. In those four years between 1961 and 1965, Michael Meredith and his example taught me and others much. He valued reading, writing, culture, study and scholarship, and passed on to us his astute love and appreciation of the great traditions of English Literature, new and old. I hope he knows as much, but I feel just as certain he would modestly deny it all and brush it aside with an ironic disclaimer and disarming chuckle.

Duncan Forbes (1960, B)

Walking the Wall - Classics Expedition to Hadrian’s Wall – March 1972

Having completed my O Levels in the summer of 1971, thought turned to my A Level choices. I was very reluctant to give up Latin after O Level, but I had not excelled at Classical Greek (having only had two years to prepare, whereas I had done Latin from the age of 8), so Classics was out of the question.

I settled on the Sciences for my A Levels. However, Dr John Moore very kindly gave up his time in the evenings to continue to teach me A Level Latin along with John Nugee, who was another scientist/mathematician reluctant to give up Classics after O Levels. It was extra work but good fun.

I completed my Science A Levels in the summer of 1973 (Maths, Physics, Chemistry) and applied to do Medicine at Oxford. I managed to get a grade A in Maths which David Goldsmith told me was utterly undeserved, as I had no talent for Maths. I agreed with him on this point and said that my A grade was entirely down to his excellent teaching. I had been warned by the medical tutor at Pembroke College that I would need to obtain an A Level in Biology, so I stayed on at Radley to complete this, as well as passing the Oxford University Entrance exam and interview.

I worked hard over the summer of 1973 to catch up on biology. I also sat A Levels in Ancient History and Latin; the Ancient History was not a problem, but the Latin was definitely a struggle! However, I was successful in these extra three A Levels, and my place to do medicine was confirmed. I was heavily involved throughout my three Sixth Form years with the Archaeology Society, whose main function was to undertake the archaeological excavation at Peachcroft Farm.

In the spring of 1972, the Classics Department organised an Easter Holiday trip to walk the central section of Hadrian’s Wall for those doing Classics A Level. It was March, and the weather in the North East was not warm! In those days, Hadrian’s Wall and Northumberland were very different to today: there was not much of a trail and there were no footbridges, so streams had to be forded! We were able to visit the granaries at Roman Corspopitum, which were well-preserved, and the Roman Fort at Chesters, where the Wall crosses the River North Tyne.

On the second day the weather was bitterly cold with sleet, snow and strong winds. We stopped at Twice Brewed. This is now a huge

Students from Radley’s Archaeology Society excavate a possible Iron Age ditch at Peachcroft Farm in 1972.

visitor centre with a busy pub, but in 1972 it was a tiny pub, with a single beer barrel on the bar. The Radleian report of the trip says that the Revd Jenkins who accompanied us (along with Mr Pound, Mr Aird and of course Dr Moore) won the jackpot on the fruit machine (divine intervention, perhaps?). We visited Housesteads Fort with its famous latrine block and the Temple of Mithras.

In 1972, Corbridge had nine pubs. It now only has three. This opportunity was too much for a bunch of students, so we had a pint in each and one more in the pub we started in on our final night. One of our number (who shall be nameless!) sat singing in the middle of the bridge over the Tyne. We felt less than well the next morning, much to the amusement of the dons. Fortunately, I travelled back with the Chaplain, who had a large and very comfortable 6-cylinder Rover at the time. I then had to get to Heathrow and fly out to Barcelona, arriving at nearly midnight, having been travelling all day, and having no desire to eat anything. I had to present myself looking bright and cheerful to my parents, and they were none the wiser. A sanitised version of the trip was published in The Radleian in the summer of 1972.

In a curious turn of fate, I was appointed as a consultant at the Newcastle General Hospital in Newcastle in 1991 and we moved to a small village about eight miles from Corbridge. Now, Hadrian’s Wall is a UNESCO Heritage site and a major tourist attraction. A proper route has been established and it is possible to walk the whole length of the Wall from Bowness on Solway to Wallsend, a total of 84 miles. The route has many tourist facilities, but it doesn’t have quite the same rugged emptiness that it had in 1972. Of course, it hit the headlines in 2023 when the iconic tree at Sycamore Gap, made famous in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, was criminally felled.

I have maintained my interest in Classics, Archaeology and Ancient History and have been a member of the Roman Society since I was at Radley, as well as other Archaeology-linked organisations. I have gone back to studying Classical Greek and Latin as a retirement hobby. I am very grateful to all those dons who took the time and made the effort to instil a lifelong interest in the ancient world. Gavin Spickett (1969, E)

For information about walking Hadrian’s Wall, visit: https://www.northumberlandnationalpark.org.uk/thingsto-do/get-active-outdoors/national-trails/hadrians-wall/

 Fording a stream during the 1972 Classics expedition walking Hadrian’s Wall.

Running the West Highland Way

With the Hadrian’s Wall run of 2020 a rose-tinted memory and the blisters long healed, three ORs, Olly Arnott (2003, H), Will Willis (2006, C) and Rupert Grace (2006, J) packed their kit and set off north again for an adventure.

Their destination was beyond Hadrian’s frontier, a string of ancient roads and Jacobite military tracks that connect the Lowlands to the Highlands of Scotland – The West Highland Way. The objective was to run the route crossing Loch Lomond and Glen Coe to Fort William in three days.

The three – absent their talismanic fourth companion Angus Oliver (2009, A) on journalist duty – made their way to Glasgow before settling into the pub in Milngavie. Discussions over a pie and a pint ranged from lack of preparation to visions of the final stage. At 8am the following day the journey began.

“Wet. Spirits high, the first 20km of our path to Loch Lomond fell without much struggle. We stopped for tea and cake in a pub. The first challenge was the summit of Conic Hill where the mizzle cleared to give the best views we’d had. Another 24 km to go, fatigue kicking in, we spurred ourselves on along the glassy banks of Loch Lomond with bleating renditions of ‘You take the high road and I’ll take the low road …’. We made it to the Rowardennan hotel in various states of repair but buoyed by the feeling that we were one down, two days to go.

After much talk of a dawn swim in the Loch before breakfast, the grey damp morning quashed that idea. Ol and I went straight for breakfast. In the meantime, Will set off on a side quest before light to run up the 974m of Ben Lomond and back. He returned triumphant in less than 2 hours as we were on our second coffee.

Setting off on the second day, we hobbled up into the trees from the shore. This single track was one of the most beautiful sections of the trail. Our slow pace allowed us to take it all in. A high-performance lunch of mac & cheese with sides of chips added much needed fuel to the engine room for all of us at the halfway mark in Bringlas. We trucked 18km along a river and through pine forests into the Highlands. Exhausted but in one piece we shuffled into our hotel in Tyndrum to set out about our various recovery routines. Mine involved a tangerine to ward off scurvy from our carb-only diet.

The first two days had been teasers for the third which was the longest distance and the most elevation. We set off in the dark at 4am with legs creaking. As we got further from Tyndrum the going was bleak. The rain was driving, we were cold, and the optimism that had carried us for the first two days was flickering dangerously. Doubts crept in whether we would finish. Ol’s indomitable spirit carried us on. However, his knee was preventing him running anymore. We made a tough call to split up for the remaining 50 kilometres. Will and I would run, and Ol would follow at his own speed.

We pushed into the most remote part of the trail. Through the mist, the valley stretched around us with barely a soul in sight. We chipped away at our milestones: the Devil’s Staircase, Glen Coe, and optimism grew that we were going to finish. The rain, which had been a constant companion kept us cool on the steeper climbs. With 22km to go our thoughts turned to Ol, who we had not heard from since our separation 5 hours before. We grinded the last section and crested the hill to Fort William at 3pm. In our hotel we crossed a fellow trail runner who said he had seen our teammate running the final section. Will and I headed to the finish line to cheer Ol across at 6pm –testament to his perseverance and unkillable engine.

We had made it. Three and a half marathons, 154 km (96 miles), 3,747m elevation, 20hrs 50mins through some spectacular scenery. That night we celebrated with an extraordinarily large curry exultant to have all made it to the finish. We slept soundly.”

Rupert Grace (2006,

J)

Radley Central Iceland Expedition, 1966, Remembered

As we approach the 60th anniversary of this 1966 expedition, our thanks go to RadSoc for reuniting most of us who were on that expedition, but we must remember those who are no longer with us, the first of whom would be Geoff Treglown who was our leader. Geoff was assisted by David Hardy who looked after our natural history and biological studies. Sadly, we also lost Simon Pepper (1961, E) in 2018. A doctor friend of GLT’s, John Cooper, who had been a Lancaster rear gunner during the war also joined us, and regaled us with stories of some of his missions, particularly the fire-bombing of Dresden.

In 1966 Surtsey was in its infancy and the good ship Gullfoss steamed by close enough on our way into Reykjavik to give us a good photographic opportunity to capture the grey spouts of ash and steam as that new island was being formed. On the way back from

our first aborted drive to the Hnifa, our eventual success in climbing back up the fearsome ‘sand cliffs’ in the Land Rover involved some trial and error. Our first attempt was to lighten the vehicle as much as possible and ‘take a run at it’ which caused too much bouncing and lost traction. In the end we were successful by simply leaving the Land Rover fully loaded and grinding up the steep face in low ratio.

During our stay in the Thjórsárver (Pjorsarver) two incidents stick in my mind which were not officially recorded. I remember the goslings wandering around our tents and pecking at the guy lines, which was a good alarm clock in the mornings. Watching the juveniles on their first flights was also entertaining since landing on the (dry) meadow required some learning. Consequently, we witnessed a number of somersaultlandings before they ‘got it right’, and it didn’t appear to hurt them. We saw predation of the pink footed geese too, probably by Arctic foxes, but what do you do when there are half a dozen recent headless kills lying there? Why, eat them of course, and they were delicious!

Iceland was full of marvels, unique to the sub-Arctic. We found a lake in the moraine at the edge of the Hofsjökull icecap and floating in this lake were small icebergs which had calved off the glacier. It was stunning.

When we stopped at the Akranes whaling station my strongest abiding memory is the smell which was so incredibly intense that it overwhelmed the senses and made me dizzy. That, combined with the slippery wooden deck over which the whales were hauled and flensed, different parts of the animal being directed down open holes to

 Peter Cockburn (Uni. Oxford), Simon Pepper (1961, E) RIP, Harold Dobbin (1961, G), John Gammage (1962, A), GLT - Geoff Treglown, Peter Clarkson (Uni. Durham), Richard Padfield (1962, A), DEH – David Hardy, Robert Hart (1961, E); missing are Tony Taylor (1961, A), who was the photographer, and Dr John Cooper who had already left at this point.

The expedition Land Rover stuck in quicksand during the first trip to the Hnifa River, as described in the expedition report in the 1966 edition of The Radleian.

whatever the next stage was in the reduction process; what fate awaited any of us had we slipped and fallen down one of them? A cauldron of boiling oil? We stopped for lunch later in the town where whale meat was on the menu, and it was delicious, its closest resemblance, for myself, being to lamb.

I have deliberately left to the last the rolling of the Land Rover, just outside Akureyri, on the 29th of August, when I was at the wheel. There were Geoff and myself in the front and Simon Pepper, RIP, packed into the back, literally surrounded with all the gear we were carrying, and perhaps Simon found it more comfortable in the back rather than that awkward middle front seat. There was a vehicle

coming the other way on this narrow road and as we passed, the ground on our side gave way, causing our heavily loaded Land Rover to roll down the grassy bank, 2 and 3/4 times. We were all able to scramble out, unload the vehicle, rock it back onto its wheels, and drive back up onto the road. Despite the seriousness of the accident, only a few miles earlier we had been driving along a ‘mountain pass’ where leaving the road would have had fatal consequences. It still haunts me.

When we got back to Reykjavik, we heard of England’s winning the World Cup and many of us also received our A level results. It’s hard to imagine such a lack of communication with the outside world today.  John Gammage (1962, A), Texas

To read the original Radleian report about the Iceland Expedition, 1966, visit https://bit.ly/3Y1yp5L.

With thanks to Tony Tayor for the photos, and to John Gammage for the photo of the Land Rover.

Cooking tinned food in a hot spring.

Rumblings in Sunny Iceland

In 2020 the boffins up here had been warning us for several months that something might be astir on the southwestern corner of Iceland. And, sure enough, our normally calm and peaceful lives began to be disturbed by uncomfortable earthquakes. On the evening of the 21st of March 2021 a little eruption broke out in the mountains, the first in the region for over eight hundred years. We could clearly see the ‘Fire in the Fells’ from our balcony, though it was much too far away to present any possible danger.

Then, in November of 2023, the little town of Grindavík on the Reykjanes peninsula, about 30 miles southwest of where we live, was evacuated when some violent shaking produced a spectacular rift valley nearly a metre in depth, straight through the town. This has been followed by five short-lived eruptions up in the fells above the town. These currently seem to occur at roughly three-month intervals, spewing up vast amounts of gunk from the bowels of the earth, and the process is still ongoing, so it is lucky that the region is very sparsely populated.

My wife’s brother used to live in Grindavík, so I know the place quite well; a rather dull little town of 3000-odd inhabitants but with a good harbour, a thriving fishing industry and over two hundred small businesses. The town is now deserted apart from a few hardy souls who keep an eye on their neighbours’ property, and most of the inhabitants have found new accommodation for the time being.

We had a magnitude 4 quake in January that rattled all the cupboard doors and made our hanging plants swing around in the conservatory; so, these days Sunny old Iceland is a never-ending round of excitement, and it remains to be seen how the Grindavík event will end.

Normally earthquakes are nothing much to worry about, because most of our houses are built like bomb-shelters, but the one that really stands out in my mind was in the summer of 2000. My wife Margrét and I had just finished hanging an exhibition of rather

fragile mirror glass stuff in one of the big hydroelectric powerstations in the south. I had put in a few extra screws, thinking “Just in case there’s an earthquake or something”. The next day, which happened to be the 17th of June, Icelandic Independence Day, I was up in our country cottage installing some new electric radiators when the window shutters started rattling a bit. Meanwhile, Margrét was at home planting out some summer flowers. Strange about the rattling I thought, because there wasn’t much wind. So, I went out to see what was happening and stood for a moment beside the car, just by the front door.

All of a sudden there was an almighty jolt and the car hopped about a foot – luckily not in my direction. I turned round and saw the shock wave racing down the valley like a ripple on water. I tried to ’phone home, but all the telephones were dead. So, I drove home rather quickly, and Margrét said that she had also experienced the shock wave; the paving stones in our driveway had made a clattering noise as the shock went past, and the house had creaked. She dashed in to see if everything was all right and came upon our grandfather-clock teetering to-and-fro; it had very nearly smashed itself. I have since screwed it securely to the wall!

We heard on the news that the quake (magnitude 6.6) had severely damaged a couple of houses in the village of Hella over fifty miles away, but otherwise people were lucky because it was a public holiday, and most were out-of-doors enjoying the good weather. The following day we went over to check on the exhibition, and it was evident that those extra screws had done their job. No damage at all, even though the power station was not very far from the epicentre of the quake.

Steve Fairbairn (1961, E)

Steve Fairbairn

Remembering Michael Reeves (1957, B)

To the editor of the Old Radleian,

I much enjoyed your coverage in the 2023 issue of ORs who have been stars of stage and screen. You may, for good reason, have chosen not to include Michael Reeves (1957, B) given his ultimately tragic life, but maybe you’d permit me to pass on a few reminiscences of a remarkable guy, who I remember as extremely engaging and who played the part of a misfit with amused relish.

Even then, Michael was obsessed with the cinema and I remember listening with amazement to the depth of knowledge and enthusiasm he displayed when talking to anyone who’d listen about films and film-making. I consider it one of my finest achievements at Radley to have been in a film Michael made, even though my part consisted solely of floating face down in the Thames near Sandford Lock plastered in tomato ketchup.

A profile of Michael that appeared in The Guardian in 2000 encapsulated his life’s story in a brutally succinct standfirst: ‘At the age of 11, he shot his first movie. At the age of 23, he filmed his masterpiece. At the age of 24, he was dead.’

The masterpiece was Witchfinder General, made in 1968, which was based on one of Oliver Cromwell’s witch-hunters who is alleged to have ordered the deaths of two hundred people between 1645 and 1646. In 2005, Total Film magazine named Witchfinder General the fifteenth-greatest horror film ever made.

In March this year, I went to Hampstead Theatre in London to watch a new play, Double Feature, by John Logan, the American playwright and screenwriter. It told the story of two sets of directors and actors: Alfred Hitchcock and Tippi Hedren; and Michael Reeves and Vincent Price. It says something about Reeves’s reputation that more than fifty years after his untimely death, he should be portrayed in a play by a writer as distinguished and film-savvy as Logan.

The play, which attracted big audiences throughout its run, was a cleverly scripted work examining how actors and directors of different generations worked together. I was delighted that the dialogue included an exchange between Reeves and Price during the making of Witchfinder General that has passed into film lore. Reeves, in his early twenties, was so totally unfazed by having to direct a veteran actor in his late fifties that he interrupted Price, telling him to “stop over-acting … and look natural for once.” Price, understandably narked, snapped back: “Young man, I’ve been in 84 films [this number varies in other accounts]. How many have you made?” Reeves’s reply came quick as a flash: “Two. Good ones.”

The Guardian profile concluded with a quote from the cinematographer John Coquillon who shot Witchfinder General It recalled a telephone conversation Coquillon had with Reeves in which Reeves talked about a new film: “It was to be called Easy Rider. It was while planning this movie that he died [at home in London]. I still mourn the man. Always will. One doesn’t get to meet many people like him.”

Jonny Henderson (1958, B)

HELP US BUILD RADLEY’S STORY

Radley’s history is more than just dusty tomes and black-and-white photos … The Radley Archives are enriched by your memories. We encourage you to get in touch and help us build an oral history for our College.

WE ARE CURRENTLY COLLECTING MEMORIES ABOUT:

 The Radley College CCF

https://bit.ly/RadleyCCF

 Radley Ghost Stories https://bit.ly/UncannyRadley

 Where Were You When … (Momentous world events experienced while at Radley) https://bit.ly/RadleyMoments

COMING SOON...

∙ Radley’s Top Sporting Moments

∙ Shop, Tuck, and Radley Food

∙ Privileges and Punishments

WHATEVER YOUR RADLEY STORY IS, PLEASE SHARE IT WITH US: radsoc@radley.org.uk

There is a playlist of Radley Archives talks available to watch online via YouTube. Topics include Radley Olympians, The Marionettes, Radley’s Landscape, Radley in the 1950s, and Radley Rugby. These events were led by Clare Sargent, College Archivist, and include plenty of memories and stories from ORs. Visit https://bit.ly/ RadSocArchVid to explore.

OR POETRY SUBMISSIONS

SCRABBLED

Scallop, screed, scatter

my mother builds a seven-letter full house on a double word score with the ‘S’ placed on a triple letter snaking at right angles to sneak an extra plural.

You could always rely on her to multiply the lexicon and fashion the board into a rococo masterpiece.

Even as Parkinson’s set in she fought the slippage of syllables, popping plosives into the gaps with a sniper’s precision:

qi, xu, ut,

but today she hunches over her letters, tears brimming, eyes swimming over upside down shapes as she musses their contours with trembling fingers

then pushes an ‘s’ on to the board and hisses: “beat that.”

Mark Floyer (Hon Member)

‘Scrabbled’ is one of the poems in Mark’s Cradle to Casket. For information, see the New Releases section.

PEPLOE IN CASSIS

Hôtel Panorama. And to think I was reluctant to bring William here with his pale colouring and pigmentation. It’s everything a wintry Scotland isn’t with sun and sunlight, warmth and colour. We celebrated young Bill’s third birthday not with Champagne but with Lafite. Château Lafite. Why not?

The Mediterranean colours are so bright the light is dazzling seen through spectacles, the sunshine glinting scintillating sun.

I smell the rosemary in the maquis and feel the crisp floor of brown pine-needles in their V-shapes springy on the sand-hot ground. Limestone calanques glow and in the harbour multi-coloured flotillas of fishing-boats are painting their own reflections on wavelets sidling in the harbour water. The Roman orange terracotta tiles shine on roofs bright against cerulean skies. What colour are those shadows? Purple? Blue?

And everywhere we hear French words In accents Provençal and Occitan, the salty speech of fishermen mending nets and smells of bread baked daily: ficelle, baguette, brioche. The market sells fresh fruits: oranges, lemons, grapes and green-striped melons with many oval seeds to be scooped out of orange-bearded and sun-sweetened flesh.

A bottle of local white wine lies wedged in a rockpool to cool among the sea anemones and shrimps. And all day long cicadas rasp and sing. I paint and paint until the sun goes down, that glowing orb of fire unquenched by sea where moonlight takes its nightly moonlit swim.

Duncan Forbes (1960, B) ‘Peploe in Cassis’ is from Duncan’s new book of poetry Under the Sun. Find out more on p. 82.

A CAMBRIDGE WALK

The unhurried chimes cascading from church and college clocks radiate a timeless feel as though the past’s preserved like a pressed flower.

The Choir Master in white tie, black gown and mortarboard emerges from King’s College School leading a crocodile of choristers in top hats and tails, starched white collars and black waistcoats. They wind their way down West Road to sing for evensong at King’s College Chapel. I follow them past The University Library, nicknamed ‘The Paper Mill’ its modern, mill-like tower so out-of-step with the surrounding, ancient, dreaming spires.

Cows and sheep graze on The Backs without even looking up.

Students punt their first loves along the lazy Cam.

I’m greeted by King’s College Bridge and The Chapel which I touch to check it’s realthe sun is hot but the weathered stone feels cold and rough. Front Court is quiet except for the ‘KEEP OFF THE GRASS’ signs for everyone but the black-winged dons.

King Henry VI’s statue scans the striped lawn for trespassers. The bowler-hatted porter nods from his prison-lodge as I merge into King’s Parade with its stream of cyclists and tourists like a river which flows both ways.

William Greig (1969, C)

NEW RELEASES

Strongholds of Satan: Volume Two and Strongholds of Satan: Volume Three

Author: William Morgan (1972, C)

Publisher: Mainholm Press

https://mainholmpress.co.uk/shop/

The second and third volumes examine the rich history of racing west of the Home Counties and Wales in vol 2 and the Midlands in Vol 3. As with the first book, they are arranged by county and profusely illustrated, with over 840 historic maps and images of the old meetings each, as well as modern aerial photos of the landscapes today. Once again, they are big books, in scope and physical dimensions, and readers will be sure to find many fascinating anecdotes and nuggets of information in their meticulously researched pages, at least as much a social history of Britain at play as a sporting one.

The Ha-Ha

Author: Tom Shakespeare (1979, D)

Publisher: Farrago https://amzn.eu/d/69MqmR8

Fred Twistleton is about to turn forty. Gathering with his friends to celebrate at a rented stately home, he finally hopes to get together with his college crush, the woman of his dreams, Heather. But Fred is also keen to publish his memoirs, and Heather realises the revelations they contain could threaten her career as a high-flying foreign correspondent.

When the treasured manuscript goes missing under mysterious circumstances, Fred’s at a loss. Could someone have stolen it? Where has the resident pig gone? And will all the group remain friends by the end of the weekend? With burst pipes, sunken kayaks, and suspicious puddings, thank goodness Fred is only going to have one fortieth birthday.

The Cricketers of 1945: Rising from the Ashes of World War Two

Author: Christopher Sandford (1970, C)

Publisher: Pitch Publishing https://amzn.eu/d/dtHiJGM

The Cricketers of 1945 is the compelling, poignant, and above all human story of the reawakening of English cricket in the immediate aftermath of the world’s most destructive war. The book brings to life the summer’s Victory Tests, played on home soil between England and Australia, as well as the personal stories of the players and their families, plus those of some of the hundreds of thousands of spectators who flocked to the matches to celebrate the return of something approaching normal life after the ordeal and sacrifice of the war years. This vivid account is illuminated by fresh archival research, encompassing the diaries and personal letters of both cricketers and cricket lovers, giving the reader a strong sense of what it was like to be alive at this unique time as much of the world awoke, or was still awakening, from the nightmare ordeal of the long years of conflict.

The First Thousand Years of the Davenport Family

Author: John Davenport (1945, B)

Publisher: Self-published

A history of thirty generations of the Davenport family, including five generations who attended Radley from 1863. This book of 135 pages is available from the author, John Davenport, 7 Lavender Court, Greenways, Beckenham, Kent, BR3 3NG, by sending him a cheque for £25 in favour of St Christopher’s Hospice.

COVER-UP

Author: Orlando Kimber (1971, G)

Publisher: A&M

Publishing https://amzn.eu/d/ cHaR630

It’s 2015. A powerful new technology allows a scientist to surface anything with diamond. An investigative journalist discovers both this breakthrough, and the hidden tentacles of greed clutching at the heart of British life. He becomes trapped between huge corporations, as they close in on this source of unlimited wealth.

Specks of Death

Artist: Howling Owl –including Nick Powell (1967, G) songwriter

Available to stream on Spotify, iTunes, and other platforms. Americana … with tinges of gospel, country and blues.

The Fishes of a Dream: A Fisherman’s Memoir

Author: Julian Cribb (1964, G)

Publisher: Piscator https://amzn.eu/d/ cMyJ7Bl

The Fishes of a Dream is the lifetime memoir of a fisherman and the remembrance of happiness spent beside some of the world’s most beautiful waters and in the company of some of its most beautiful creatures. It is also an act of communion with a vanishing world: nowhere in the waters of our watery Planet is now safe from the brutal onthrust of humanity. The world in which we, the descendants of the fishes, arose is vanishing, far faster than anybody could possibly have dreamed. This story is partly a lament to its passing – and partly a celebration of its wonders and the joys it still has to offer us.

Love: A Curious History

Author: Edward Brooke-Hitching (1996, A)

Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK

https://amzn.eu/d/gqsXcHc

From prehistoric carvings and ancient Egyptian statues, to medieval spell books and Victorian codewriting, this unique collection gathers a wealth of curious objects and surprising stories to trace the story of love through the ages. Discover the royal marriage that crossed the boundary of death in 14th-century Portugal, the judicial duels between husbands and wives in Early Modern Europe, the love spells found in medieval manuscripts, and the romantic codes hidden in some of art’s greatest masterpieces. Meet the feared ancient Greek army regiment comprised entirely of male couples; the French pirate queen avenging her murdered husband; the first woman to sail around the world; and the quack sexologist who conned 18th-century London with his musical mechanical bed. Here are ancient gods, mythical monsters, the Elizabethan portraits of smiling men on fire and the erotic paintings hidden beneath the ash of Pompeii, as well as Nigerian wedding chains, Welsh love spoons, cryptic postcards and the centuries-old cartographic tradition of mapping the heart.

A curiosity cabinet of romantic treasure, Love: A Curious History in 50 Objects draws on a wide range of sources to form a collection perfect for fans of beautiful illustrated works and curious history, while also making the ideal romantic gift.

Follow Your Leader: The memoir of a Newmarket trainer

Author: Gavin Pritchard-Gordon (1959, C) https://amzn.eu/d/iwpuxHI

The fifty-year career of Gavin Pritchard-Gordon in Newmarket, the Headquarters of British Racing, proved to be as exciting a ride as those provided by his many winning horses. This caught the author as much by surprise as anyone else. The opportunity to train racehorses was offered to Pritchard-Gordon somewhat out of the blue by the legendary trainer Harvey Leader. Pritchard-Gordon grabbed at the chance to follow in Mr Leader’s footsteps. He never looked back as a life in Racing took him to many a Winners’ Enclosure and the country’s grandest houses, all the while having great fun with the top names of Racing, past and present.

Foreword by Brough Scott (1956, E)

The Most Interesting Book in the World

Author: Edward Brooke-Hitching (1996, A)

Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK https://amzn.eu/d/dWGRdWQ

Drawn from a lifetime’s search for the weird and the wonderful, The Most Interesting Book in The World is a miscellany of things too strange to be true, yet somehow are.

Written by a former BBC QI Elf turned bestselling author, this remarkable treasury of tales and trivia will whisk you on a jaw-dropping journey through time and space, stopping off to marvel at only the obscure, the startling and the straight-up weird.

In it, Edward Brooke-Hitching considers questions such as:

. Why is a cat technically a liquid and a solid? How did nineteenth-century scientists attempt to signal aliens?

Why did the Dutch once eat their prime minister?

Under the Sun

Author: Duncan Forbes (1960, B)

Publisher: Self-published www.duncanforbes.com

Under the Sun takes up where Human Time (2020) left off. This new collection contains poems on a variety of subjects and in various moods and modes. Once again, humour is mixed with sadness and free verse with formal poetry. There are delicate poems about nature and yet human concerns remain very much at the fore. Duncan Forbes captures memorable moments and also has a deep sense of time and time passing. The poems express their ideas colourfully with his characteristic verve, accomplishment, elegance, poignancy, wit and insight.

In the course of a writing life, Duncan Forbes has won numerous prizes for his work including a Gregory Award and a TLS/ Blackwells Prize. His poems have been published or anthologised by Faber, Secker, Penguin, Bloodaxe and Enitharmon.

Cradle To Casket

Author: Mark Floyer (Hon Member)

Publisher: Kelsay Books https://amzn.eu/d/3EwUCUy

Mark Floyer’s collection of poems about Calcutta, the city where he spent his early childhood, is replete with images, sounds, smells, and reflections about a place, a people and a country which is intricately woven into the fabric of his life and that of his ancestors.

- Rajat Chaudhuri, Bengali novelist and eco-activist, author of Amber Dusk (2007), Hotel Calcutta (2013), and The Butterfly Effect (2018).

Conan: Cult of the Obsidian Moon

Author: James Lovegrove (1979, C)

Publisher: Titan Books https://amzn. eu/d/eUQcHzl

A new chapter of the Titan comics & Heroic Signatures massive narrative event: The Battle of the Black Stone. A thrilling story about Conan the Barbarian facing incomprehensible Lovecraftian horrors written by New York Times Bestselling author James Lovegrove.

Gladiator II

Art Director: Olly Williams (2005, B)

Paramount Pictures

Years after witnessing the death of Maximus at the hands of his uncle, Lucius must enter the Colosseum after the powerful emperors of Rome conquer his home. With rage in his heart and the future of the empire at stake, he looks to the past to find the strength and honour needed to return the glory of Rome to its people.

Stags

Executive Producer: Jamie Campbell (1990, A)

Paramount+

Following groom-to-be Stu and his friends on his stag do in South America. What was meant to be a week of drink, drugs and fun soon turns dark.

The Penguin Book of Elegy: Poems of Memory, Mourning and Consolation

Author: Andrew Motion (1966, A)

Publisher: Penguin Classics https://amzn.eu/d/8rJX9sr

Elegy is among the world’s oldest forms of literature. Born in Ancient Greece, practised by the Romans, revitalised by the poets of the Renaissance and continuing down to the present day, it speaks eloquently and affectingly of the experience of loss and the yearning for consolation. It gives shape and meaning to memories too painful to contemplate, and answers our desire to fix in words what would otherwise slip our grasp.

In The Penguin Book of Elegy, Andrew Motion and Prof Stephen Regan trace the history of this tradition, from its Classical roots in the work of Theocritus, Virgil and Ovid down to modern compositions exploring personal tragedy and collective grief by such celebrated voices of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries as Dylan Thomas, Elizabeth Bishop, Linton Kwesi Johnson and Denise Riley.

The only comprehensive anthology of its kind in the English language, The Penguin Book of Elegy is a profound and moving compendium of the fundamentally human urges to remember and honour the dead, and to give comfort to those who survive them.

Truelove

Writer & Producer: Iain Weatherby (1984, F) Channel 4

A gang of older friends make a pact that, if and when the time comes, rather than let each other suffer a dreadful decline, they will engineer a more dignified death. But what starts out as a fanciful idea soon morphs into shocking reality.

To War with the Old Gent: The Story of the 1/8th Battalion, the Worcestershire Regiment in the First World War

Author: Nicholas Lambert (1970, E)

Publisher: Bertie's Books

https://fimi.co/products/to-war-with-the-old-gent

In 2004, Nicholas Lambert’s mother handed him a leather-bound case embossed with the royal cipher; inside lay a Military Cross with a silver Bar. It had belonged to her grandfather. So began a search for the history of John Osborn Walford – the ‘Old Gent’. Nicholas tracked down his grave in Worcestershire, visited his school and found the citations for his medals, won in his fiftieth year. Nicholas was inspired to discover not only the Old Gent’s story, but also that of his fellow Worcestershire volunteers. Nicholas uncovered the lives and contributions to county and country of many other ordinary and extraordinary officers and soldiers of the Battalion. To War with the Old Gent is his first book.

Radley Galleons

In March this year, the Galleons returned to Radley in glorious sunshine for another instalment of Galleons Day. After last year’s highly competitive game against a strong boys’ side, we hoped that this year would be more of an even match. How wrong we were!

Shortly into this game, it quickly became apparent that the boys were markedly fitter than the Galleons. Although this is typically the case, it seemed that Mr Hills had got the boys doing extra fitness sessions this year as they consistently beat us on the break which resulted in them netting two goals in the first half. However, the Galleons dug deep in the second half and with goals from Tom Way (2017, B) and Rufus Darwell (2013, H), the scores were tied at 3-3 with ten minutes to go. However, the boys showed their class in the closing minutes and scored two goals in quick succession bringing the score to 5-3 at the final whistle.

After a hearty Sunday roast in Hall and a quick pitstop to look around the Chapel, it was time for the dons’ game. To our delight,

the dons this year had chosen not to fill their side with Vths or Removes and their team was filled with legends of the game such as Scott-Malden and Campbell.

I am not sure if it was the generous pouring of the wine at lunch or our muscles being proficiently warmed up by this point, but the Galleons proved to be much more energetic for this match. The dons were fired up for this game and it turned out to be one of the most contested matches we’ve had in recent years. With everyone’s competitive juices flowing, this proved a busy game for

Boys' and OR teams, Galleons Day 2024

both of the umpires due to the frequent stick tackles and multiple points of order from Ned Campbell on their rulings.

With ten minutes to go, and with the scores drawn at 2-2, the dons scored what we thought was a game-winning goal. But all was not lost and in the closing minutes of the game, James Todd (2010, G) calmly slotted an equaliser on the edge of the D to make the final score 3-3. Shoutout to Ollie Mordaunt (2017, H) who scored the other two goals as well.

Following this game, all three sides headed off to the JCR for some well-deserved refreshments. As ever, we look forward to returning to Radley for Galleons Day 2025 - thank you to all the dons and staff who make it possible every year.

Thanks to the flexibility of Battersea Park and an increased eagerness from other old boys’ hockey teams, the fixture list for this year’s season is looking busier. We currently have three games booked for the remainder of 2024, two for early 2025 and the prospect of a one-day tournament in May next year, in addition to the annual Galleons Day event in March 2025.

If you are interested in playing some hockey for the Galleons, don’t hesitate to get in touch. We welcome all ages and abilities!

Will Swift (2010, F), Captain of the Radley Galleons swifwd@gmail.com

Dons' and OR teams, Galleons Day 2024.

Old Radleian Golf Society (ORGS)

The ORGS ended 2023 with the appointment of Charlie Barker (1964, G, Hon Member) as President, succeeding Richard Palmer (1956, D). This allows me to pay tribute to Richard’s many years, mainly as Hon Sec and finally President, running and contributing to the success of the ORGS. We would not be in such good health without his efforts.

The Halford Hewitt Schools Centenary Dinner was in January. Whilst Radley failed to raise a team to compete in the first Halford Hewitt 100 years ago, we produced the strongest ‘team’ (26 ORs) to attend the celebrations.

The ORGS is at its essence a social golf society, but with a healthy competitive spirit particularly in the School Old Boy competitions. This is best illustrated by Hugh Wolley’s (1970, F) Aldburgh weekend which was attended by 16 ORs (and some wives). The instruction was to enjoy the golf and forget the scores, which we all did. I hope that this can continue as a regular fixture.

We can’t operate without those who manage matches and competition teams: Simon Curtis (1983, A), Arthur Fane (2005, H), Simon Peck (1985, C), Tom Etridge (1985, A), Tom Beasley (2007, B), Hugh Wolley (1970, F), Duncan Ritchie (1964, C), Angus Chilvers (1979, F), Clive Seigal (1960, F), Tobin Ashby (1985, F), Tim Marshall (1960, A), and of course Will Bailey (1968, D) our Hon Sec.

The advantage of golf is that the handicap really does allow interesting competition between those of different standards.

This is what allows us to have enjoyable matches & meetings, at wonderful courses.

We welcome any OR who plays golf and would like to play in our various fixtures. Register at https://www.orgs.org.uk. There are generous subsidies for those ORs under 30.

Finally thank you to Tim Rowntree (1971, B) who has done sterling work as Captain for the past two years.

Philip Godden (1979, B), Captain of the ORGS

Bruce Cup winner Christian von Celsing (2005, G) (L) with Arthur Fane (2005, H).

The Bruce Cup 2024

ORGS Results 2024

AUTUMN MEETING 2023 – ROYAL ST GEORGES GOLF CLUB WINNER

Stableford

Ollie Meade-King (42 pts)

Scratch Charlie Davies (76 pts)

Under 35 Stableford

Captain’s Prize - Foursomes

Archie Birkmyre Salver

Aggregate Combined Scratch Spring & Autumn

James Todd (41 pts)

Caspar Lumley & Arthur Fane

Will Libby (41 pts)

James Todd (77 pts)

Archie Wilson (39 pts)

Mike O’ Connor & Jo Oram

David Turner Scratch

JH Mobbs Salver >55

Wilson (39 pts) FOURSOMES

Paul Cooper Cup (Past Captains)

Bruce Cup <35 (Sunningdale Golf Club)

Robin Turner Knockout: Winner - Will Bailey; Runner up - Toby Denne

RESULTS FROM SOCIAL MATCHES

Old Shirburnian GS (2023) Won 5 - 3

Old Haileyburians GS Halved 4 - 4

Radley College Lost 0 - 3

Old Lancing GS Won 4.5 - 3.5

Still to play: Old Amplefordians, Old Carthusians, Old Shirburnian GS

School Old Boys Competitions:

12 - 14TH APRIL: HALFORD HEWITT SCHOOLS OLD BOYS KNOCKOUT.

This was the Centenary competition and Radley have been involved since the beginning.

Christopher Clarke

Christian von Celsing

Players for Radley were: Tom Etridge (1985, A), Simon Peck (1985, C), Simon Stalder (2009, E), Fred Campion (2011, J), Arthur Tapner (2013, F), Sebastian Butterwick (2014, C), Thomas Beasley (2007, B), Alexander Beare (2012, K), Thomas Wright (2011, C), and Alexander Bibby (2010, G).

Radley won the first round v Downside (3 – 2); but unfortunately lost in the second round v Rossall (2-3). Rossall lost in the fourth round against the eventual winners, Eton.

GRAFTON MOORISH

After our good run in 2023 in the main competition we did not manage to get through qualifying this year. The pairs were Simon Stalder (2009, E) & Patrick Goodwin (2017, B), Tom Atkinson (2004, G) & Baz Butterwick (2014, C), Alex Wright (2008, C) & Adam Leetham (1983, A). We hope for more success next year.

BERNARD DARWIN >55 SCHOOLS OLD BOYS KNOCKOUT

Eventually the current cohort, helped by new recruit Adam Leetham, have managed to get past the first round of the Bernard Darwin by beating Clifton 3-0. Despite hard fought matches we then lost to Repton 1-2. We hope to proceed to the second day in 2025!

The pairs were Angus Chilvers (1979, F) & Philip Godden (1979, B); Will Bailey (1968, D) & James Male (1977, B); Adam Leetham (1983, A) & Andrew Marshall (1978, F).

SENIOR DARWIN >65 SCHOOLS OLD BOYS KNOCKOUT

As luck would have it we were drawn against Malvern, the eventual winners, who had 6 players of 3 handicap or less!

The pairs were Michael Kfouri (1952, D) & Robert Seward (1959, B); Jo Oram (1964, C) & Hugh Wolley (1970, F); Francis Murray (1969, E) & Duncan Ritchie (1964, C).

VETERAN DARWIN >75 SCHOOLS OLD BOYS

STABLEFORD SCRATCH FOURSOMES

This was our best result of the season. Congratulations to Michael Kfouri and Christopher Ball (1958, A) on their second place behind Charterhouse.

Alex Wright (156 pts)

SPRING MEETING 2024 – DENHAM GOLF CLUB WINNER

Charles Jeffrey Silver Bowl (Stableford)

Paul Craigen (41 pts)

Will Libby (41 pts)

Cup

Will Bailey (77 pts)

James Todd (77 pts)

Paul Craigen (41 pts)

Archie

Radley Keys

SEASON STATS: 43 players have taken to the field. 21 games played; 7 won, 8 drawn and 6 lost. 52 goals scored.

The 2023/24 season will live long in the memory for a variety of reasons. No red cards were brandished. Charlie Williams (2012, B) continued occasionally showing up to games (sometimes with boots; sometimes without). Gus Lowe (2007, E) remained hitting the woodwork. Andy Sweerts (2006, A) (GK) registered more goals/ assists than half the outfield team. Tom Rutherford (2012, G) treated an empty net as though it were a basket of snakes for him to jump into. The return of Freddie White (2012, G). The return of Henry Taylour (2004, E/K). Above all else however, it was the fact that the Keys were back in Division One after three years which really hit the headlines, and if our preseason was anything to go by, we were going to be competitive (beating Eton 4-2 and drawing to Harrow 2-2).

Whilst the Keys will always rely on the more experienced players to make up the numbers, some of these in recent years had decided, against the wishes (or permission) of skipper Alex Kelly (2007, F/K), to migrate out of London, have children and acquire pets. This might have proved headache worthy for some teams, but the Keys Academy is there for a reason and this year’s smattering of talent proved to be integral to the season. We welcomed into the squad Chris Sloan (2015, C), Harry Glassey (2015, F), Archie Elvin (2018, J), Ben Weldon (2013, G) and Ollie Donaldson (2012, F). And the season started with a bang. We hammered Old Salopians

5-0 in the first game, followed by inflicting the same fate on Old Westminsters only a week later. It seemed for all intents and purposes that Gus Lowe was unable to touch the ball without it flying into the top corner. Freddie White, clearly ignoring his selection at right back, was also in the market for goals, bagging three in the same two fixtures. And then the following game saw us beat Old Marlburians at the death 2-1, courtesy of two goals by the self-proclaimed “Slipper King” Archie Hewlett (2007, B) himself.

The keys were purring louder than the old Shop cat at short break and it gets you thinking. Were things going too well? Could we go unbeaten? Was this finally the return of the continental brand so carefully constructed and developed under the old stewardship of Henry Taylour et al.? These were all questions the senior leadership team (now made up of Alex Kelly, James Sloan (2012, C) and Thor Winkler (2010, H)) had to ponder as we entered into the next set of fixtures.

But fate would no longer be on our side, as the injury list started to grow exponentially. Winkler, Hewlett, Williams, Miller, Elvin and Taylour; all stalwarts, all succumbing to injury. Our form subsequently suffered and, whilst we weren’t losing so many games, it quickly became apparent that this Keys team had two newfound propensities: 1) for conceding goals early and 2) for drawing games in spectacular fashion. High scoring draws seemed to become the staple of the side, seeing eight of them across the season (the most by any club, out of the 56 teams in the league pyramid). Three of which were 4-4, against Tonbridge, Marlborough and Rugby. The season finished with the Keys in fifth place which, on balance,

was a fine result given the club’s recent promotion. The draws had not helped their standing and some would argue that we deserved more than the results. But as Michael Owen would tell you “whoever scores the most goals, will win the game” and the Keys would do well to listen to such wisdom for the next campaign.

The awards for the season were a close one, with so many of the players (old and new) making admirable contributions. As voted for by the players, Ollie Donaldson picked up the Rolt Cup (Player of the Season). An excellent debut campaign at centre back, Donnie is now a commanding figure in the backline. Freddie White was awarded Clubman of the Year for his unfettering and undivided loyalty to the badge. Ben Weldon picked up Young Player of the Year for a sterling first season in the midfield. Gus Lowe won most goals with 13 from 10 appearances. And quite remarkably, our goalkeeper Andy Sweerts won Goal of the Season for his vicious near halfway line freekick in the 98th minute against Winchester. He too, alongside Alex Kelly, has picked up his 100th appearance for the club; for which both of them received their caps this season.

This group really is still in its infancy, and we believe firmly that we can compete for the title next season. We look forward to the campaign ahead and hope next year to report back that we have finally reached the Premier Division for the first time in our history …

If you are interested in playing old boys’ football for the next season, then please reach out to Alex Kelly. Alex Kelly (2007, F/K), Captain of the Radley Keys alexandercikelly@gmail.com

Follow the Radley Keys on Instagram: @oldradleiansfc

RCBC and the Radley Mariners

The Boat Club had another busy, sometimes wet, and successful year. This wet weather did at times make it very difficult for our youngest years in the Lent term, but the boys and coaches did admirably to keep things moving forward and progressing. However, a number of races were cancelled as a result. Main highlights for the head race season included strong placings for all who took part in the Schools’ Head of the river in March, with a special mention to the J16B crew who won their event.

The summer season saw better weather and more racing opportunities, with all groups from the 165 boys at RCBC travelling to various regattas around the country. The highlight for the club remains the National Schools Regatta in May and Radley took 112 boys to the regatta and saw some very encouraging performances across all year groups. Medals were won in the J14A (bronze), J16A and B (gold for both), 3rd VIII (bronze) and a very hard-fought silver medal by the 1st VIII.

The 1st VIII travelled to Henley Royal Regatta as one of the selected crews in a very competitive Princess Elizabeth Challenge Cup event. Radley earned a win in a tough first round against Hampton School and then a more straightforward win against Kings School Chester. This then saw the crew face Shiplake on the Friday, which saw silver and bronze from National Schools meeting again. Radley were aggressive and looked to take the race on from the start but were rowed down in the very closing stages of the enclosures in a classic Henley race. Shiplake moved on to knockout Eton in the following round and lose in the final to St Pauls.

Post Henley, a number of Radley oarsmen continued to trial for selection for their country and this saw many boys get selected. Zak (6.2, H), William Eddleston (2019, D) and Brandon Murphy (2019, A) were selected for England in the Home International Regatta in the four and eight. Both crews won gold medals and helped England win the overall trophy. Hector Harvey (2019, K) won a seat in the coxless four for Great Britain at the Coupe de

The Mariners' Challenge 2024

la Jeunesse in Račice. His crew raced well taking home a silver medal on both days. Gaspard (6.2, D) raced at this event too for Switzerland in their eight, also earning a silver medal on the final day. Gabriel George (2019, K) was selected for his second Junior World Championships for Great Britain in the top boat. The coxless four raced very well to gain a silver medal, just behind the Italian crew.

Radley also saw representation in the J16 category, with the J16A crew showing excellent dedication post GCSE exams to keep training and follow up their National Schools winning performance by winning the trial to represent Great Britain in the annual GB vs France Match. The crew raced superbly in Rouen, France, to win by three quarters of a length over a strong French crew.

Many Mariners were also extremely busy through the last year. Hylton Harvey (2017, K) and Niamh Murphy (2018, C) competed for Great Britain in the World Rowing Coastal Championships in Genoa, Italy, coming home in fifth place. There are still a vast number of ORs rowing, which is always a pleasure to see both in the UK and abroad. A number of these are across the Atlantic in the American University system. Last season there were six people racing for US universities at Dartmouth, Harvard, Washington and Stanford, with many more starting this coming year at Northeastern, Yale and Princeton. A special mention to Nikita Jacobs (2018, K) and Cameron Tasker (2017, E) who as part of the Washington first boat won the IRA Championships to become the fastest university boat in America.

There were some strong successes too for Mariners racing at Henley Royal Regatta. Kit Gordon Brown (2017, A), Lawrie van de Grift (2018, A) and March Turnbull (2017, E) all competed in the regatta for Imperial College, Thames Rowing Club and Durham University respectively. Josh Bowesman-Jones (2012, J) won the Visitors Challenge Cup with Leander Club and Tristan Wenger (2018, D) won the Thames Challenge Cup with Thames Rowing Club before heading off to study at Princeton.

The year was capped off with some truly outstanding performances by Team GB in the Paris Olympics and three ORs were part of this in the British Rowing Team. Tom George (2008, G) and

Ollie Wynne-Griffith (2007, D/J) have formed a formidable partnership in the coxless pair over the last three seasons and won a tremendous silver medal in an epic battle with the Croatian pair. Charlie Elwes (2010, J) raced as he did in the Tokyo Olympics in the eight, going two steps further up the rostrum this time and taking gold to become an Olympic Champion with his crewmates in an outstanding row.

At the end of this year, we also said farewell to John Gearing and his wife Hazel, who have moved to Perth, where John takes on a new role as Head Coach of West Australia Rowing Club. John has been the Head Coach at Radley for eighteen years and dedicated himself to the job, nurturing young men into oarsmen throughout that time, including our three Olympians who he was there to watch in Paris. We are also delighted to welcome Patrick Duggan into the Head Coach position, along with his wife Ally. Patrick joins Radley from the Kings College School, Wimbledon, having been Head Coach there for 14 years.

Sam Townsend, Master in Charge of Rowing

John Gearing speaks to guests at The Radley Rowing Dinner.

Old Radleian Sailing Association (ORSA)

The Old Radleian Sailing Association (ORSA) provides social and competitive sailing for ORs, develops and maintains a community for ORs who sail, and maintains Radley’s presence, through ORs, in the wider sailing community. ORSA welcomes all ORs, Honorary Members of the Radleian Society, current and past Radley parents and current members of Common Room. All are welcome irrespective of sailing experience or ability! Contact details are available through the Radleian Society website or on the ORSA Facebook page.

2024 saw ORSA attempt to take part in three main events. The Round-the-Island Race on Saturday 15th June, the Seaview Regatta on Sunday 15th September and The Arrow Trophy on the weekend of 5th-6th October.

ROUND-THE-ISLAND RACE 15TH JUNE 2024

ORSA entered Ed Butterworth’s 34-foot yacht Bingo to compete in this iconic event, racing 50 miles around the Isle of Wight. However, extreme conditions on the day, with winds gusting in excess of 50 knots at the Needles, meant that ORSA took the wise decision not to attempt to race. Of the 939 boats originally entered, 571 started, but only 153 actually completed the race. We’ll try again next year.

SEAVIEW REGATTA 15TH SEPTEMBER 2024

The annual Radley vs Winchester vs Ryde School Regatta is a one-day event which sees current and former pupils from each school racing against each other on the Seaview Yacht Club’s twelve Mermaid keel boats. Unfortunately, this year, neither Radley pupils

The victorious ORSA team: (L-R) Tom Holbrook, Sam England, Jules Facer, Tori Facer, Sam Petty, Izzy England, Simon England

nor Ryde were able to compete, so the event ended up as ORSA vs Old Wykehamists vs Winchester vs Seaview Yacht Club. Crewing three boats a piece, the four teams gathered first thing on the Sunday morning for the race brief, but it took a couple of hours for the wind to fill in. The ORSA boats were crewed by Tom Holbrook (2006, D) and Jules Facer (1982, C), Sam Petty (2002, D) and Tori Facer and the England family, Sam (2018, J), Simon (1979, D), and Izzy. Overall, the wind was good and the sailing conditions were excellent and with three helms (Sam, Sam and Tom) who knew what they were about when it came to team racing, ORSA put on a very good show. ORSA won all three races in the morning, but only won one of three in the afternoon. However, this was strong enough for ORSA to reach the final, where with a nail-biting finish (Sam England just inching over the line in first place), ORSA beat the Old Wykehamists, winning the Regatta for the first time in many years. Hopefully 2025 will see Radley boys back in the fray once more.

Team racing the Mermaids. Radley in white, light green and dark green hulls

ARROW TROPHY 5TH-6TH OCTOBER 2024

The Arrow Trophy is a sailing competition between Independent Schools, raced as an annual weekend regatta in two fleets of onedesign yachts crewed by former pupils. Following our success last year, ORSA was ‘promoted’ into the 10-strong Sunsail F41 fleet (the other fleet consisting of 9 Fairview Oceanis 37s). The sailing conditions on both days were superb and enabled some great racing. The ORSA entry was skippered again this year by Ross Culbertson (2003, B) and crewed by Simon Palmer (1987, F), Mike Baldwin (1980, D), Ed Verdon (2017, E), Alex Senior (2015, E), Max Senior (2013, E), Sam Hughes (2015, K), Yann Sobaszek (2019, F/L), Marcus Knight (1996, C) and Jules Facer (1982, C). Saturday saw four very lively races and ORSA managed to bed in well as a crew of 10 and produce some great racing, and much enjoyment was had by all. The Regatta dinner this year was back in the Royal Ocean Racing Club’s (RORC) newly refurbished clubhouse, and with 180 people attending that evening in Cowes it was a very lively evening catching up with the rest of the competitors from across 19 schools and engaging in off the water competition with Cheltenham. The racing on Sunday was with a slightly smaller fleet of six, and further bedded in as a crew, ORSA managed two 3rd places in a row. Overall, a really great weekend, and a highlight for ORSA in 2024.

ORSA 2025

The line-up for 2025 is looking good. February will see an ORSA dinner in London. There is a cruising weekend planned for May and October, and ORSA will be entering at least one boat in the Round-the-Island Race in June/July. The Seaview Regatta will feature again in mid-September, followed by the Arrow Trophy in early October.

We would love to see anyone with an interest in sailing join us at any or all of these events. Please do get in touch.

Jules Facer (1982, C), Commodore of the ORSA jands.facer@gmail.com

The ORSA Arrow Trophy 2024 team: (L-R) Yann Sobaszek, Simon Palmer, Ross Culbertson, Jules Facer, Max Senior, Alex Senior, Sam Hughes, Ed Verdon, Marcus Knight, Mike Baldwin

ORSA Fleet Racing in the Sunsail F41.

Flying the spinnaker

Radley Rangers

The Rangers success relies on more than our efforts on the pitch. So, it has been exciting to building stronger links with the incredibly supportive Radleian Society and the recent leavers, whom we rely on to have more than 100 players a year representing the club. This allows us to do what we love to do, play nearly 20 games of cricket throughout the summer and win high pressure victories in the Cricketer Cup. 2024 was a season where we did exactly that.

SUNDAY 9TH JUNE: THE CRICKETER CUP, ROUND ONE

The Rangers won the toss and elected to field first against an Oundle side which the Rangers in recent years had struggled to beat. However - armed with a strong side, a wicket prepared by Adam King, and a shorter journey to the ground - the Rangers were confident. George O’Connor (2017, J) (1-40) spearheaded the four-seamer attack and bowled well with the new ball with Jonty Robinson (2012, K) (3-28) at the other end. The change bowlers

kept up the pressure on Henry Chapman (2014, B) (1-23) & Harry Purton (2014, H) (2-46). The four-seam attack left just batsmen 9, 10 & 11 for spinners Kit Morland (2011, D) (1-18) and Freddie Horler (2014, B) (2-14). We bowled a top side out for 196 off 45.4 overs; it was an impressive display. With bat in hand, Will Gubbins (2003, H) (51 off 79), Captain Jamie Dalrymple (1994, H) (55 off 73) and Chapman (42 off 52) made light work of the total and allowed the Rangers to breeze to victory inside 46 overs with 5 wickets remaining. It was a great Rangers victory which reannounced the Rangers as a top-quality Cricketer Cup side.

SUNDAY 30TH JUNE: THE CRICKET CUP, ROUND TWO

The Rangers again won the toss and chose to field first. O’Connor (4-45) bowled a tremendous spell of fast bowling but had little support from the seam attack of the first round. So, we relied on Dalrymple’s (3-51) hard work with the ball, and off spinning support from Horler (1-51) and Christian Hollingworth (2009, K) (1-49). Millfield’s did bat well, and their middle order allowed them to post a strong 255 when they were bowled out in 48.1 overs. The Rangers fought hard with the bat, and Oliver Martyn- Hemphill (2012, F) (69 off 84) and Hollingworth (66 off 75) took the Rangers to within one run. Sadly, Hollingworth was bounced out with

Radley Rangers v Bigside 21st April 2024

Radley Rangers vs Hurlingham Club, 4th August 2024

fightback led by Ned Greville Williams (2013, K) with the ball, resulting in an agonising one wicket loss in SW6.

two runs to win; the Hon. Sec left stranded at the other end. A heartbreaking knockout, but a set of performances that have given the Rangers a lot of heart, in a competitive environment.

Aside from Cup games, the Rangers travelled across our favourite spots in England to play cricket and drink beer. Victories vs I Zingari, The Gauchos, Marlborough Blues, Guards, and Yorkshire Gents (YGs) all showed the Rangers hundred-man squad are worthy opponents.

Some special performances in these games include a MartynHemphill 77 vs Bigside in April, an innings only matched really by his 40 vs the MCC, where he scored 10 fours, without running between the wickets, to protect a well worn-out hip. Hollingworth’s Indian Summer with the bat was also special. From my first game with him over 10 years ago, I had never seen such assertiveness, particularly a crunching drive through extra cover on Bigside sticks in the mind. Rollo Harrap’s (2017, F) 67 off 53 balls vs Bradfield and Jack Folkestone’s (2012, E) 91 vs the Guards also showed the Rangers clearly can bat when they put their mind to it.

With ball in hand, Patrick Hayes’ (2013, K) magic over at Burton Court which read: “..W..+W..”, was the season highlight. Not since Flintoff, Langer, and Ponting in 2005 had a man bowled an over putting his side in such a frenzy and the opposition in such disarray. Fix Sec George Greville Williams’s (2012, K) 3-32 that day also gave the Guards a lot to think about.

There were disappointing losses vs the Eton Ramblers and Hurlingham Club. Although against the latter there was a heroic

So, it must be said that the Yorkshire Tour’s two-day game vs the Yorkshire Gents was the highlight of the second half of the season. The ball moved in the air and turned square off the pitch. High value was given to aggressive batting. And Sam Hoddinott’s (2012, B) 2nd innings 40 became the difference between the two sides that gave us a thrilling victory. Most pleasingly of all, we beat the YGs in the ‘boat race’; downing 11 pints faster than those broodmares was magic ...

So, another season over; as usual, great cricket on the pitch and plenty of good company to keep us occupied off the pitch.

We hope to see more players join us in the 2025 season for more of the same.

Jonty Robinson Hon. Sec. of the Radley Rangers

LEADING RUNS & WICKETS

Radley Rangers vs Yorkshire Gents, 10th-11th August 2024

Radley Serpents

The Serpents had another strong year in 2024, marking the return of summer 7s to the calendar and witnessing rugby at the College continue to thrive. This momentum lays the foundation for further growth of the Serpents in the coming years.

The John Fishwick 7s, held at Wimbledon RFC, was a fantastic success. Playing an ambitious brand of rugby is at the core of the Serpents’ identity, and although the added space challenged our legendary fitness levels, it also provided the perfect stage for showcasing even more daring displays of skill. While a narrow defeat in the semi-final was disappointing, it didn’t stop us from celebrating victory off the field in true Serpents fashion.

The established London fixture against the Marlborough Malones once again saw fantastic support. It was a tightly contested match, and the evening was made even more special by reuniting with fellow ORs. Unfortunately, we had to cancel the planned OR Day fixture due to the opposition withdrawing at the last minute. Despite our best efforts to arrange alternatives, it wasn’t meant to be this time.

The 2025 schedule is outlined below, with further details to follow soon. We’re excited to introduce several new events to the calendar, starting with a social gathering ahead of the England v Japan match this autumn. Additionally, we’ll be entering the Bournemouth 7s, and are planning to assemble a ‘tour’ party for this iconic event in the rugby calendar.

A massive thank you to everyone who has donned the Serpents jersey, attended an event, or supported the club throughout the year. We can’t wait to welcome you all back soon! We’re always on the lookout for new members, and if you have any event ideas, or teams you’d like to see us compete against, please let us know, and we’ll do our utmost to make it happen.

For those currently at university or needing assistance to attend any future events, don’t hesitate to get in touch – we’re more than happy to help.

The Radley Serpents Committee James Cunningham (2012, G), Chairman Hugo Eyre (2012, F), Captain George Redmayne (2014, D), Social Media Secretary

Follow & contact the Serpents on Instagram: @radleyserpentsrugby

Radley Serpents at the JF7s Rugby – match report https://www.radley.org.uk/news-events/news/jf7s-2024/

Radley Serpents v Marlborough Malones - match report https://www.radley.org.uk/news-events/news/serpentsapr-2024/

Radley Serpents RFC Kit Shop

2024 RESULTS

DATE OPPOSITION RESULT

26th April 2024 Malones 12-22 (L)

27th July 2024 John Fishwick 7s Semi Finalists

14th September 2024 Sherborne – OR Day Cancelled

UPCOMING EVENTS

24th November 2024 Autumn Internationals Social (England vs Japan) Twickenham Pubs/Bars TBA

April 2025

XV Fixture - Chiswick RFC Malones

May 2025 Bournemouth 7s Various

20th June 2025 Lions Tour Social (Lions vs Argentina) London Pubs TBA

July 2025 John Fishwick 7s Various

OR Fives Club

The OR Fives Club play several fixtures throughout the year. A principal aim is to encourage fives playing at the school & beyond, and anyone interested in playing or attending should email Duncan Neale (1982, G) duncanjneale@gmail.com for more details. There is no joining fee.

For a description of the team and sport visit: https://therfa.uk/#promo

We run weekend fixtures against the College in term time, plus participation in the Owers Trophy, where the ORs will play against old boys & girls from other fives playing schools.

Please contact the organiser, Duncan Neale for further information: duncanjneale@gmail.com.

OR Cross Country

Benedict Pollard (1986, H), Captain, OR XC Club invites all ORs to take part in the Radley Relays at College in February. This is a team relay event of 8 miles, wherein runners can do either 8, 6, 4 or 2 miles each. The event usually has in excess of 50 teams from all sorts of schools across the region, but within that there is a bespoke contest of the ORs vs the dons/ staff vs the boys.

All ages are welcome, and we particularly encourage some younger ORs to join in, seeing as the current average age of the team is now probably over 50(!), so some fresher legs will no doubt help the results! Please email if you are interested: benedict.pollard@gmail.com

The event is usually on the second or third Tuesday in February, starting at about 2pm by the cricket pavilion, date to be confirmed closer to the time. It is hoped that this notice gives ORs enough time to put in some good training beforehand, but please note that all paces are welcome.

OR Rackets

Over the last year we have had great participation from both recent and not so recent leavers, and were able to field a number of pairs in the annual Noel Bruce competition at Queen,s Club, London.

At the College, this year was our most successful on the Rackets circuit for quite some time. In December we reached three out of the four singles finals, with Laszlo (R, C Social) winning the Jim Dear cup. Morgan (6,2, B Social) and Nathan (6.1, L Social) did a fantastic job getting to the final of the Renny Cup and Incledon Webber Cup respectively. In March, the club did extremely well in the doubles tournaments. The senior 1st pair, the senior 2nd pair

Croquet

As Croquet Fever continues to grip the Radley College lawns each Summer Term, so too do more and more Old Radleians enjoy the sport. Hundreds of leavers over the last few years have punctuated their summers with matches in the Radley College Open Pairs Competition, and a more select number have taken part in interschool matches and events in prestigious locations, such as the Surbiton Southern Schools tournament, of which Radley are now the two-time defending champions. The highlight of the season, though, is the annual match at The Hurlingham Club, in London, where a team of Radleians take on a Club select side, comprising members who have a strong Radley connection (mostly ORs, but with some OR parents and other friends of the College).

This year, teams of 10 did battle; the Radley team managed to complete their unbeaten season, but the result mattered little as everyone first enjoyed their play, and then a fine burger and chips once dusk forced play from the lawns. One OR neatly summarised the occasion: ‘The Radley boys were wonderful; what a great bunch - it was a complete blast.’ The Old Radleian team is actively recruiting players: contact hc@radley.org.uk for more information. Harry Crump, Deputy Head (Co-Curricular) and Master in Charge of Croquet

and the U16 pair all reached the semi-finals and the U15 pair of Laszlo (R, C Social) and Evy (V, C Social) won the Peter Gray Cup for the U15 doubles. A superb year for the club.

Over the coming year we hope to provide more opportunities for ORs to connect and play so we can continue this growth and strengthen the community of players.

If you would like to get involved, please do reach out to find out more about opportunities. You can contact us via the RadSoc Office: radsoc@radley.org.uk.

Radley Wildebloods

The Wildebloods enjoyed their summer drinks party on a rooftop bar overlooking Liberty London, and in classic British summer style the heavens opened. Fellow boarders from Harrow to Eton joined us in celebrating our small but important LGBTQIA+ community in the summer showers. We’ve also seen some internal shifts with Adam Lambert stepping down as Chairman. Huge thanks to Adam for championing the Wildebloods and creating a joyful community for us all. Nick Pelly-Fry has passed the Secretary baton on to Arran Ryder as Nick ascends into the Chairman role. Good luck Nick! The Wildebloods are now looking ahead to their Christmas gathering which usually involves a cosy London pub, red wine and a roaring fire. More details to follow!

If anyone would like to be added to the Wildebloods mailing list please reach out to us at admin@radley-wildebloods.com – we’d be delighted to have you.

Arran Ryder (2012, H), Secretary of the Radley Wildebloods

OR Polo Club – New for 2025!

Calling all Alumni polo players … The OR Polo Club is being launched this winter, aiming to bring together ORs of all skill levels who share a love for the amazing sport.

The team will be based at Oxford Polo and Kirtlington Park Polo Club, which both offer great facilities and a vibrant polo community. Kirtlington is Radley’s local club and is situated at Park Farm, Akeman Street, Kidlington, OX5 3JQ.

With numerous ORs and current Radleians active in the polo world, the team has a strong foundation and the current plan is to organise friendly matches in 2025, providing opportunities for players to connect in a competitive and social environment.

Whether you’re a regular or less frequent player, the OR Polo Team welcomes your interest. To learn more about joining the team, please contact Frank Barlow (2015, B) via email at frankie.barlow2001@ gmail.com or by phone on 07824 632026. We look forward to hearing from you!

JOIN AN OR SPORTS CLUB

Whether you’re looking to rekindle your love for a sport, meet up with like-minded friends, or simply stay active, take a look at what’s on offer.

For more information and to join up, visit https://bit.ly/RadSocClubs

SPORTS CLUBS AVAILABLE

The Mariners (Rowing)

The Serpents (Rugby)

The Keys (Football)

The Rangers (Cricket)

The Galleons (Hockey)

The Old Radleian Golf Society

The Old Radleian Sailing Association

Old Radleian Cross Country

Old Radleian Rackets

Old Radleian Real Tennis

Old Radleian Fives

Old Radleian Squash

Old Radleian Polo

Old Radleian Croquet

HEALTH BENEFITS OF SPORT

 Reduce Stress

 Increase Fitness

 Widen your Network

 Unite with Friends

 Meet New People

 Rekindle Old Hobbies

 Access Top Sporting Facilities

 Social Events

 Get Involved in Leagues and Competitions

COLLEGE UPDATE

bursar’s report 2023-24

On learning the theme for this year’s Old Radleian was “Reimagining the World”, I was struck by how relevant this seemed given the need continually to reimagine Radley.

I have written before about the many challenges we have faced since 1847; indeed we have all lived through some of the most recent ones, and as I write, we are faced with the prospect of imagining a world where there is a tax on education, in the form of VAT on independent school fees.

The cost of providing a first-class boarding education at Radley is very significant indeed; we all know that. The incremental additional cost of VAT therefore provides new challenges as it risks pricing loyal hardworking parents out of our market and making us less accessible to all. We have recognised the challenges around the affordability of fees over many years. The progressive growth of our bursary funding and the development of our approach to Admissions has already been central to how we imagine a Radley of the future. With VAT, things simply get harder. We continue to strive for the

best possible education we can provide and have been clear in our messaging that we do not want to make sacrifices on quality or breadth of education. This has been something that our parents have been reassured by, and yet it comes at a price, in the form of the school fee. How can we manage that? Well, the three key levers seem to be cost management, growth and diversity of income, and a larger funded bursary programme.

All good organisations should be managing costs and reviewing their ways of working and we are no exception here; and, yes, a shock like VAT on school fees should encourage us to try harder. As with all schools, our biggest cost is our people, and within this, our teachers are prominent, and it is difficult to reimagine a school without teachers (despite the massive advances in AI!). However, we will scrutinise all costs and save where it makes sense including where technology or other innovation can support productivity improvements. Our aspiration to deliver a solar farm, thereby saving significant electricity cost, is an example of this.

Another area of cost is building, and it seems ironic, in a year that has seen the start of the extension and redevelopment of our music department, to talk of a slowdown. However, as we manage the transition into the post-VAT world, a slowdown of capital investment is appropriate. Music represents the last of the really major projects needed as we have adjusted to our current size of school. There will always be demand for new projects, and we have some on the wait

list – for example, we want to invest in improving the capacity and provision at our Health Centre and we are looking ahead to when we need to invest in our Boat House. However, these projects will either be on a smaller scale, and so affordable if done in sequence, such as with the Health Centre, or they will be reliant on fundraising, if we are to commence them sooner, such as with the Boat House. Capital investment will most likely not cease, we will continue to invest in maintaining or improving the quality of what we already have, but we do expect to slow things down a little.

On income, we will redouble our efforts to identify and develop third party income streams to support our core offering. For example, we already have a well-developed programme of commercial activities, and we will look to build on that. We also have other assets that make a return for us, and ongoing management of our balance sheet is an important part of this. Other schools have identified additional ways of growing income. But we must always look at opportunities within our own context and balanced against risk and impact. Suffice to say, it is an ongoing strategic role to identify and evaluate new opportunities and how they may fit within what we do, and contribute to a Radley education accessible to all.

In respect of our bursary programme, we rely on two things. Our growing endowment to fund awards and the generosity of donors to support the funding of places at Radley. We have made great strides with strategic land sales, and our endowment has just experienced a step change growth at a very helpful time as VAT comes in. Our challenge now is to nurture, protect and grow our endowment and the income it generates. New opportunities will arise from time to time, but we must manage our estate as a longterm asset, and we will do that; indeed, our sustainability strategy is leading us to look at how we use our off-campus land in new ways.

In reimagining Radley in a post-VAT world, we must also reimagine our sector. Times of crisis also bring opportunity and great change. There are many players in our sector, and many school structures, groupings and configurations. Some of the traditional norms may change, and parental demands may change. We must look at our market, understand our market and our competitive environment. We must also be nimble and open-minded to change, including in our model and how we do things while also being clear on what is truly distinctive about what we do and what we want to protect. In its own way, Radley has already changed significantly in preceding decades, and so this is nothing new.

Jonathan Porter Deputy Head (Academic)

Change can be unsettling and the times ahead, for our sector at least, may well be turbulent. However, viewed from a boy's perspective, each year should be a year of education, and not of corporate upheaval. We must remember this as we develop how and what Radley delivers and always be true to the needs of our current cohort.

The College can take great comfort in what it already has: a beautiful rural campus with magnificent facilities; a setting on the doorstep of Oxford, a global educational brand; a large and growing endowment; and, above all, a loyal and committed workforce dedicated to delivering a world class education today, tomorrow and long into the future reimagined.

Andrew Ashton Bursar

Hector's instructions in 'The History Boys' - "pass it on". Another famous history don, Steve Rathbone, has done just that, passing on the role of Academic Director (Deputy Head, Academic as we now call it) to me. It is a great honour, and I am very fortunate to have taken on an academic culture in such rude health.

As an Old Oundelian, I am a little nervous about introducing myself to the OR community. The last time I met some of you was on Bigside as a teenager, and I remember it being a somewhat bruising encounter!

However, my wife and I also counted three ORs at our wedding in Cambridge – the Chaplain noted that they were the loudest singers – and they at least had the good manners not to tackle me on my wedding day.

Since then, I trained to teach via the Teach First programme, learning the craft in a euphemistically named ‘challenging’ school in Birmingham, before becoming part of a team that founded what is now the top school in the country for academic progress, the free school, Michaela, in London. Having most recently taught at Haileybury, I am delighted to bring a wide array of experiences to the role.

I hope that my first year at the College has built on my predecessor’s success. You will be pleased to know that A*-B was up 3% at A level this year, and 7-9 (A to A** in old money) up 7% at GCSE. Boys who

UNIVERSITY DESTINATIONS

would have received Cs at other schools are getting Bs at Radley, and boys who would have received 7s at other schools are getting 8s. We are still waiting for reviews to come back but the overall results are pleasing and are testament to the diligence and care that I have come to expect of Radley’s Common Room.

In terms of university admissions, 11 boys were accepted into Oxbridge, two of whom are organ scholars. And the burgeoning US sector continues to bear fruit: 15 boys are off to American universities, five of whom have been given places in the Ivy League. Closer to home, 84% of boys are going to Russell Group universities; we continue to prepare boys superbly for their next step.

We’re not complacent and, in the years to come, I would like us to

do even better. As I said to Common Room at the beginning of the year, it’s important to remember that underneath the exam results is an individual boy who has a more enriched life and a brighter future because of our teaching. Many of the changes that we are bringing in have this end in mind: we want the quality of learning in the classroom to be better than any of our competitors, and we want boys, outside of the classroom, to be incentivised to work as hard as they can. I hope some of the juicier carrots I am introducing, such as extra Shop Lunches for boys who gain Distinctions, will help with that.

The wonderful thing about the academic life of a boarding school, though, is it cannot be contained in the exam hall. I think I was just as happy when I saw one of the Removes ‘fist bump’ the boy next to him after he, unexpectedly, won the Geography prize in the Serpentes

Essay Competition. I was definitely as happy when I saw Dr Schmalz beaming from across the Common Room because a team of Radley boys triumphed in the ESU Schools Mace – winning the country’s premier debating competition.

I have said nothing of the Radley team’s success at VEX Robotics, one boy’s recent triumph in the John Locke Essay Competition, or Kelvin's (6.1 C) astonishing accomplishment to be invited, as one of only 20 pupils in the country, to train in Hungary because of his outstanding performance in the British Mathematics Olympiad. Mr Wiseman tells me that this is the first time, in his memory, that a Radleian has accomplished such a feat.

As you can see, Radleians are thriving academically, both inside and outside of the classroom.

I could not write a report about the College’s academic life without mentioning new technologies. As I said to the Sixth Form at the beginning of the year, new technologies afford us significant new powers and opportunities, if we know how to harness them. Innovative quizzing apps such as ‘Quizlet’ and ‘Anki’ are able to ‘learn’ which bits of information we forget more frequently and can use sophisticated algorithms to feed those bits back to us at greater regularity.

In addition, online learning platforms such as ‘Massolit’ and ‘Up Learn’ provide boys with opportunities to hear lectures from world renowned academics or complete courses of study which adapt as they get questions right or wrong. With boys not physically present in the College for around 40% of the year, these online platforms provide huge opportunities to expand the boys’ minds when they are not physically with us. ChatGPT and other ‘Large Language Models’, used well, can also be very powerful, giving boys quick summaries of thinkers’ arguments,

periods of history, or lists of exam-style questions with which to practise. Such technologies can propel the boys to knowledge and skills that geographic limitations previously made impossible.

But we should always be careful of falling into the ‘Whig’ view of history: not all innovation is progress and not all of the technological change that we see in education is positive. The fact that I did not use ChatGPT to write this report is an indication itself of AI’s limitations (so far!). And the influence of ChatGPT as the first port of call for any information a boy needs raises questions about the authority that such technologies have over the boys’ perception of what is true. Steve Rathbone was absolutely right to warn, in the 2023 issue, of a deepening culture of censoriousness in parts of Silicon Valley which subtly filters much of the information that our boys read on the internet. ‘Wise as serpents and as innocent as doves’ feels as pertinent and as relevant now as ever.

And, while many aspects of the technology that the boys have at their fingertips is very positive, not all of it is. The engineers of Silicon Valley are some of the finest minds in the world, and, as I often say to the boys, they are paid a lot of money to get us to look at their creations. That is not always a good thing. There is a healthy debate to be had about which technologies help us to achieve our aims and which technologies prevent them.

It is partly because of these debates that I was so keen to work at Radley. I think there are very few schools in Britain now as thoughtful, as committed to heterodoxy, and which have the intellectual confidence not to jump onto every fashionable social, political or technological bandwagon. Where some other schools are shutting down free discussion, Radley is opening it up. We are proud to do so.

This is because the cut and thrust of debate, of criticality, and the valuing of knowledge and beauty, for their own sake, is in the foundations of the College.

There is a line from Proverbs that I have always liked. ‘It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: But the honour of kings is to search out a matter.’ (Proverbs 25:2)

You can rest assured that the elusive, but necessary, search for Truth, Goodness and Beauty, which animated our founders nearly 200 years ago, continues to lie at the heart of the College and its academic life today.

Jonathan Porter Deputy Head (Academic)

Meals in the newly renovated Shop

INNOVATION SCHOLARSHIP: BRINGING BRILLIANCE TO RADLEY

Old Radleians of all vintages will have fond memories of their time in the Design Engineering Department at Radley. Whether being encouraged to supersize a humble Shell project by Will Matthews or plotting to rewire the College’s electricity circuit with Max Horsey, the Design Department has always been a sanctuary for boys with creative and practical minds. Under Dennis Silk, the department became one of the most innovative and well-resourced in the country, and the relentless focus on quality of both the equipment and facilities, as well as boys’ work, continues to the present day.

In line with technological advances, more boys have seen the Design Department as a catalyst for entrepreneurial spirit and innovation. Perhaps the most obvious example is the meteoric rise of robotics. Radley teams have qualified for the World VEX Robotics Championships in Dallas for the last two years, finishing as the top UK team on both occasions. To ‘quote’ Sewell, innovation flows through Radley as grain meanders through marble or oak.

But could we use our established reputation for Design Engineering and burgeoning technological standing to attract more talented and ambitious boys to the College? In 2023, the Admissions Team launched the Innovation Scholarship, a new award designed to celebrate boys with big ideas and the determination to realise them.

The Design Engineering and Computer Science dons concluded that whilst boys must have some technical ability in one or more of product design, robotics, coding, graphics, computer science, video or game design, the ability to ideate and iterate were the key skills of great innovators. As such, the assessment process was designed to uncover out-of-the-box thinkers with outstanding communication and problem-solving skills. It involves group challenges, a written assessment – where boys respond to a brief individually – and an interview presentation, where candidates are quizzed about their response. They are also encouraged to bring something they have made (physical or digital) for discussion.

30 boys applied for the award in the first year, making it the most popular scholarship after our long-standing Academic and Sport awards. Sophie Langdale, Director of Admissions and Communications, said: “The quality of boys’ work was exceptional. The beauty of this programme is that every entry will be completely different. Whilst some brought ‘traditional’ design projects made from wood or metal, others showcased 3D digital projects, games and coding projects. The best candidates were able to articulate the specific problem their creation solved which is a rare thing for a young designer, but everyone was passionate about innovation.”

As we double down on our efforts to welcome more boys of different talents and backgrounds to the College, the Innovation Scholarship will play a critical and levelling role. Whilst The Keys Award (our new all-inclusive funded places programme) has removed the requirement for boys to secure a scholarship to receive funding, the breadth of the Innovation Scholarship and the unique nature of the assessment process allows us to be more confident when approaching schools, clubs and community groups to find talented boys. Equally, it removes barriers to entry by placing the emphasis on ideas, rather than requiring boys to have access to expensive technology and equipment.

As the College continues to look to the future, we celebrate our traditional values and the modern education we provide. This new award showcases the College on the front foot, embracing new ideas and celebrating the individual skills and talents of prospective Radleians. The Admissions Team is always keen to hear from boys considering Radley and enjoys welcoming families of ORs to Open Days and for personalised admissions tours throughout the year. Please

SERPENTES ESSAY PRIZE

The 2023-24 Senior Academic Prefect, Hyunjo Kim (2019, J), introduced a series of scholarly prizes in the last academic year. The Serpentes Essay Prize, named after the College’s academic journal, allows boys to flex their intellectual muscles and explore passions that lie beyond the core curriculum. The Prize continues Radley’s long tradition of encouraging boys to participate in the challenge of research and appreciate the thrust of debate.

The 10 new Serpentes Essay Prizes are named after Old Radleians of distinction. Hyunjo worked closely with Clare Sargent, College Archivist, to select ORs whose achievements would serve as inspiration to current boys.

Of the prize-winning essays across the 10 subjects, one is selected to win the overall grand prize: The Serpentes Prize.

“It’s incredible how many amazing men have graced Radley College.”

– Hyunjo Kim (2019, J), Senior Academic Prefect 2023-24.

Best Philosophy Essay –The John L Johnston Prize

John L Johnston (1899, B) was Radley’s most highly regarded academic to fall in WW1.

He was Dean of Divinity at Magdalen College, Oxford. As a scholar he was concerned with the relationship between Christianity and comparative religions, ethics and moral philosophy.

He visited China during the turbulent period at the end of the Qing Dynasty to look at the role of Christian education there. He also worked with the University and Radley College missions in London. His final works looked at the relationship between science and faith.

He was killed in France in 1915, aged 29.

Q: There is progress in science. Is there progress in philosophy, and is the field only successful if there is?

Best Theology Essay – The Henry Bazely Prize

Henry Bazely (1855) was the most able boy in the school and the first to be awarded the Richards Gold Medal. However, his theology was diametrically opposed to the Warden’s, so William Sewell refused to appoint him Senior Prefect, giving him instead the title ‘Princeps’.

As a clergyman, Bazely refused to be ordained in the Church of England. He worked among the poor in Stepney and in Oxford, and as a philanthropist and open-air evangelist in Abingdon and Oxford.

He established a Presbyterian church in Jericho, then the poorest area of Oxford. His religious integrity caused him to renounce any chance of career advancement.

Q: To what extent is religious faith rational?

Best History Prize – The Owen Prize

Sidney Owen came to teach at Radley in 1853 when Sewell was Warden. He left in 1856 to take up the post of Professor of History and Political Economy at Elphinstone College, Mumbai.

He returned to Radley as the school’s first (and only) Lecturer in History from 1860 until 1868. He completed his career as Oxford University Reader in Indian History from 1878 until he died in 1912.

The Historical Essay Prize founded in 1859 was originally called the Owen Prize.

Q: Where does History end?

Best Linguistic Essay –

The Michael Glenny Prize

Michael Glenny (1940, F) probably learned some Russian from don Stephen Paton whilst at school.

He was first invited to the Soviet Union in 1960 to advise on a collection of Wedgewood china. He began work as a part-time translator whilst there.

His speciality became the discovery and transmission of contemporary Russian literature that was unavailable to an English readership, such as the work of Bulgakov and early writing by Solzhenitsyn.

At the time of his death in Moscow in 1990, Glenny was researching the works of Soviet writers who had perished in the gulags.

Q: Discuss the way in which people may threaten each other’s power in spoken interactions.

Best Literature Essay – The Peter Way Prize

Peter Way (1936, F) is one of only three Radleians to win the Oxford University Newdigate Prize for Poetry.

He came back to Radley to teach English in 1952, after serving in WW2. He is considered one of the most inspirational dons ever to teach here. His pupils included several poets and novelists, including Andrew Motion, the Poet Laureate. Motion wrote of him:

‘My teacher, who reached down inside my head and turned the first lights on … Who made me read. Who made me write … Who gave my life to me.’

Q: To what extent should authorial biography matter?

Best Politics Essay –

The John X Merriman Prize

John X Merriman (1856) went to live in South Africa with his parents in 1848, and eventually returned there in 1861 as a land surveyor.

He entered Parliament, eventually becoming the last Prime Minister of Cape Colony before the Union of South Africa in 1910.

As a politician, his attitude to the Black citizens of his country completely changed, from deeply prejudiced to enlightened respect. He became strongly anti-imperialist, opposed Cecil Rhodes’s company’s exploitation of Africans and fought to extend multi-racial suffrage throughout South Africa.

Q: Is Democracy really the best form of government?

Best Classics Essay –

The Geoffrey Adams Prize

Geoffrey Adams (1909, F/C) was a Classicist and a War Poet. He turned down his scholarship (Demyship) place to read Classics at Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1915 to enlist in WW1.

He was killed on the Somme in 1916.

His father, Arthur Adams, became Chair of the War Memorial Committee, speaking for all those parents whose sons had no known grave:

‘He wanted a Memorial which the boys would in their hearts connect with the idea of self-sacrifice and resort to for inspiration in difficulties.’

Geoffrey carried a copy of Homer’s Odyssey in the trenches. The Warden arranged publication of his war poetry after his death.

Q: ‘Ancient philosophy is not relevant to modern political or ethical debates.’ Do you agree?

Best Geography Essay –

The Boyd Alexander Prize

Boyd Alexander (1887, A) was an explorer and naturalist.

As an ornithologist, Boyd was responsible for identifying several previously unknown species of birds on the Cape Verde Islands and the Gold Coast. He also conducted a survey of avifauna of Lake Chad.

As an explorer, he commanded the first European expedition to find a route across Africa from West to East, from the River Niger to the River Nile.

In 1908 he was awarded the Founders Medal of the Royal Geographical Society ‘for his three years’ journey across Africa from the Niger to the Nile.’

Q: Is it better for countries to be wealthier or to be more equal?

Best Law Essay –

The Arthur Austen-Leigh Prize

Arthur Austen-Leigh came to Radley in 1851.

He was one of the first Prefects. He also won the first Distinction ever to be awarded, when he saved the life of another boy from drowning in the river.

He went up to Balliol College, Oxford, in 1855, where he became the first Radleian to take 1st Class Honours in a Law degree.

He was a keen sportsman who played football for Maidenhead in the inaugural FA Cup. He was Jane Austen’s great-nephew.

Q: ‘The law only portrays the various needs of the people at a given time.’ Discuss.

Best Economics Essay –

The Andrew Hughes Hallett Prize

Andrew Hughes Hallett (1961, C) held multiple professorships of economics and was considered among the top 5% of economists worldwide at his death in 2019.

He was based primarily in Scotland, where he was charged with designing an economic framework for an independent or financially autonomous Scotland, and policy arrangements to support it. This included a system of fiscal rules, debt control, currency choice, a financial regulation system to meet Scotland’s needs, trading arrangements under Brexit, growth policies, diversification, and a sovereign wealth fund. He also worked extensively on sustainability.

Q: ‘The main claim of macroeconomic theory is that markets are beneficial institutions.’ Discuss.

A YEAR AT RADLEY

Work started on the Music School redevelopment project in July 2024.

In July, a Boeing AH-64 Apache attack helicopter arrived at Smithson’s Fields, Radley, for the CCF Inspection Day.

Actor Dominic West, star of The Wire, spoke to Removes about his career and current role in a production of Arthur Miller’s A View From The Bridge in June.

. This year’s Peter Cook Cup was awarded to Caspian (6.2, F) for his performance of Joe in Our Boys. Highly commended were Blake (6.1, A) as Captain Beatty in Fahrenheit 451, and Arthur (R, H) for his monologue What Theo Did.

Aurora borealis were visible over Radley College in May 2024, captured here above Clock Tower by George (6.1, D) and Mr Alastair Vaan (Head of Computer Science).

. In Rugby, Radley’s Junior Colts 1 became National Champions in March, beating Northampton School for Boys to take win the Continental Tyres U15 National Schools Cup.

The College’s robotics teams achieved success at the National VEX Robotics Championships. Team Polaris won their division and narrowly missed overall national victory in the UK grand final.

In February, Kumar (R, F) was awarded this year’s Declamations prize – the Elizabeth Madgen Casket – for his performance of The Sandman (Vol. 8) by Neil Gaiman.

. E Social were this year’s Inter-Social Ergo Competition winners back in January.

Radley claimed three overall team prize wins at the Independent Schools’ Ski Championships in Sestriere, Italy, in December 2023: Slalom Senior, Giant Slalom Senior, and Combined Senior. Congratulations to Freddy (6.2, K), who won both the U19 Slalom and U19 Giant Slalom events.

This year’s Partsong competition was won by E Social, comprising 18 singers, for their performance of Sherry by Frankie Valli, arranged by Christian (6.2, E).

. Aaron (V, G) won the Independent Schools’ Medical Lecture Competition for his presentation on Haemophilia and medical ethics.

. Radley was honoured to have been named Public School of the Year 2024 by Tatler

. Hyunjo (6.2, J), Sepehr (6.2, E) and Gaya (6.2, A) were honoured at this year’s Oxford Young Scientist awards, having been nominated by Radley in recognition of their outstanding ability and for inspiring excellence across the College.

Laszlo (S, C) won the Jim Dear Trophy at the National Schools’ Rackets Championship in December 2023.

Brothers Will (R, H) and Ned (S, A) won the British Junior Real Tennis Championships for those under 15 back in October 2023. Ned won the competition again this year in September 2024 alongside Felix (R, G).

This year the W B Woodgate Sculls Trophy was awarded to Hector (6.2, K).

For the first time in Radley’s history, a team from the College won The English Speaking Union’s Mace Debating Competition, making them national champions. Congratulations to Blake (6.1, A), Mustafa (6.2, A), and Brayden (6.2, A).

A group of pupils braved temperatures as low as -29°C to attend the 2024 Iowa Republican presidential caucuses in January.

In the academic year 2023-24, Radley boys helped to raise over £18,500 for charity, including for the Poppy Appeal, Oxfordshire Youth, Sobell House, Help for Heroes and £15,000 for Active Oxfordshire via the Six Rackets event.

The J16A rowers beat France by 2/3 of a length whilst representing British Rowing in the GB vs France match in July.

Radley had brilliant success at the National Schools Regatta. J16A & J16B took first place in their respective events, the 1st VIII & Senior IV came away with silver medals, and J14A & 3rd VIII won third place.

. G Social won this year’s Spens Trophy (Radley’s answer to University Challenge).

So many of you gave your time and shared your expertise at the College and at our events in 2024. This has a huge impact on the boys, introducing them to a wide range of topics and preparing them for the world beyond Radley.

OR CAREER PROFILES

Will Christie (1991, D)

Will Eliot (2006, B)

Will Flindall (2008, G)

Phil Robinson (1985, D)

Alex Rose (2003, C)

George Stoy (1990, E)

Read online: www.radley.org.uk/ radleian-society/careers-profiles/

6.1 FUTURES NETWORKING EVENT

Freddie Bradshaw (2008, A)

Piers Daubney (Radley parent)

William Dyott (2000, F)

Tony Harris (Radley parent)

Sarah Hewett (Radley parent)

Ollie House (2012, E)

Dominic Kay (Radley parent)

Alex Low (2006, G)

Kate Markham (Radley parent)

Simon Peck (1985, E)

George Popescu-Craiova (2006, K)

Tony Ruane (Radley parent)

Adam Skinner (1990, D)

Charlie Vey (2002, H)

George Wills (2006, C)

Thor Winkler (2010, H)

Ben Withinshaw (1996, C)

Arthur Woyka (2011, A)

RADSOC BUSINESS NETWORKING EVENTS IN LONDON

Robert Bassett Cross (Radley parent)

Alexander Bowden (1986, F)

Max Bullen-Smith (2004, E)

Philip Guest (Radley parent)

Spencer Hanlon (Radley parent)

Chris Hill (Radley parent)

Tom Holbrook (2006, D)

Hugo Thorp (2002, G)

Charles Towers-Clark (1983, C)

Alan Vaksman (Radley parent)

Sigurd (Robbie) Wendin (2009, J)

Andrew Yeoman (Radley parent)

Watch online: https://bit.ly/ RadSocBisVid

ONLINE ‘BEYOND RADLEY’ DISCUSSIONS

Oli Christie (1984, D)

George Hanlon (2018, C)

Charlie Lass (1994, A)

Paula Ward (Radley parent)

Watch online: https://bit.ly/ BeyondRadley

TALKS AT THE COLLEGE

Charles Ash (2011, K)

Giles Bancroft (1990, G)

Ollie Bartlett (2004, E)

Angus Bauer (2001, C)

Gilly Cooper (Radley parent)

William Cowen (1985, A)

Max Eastwood (2016, B)

Thom Elliot (1997, F)

Harry Fox (2008, C)

Paul Graham (Radley parent)

Philip Guest (Radley parent)

Tony Harris (Radley parent)

Max Hobhouse (2011, F)

Rupert Lowe (2016, H)

Catherine Manson (Radley parent)

Greg Morgan (1993, H)

James Nairne (1973, F)

Simon Pillar (Radley parent)

Milo Pinckney (2009, H)

David Sun (2015, D)

Tom Sweetnam (2014, J)

Guy Stone (1985, D)

CAREERS & WORKPLACE VISITS

Robert Bassett Cross (Radley parent)

Paul Beard (Radley parent)

James Blackwell (Radley parent)

Max Carter (Radley parent)

Patrick Jubb (Radley parent)

John Morton (1993, F)

Richard Pearson (Radley parent)

James Pritchett (2001, F)

Henry Reilly-Collins (1997, E)

Alan Ruddy (Radley parent)

Andrew Yeoman (Radley parent)

CAREERS MENTORING

Charlie Huntingford (2008, A)

If we have missed you off this list, we apologise. Your help is so valuable – thank you!

Can you help prepare Radleians for the world beyond College or help young ORs find their feet in a new industry? Get in touch with us: radsoc@radley.org.uk

VALES 2023-24

Ben Holden

Ben Holden arrived at Radley in April 1987. He had been offered an assistant teacher of CDT role by Dennis Silk and enjoyed having the Summer Term to get to know the College. He spent his formative years in the Design Department working with Pete Wilkins and Ian Haslam, teaching the likes of Charlie Palmer and Ashton Shuttleworth. In 1991, Pete Wilkins went on sabbatical to Australia and Richard Morgan asked Ben to run the department in his absence. Pete loved Australia so much that he emigrated the following summer. Ben therefore inherited the role as HoD of Design and Technology and ran the department from January 1993 to January 2000. In the meantime, Ben had met Helen in 1989. Helen taught Art at Shiplake College from 1990 to 1993, and then here at Radley from 1993 until 1997. She then pursued a career in academia at Oxford.

In November 1999 Richard Morgan summoned Ben to his study and asked him and Helen to take over D Social from January onwards. Ben started his career as a Tutor in difficult circumstances, but very quickly warmed to his task. He and Helen created a real family atmosphere in D Social, and generations of boys (and dons) benefitted from their kindness and advice. Ben and Helen were supported in D by Mary Norton and Sally Denyer as PHMs and Chris Bedford, James Whitehead, Nick Hamshaw and Tony Jackson as Sub-Tutors, and the twins Ruairidh and Sadhbh were born in the Social in 2004. Helen returned to teaching at d’Overbroecks, and then ran a very successful Art Department at Our Lady’s, Abingdon, thereafter.

Having run D Social very successfully for eleven years it was no surprise when Ben was appointed as Senior Master Pastoral in 2011; a role which was his introduction to becoming Sub-Warden and Designated Safeguarding Lead. He fulfilled the latter two roles with dedication, expertise and enormous professionalism, often in sensitive and trying circumstances. He had infinite patience in managing all pastoral matters, and in particular the Tutors, Resident Sub-Tutors and PHMs. Being DSL means being ‘on call’ 24/7, as well as getting to know various local agencies and authorities, and Ben’s diligence here was second to none.

Away from all of the above Ben played a full role in the life of the College. He loves his wood-chopping, sailing and fishing, and also even coached archery back in the day. He attended CCF camps and various other trips, but his impact was most keenly felt by RCBC. Not only was he on the Mariners’ Committee, but after flirting with J15s and J16s, he found his niche especially amongst the J14 crews, liking nothing more than a summer afternoon’s launch on our reach of the Thames. The J14 row back from Teddies through the locks, carrying the eights, and consuming vast quantities of ice creams, was his and Andy Thomas’ brainchild, and huge numbers of J14 rowers remember it as their most successful outing.

Ben and Helen leave to take up residence in County Cork, overlooking Bantry Bay (no doubt with the odd pint of the black stuff in attendance), as well as popping back to Oxford on occasion. We wish them and the twins the very best for the future.

Hazel and John Gearing

After 18 years of incredible service to the College, John and Hazel have taken the completely understandable decision to move to the other side of the world, not only to a warmer climate more akin to what they were used to before joining us here at Radley back in 2007, but to join up again with two of their four sons, Ross and Sean, who are also in Perth, with Tom and Eliza not too far away, in Melbourne.

Hazel has been involved in a wider variety of College departments than almost anyone. She has been part of the housekeeping team, has looked after the beagles and farm animals at the Countryside Centre, was the PHM in G Social for a term and then a roving PHM in the rugby season. She covered in the Art department when Ian Ellis (former Head of Art) went on sabbatical. Hazel was chief invigilator in the Barker Gym for five years and, more recently, Hazel has worked tirelessly in the reprographics office, going above and beyond to get various papers, leaflets, and brochures produced to the highest standard, and always with a smile and a caring conversation.

Over the years, Hazel has been very generous with her amazing artistic talent, producing fantastic paintings for charity fundraisers. If you walk into any home in the College where staff have been lucky enough to have children whilst here, you are very likely to see one of Hazel’s incredible personalised newborn samplers on their wall. Her yoga tuition has also given her the opportunity to reach many more of the Radley community, imparting her gentle wisdom and kindness wherever it is needed.

Having had four boys row in the 1st VIII here at Radley and a husband who has coached that crew for 17 and a half seasons, Hazel has inevitably become an extended part of the coaching and support team. This has covered many roles, from brownie maker, yoga instructor, creator of bunting for the RCBC tent, to coxing on numerous training camps and races. Hazel has always been incredibly supportive of RCBC and its crews, particularly given how much it sees John away from home during the holidays.

John, or JEG, as he is often affectionately known by his oarsmen and colleagues in the rowing world, has had many roles at Radley

over his 18 years, from Geography teacher, English teacher, both at the same time for a short period, Sub-Tutor in G, K, and most recently C Social. However, whilst John put his all into each of these roles, his real passion is rowing. This is something that John excelled at as an oarsman himself, representing his native South Africa at World Championship level multiple times. He soon developed into a world-class coach after his own rowing career, which saw him join Radley from St Andrew’s in January 2007.

His record speaks for itself: countless medals for crews at the National Schools Regatta, three Henley finals, numerous weekend appearances and vast numbers of boys who have gone on to represent their country. This includes three who under his initial tutelage went on to study at Yale and Princeton and become Olympic medalists in 2021 and 2024. An enormous legacy.

Many see JEG as a relative introvert, which is true, to an extent, around campus, but those who witness him on the river when coaching see him come to life. This is why the boys admire him so much. He has a brilliant sense of humour and timing, keeping things light and relaxed when they could easily become too serious and stressed.

We are very lucky to have worked with one of the best in the business – not many school sports coaches get handpicked and drafted in to coach an Olympic crew to help them try to qualify for the Games.

In a conversation with JEG before he left Radley, about what he thought should be in the job spec for his current role I asked him what three things he thinks are most important in his job? Without hesitation, his answers were: the quality of coaching, ability to build boys’ self-esteem and confidence, and instilling a lifelong passion and healthy relationship with physical exercise into adulthood. I think that perfectly summed up what an incredible rowing coach, role model and schoolmaster we have been lucky enough to have with us here for so long. While operating at the very highest level, John never lost sight of who we do this for and why.

Hazel and John will both be sorely missed. We wish them the very best in their new chapter in Australia.

Lydia Robinson

Since she arrived in 2013, Lydia Robinson’s (née Gregory) time at Radley has brought profound changes to the Geography department and across the whole College. As a Cambridge University graduate with three years’ experience teaching girls at Wycombe Abbey, Lydia brought a refreshing perspective to geography, fostering deeper understanding, empathy, and critical thinking among our boys. As head of department, Lydia updated the Shell curriculum and introduced the new OCR A level course, encouraging boys to engage with contemporary global issues such as place identity, gender, and environmental challenges. Lydia’s meticulous leadership extended beyond the curriculum; generous with her time and support for her colleagues, Lydia expertly guided new teachers through their training and early years. Likewise, Lydia tracked each boy’s progress, making timely interventions using an impressive and colourful spreadsheet! She also applied a similar spreadsheet in ranking potential partners during her dating days before marrying Tom in Radley Chapel.

Lydia’s commitment to the whole life of the College extended beyond the classroom to the sports pitches and into Social. During one chilly November afternoon’s rugby practice, Lydia sported a distinctive bobble hat, an unusual sight at Radley. However, this choice of apparel has caught on, with bobble hats becoming a fashionable norm across all sporting teams. In F Social as Resident Sub-Tutor, Lydia helped to create a respectful and fun atmosphere. Boys enjoyed her company, on one occasion coming to the rescue to find her missing cat, bemused about how it had ended up in a drawer, under the bed ...

Lydia’s belief in educating the whole boy led to her leading Caledonian Society balls with local girls’ schools, and through a growing awareness of the challenges facing boys in building positive relationships with girls, particularly in light of the “Everyone’s Invited” movement, she took a proactive approach leading to the establishment of The Respect Project. Collaborating with Downe House, this initiative allowed pupils from both schools to work together in planned academic, social, and co-curricular activities nurturing lifelong skills in building relationships as brothers, friends, partners, and fathers, a notion central to Lydia’s vision of holistic education. The success of this project has been acknowledged as one of Radley’s most impressive recent achievements.

Lydia and Tom and their two daughters, Annabel and Octavia, move to Lincoln School, leaving a remarkable legacy at Radley. Lydia’s influence has delivered record numbers and impressive results in Geography while helping to cultivate an environment in which both boys and teachers thrived. Tom’s unwavering support has helped Lydia’s commitment to Radley, shaping not just an academic department but aspects of the entire Radley community and inspiring us to think critically, act compassionately, and cherish our shared experiences. Lydia has certainly helped to shape this place and the people within it. JMS

Andria Pancrazi

Dr Andria Pancrazi joined the MFL (“Emma fell? I hope she didn’t hurt herself...” I can hear him say) department in September 2018. He had Rolls Royce credentials, with a triple whammy of previous teaching credits from the Sorbonne, Cambridge University and Oxford. A man of acuity and sensitivity, alert to, and prepared to provide for, the needs and requirements of boys whose dispositions and personalities ranged from the academically gifted to the less orthodox, he was an immediate hit in the classroom.

Wordplay and Insta banter are salient features in any interaction with AP and his lessons often begin with a game of Etymologeez, his own word derivation game, which he is apparently looking to launch, online, as a rival to Wordle. “It’s such an interesting way to explore more about the make-up of languages and see beyond the syllabus briefly” explains a 6.2. Many readers will recognise “Jennifer Slowpez...” or “snoregasm ...” as examples of his playful approach to his adopted language and, hearing him deliver one of his excellent Social Prayers, or reading his reports, it is easy to forget that English is not his mother tongue.

His classroom, L12, is a welcoming and subtly fragranced space; softly furnished, stylishly arranged, with a Nihon Buyo poster here, and a framed Monet there. The importance of the aesthetic, that shines through all of Andria’s interactions, is inescapable, not just in his room but also in the recently refurbished departmental library, and in his sartorial decision making. “He slays every day with his wardrobe choices” says one 6.2 “slays what?” I asked, “it’s an intransitive verb Sir, so it does not require a direct object.”

Under lockdown, AP galvanised Radleians and dons into creating a very popular photography competition, helping to bring hidden artistic talents to the fore. His own prodigious photographic talents can be enjoyed on his popular Instagram site, showcasing his signature pink buildings accompanied by suitably erudite comments like “In the indigo interstices of the burning-hot building walls, through the cool, suspended air of an old apartment...”

Above all, Andria is a born teacher “Sa paroisse, c’est la pédagogie” as one colleague puts it. In his lessons, you will observe that subtle flick from horse play to horsepower, and back again. One OR said of Andria:

“My time spent being taught by Dr Pancrazi was the most impactful student-teacher relationship of my life. He taught me how to read good poetry, and how to read bad poetry and not be a knob about it. He spoke to me in everything from Alexandrine to verlan, he gave me my first detention, he read my personal statement 242 times (exactly). He didn’t tell us what to think, rather, he made us believe that our opinions mattered, that there was something valuable to what we had to say. Confidence was the most important gift.”

We wish Andria, Henry and Sunday every happiness and success in their new adventure in London, where Radley’s loss will be Highgate’s gain.

Daniel Lafferty

Standing outside Dan’s classroom at the start of a January term, after some set changes a few Remove boys were discussing their new teacher. The topic of concern was how to side-track Mr Lafferty. Fortunately, one of the group had not moved sets, so they knew the answer. ‘Just mention Cambridge or rowing’.

Is there any member of Common Room who doesn’t know that Dan went to Cambridge? Go into his classroom and his screensaver is a photo of King’s College Chapel. Look at his watch strap, and it is Cambridge light blue. If he serves you a gin, it will be Cambridge gin.

I remember over five years ago when we advertised for a graduate trainee in Maths. This marvellous CV arrived. Four years at Cambridge studying Maths and Biology. And University sport in both rowing and water polo. He had also experienced the classroom having given up his summer holidays to teach STEP on the Eton outreach course for University entrance. I did my internet search, and found a picture of a fair-haired young man, so I was a bit surprised, at interview, to meet the Dan we know now. I have since discovered that Dan’s hair moved through a variety of colours at Cambridge, and he had dyed it back to something respectable for the interview.

Departures from Music: Simon Carr and Molly Moran

Simon Carr joined Radley 27 years ago and quickly became an integral part of the music team as Head of Woodwind and Brass. In that time, he helped to lead 14 Music tours and played in 11 College musicals, under three Precentors and three Wardens. He has been an inspirational conductor of the Concert Band, Big Band and numerous chamber ensembles. Simon is always the first to volunteer, quietly and modestly solving problems – whether jumping in to conduct the orchestra to cover last minute illness or deputising as best man with 24 hours’ notice for one of the VMTs.

A phenomenal teacher, whose pupils do brilliantly at all levels, Simon is someone who cares deeply about the boys. There are so many boys who would have given up, would have left ensembles, would have drifted away from music were it not for Simon’s insistence, his flexibility when needed, his understanding of their wider, complicated, messy existences here at Radley. Tutors are unanimous in how highly they talk of his pastoral instincts –the quiet chat at lunch about a concern or, just as often, a small success achieved by a pupil under the radar. Simon has also been a tower of support to many in the music department, looking after colleagues, giving advice, and always making time to listen. We lose a wonderful friend, advocate, counsellor and support.

Dan has done a lot in his five years at Radley, but I don’t think many people here know the real him. The loud voice and strong opinions strongly expressed can sometimes conceal what lies beneath the surface. He has high expectations of those he teaches or coaches, and this focus can hide someone who has real people skills. As Resident Sub-Tutor, working alongside George May in H Social, a boy who had problems would be shown real kindness by Dan, and genuine pastoral care.

In the classroom, and on the river, Dan demands the highest of standards, and some boys find this a bit intimidating. But he does this because he cares for the boys, and he wants them to realise their potential. Over the last three years as coach of the 3rd VIII, Dan’s crews have won the Schools Head twice, and also achieved two golds and one bronze at National Schools’ – an impressive record.

Institutions like Radley find it more and more difficult to appoint the good all round schoolmaster. In some schools we see a move to teachers teaching in the classroom, and outsiders being brought in to coach the games, even in the lower teams.

Dan is a talented schoolmaster who has given an enormous amount to Radley. But, as a young man, he was unable to find enough time for himself, such is the all-embracing expectation of boarding school life. With friends in London, and in an attempt to make a bit more space for himself, Dan is moving to Latymer. We wish him the best in the next chapter of his life.

Although only with us for three years, Molly Moran has had a comparably large impact on pupils, teachers and the whole Radley Community. The boys quickly learnt that, whilst she was kind and eminently approachable, she expected the very best from them – in their commitment, their ambition, and their manners. This was the same in Social, in running the bands night programme, teaching Shell music, the 6.1 CEP music tech option, chorister theory, on music tours, trips, coaching Midget 7, 8 and 9 rugby, and so many other areas of College life. At all times, the boys have been right at the heart of things: every decision has been made to ensure that they have the best experience, the best opportunities, the best support.

Molly is perhaps best known for her role with Contemporary Music at Radley. At a school like this, the boys might assume that Western Classical music is the gold standard. Molly has turned that on its head. The weekly bands nights are packed, countless boys write their own songs, and there is even a Radley recording label. Boys feel welcome, valued, and that there is a pathway for them to achieve, to be brave, to bring their own musical ideas. Our pupils are often the best reflection of us as teachers: watching boys of all year groups encouraging each other (and that generosity and kindness spreading to the audience) is a direct reflection of Molly’s approach in mentoring the bands, producers and songwriters. The care she has shown to boys has been just as generously shared with us all: she is immensely wise, immensely funny, and immensely kind.

SILK, DM (HON MEMBER, WIFE OF WARDEN DENNIS SILK)

Eulogy delivered by Tom Silk (1981, F) at Diana’s Thanksgiving Service

The morning after Mum died, Kate, Al, Will and I awoke to the most glorious sunrise. From across the Somerset Levels, a flaming orange globe arose. For Ma, there could be no more fitting tribute than Mother Nature taking time from her drab, January duties to pay respect. It is a respect we all share.

We don’t come here today to celebrate great feats or recognise grand accolades. Instead, we gather here to honour Ma for her acts of everyday kindness. For her gentleness and humility. For her extraordinary sense of duty and commitment to community. For her ever-present smile, so often twinned with laughter. Today, it is my privilege to share a little of Diana’s story – the story of the other “D”. To remember someone who filled life’s cup to the meniscus and in so doing made the world around her a better place.

Ma’s smile and her capacity for kindness were a gift from her mother, Gwendolyn Milton. When it came to friendship, our grandmother was ruthless in her deployment of equal opportunity! Be you dustman or dandy, postman or peer, Gwen always had time for you. Another gift was enormous zest for life. This was never more evident than on our annual summer camping excursions to Cornwall. Every morning, at 6am, mother and daughter would emerge from adjoining caravans dressed in woollen swimming costumes and floral swim caps. Clutching oak surfboards, they’d hurry to the beach to catch the first wave of the day!

Meanwhile, Ma’s father, Frank Milton, bequeathed his daughter resilience and nous. Born in 1896, he was of the generation of schoolboys that had swapped books for bayonets, enlisting in the Army in 1914. By way of a mixed blessing, Frank was injured in the Battle of the Somme and invalided home. He went into business, rising swiftly up the ranks of a successful mattress-making company. On becoming Managing Director, he demonstrated customary flair by renaming the company “Relyon”.

Luckily, Ma inherited her father’s head for numbers and, on getting married,

took charge of the family purse. Dad was notorious for his shortcomings in this department. His idea of a savvy investment was to collect Staffordshire figures. In their hundreds! 50 years on, we are still waiting for the market to agree with him!

Born and bred in Somerset, Ma followed her sister to Cheltenham Ladies College. Convention might have suggested a modest country life, but Ma had a great sense of adventure and wanted more. She went to work in Paris as an Au Pair and then London as a secretary. On a brief trip home to Somerset, at a local charity ball, serendipity stepped in. Alone and standing at the bar, Ma asked a young chap with a square jaw, “Do you come here often?” “Only in the mating season!”, the young man replied. It was hardly Dad’s most polished line, but it marked the beginning of an extraordinary 56-year partnership.

Three days after first meeting, Dennis and Diana were engaged. A respectable four months later, they got married and Ma was catapulted into Dad’s busy world of schoolmastering.

Ma threw herself wholeheartedly into life at Marlborough and then Radley. She unstintingly shared Dad’s vision and undertaking. I can see them now, morning after morning, sitting up in bed, rehearsing the day ahead over a cup of tea. Ma was a source of quiet reason and had an unswerving instinct for doing the ‘right thing’.

With a young and growing family of her own to care for, Ma nonetheless made time to create a school-wide family, getting to know all College staff and their kin, setting up a playgroup for those with little ones, hosting one dinner party after another, supporting appeals, arranging chapel flowers and forming a tapestry group that led to the kneelers some of you may be enjoying today.

At this point, Ma would be blushing and would remind us that there was a pantheon of remarkable women who helped shape the Radley community of her day. Alison Jones, Di Langdale, Liz Hudson, Jen Dowding and many more besides. However, it was Ma’s capacity for friendship that made her unique. Whether you were faculty or family, cook or cleaner, she looked out for you.

This last February, 30 years after she left Radley, Ma was due to have lunch with Jan Hill and Rosetta Astoni, two long-standing Radley staff, who themselves spent decades working tirelessly behind the scenes. The lunch never happened but the memory of friendship endures.

As many of you here will know firsthand, Radley can be hard graft. Mum and Dad’s antidote was Mulberry Cottage, a labourer’s small holding at the end of a half-mile of dirt track in deepest Dorset. Much to Mum and Dad’s relief (but to the horror of us children), there was no telephone or telly. Instead, under Ma’s watchful eye, it was the place where we

Diana Merilyn Silk

OBITUARIES

were a family, the place where the routine and quotidian overtook us: gardening, long walks, wall-building, trips to the seaside, and cups of tea with neighbours.

After 23 eventful years at Radley, Mum and Dad retired, returning to Somerset from whence they both came. The word ‘retired’ doesn’t seem fitting for the active life Ma led for over 30 years in Stoke St Gregory. There, she made a home for her children and 11 grandchildren. For the young, Ma was a source of boundless fun; from trampolining to tractor rides, she was always at the heart of the action. Likewise, she was at the heart of village life, campaigning for a local shop, cleaning the church and arranging flowers, hosting groups of artists and cooking meals on wheels.

Bump into her in the village, she would greet you with her sparkling smile, give you and your story the time of day, and pep you up, if that’s what you needed.

Ma’s final task was perhaps the most challenging of all: to provide care for the man she loved as he slowly slipped into the fog of dementia. Dad’s decline was difficult for all of us, but it was Ma who cared for him on a daily basis and whom he knew in his heart, if not his head, as his consort and comfort.

The day Ma died, she was, ironically, due to attend a friend’s funeral service, so she looked radiant, having had her hair done that morning and applied a little make-

up. In her final moments, as if to thank her for a lifetime of Christian service, a school chaplain appeared by her hospital bedside. She slipped away, surrounded by her children and her grandchildren, to the words of Psalm 23: “The Lord’s my shepherd, I shall not want.”

Psalm 23 strikes me now when I think of Mum. Above all, she gave meaning to the words, “my cup runneth over”. A sense of having enough and being enough allowed her to give to others. To offer friendship without grand gesture; to show kindness through simple acts, a helping hand, a listening ear, an encouraging word. All brought to you with her inimitable laugh and smile. Acts that when judged individually may seem like grains of sand, but when lived over a lifetime, give us reason to believe in the goodness of humanity. Thank you, Mum.

Diana Merilyn Silk died peacefully on 19th January 2024, aged 88.

PAINE, DWM (HON MEMBER)

Obituary by John Bridcut (1965, A)

In a way, Donald Paine’s connection with Radley stretches back to five years before he was born. 1925 was the year that the musician and priest Harold Ferguson became Warden – before going on to be Canon Precentor at Salisbury Cathedral, where he prepared the young chorister Donald for confirmation. It was why

he particularly asked for Wolvercote, Ferguson’s tune for the hymn, ‘O Jesus I have promised’, at his memorial service in Chapel in October. And perhaps why he was happy to resort for a day or two each term to the Public School Hymn Book (co-edited by Ferguson) when the English Hymnal was deficient, even though it meant he had to put out a copy on 500 seats in Chapel.

As befitted a director of music with the title precentor, Chapel was at the heart of his work. As well as training a continually fine chapel choir, he took congregational practice every Saturday morning – and managed to get the rest of the boys learning a new hymn tune, or even an anthem, by singing phrases himself. I remember the chance comment of one who had just listened to Dietrich FischerDieskau singing Schubert: “he sounds just like Mr Paine”! On one of those Saturday mornings in 1968, that year of student protest, he walked up to the east end of Chapel, and took everyone aback by ripping a strip off boys in the gallery who had been sabotaging the hymns by singing very slowly and very loudly. “I never thought I would have to say this”, he said. I feared he would be barracked on his way out: but he was heard in silence and the rebellion died there and then. It took courage to do that, but it also showed the respect in which Donald was held.

It was from Ferguson that he inherited the tradition of singing the psalms in

Donald Paine (with his dog) and the 1966 orchestra

Gregorian chant (apart from Stanford’s setting of Psalm 150). Those new boys who had passed his termly voice test were initiated into the mysteries of plainsong by the succentor, Hugo Langrish, in the Big Room in the Music School. The building dates from 1927, two years into Ferguson’s wardenship – a shared space then with the Armoury, where the CCF’s guns were stored on the ground floor. Some wags said it was to make sure that the noisiest outfits were kept far away from the rest of the college. As precentor, Donald would bemoan the lack of space in the Music School, and indeed began Music’s gradual takeover of the ground floor. The Silk Hall was added in the last few years of his Radley career, saving the regular perilous transport of the grand piano down the stairs outside Hall for concerts (and, worse, up again afterwards).

At the end of his life, he was delighted to hear about the current expansion and rebuilding of the Music School, and amused by the inevitable consequence – that music would have to infiltrate more of the Radley campus in the interim.

Donald was at Radley for just 32 of his 94 years, but the College remained the thread running through his life, largely through the friendships he built with the musicians he worked with, and with his fellow dons. The rehearsals he took, and the performances he conducted or accompanied, did not seem to belong to a College discipline, but to a collegiate fraternity without hierarchy.

When he arrived in 1959, appointed by Warden Milligan as the latest in Radley’s traditionally young precentors, he found an exercise book full of advice from his predecessor, Anthony Caesar. He soon became one of Radley’s most recognisable dons because of his large white companion as he toured the sports fields: first, Tiny, and then Chomo – both mountain dogs, though of Pyrenean rather than Himalayan provenance, despite having acquired Chomo (short for Chomolungma, the Tibetan name for Everest) after a recital tour in India with the Radley cello teacher, Jean Fry.

In those days, he employed six or seven peripatetic teachers (compared with the fifty or so today). Violet Blofeld (violin) and her great rival Rhona Parkinson

(piano) had taught at Radley since the mid-1920s. Eric Goater (the beloved bandmaster) was a youngster: he had arrived only in the 1940s. Donald and Hugo both taught the piano and the organ, and Donald had no reservations in passing his most talented organists, such as James Wood and Harry Bicket, to Simon Preston (organist of Christ Church) when he felt he had nothing more to teach them. That was typical of the generous and thoughtful man he was.

He nurtured a remarkable roster of musicians who soon moved into the professional world. They are his greatest legacy. Caesar had bequeathed him a new boy scholar, the violinist Richard Deakin, who became leader of the National Youth Orchestra and co-founded what is now the Orchestra of St John’s with his fellow Radleian, the conductor John Lubbock. Deakin describes Donald as his rock throughout his career. The opera producer, Sir David Pountney, is a Paine alumnus, as are the conductors Peter Stanger, Andrew Gant, Robert King, Antony Shelley and Harry Bicket; the violinists, Oliver Butterworth and Julian Smedley; the singers Jeremy and Simon Birchall; the composer James Wood, the pianist Michael Dussek … and the list goes on. Several have said they would never have taken up a musical career, had it not been for Donald. The rest of us were lucky to make music alongside them: they raised our horizons and aspirations, all under his benign aegis. Outstanding were the two concerts for the Music Masters’ Association conference, held at Radley in 1969. Donald on the podium even managed to get the music masters singing along to folksong arrangements – a regular tradition at the Christmas concert.

The music was not confined to the Radley campus, but was exported to other venues each term – and to Scandinavia for seven full-blown music tours between 1967 and 1982. He would also arrange visits to Royal Festival Hall concerts, Sadler’s Wells and the Coliseum (for inductions into Wagner), the Royal Albert Hall for an early performance of Britten’s War Requiem, and the Queen Elizabeth Hall to hear David Munrow, that pied piper of early music, demonstrating crumhorns, rebecs and shawms. He gave me, and countless others, a lasting love of English music, from Boyce to Britten, via Parry,

Stanford, Vaughan Williams and his beloved Elgar, to whose birthplace outside Worcester he would lead visits. He wrote a well-regarded chapter on English music of the 19th and 20th centuries in the Larousse Encyclopedia of Music. He also wrote deft, clever music to Peter Way’s lyrics in a series of hilarious Dons’ Plays, and foreshadowed Radley’s current series of musicals in the Theatre with performances of The Beggar’s Opera staged in the Old Gym.

For those who found life at Radley difficult but were involved in music, he was a lifeline through his warmth and kindness. At the last bar of the music, he would offer mulled wine brewed on a gas ring in the little turret off his study, instruction in the tricks of the Times crossword (never the Telegraph, whose clues were “inferior”), or the game, as we sat in a horseshoe, of “The Prince of Wales has lost his hat, and Mr … has found it”. Any hesitation or deviation from the verbal formula as the metaphorical hat was tossed around meant dismissal to the bottom chair. The game began allegro, accelerated to presto, and when we became too good at it, we had to play it in French, or answer not to our own name but to that of the person who had sat on our chair at the start. In the holidays, there was walking in the Lake District, the Cumbrian fells or the Welsh borders, all part of Donald’s love of landscape and the natural world.

He retired as precentor in 1978, but was delighted and surprised when Warden Silk asked him to stay on in the music department: over the next thirteen years he took on teaching English to the Shells – an appropriate course for such a well-read man. He also supervised Declamations and was chairman of the boys’ Action Group in the early 80s: much to his later chagrin, he was filmed in the BBC series Public School representing (in an awkward meeting with Silk) their unhappiness about the proposed golf course.

Before Radley, he had been at Denstone College and Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he took a First in music, and then became a fellow of the Royal College of Organists. For several years he was on the music staff at Oundle. After Radley, he continued as an examiner for the Associated Board, joined the

Samaritans, and went on Fred Olsen cruises with his sister Mary, funded by his organist’s fees in two Sussex parishes. He only stopped playing at the age of 90 when the first coronavirus lockdown intervened. By then he was becoming increasingly deaf, and he even had a notepad for visitors to write words down when their shouting had failed. It was a bit like visiting Beethoven! Deafness is of course a great trial for a musician, but Donald in his care home for the last two years said he could still hear the music in his head. He did long, however, to hear the new organ in Chapel – a wish he could no longer fulfil, though he had done the next best thing in studying its specification.

Donald Paine was unobtrusive, never sought the limelight, and in that way was not a natural leader. But leader he was, through his encouragement, enthusiasm and personal example. For many Radleians, he was an inspiring mentor, and a highly committed and accomplished musician in his own right. Above all, he was an enduring friend. There could be no finer tribute than the moving performance at October’s thanksgiving service of Purcell’s Evening Hymn given by the counter-tenor Iestyn Davies, with musicians from Harry Bicket’s English Concert.

He remained mentally sharp to the end, and even as his health failed, he was never short of a good anecdote, which was always brief, neat and to the point. He spoke of his boss at Oundle, who by his own admission was not a very good organist but felt he should try to play occasionally. One evening he was struggling through his chosen voluntary while the school filed out of chapel. Two boys remained to listen, one a new boy, the other a prefect. Small boy: “Is this by Bach?” Older boy: “Some of it ...”

A tribute by Rev David Coulton, Former Chaplain Arriving at Radley as a new don, over fifty years ago now, one very quickly became aware of the genuine warmth and friendliness of the place and aware also, that Common Room contained a great number of interesting and impressive people. Someone who, for myself, made an immediate impression was D.W.M.P. Here was certainly one of those whose genuine warmth, humour and courtesy were all part of the welcome he offered.

Indeed, Donald was someone who consciously or otherwise, enriched those around him without needing to impose upon them. He had a ready smile and a breezy chuckle – and to someone like myself, who had an early love of music from distant chorister days, was someone to whom one could immediately relate.

I shared his view, and that attributed to St. Augustine, that ‘He who sings, prays twice’ and that the purpose of singing sacred music is, as the hymn puts it, ‘To teach our faint desires to rise – and bring all heaven before our eyes’. Also, that music often can take us to spiritual heights beyond that of almost any other cultural medium, even though music in worship can lack spiritual impact if it is not carefully prepared and well executed. Donald had the skill and the sensitivity to ensure that music complemented the liturgy without distracting from it and did so in a way in which the spiritual element could be quietly revealed.

In addition, Donald’s aesthetic, and perhaps spiritual, appreciation of art, literature and beauty in nature were also impressive and inspiring, despite the fact that he often displayed a quiet reticence in sharing his wide cultural knowledge and enthusiasms – but the impact on so many of us, in that respect, was considerable and lasting.

On occasions when Donald and I visited each other’s holiday homes, one saw how much the outdoors and the beauty of nature meant to him. I recall a visit I made to his house in Shropshire when Donald was excited to show me a new walk he had discovered and the beauty of a particular landscape that suddenly came into view. As we looked silently at the beauty beneath us, I wondered if it was only the breeze that made Donald’s eyes water. That evening, Donald chose some music which he felt would enhance the view we had earlier enjoyed and so introduced me to a tranquil and beautiful part of C.V. Stanford’s 1st symphony. That, together with Donald’s excellent cooking, ended a very civilised and heart-warming day.

I still have, from Donald, many books and recordings he thought I would enjoy, including all the Stanford symphonies! These appeared as gifts, always nicely wrapped and generously presented – and there were, I know, countless others, who

over the years benefitted from Donald’s many cultural enthusiasms and the generosity that resulted in thoughtful and appropriate gifts. It may well be a cliche to say that the young often find role models – but certainly, good influences are never wasted on the young. Certainly, young and old alike have been able, actively or passively, to absorb such influences and qualities from people like Donald.

I remember well, Paul Crowson saying that there needed to be ‘Little Oases of Culture’ in every area of College life to leaven the quality of the whole and certainly that was a conviction that Donald shared and certainly addressed.

The spiritual impact a person has on a community is not easy to judge or recognise on a broad scale. So often it is a complex and very individual and personal matter and not always immediately recognised, if at all in some cases. I do believe, however, that Donald’s spiritual influence was considerable; both musically, within the college chapel and beyond - and in a wider cultural sense also, in that he shared with so many of us, those things that lifted the human spirit, enlarged the dimensions of civility, and touched upon the deeper meaning of the life we all shared - and did so with great warmth and sensitivity. Such gifted people can put us in touch with a sense of the divine and therefore with hope and peace and purpose.

Donald Paine died on 15th May 2024, aged 94.

LANGRISH, WHC (HON MEMBER)

Hugo Langrish, 95, passed away peacefully on 4th August 2024. Born on 8th August 1928, Hugo (WHCL) was a cherished husband, father, and grandfather. He devoted his life to music, working tirelessly as a teacher, composer, and performer. Hugo’s passion for music left a lasting impact on the UK musical community. He is survived by his son Anthony and his grandchildren, Sami, Natasha, and Laila. Hugo’s legacy of dedication and love for music will be remembered and cherished.

Hugo studied at Westminster School, where he started his lifelong love for the organ. After Westminster, Hugo

was conscripted to the armed forces before being demobbed to become an articled pupil to Denis Pouncey at Wells Cathedral. Following Wells, he went to Christ Church Cathedral School as Director of Music, before he was ‘recruited’ to join the staff at Radley as Succentor. One of Hugo’s first jobs at Radley was to propose to Miss Viner, the in-school matron. They married in 1961. Radley suited Hugo and he conducted the Second Orchestra, played organ for chapel, and, maybe by default, became in charge of the Marionette theatre. Many afternoons were spent in his workshop carving faces utilising a mixture of wood and fiberglass. Hugo also conducted the Abingdon and District Music Society and later became principal horn with the Oxford Symphony Orchestra, all of which enriched his service to Radley. Hugo was also a composer, and his Eight Easy Pieces for Horn have been performed by almost every beginner horn player in the world. Many generations of Radleians sang his Benedicite, Jubilate, and Communion settings. Hugo had a house in the Cornish village of Mullion; many ORs will remember coming to stay to participate in mini brass courses and building sandcastles on the local beaches.

Hugo Langrish died peacefully on 4th August 2024, aged 95.

Elizabeth Arkell died after a short illness on 15th February 2024 aged 89 years. She was full of vitality and positive energy until the very end.

She was the elder daughter of Rev W J Llewellyn-Jones who was a Radley don from 1938 and E Social Tutor from 1948-58. Elizabeth and her younger sister, Diana, lived at Radley during their childhood years residing for a time in the top floor flat of the Mansion. She has good memories of her time there, made many lasting friendships and remained a great loyal supporter of the school ever since. Her father was also a rowing coach and Elizabeth was often seen supporting the crews on the towpath. There was a ‘particular group of suitors’ amongst the boys, one of whom, Ray Arkell (1944, A), asked her for her hand and they married in the College Chapel on 25th April 1957, presided over by Rev Charles Neate (Chaplain). They were married for 60 years and had three children, two of whom are ORs: Stephen (1972, D) and Thomas (1976, D).

Their daughter Caroline sent her three

boys to the school: Mischa (2001, H), Joss (2003, H) and Oscar Richards (2006, H). Another of the ‘particular group of suitors’, Robin Godwin-Austen (1945, F), reconnected with her after reading of her husband Ray’s death in the Old Radleian and they became close companions for the last few years of her life. Robin also had a son at Radley, Stephen (1975, C).

Elizabeth was born in Bath in May 1934. In these early years her father was a master and rowing coach at Monkton Combe. Soon after they moved to Radley where she attended St Helen’s School in Abingdon.

After marrying Ray Arkell and having their three children she became a County Councillor for Buckinghamshire living near the Thames in Bourne End. After Ray’s retirement they moved to Dorset, where she chaired NADFAS and volunteered at the Dorchester Museum. Radley remained an important part of her life, she supported various appeals, but rowing was her passion and she never missed a Henley Regatta. She was very hospitable and ran an ‘open house’ policy, and often had a whole crew to stay during Henley or Marlow Regatta, such as the 1967 Monkton Combe crew, the 1977 Radley 1st VIII and a crew from Durham University every year from 1985–1990.

She is survived by three children, nine grand-children and four great grandchildren.

Elizabeth Mary Llewellyn Arkell died on 15th February 2024.

ARKELL, E (DAUGHTER OF W J LLEWELLYN-JONES AND WIFE OF RAY ARKELL, OR)

Hugo Langrish

Elizabeth Mary Llewellyn Arkell

VARLEY, J (G SOCIAL MATRON AND SISTER OF THE SANITORIUM 1969-1976)

Jane’s fierce independence and determination to live in her own home ensured that it wasn’t until the last few months of her life that she moved to Beech Court, a nursing home, where she mused to her Grandson Charlie only a few weeks before she died, that if only she could get out of her bed and scale down the wisteria covering the front of the building she would escape back home!

Jane arrived at Radley in 1969 to take up the post of Matron in Bob Stoughton-Harris’s G Social. Charlie Barker (H Social Tutor 1989 – 2001) was Head of House that year. Jane moved at the end of her first year to become the formidable Sister Boddy’s deputy and then to take over the running of it, when Jean retired a year later.

Jane trained as a Nurse at St Thomas’s Hospital and in May 1961 she set sail from Tilbury to Leningrad as the newly married wife of the assistant Naval Attaché at the British Embassy in Moscow, a fascinating and dramatic time spent there at the height of the Cold War. Her only son, Charles, was born in February 1962 in Helsinki, Finland, as it was not safe at the time for Embassy babies to be born in Moscow hospitals. A rapid departure ensued in late 1962 from Moscow back to Tunbridge Wells in Kent, where she’d lived her childhood years, as a consequence of the tit-for-tat diplomatic recriminations and expulsions following the Greville Wynne and Oleg Penkovsky involvement in the Cuban Missile Crisis.

A further overseas posting for two years in 1966 followed in Johore Bahru, Malaysia, and Singapore. Returning to the UK and with a marriage that had failed, Radley provided the perfect antidote for Jane, and with the school holidays the perfect balance to bring up her son.

Always out walking the touchlines in all weathers with her King Charles spaniel Scrum, Jane had a wonderful seven years at Radley and fondly recounted those days as the happiest times, with friendships made that endured for the rest of her life. Jane was an accomplished cook and a new career beckoned, and so she left Radley in 1976 to fulfil this passion by becoming Chef to the London Director’s dining room at BHS/Storehouse under Terence Conran and Denis Cassidy. With unlimited budgets in those days, she had the joy of shopping for ingredients at Marylebone’s finest grocers and butchers.

In 1988 she opened her own restaurant, The Good Hope at Hilfield, a little village near Cerne Abbas in Dorset. The timing was bad, and the financial crisis of 1989 resulted in the restaurant closing a few years later. She never regretted the opportunity to have done her own thing.

Jane returned to schools, first becoming a Dame at Eton College and following that as Housemistress at Stover Girls School near Newton Abbott in Devon. Moving back to her roots in Oxfordshire to be nearer her son and his family, in 1998 Jane turned her hand to sales and spent many happy years at MultiYork furniture in Oxford, working well into her late 70s.

A complicated spinal operation, resultant from a car accident she had had coming back down the M4 from London to Radley in 1969, left her having to give up work and slowly becoming wheel-chair dependent.

She continued to see the ‘Fieldings’ and ‘Harrises’ and the wide circle of Radley friends, and the Stoughton-Harris girls and Richard Hornsby from the G Social days were there at her funeral at St Matthew’s Church, Harwell, in Oxfordshire where she is buried in the cemetery.

Jane Varley passed away at her nursing home in Eynsham in Oxfordshire on 17th August 2023.

WILSON, BWJG (COMMON ROOM)

Brian Wilson was born in Singapore and lived in Kuala Lumpur until he was almost five. With his mother and sister, he narrowly escaped the Japanese invasion of Malaya, leaving his father and uncle behind, one interned in Changi, the other torpedoed in a prison ship en route to Japan.

Educated in Northern Ireland and England, he became a scholar of Christ’s College, Cambridge, and a lover of Classical and English literature, choosing not to follow his parents, both consultant surgeons, into medicine, nor his archbishop grandfather into Holy Orders, though theology was a lifelong interest of his. Instead, he became a schoolmaster, teaching in some of the country’s leading independent schools: Radley, King’s School, Canterbury, and Eastbourne College before becoming Headmaster of Campbell College, Belfast, during a challenging period of educational as well as civil disturbance, and then deputy head of St. Mary’s, Wantage.

He was an A level Chief Examiner in Latin and Ancient History, a religious broadcaster for the BBC for twenty years, a local councillor, an author and a translator who lectured on Mediterranean cruises. He also served for a time on the Central Religious Advisory Committee of the BBC/ITV.

He married Sara Hollins (who died in 2022) whose family firm invented Viyella, and had two children, Anna and Emma, who survive him together with his four grandchildren.

Jane Varley

Brian William John Gregg Wilson

He was a much-loved gentleman who will be missed by many.

Brian William John Gregg Wilson died on 10th November 2023.

HOMAN, JRS (1938,

B)

Born on 7th January 1925 in Burley, Hampshire, Dick grew up in the New Forest. After prep school in Seaford, he started at Radley (on the advice of his brother-in-law and OR Edward Shackleton (1925, B)). He loved his time there, especially rowing and playing the clarinet in the school orchestra. On leaving in 1943, he joined the Navy and served as a junior officer on the aircraft carrier HMS Tracker, which carried out several long-distance missions including crossing the South Pacific, and, most perilously, taking part in the Arctic Convoys in October 1944, during which his ship narrowly missed a U-boat attack.

From 1946-49, Dick studied Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Christ Church, Oxford. He became an ICI management trainee, before joining the National Economic Development Office in London in 1968.

In 1961, he married Mary Buckley, and they and their children, Robert, Frances and Rosie, and settled in Ticehurst, East Sussex. In his leisure time, he enjoyed classical music – especially opera at Glyndebourne and, later, singing in amateur choirs. He also loved archaeology, history and walking, both in the countryside at home, and on intrepid holidays abroad. After retirement from his government job (for which he was awarded the CBE) Dick became involved in voluntary work, especially as part of the Salters Livery Company in London and their Chemistry education initiatives, receiving an Honorary Doctorate from York University. Dick was a tremendously optimistic and kind person, ever lively in his curiosity about the world. He is survived by his daughters Rosie and Frances, son in law Gerry, and twin grandsons Oliver and James.

Dr Richard Homan CBE died on 6th October 2023.

DEWEY, DL (1941, E)

David was an honourable and private gentleman who afforded himself very

little fuss. His passion was for science, an inventor at heart, he was happiest tinkering in his workshop or pottering in his garden.

David attended Radley College as a teenager, where his teachers compelled upon him Latin and Greek philosophy whilst all he wanted was to read up on nuclear physics. He went up to Pembroke College, Cambridge, in 1945 to study Natural Science, but was called up at the end of the second world war. After a brief training, David was sent to occupied Germany as a 2nd Lieutenant in charge of educating the British troops between Hamburg and Denmark, returning as Captain.

After the war, David returned to Pembroke College where he completed his studies gaining a BA in Natural Science and, in 1950, an MA in Biological science. During 1949 he was president of the Pembroke College Stokes Society, a position he greatly enjoyed. He then went on to University College Hospital in London as a research scientist and in 1953 earned his PhD in Medical Science.

In 1956 he joined the Cancer Research Campaign’s Gray Laboratory, initially working with the great Dr Harold Gray himself, whose name is now used for the unit of absorbed X-ray dose. He spent his career researching the effects of radiation on cancer cells, publishing over 100 scientific papers in journals such as Nature and the British Institute of Radiology. In one of his early papers, published in 1959, he and fellow scientist Jack Boag, describe the effects of large pulses of radiation on bacteria saturated with oxygen. This paper has since been cited over 2000 times, most recently in conjunction with a new cancer treatment, FLASH radiotherapy, whereby the radiation dose is delivered in a fraction of a second. The theory is that if the dose is delivered in a very short time, well oxygenated normal tissues will experience greater protection than poorly oxygenated tumours.

David’s passion for inventing continued outside his work and he often said one of his hobbies was making gadgets. In 1957, during the Suez Crisis when petrol was scarce, David made an electric tricycle so he could get to work and back. Using heavy duty bicycle wheels, an old lorry battery and Lancaster bomber’s starter motor, his electric tricycle took two

David Lewis Dewey

weeks to build, which including getting it taxed, licensed and insured (civil servants were very cooperative in those days). Initially, the major hazard was pedestrians stepping into the road without looking, not expecting a totally silent vehicle. This stopped when he fitted a fan to cool the motor which made a high-pitched whine. The electric bike got him to work and back for many years, in all weathers. He was certainly well ahead of his time.

On retirement, in 1990, David’s creativity turned to gardening, where he spent many happy hours pottering around in his garden and sheds, still wearing a tie and sporting his favourite jacket. He loved growing fruit and vegetables, corn on the cob from plant to cooking pot in less than 5 mins was a speciality. His long-standing battle to outwit the squirrels in the garden was a source of great family amusement. He made elaborate fruit cages and grew the pears in plastic bottles attached to the tree branches to protect the fruit. He usually outsmarted the wildlife one way or another, in his own unique way.

He was a wonderful provider for his family who he adored. He met his wife Jackie at a dance in 1958, they were married in 1960 and enjoyed a remarkable 63 years together. David is survived by his wife Jackie, three children, six grandchildren and his great granddaughter.

David Lewis Dewey died on 22nd March 2024, aged 96.

BLAKE, MAA (1942, G/H)

Martin Amyas Arnold Blake was born in Crewkerne on 19th July 1928, the youngest of four sons of Humphrey and Amy. He attended prep school St Dunstan’s in Burnham on Sea, and afterwards Radley, and the University of Oxford where he studied French and History at Worcester College. Interspersed with his studies, Martin enjoyed his National Service with the Somerset Light Infantry, being posted to Greece in the late 1940s, working in the Adjutant’s office in Thessaloniki. Back in civil life, Martin followed a vocation in teaching, with his first job at All Hallows School back in Somerset.

A few years later he moved to Worth School in Sussex, beginning a long career teaching French at the Benedictine boys’ school. Through mutual friends, he met Liz Hartley, and they married in 1963, being blessed with three children, Joanna, David and Peter, and later four grandchildren, Rory, Ann, Monica and Fergal. Martin was a keen member of staff at Worth, happily taking on many extracurricular duties in addition to his French teaching. Martin is well remembered by Worth alumni for the numerous summer holiday trips he led for pupils around northern France. Invariably these would involve camping in the gardens of various French friends, including a luxurious chateau belonging to a distinguished duke. Some of these trips became legendary for the high-jinx and adventures that ensued, as one might expect when young lads are let off the leash in a foreign land! Martin also enjoyed instructing Worth boys in squash, tennis and shooting practice. During his time at Worth he also played an active role in several musicals.

It was at Oxford that Martin converted to Catholicism, beginning a life-long

devotion to that religion. He built up an incredible network of friends and contacts through his religious interests that persisted to the end of his life. It was these interests that drew him to Glastonbury on retirement in July 1987, given its legendary connections to Jesus’ life. Martin was amazingly busy in retirement, travelling frequently to visit friends and family in the UK and abroad, as well as leading several pilgrimages to Lourdes, Fatima and Medjugorje. Long distance trips to Thailand, Mexico, India and Ghana didn’t daunt him, as well as numerous shorter trips around Europe.

Martin was a keen follower of the local beagle pack and helped with tree planting and conservation work, including chairing the Wells branch of the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England for several years. He had a lifelong love of classical music, playing the French horn in orchestra and singing tenor with the Weald Choral Society in Sussex and subsequently the Cantilena choir in Glastonbury.

When at home, he spent much time translating Catholic doctrinal documents and pamphlets between English and French, as well as writing a book on the life of Marthe Robin, campaigning for her to be beatified as a saint. One of his close friends commented that he found him to be a kind, generous and helpful person, with a great memory for poems, texts, historical persons and places stretching back to his childhood.

In 2011 at the age of 83 and after 24 years living in Glastonbury he moved to Henleyon-Thames, to be close to his daughter Jo and her family. Despite slowing down a bit, he remained strongly independent and made many new friends, while keeping up with old. Following in his fathers’ footsteps, he became a social member of the Leander Club, a famous rowing club based in Henley-on-Thames.

He drove down annually to Somerset and the Wye Valley well into his late 80s. Growing increasingly frail over the last couple of years, he was well looked after in his final 18 months in Tower House care home just outside Henley, still enjoying regular trips out to concerts and his favourite places such as the Maltster’s pub and the Chocolate Cafe.

In late May he fell seriously ill with acute appendicitis and died on 2nd June.

Martin took enormous pride in the deep roots that the Blake family have sown in Somerset for at least 500 years. As per his wishes, he was buried in Chiselborough churchyard, alongside his brother David and his parents. When Martin was young, his grandfather was also the Vicar at the church, so he will rest in peace there feeling quite at home in a lovely churchyard with so many family connections.

Martin Amyas Arnold Blake died on 2nd June 2024, aged 95.

HAYMAN-JOYCE, JG (1946, E)

On 17th November 2022, John Gerald Hayman-Joyce MA (Cantab) CEng FICE. An Exhibitioner at Radley, he sang in the choir and was Captain of Shooting. After taking his Higher School Certificate a year early, he went up to Trinity Hall, Cambridge, in 1951, where he read Mechanical Sciences. Upon graduation in 1954, he joined the civil engineering firm of Sir Alexander Gibb & Partners.

Initially assigned to work on coalfired power stations rather than the hydroelectric projects he had hoped for, he joined the firm’s Docks and Harbours department in 1957. It was here that he began to specialise in maritime civil engineering, working on projects in India, Australia and North Africa.

He joined Livesey & Henderson, as a Project Engineer in their maritime section, in 1969, becoming an Associate in 1970 and a salaried Partner of the renamed Livesey Henderson & Partners in 1972. He was elected a Fellow of the Institute of Civil Engineers in 1975. In 1982, he became a consultant, initially to Livesey Henderson & Partners before becoming a freelance maritime consultant in 1986.

He continued to work as a consultant on maritime engineering projects worldwide into his eighties; however, he decided to return to university at the age of 68, graduating from the University of Surrey with a BSc in Integrative Counselling in 2004 – fifty years after his Cambridge graduation.

Martin Amyas Arnold Blake

He did not practise counselling professionally, instead volunteering as a counsellor with his local NHS trust; he continued to do this after his eventual retirement from engineering, electing to retire from counselling as well in 2016. Instead, he became an active volunteer with his local branch of Age UK, putting his skills and experience to use befriending isolated older people and initially helping with, before later running, a weekly meeting for dementia sufferers.

He was also a committed member of the Epsom Light Opera Society, where he rediscovered his love of singing and was a mainstay of the men’s chorus for many years.

He had five children and ten grandchildren, the youngest of whom was born a few months before his death. His youngest son Nicholas Peter (1992, E) attended Radley, the third generation to do so following John Gerald himself and his own father, Hayman John (1910, E).

John Gerald Hayman-Joyce passed away as a result of complications from Covid-19 on November 17th 2022, nine days short of his 90th birthday.

LE BLANC SMITH, AM (1947,

C)

Andrew Meryon Le Blanc Smith was born in Oxshott, Surrey, on 28th June 1933 to Maurice (1909, C) and Peggy Le Blanc Smith. After attending Parkside School, Haywards Heath, Andrew joined Radley in 1947 going to C social. He was the third generation of his family to attend the school, following in the footsteps of his brother, Robin (1943, C).

Andrew excelled at Radley, both in the

classroom and on the sports field. He was in the 1st Hockey XI, captained the tennis team and played cricket alongside Ted Dexter (1948, F). At the same time, he was a school prefect, and was sufficiently academic to be offered a place at Oxford to read Maths. In 1951 he instead decided to first do his National Service and joined the 8th Royal Tank Regiment which he thoroughly enjoyed, including being stationed in Paderborn, Germany. Sport played a major part throughout his time, and he represented the army in many outside tournaments, most notably in hurdling.

Although sorely tempted to remain, in 1953 he left the army, and made his first step into what was to become a lifetime career in the timber-trading business by joining timber importers, May & Hassell Ltd. After several years with them, he went out to Zambia where he was made managing director of the state’s vast conglomerate corporation. This was a hugely responsible position which he tackled with enthusiasm and diligence. He thoroughly enjoyed his time in Africa and travelled & sailed extensively. It was in Zambia where he met his future wife, Kathy.

Upon returning to the UK, he joined Price and Pierce International timber agents. With them he spearheaded a new trading division and was highly successful in capitalising on new trading opportunities between Scandinavia and the Middle East. He eventually rose to managing director level and remained with the organisation for nearly two decades. He subsequently decided to set up his own international timber trading company in the early 2000s, concentrating more on the Egyptian market, and was hugely liked and wellrespected throughout the industry.

Radley meant so much to Andrew that he put all three sons (Paul (1989, H), Mark (1994, H), and Simon (2000, H)) through the school. He made extraordinary sacrifices to do this, but he believed so passionately in the incredible opportunities Radley offers. In 2018 he lost youngest son Simon (aged 28) in a tragic accident in Singapore which devastated him. Yet still into his late 80s he led an active life, continuing his hobby of work, whilst also playing regular golf, and holidaying as far as Asia and Australia. In June 2023 he celebrated his 90th birthday, and his 50th

wedding anniversary in September 2023. Three weeks later he suffered a sudden stroke from which he never recovered. He was so happy during his time at Radley, always spoke fondly of his years there, and him wearing his Old Radleian tie at every opportunity was testament to this. Andrew was a gentleman, and Radley was instrumental in shaping him as a kind and caring human being. And for that, his remaining family would like to thank Radley.

Andrew Meryon Le Blanc Smith died on 9th October 2023.

PRICHARD,

DCM (1947, F)

David was an islander. The second son of Reverend George and Mrs Mostyn Prichard, who was Rector of Whippingham and Chaplain to Osborne House. So, it was not surprising that HRH The Princess Beatrice agreed to be his godmother and Lord Penhryn, his mother’s cousin, godfather.

In 1940 David was sent away with his brother from the Vicarage at Kew, aged five, to board at Swanbourne House in Buckinghamshire. The form mistress wrote to his parents, “Preston is such a nice boy but I think we shall have a lot of trouble with young David.”

David, anxious to be involved with Radley’s Centenary celebrations in 1947, claimed to have achieved nothing except his first term’s Warden report which read “He may be the youngest in the College, but there is no need for him to be the worst behaved.” However, he rowed for the 1st VIII, which rowed in the final of the Princess Elizabeth Cup at Henley.

With parents short of funds, he was withdrawn to take Oxford Responsions in Latin and French. Once achieved, he started teaching, aged 17, at his old prep school.

At Pembroke, Oxford, he was 2-3 years younger than most as faulty hearing denied him National Service. He was Captain of College Boats, a member of The Teasel Club and stroke of the university Isis VIII.

After eight years at Monkton Combe, he was asked to direct the school 100K appeal. It had raised 70K over seven years

Andrew Meryon Le Blanc Smith

and David raised 35K in four months. He became Secretary of the OM Society, Commanded the CCF as a Lt Cdr, and initiated the UK’s first Volunteer Police Cadets, which resulted in much media attention. On leaving, his Headmaster wrote “Your contribution has been outstanding. Your pastoral care has been an influence for goodness and novelty.”

At 34 he was appointed Headmaster of Port Regis, then Bryanston’s Junior School. It budgeted for 124 boarders but had only 90, of whom 30 were due to leave in July. Over 24 years Port Regis was considered one of the top five in the country. In 1972 the school was renting 48 acres and the eightyroom mansion, but David purchased 150 acres for £50,000 which the Daily Telegraph printed as ‘The Buy of the Century’.

On his retirement there were 320 boys and girls. The Princess Royal educated both her children there, other international royals the same; he entertained the Queen and Prince Philip for four hours when she opened The National Centre for Junior Gymnastics. David was also Chairman of IAPS and received his MBE from the Queen for services to education and charitable services.

At 59 he became Headmaster of Wycliffe College and increased their numbers from 400 to 800 in four years. The inspector wrote “Wycliffe has been transformed. The speed of this life-saving transformation must be credited to the remarkable inspiration of the Headmaster.” David took two sabbaticals. His experiences included being shot at in Israel, stabbed in Morocco, tutoring the son of the British Consul in Paris, driving his jaguar with diplomatic plates, working with a VSO in Laos, thumbing a lift in a US transporter, trekking in Nepal, and representing Bath, UK, in the ten Baths in USA. He even rode Embassy stallions in Ethiopia.

He enjoyed dinner and an overnight stay In Holyrood Palace and was invited twice to Thatcher’s Number 10. He gave the Bicentenary Lecture “Creativity in Education” at the opening of Darling Harbour in Australia, and another at African HMC conference in Cape Town.

His lifetime achievements included being a Governor of nine prep schools, Chairman of the Smallpiece Trust for Industrial

Design and a Trustee for 25 years, leaving with £12 million in the bank.

He became a Freeman of the City of London, a Trustee with John Makepeace at Parnham, a member of the Board of Visitors at Guys Marsh Borstal, a Commissioner for the Inland Revenue, Shaftesbury Rotarian, the Master of Two Masonic Lodges and organised for ten years National Conferences for Governors, Bursars and Heads. He certainly merited his inclusion in Who’s Who and Debrett’s.

David spent half his life knowing Elizabeth, whom he first met at a Heads’ Conference Dinner. He proposed at his third Buckingham Palace Garden Party. His life with Elizabeth was blissful for they never argued and laughter was heard daily.

David was devoted to one he described as beautiful in face and character, a talented chef and one dedicated to kindness. It all could have started badly if his African diamonds were lost during a midnight emergency landing at Nairobi.

David Colville Mostyn Prichard MBE died on 2nd April 2024.

BOND, CW (1948, A)

Christopher Wigram Bond, born 24th September 1934 in Plymouth, died on 11th November 2023 at his home in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, aged 89, after a short battle with cancer.

Christopher attended Radley College between 1948 and 1952 and went on to study auto-mobile engineering at Loughborough College. He began his career as a junior engineer with Lucas and Tube Investments, and later with GKN, where he transferred to the Personnel Department. Using his considerable communication and organisational skills he later worked as a management consultant with the Department of Trade and Industry. He married Margaret in 1959 and they had three children.

Christopher’s life was defined by his Christianity, sharing his faith with those around him whether it was in Birmingham where he lived until 1981 or in the Cotswolds where he lived until the end of his life. He was a keen artist, and loved

recording disappearing architecture in Birmingham, glimpses of his travels to Southern India, Eastern Turkey and the Baltic States, and the much-loved Isle of Mull in Scotland.

He was passionate about music and literature, and created a small amateur group, The Goliards, which gave occasional performances of music and readings. He was also an enthusiastic member of the Birmingham Meccano Club where he would show his intricately designed models, and of model railways. Christopher had an enquiring mind and loved reading on a wide range of topics. He shared his love of the outdoors with fellow climbers and walkers, including trips to Norway, the Lake District and Welsh Hills. He will be fondly remembered for his gentle humour, sharp mind and his generous, caring nature.

He is survived by his wife Margaret, his sons Philip and Andrew, his daughter Jacqui and four grandchildren – Zara, Thomas, Leo and Max.

Christopher Wigram Bond died on 11th November 2023, aged 89.

BLAIR, JW (1950, B)

Johnnie Blair was born in 1937 and, despite being raised in Scotland, came to Radley from Stone House Prep School in Broadstairs. A popular and dynamic figure, he became a School Prefect and was quick to make his mark as a wet bob. He coxed the 1st VIII that won the Princess Elizabeth Cup at Henley in 1952, when, as reported in The Old Radleian 2019, FieldMarshal Montgomery praised the crew’s spirit and deplored the length of the cox’s hair; and he went on to row in the 1st VIII

John Woodman Blair, cox of the 1952 1st VIII

in 1954 and 1955, being Captain of Boats in the latter year.

After National Service and reading Law at Brasenose College, Oxford, Johnnie returned to Scotland, qualified as a solicitor, and was subsequently admitted as a W.S., rising to be senior partner of the family firm Strathern & Blair, which under his aegis later amalgamated with another Edinburgh partnership to form Anderson Strathern. In addition to his 37 years as one of the pre-eminent private client lawyers in Scotland, he was a director of British Investment Trust and a trustee of the Royal Botanic Gardens and numerous charities.

Blessed with stature, good looks, energy, a sense of humour and mischief, and abundant charm, Johnnie was a muchloved feature of the Scottish social landscape. It was said of him that, such was the admiration of the lady motorists, the traffic would come to a halt in George Street when he crossed the road on his way to the New Club. He married Claire Ford in 1974 and they had three children, Zeph, Charlie and Molly. Clint, their lovely house in rural East Lothian, was famously hospitable with fires burning, both in summer and winter.

Johnnie was a keen shot and fisherman but his primary passion was gardening and arboriculture. Almost to the end, though handicapped by numerous afflictions, he would tend his flower beds from a mobility scooter

John Woodman Blair died on 6th February 2023.

BRIGHT, JE (1950, C)

John Bright was born in Surrey to Edward and Doris Bright. He came to Radley in 1950, joining C Social (Cocks’ Social, and later Thompson’s Social). He played for the 2nd XV rugby team in his final year, was a member of the College’s Political Society and also of the Radley Fire Brigade where he played his part in keeping his contemporaries and the College safe. As well as rugby, he had some success at the 100yard race, shot put, and discus which he won with a throw of 88ft when he was 14. He joined the army straight after school. Then, after trying out several professions in London, he emigrated to Australia for

10 years. He played club rugby well into his forties.

He stayed in touch with his school friends, Anthony and Roger, despite the geographic distances which separated them. He travelled widely and was fascinated by the history of the Middle East and Southern Africa. John was always happiest when reading, which was how he spent most of his time. He survived cancer twice and the many difficulties of ageing, but his placid nature and lack of memory made for a predominantly happy old age.

He married early to his great childhood love, Geraldine, and had three children: Jane, Fred and Susan. He stoically provided for his family through thick and thin and was not especially concerned with appearances. He loved Springer spaniels and his pipe. John spent the last 10 years in South Africa with his family and travelled back to England frequently.

John was a man of few words, but when they came, he could be incredibly quick witted and dry.

He lived a simple life, gently, with great kindness.

John Edward Bright died on 17th June 2024, aged 87.

BAWTREE, M (1951, G)

On Saturday, 24th August 2024, Michael Bawtree died peacefully in his sleep, the day before his 87th birthday. Though his loss is felt keenly by his family and friends, his accomplishments and achievements are a testament to the force of nature that was Michael Bawtree. News reports immediately following his death drew upon those who had known Michael since his arrival in Nova Scotia in 1990, four years before he, his partner, Colin Bernhardt, and three other friends acted upon a shared vision to create an Atlantic Theatre Festival. But Michael was more than the founding Artistic Director of that Festival. He was a writer, dramaturge, actor, director, playwright, literary critic, and fundraiser with a Midas Touch when it came to garnering money for projects about which he developed a passion. Once Michael envisioned something, nothing could dissuade him. And when a project

Michael Bawtree

ended, Michael moved on, ready to lend his talents to the next one.

Born in Newcastle, Australia, Michael moved to the UK when he was two – or, as he said, his parents moved and he just went along (probably the last time he ever just went along with something, rather than being the initiator!). He attended St. Peter’s College, Radley from the age of 13. Though raised with an appreciation of “fine arts” and regular piano lessons, he credits his time at Radley with developing his appreciation of Shakespeare and deepening his interest in music. After Radley, he attended Worcester College, Oxford, where he completed his BA in English Language and Literature, then his MA. National Service was still a requirement when Michael was a young man, and he joined the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry in May 1956. As a 2nd Lieutenant, he served in Cyprus in 1957-58. During the Second World War, the Ox. And Bucks. L.I. was instrumental in the capture of Pegasus Bridge during D-Day in 1944, an act later captured in the film The Longest Day. Michael wrote a one-man play about the event, “The Pegasus Bridge Show!”, performing it in several UK venues in 2008, donating proceeds to The Veterans Charity.

Michael sailed to Canada in 1962 after Bill Glassco told him that interesting things were happening in Canadian theatre. He intended to remain for one year. The opportunities that arose kept him here

for the rest of his life. Here, he worked in theatre, penned a column as principal book critic for the Toronto Telegram, co-hosted two CBC-TV educational series for schools, lectured at the new Laurentian University, and founded the theatre program at the nascent Simon Fraser University. He was Director of English Theatre at the National Arts Centre, Associate Director at the Stratford Festival, founding Artistic Director of COMUS Music Theatre of Canada, and Founder and Artistic Director of Banff Music Theatre Training Ensemble. His work with Michael Langham at the Stratford Festival developed into a lifelong friend/ mentorship. Decades later, both Michael Langham and his wife, Helen Burns would direct plays at the Atlantic Theatre Festival. Michael’s career took him around the globe: Colombia, Peru, the Soviet Union, the UK and the US. In Finland, he founded a music theatre company with Pirrkoliisa Tikka who remained a dear friend and colleague for the rest of Michael’s life.

He moved to Wolfville in 1990 for a oneyear contract to teach theatre at Acadia University. After two years, he became director of the Theatre Studies program and remained there until his retirement in 2003. During his time at Acadia, Michael and his partner, Colin Bernhardt, influenced, challenged, and encouraged students. Many who graduated from the program stayed in touch with him for the rest of his life. He showed keen interest in learning about their progress and projects and welcomed them when they turned up for a visit.

Michael’s energy and passion wasn’t confined to theatre. Community was important to Michael, and he was happy to lend his talents to projects. He founded the Joseph Howe Initiative, a one-year project of more than twenty events and ceremonies to mark the 200th anniversary of Howe’s birth, and Howe’s contributions to Nova Scotia as a journalist, politician, and public servant. Michael wrote a stage version of Howe’s famous 1835 libel defence speech, which he performed in Halifax, Ottawa, Boston, and London, England.

He gave his energy and talents as a board member of the Wolfville Historical Society, helping to create events and summer programming. He spearheaded events for

“1914 – War Comes to Wolfville”, not to glorify war but to portray its impact on communities. He coordinated a theatre piece, “The Pity of War”, which raised funds for the Historical Society.

His final project was to assist with the renovation of the Dr. C.B. Lumsden Branch #74, Royal Canadian Legion building in Wolfville. An extensive project, he solicited the talents of architect Mike Harvie, who had transformed a 1920s hockey arena into a 514-seat thrust stage theatre in 1994-95 for the Atlantic Theatre Festival. The Legion building transformed from one to two storeys, with a lounge, named in Michael’s honour in July, that boasts the best views of Wolfville’s dykelands out to the Minas Basin. Among awards and honours he received are the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Medal, an honorary doctorate from Acadia University, and the Valley Arts Award.

Michael wrote and published two volumes of his memoirs: As Far As I Remember (2014), and The Best Fooling (2017). He was working on the third at the time of his death.

Michael’s obituary could read like a Who’s Who of notable literary, theatrical and academic figures. Some became lifelong friends with whom he kept in touch up to his death, among them Christopher Ricks, Jonathan Harlow (who, though separated by an ocean, met with Michael and a few friends online every week to work on The Guardian crossword), and Jeremy Gibson.

When Michael began to have challenges with his mobility, he initially thought he had sciatica. He attributed this to age and began to use a cane. By 2023, he traded the cane for a walker and sought medical advice. Tests and examinations led to a diagnosis of MND in March. Soon after, he needed a wheelchair. On June 5th, he received his final diagnosis: ALS. He was philosophical about his diagnosis and sought approval for MAiD. Though he set the date for December 31st, he stopped taking his heart medication in the hope that he would die in his sleep – a wish that was granted on August 24th.

He is predeceased by his partner of 45 years, Colin Bernhardt and by his parents, Kathleen ‘Tessa’ MacEacharn and Raymond Francis ‘Ben’ Bawtree. He

is survived by his sisters, Jo and Jenny; his nephew, Nicholas, dear friends, and an extended ‘chosen family’ for whom, though not related through blood, he was a brother, father, uncle.

Cremation has taken place, and a small graveside interment will follow, with a larger celebration of life planned to coincide with the release of the final edition of his memoirs. In lieu of flowers, Michael requests donations be made in his memory to the Wolfville Legion and the Wolfville Historical Society. Funeral arrangements have been entrusted to the White Family Funeral Home and Cremation Services, Kentville.

“I have been extraordinarily blessed in Canada ... finding great things to do, a wide circle of friends and colleagues from east to west, and above all, an abiding love.” - Michael Bawtree

A tribute from Jonathan Harlow (1951, F) Michael Bawtree was born 25th August 1937 in Australia and died in Canada on 24th August 2024.

The main facts of his life, including his impressive list of stage productions can be found in the very full and up-to-date Wikipedia entry. And all of it up to 1979 in his two self-published volumes of autobiography: As Far as I Remember (Mereo Books 2015), and The Best Fooling (Mereo Books 2017). (The third volume, not necessarily complete, will be published next year.) Here I shall just say a little about his time at Radley and about Michael as a person.

Michael was a music scholar at Radley and a member of the fast-moving set who took O Levels after two years and their first A Levels in their 3rd year. But it was as an actor that he first made his mark: Romeo in a wonderful production by the newly appointed Peter Way in 1953. More acting followed, and then in 1955 his first musical play and production: he and Peter Cook (yes, that Peter Cook) wrote Black & White Blues for Chris Ellis’s great Marionette Society. Michael himself claims to remember none of what he wrote, but I do: ‘The Slump Jazz Band Shall March at Dawn!’ for one, and ‘I’m an Old Etonian’ –Peter Cook as the suave African chieftain.

I was Michael’s contemporary at Radley.

He and I became fast friends and remained so to the end. So, Michael as a person. He was of course very gifted: in music, in words, and in producing plays which became his career. He was socially gifted too, rapidly making himself welcome and appreciated wherever he went. He was also very quick at grasping what people were getting at and what mattered to them. These gifts of course favoured his career: he quickly made an impression on those who could offer him quite precocious opportunities. But he was never a career man. Indeed, between about 1966 and 1976 he quite recklessly threw himself into the cause of theatre workshops/co-ops and socialist drama. And, quick though he was to make friends, and tormented by the “endless and often agonising search for money”, the current work always came first, and he never compromised on his own standards, or let anyone down.

The precarious years passed and his second volume leaves him at the beginning of a more settled life, in a seven-year stint at Banff and then, after three years commissioned freelancing, on to Acadia University in Nova Scotia. There he founded the Festival Theatre, recently named the ‘Bawtree Bernhardt Festival Stage’ in honour of Michael and his long-time partner and colleague Colin Bernhardt. Michael’s work there was recently recognised by a D. Litt.

In his retirement, he remained in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, where, as always, he had acquired a circle of warm friends. He recently found himself afflicted with ALS and did not look forward to the progressive degeneration ahead. He died peacefully in his sleep, warmed by anticipation of his birthday the next day.

Michael had so many accomplishments, but I think the qualities which stood out throughout his life were idealism and integrity, courage and commitment, laughter and love. His loss is hard to bear, but,

Still are his pleasant voices, his nightingales, awake For Death, he taketh all away, but them he cannot take.

Michael Bawtree died peacefully on 24th August 2024.

MORKILL, TW (1952, B)

Tribute by David Morkill (1957, B)

It was not always easy arriving at a new school the term after my older brother had left, his successes in many spheres of school life leading to expectations I felt beyond me to achieve. As we grew older, we developed a much better appreciation of each other.

At Radley he was a school prefect and Head of B Social under Mr Fisher. He was in the 1st XIs for both cricket and hockey, and captain of both (if I recall correctly) and played full back in the rugby XV. He was an excellent squash player and a useful performer at tennis and golf. In his last year, he was one of the founder members of the Radley Galleons that entered the Folkestone International Hockey Festival for the first time that year. While he had been offered a place at Oxford, he opted to do his National Service first. In his two years’ service, he passed the War Office Selection Board and, after officer training at Eaton Hall, was commissioned into the Green Howards, our father’s (Lt Col H. B. Morkill (1910, B)) regiment, and spent much of this time in Hong Kong. By the time he had finished his National Service, he had decided that further academic study was not for him and at the invitation of a neighbour he joined Charringtons, the London brewer, working on the distribution and transport side. He spent his whole working life with the company as it went through various takeovers and changes to become part of the Bass brewing empire. He progressed to various senior management posts in the company, one of which took him to Burton on Trent.

He settled in Staffordshire near Burton with his wife Mary Jane and together they

raised four daughters, Susan, Jennifer, Kate and Clare who grew up there with their horses and ponies. When he was promoted to manage the Northern Region of the company, he commuted to Leeds weekly. After a time, he moved back to London and they purchased a farmhouse and 16 acres in Buckinghamshire. Sadly, the strain of all this disturbance and separation had taken its toll and the marriage was eventually dissolved.

After this he lived in Hertfordshire, in the next village to our old family home. He married Jean and lived out his retirement there. At one point he was Chairman and a Trustee of the F.E. Cleary Schools Fund and he was the Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal organiser for the area. He was awarded his MBE for services to charity.

During his life he played cricket for many clubs (Radley Rangers, Incogniti, Gerrards Cross and M.C.C. amongst them) and golf at Little Aston in the Midlands and Denham near London, where he became a director of the club. He was also an excellent bridge player.

Perhaps Tom’s greatest gift was his ability to get on with his fellow men. I cannot recall seeing him lose his temper with anyone and he seemed always to look for the good in people. He had a large circle of friends who always seemed pleased to see him.

He was a much-loved brother to me and a kind uncle to my daughter.

Thomas William Morkill died on 8th August 2024, aged 85.

HEWSON, AR (1953, B)

The vagaries of war saw Alan, at the age of four, attending Great Ballard Preparatory School at Stowell Park, Gloucestershire, the property of the Vestey family. There in the warm and homely atmosphere engendered by Norman Knight and his wife Crystal (Tim), Alan enjoyed participating in the school’s activities and playing in the spacious grounds and remains of an old Roman villa with its mosaic floors. These were peaceful surroundings compared with the mined beaches of Teignmouth where he lived. A natural love of singing and choral music was encouraged by Norman Knight, a member of the Bach Choir, and as a young

Thomas William Morkill

treble Alan had the opportunity to sing in St George’s Chapel and the Albert Hall. Rugby was another great love fostered by this enthusiastic headmaster.

Alan went to Radley in 1953, aged 13, and became part of Fisher’s B Social. He loved all the sports – bicycling to the river for rowing, cricket, athletics, tennis and especially rugby. Sport remained a major interest throughout his life. A faded newspaper clipping mentions a young Hewson who had been seconded to play in the Firsts against Wellington. G de la Condamine, the Schools Rugby reporter, described a “Cut-and-Thrust Battle”:

When two schools of this calibre come together one expects to see something out of the ordinary and though there was not a great deal of skill shown, the spectators must have come away fully satisfied.

Both sides scored unconverted tries in the first half and though the second was barren of points, it produced an enthralling battle that continued bitterly until the end. It was soon obvious that Wellington were bigger and stronger outside, and that their wings Piesse and Soutry, powerful and fast, would be difficult to stop in full flight. Indeed, this was well shown when, early on, Piesse attacked like a tornado on the left, was just stopped and the ball was whipped across to the wing for Soutry to score.

Watson, the Radley hooker, held a near mastery over the scrums and with neither side very adept at the line-out, Radley were allowed to attack. Their fly-half, however, ran across and then had to resort to the diagonal, and it was not until just on half-time that Hewson scrambled over in the corner.

The second half was desperate cut-and-

thrust with Wellington swarming on the Radley line and doing everything to score. Radley lost Mackeown with an injured shoulder, but they battled on and held their line intact, earning a very proper reward. Wellington 3 pts, Radley 3 pts.

An ill-considered family decision unfortunately saw Alan leaving a year before he was due to complete his schooling. Seeking employment, he responded to a coloured advertisement of a man pulling a rickshaw and the invitation to join the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank and see the world. He decided he would like to work overseas, so he left Teignmouth and hitchhiked to London. After a successful interview he joined the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation in October 1957 and worked in the London office for four years. Alan sailed to Hong Kong in February 1962 on the German MV Hamburg, a Holland/ America Line; it was a slow cargo ship, visiting many ports and taking five weeks to reach Hong Kong. At last, he was seeing the world.

Bachelor life in Hong Kong had its heady moments as well as community responsibilities; he was a useful treasurer for youth and sporting clubs, and a keen volunteer for exciting and dangerous raids with the Maritime Police. After completing tours in Hong Kong, Singapore and back to Hong Kong he decided to resign and continue travelling. Jokingly, he said he would have remained if he had been posted to a different Asian country, but one is usually returned to the social pool at Head Office if you are still a bachelor. A serious consideration was the political unrest and insecurity during the 1967 Hong Kong anti-government riots protesting British colonial rule and supported by the Chinese Communist Party. A time of strikes, demonstrations and the planting of bombs on the HKSBC steps and curiously, those of the Salvation Army.

His travels led him to Europe, Canada, the USA, New Zealand, Tonga and eventually Australia, where he decided to stay in Melbourne. At that time little was happening in Australia in the way of international and glamorous merchant banking. No overseeing the inspection of cow gallbladders and gallstones worth their weight in gold as in Hong Kong, so

Alan joined a stockbroking firm, A. C. Goode & Co. and brought his banking experience to a different branch of Securities.

He married Helen Harvey and moved to Sydney. Soon they were exploring East Africa, touring Europe, meeting English relatives, visiting Radley where Mr Fisher inquired: “still with Honkers and Shankers, Hewson?” and staying with Bank friends throughout Asia.

Returning to Australia they finally settled down to raise a family and restore an early colonial house. Alan joined the Sydney Stock Exchange in 1971 as an administrator and national manager of listings and continued in this role when the Australian Stock Exchange, ASX was formed. He survived many stock market booms and recessions and was pleased to retire in 1997 and spend more time gardening and plan further travels abroad and around Australia.

Radley’s foundation grew out of the Oxford Movement and the tradition of choral music and masses fostered from Alan’s earliest school days and celebrated in the weekly Chapel services were very important. He discovered Christ Church St Laurence, an Anglo-Catholic Church in the heart of Sydney and, with Helen, attended for many years serving at the altar as a Sub-Deacon and a Treasurer.

Finally, they moved from Sydney to Adelong, an old gold mining town on the southwest slopes of the Snowy Mountains in New South Wales to be near daughter Eve, her husband Andrew MacDougall and their children. The MacDougalls are beef producers at Green Hills, while in the village, near Helen’s restored cottage on the banks of the Adelong Creek, live son James and daughter-in-law, Miriam.

Alan’s sudden and final illness caused by brain tumours was a great shock to his family and friends. Alan was always a loving and attentive father, a generous, thoughtful, and caring companion with endless time for his grandchildren, Charles, Alice and Edward. They enjoyed his gentle kindness and droll sense of humour. His cat did too.

Alan Robert Hewson died on 17th July 2021.

Alan Robert Hewson, standing at the rear on the left, with with 1957 Cross Country Team.

MORRIS, RM (1955, C)

After attaining a CCF Flying Scholarship at Radley in 1959, ‘Ricky’ Morris joined the RAF where he was a pilot for 12 years. He commissioned in 1960 and was awarded RAF Wings in 1962. In his RAF career, he was a ‘V Bomber’ pilot, flying the UK’s V Class strategic nuclear strike force for three years, a Canberra Special High Altitude Reconnaissance pilot for three years, and finally an RAF Instructor.

Following the RAF, Rick joined Britannia Airways, flying Boeing 737s, 747s, 757s and 767s for many years, retiring in 2002 as a Senior Captain. He continued to fly in retirement, as a glider pilot and glider tug pilot for ten days every month at London Gliding Club, Dunstable.

Rick belonged to the model flying club at Windsor Park, and he made all his own model aeroplanes. He was married to Mary in 1970 and had two sons. Later, in 2005, Rick married Maggie and they lived happily in Ascot for many years.

Captain Richard Morris died on 16th July 2024, aged 82.

CUNDY, TWA (1955, D)

Anthony Cundy was born on 23rd August 1941 and joined D Social in 1955.

After leaving Radley, Anthony went to work on a farm in New Zealand, he returned some years later and began farming in Papplewick, Nottinghamshire, which would be his home for the rest of his life.

Thomas William Anthony Cundy

He spent his life expanding and growing his farm, acquiring a number of other farms and always staying true to his value of “no-one will ever work for me, they work with me.”

A favourite reference of his was “Duke or dustman, makes no difference” and it really didn’t – Anthony had an endless capacity to listen, be interested, and to enjoy the company of people from a hugely diverse spectrum of backgrounds.

Anthony was the epitome of what a true English Gentleman and Gentleman Farmer should be.

He was a devoted husband to Sue, the most wonderful father to John and Rachel, a perfect grandpa to Lucy, Harriett, Thomas, William, Max and Ben and a friend to so, so many.

Anthony is deeply missed by all who had the honour of knowing him.

60 years after leaving Radley, he still had his Radley school tie!

Thomas William Anthony Cundy died on 25th October 2022.

BALLANCE, JHW (1956, D)

John was born in Ormskirk on 22nd January 1943 to Howard, a dentist, and Marjorie, a Pure Mathematics graduate from Liverpool University.

John and his younger sister Jen were sent away to school; Jen to a north Wales school, John to a prep school and then to Radley. They both hated it, and Jen would later say that John pretty much disliked his whole childhood. He was just very glad to get it over with.

Despite being very bright, John was a people person and never really got huge satisfaction from spending time with his head in books researching. He loved drama, even as a pantomime dame. He also loved all things electric, particularly radio, and languages.

John went on to the local technical college at Old Swan where he got his A levels, followed by an interview at Liverpool University Medical School. He was

sponsored by the Army which required that he finish his civvy street duties and start as an RMO officer, before training in his chosen specialism.

In those days, you could do what you can’t do now, and cover for a local GP as a locum without all the preliminary training. Thus, in off-duty moments he supplemented his income close to where he was stationed in Colchester.

Famously, there was a full waiting room of patients and JB was preparing to start his first ever morning’s surgery when a rather flustered receptionist came into his room. “Could you come out doctor, somebody’s died.” He walked out; indeed, somebody had died. His first patient that morning was dead on the floor. “Could you remove the waiting patients to outside the building?” asked JB. “They’ve gone, they’ve already all gone.” was her reply.

He served with the first Royal Horse Artillery and was out in Belfast on duty in 1970/71. Apart from clinical duties he was appreciated for his technical skill with radios, not least on those Border patrols. It was fraught work. JB always underplayed the serious army bits, concentrating instead on lots of great stories. However, one of his senior officers described John as a hero who left an impression wherever he went.

John soon fell in love with ‘a very beautiful nurse’, Carole, and they married in 1975. Soon, along came their gorgeous daughters, Becca, Rachel and Siân. They remember holidays, Centre Parks often with friends from school added in, and describe John as the ‘ultimate dad’ at the poolside in his speedos with a pint and his newspaper. Leaving the army for the civilian medical

John Howard William Ballance

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world took the family to Bristol, Plymouth and Oxford as JB’s anaesthetic training progressed. Chance, through his then fatherin-law, led them to Hereford in 1981, where he came to develop obstetric anaesthetics. John eventually took leave of the family, and met Nessie. John would be the first person to say that she helped him to find himself. It brought him a lot of the happiness that had eluded him. They married in 1993, and it made his last decades very contented.

The personal turbulence didn’t touch his work. He was much liked and respected by all his colleagues. And being the guy he was, he never distinguished between a senior consultant or nurse or porter or cleanereveryone was treated in exactly the same way.

JB became deeply involved with the UK Resuscitation Council, initially teaching courses, and eventually finding himself on the European Resuscitation Council as a board member. John joined the Operating Department Assistants Association, becoming their President and helping them to achieve full professional status, and go from being ‘assistants’ to being ‘practitioners’.

Other organisations also benefitted from his knowledge and energy: the Ambulance Service, the Association of Anaesthetists, and St. Michael’s Hospice to name a few.

In his 70s, the first signs of Parkinson’s started appearing with John. His family took the very best care of him throughout his illness.

He was a man of the stage and a broadcaster, the man who kept the brewing, wine and distillery industries afloat. A man whose medical vocation was generously lived, a man of terrific fun and humour and energy and truly appalling handwriting, who was actually made to go on a handwriting course by his professor, obviously having no effect whatsoever. He will be much missed by us all.

John Howard William Ballance died on 21st November 2023.

OLIVIER, JS (1958, D)

Extracts from the obituary by friend and colleague Major GH Tweedie, formerly The Blues and Royals.

Shamus Olivier was already with the Blues when I joined at Harewood Barracks in Herford in 1964. He was then, and remained throughout his career, the most charming and relaxed regimental officer with the added advantage of being a superb sportsman. At Radley he had been the best athlete, boxer and rugby player of his year.

It has been reported that he gained the nickname Shamus because of too many ‘Jameses’ in the mess, though I do not remember any others. He was given the name by David Smiley, also in the regimental rugby team and an inveterate name giver. Somehow it stuck within the army, though never in his family.

Shamus was an officer who could turn his hand to anything. His natural slightly shy charm and humour made him successful in his dealings with all ranks. His sporting gifts and his obvious competence made him highly respected as well as an excellent companion, poker player and mess member. It may have been an advantage that he never became interested in either polo or skiing, the two predominant and slightly divisive sports within the regiment.

While a troop leader with a detached squadron in Cyprus, he met Sally Anne, who lived in Boghazi, a lovely house overlooking Kyrenia. Fortunately, he returned to Cyprus as second in command of another squadron and despite considerable and formidable competition, he won her over. They were married shortly afterwards. They were to remain a most influential and supportive couple for the rest of his life.

His first posting away from the regiment was to the Armoured Trials and Development Team at Bovington, which suited his abilities. His competence and confidence briefing senior officers was noted. He was to continue with technical staff appointments when he could be prised away from regimental service. He particularly enjoyed an extended tour at Kirkcudbright, where running the local shoot and taking part in the many sporting opportunities available, may have taken more of his time than testing advanced tank guns. He and his young family came to feel that this part of southern Scotland was a second home.

On two separate tours with the regiment in Germany, Shamus and Sally Anne managed to live in the same hiring just outside Detmold. Here they were incredibly hospitable to many, especially the young subalterns seeking relief from the boredom of mess life in Germany.

In due course, he was selected to be regimental Second in Command, a job which he dreaded as he would inevitably be more confined to his office, a lifelong aversion. However, when Hywel Davies, the Commanding Officer broke his leg, Shamus had to take over command during a demanding exercise, which he conducted with great skill, drive and tactical sense.

He was recommended for command, but somehow, due to the mysterious workings of the appointments system, he was not selected, although he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel.

His last job before retirement was with the clothing and equipment trials unit at Colchester. This had the advantage of allowing him to personally test the latest cold and wet weather clothing when shooting, much to the envy of his fellow guns.

He remained at Regimental Headquarters for 14 years, providing strong and reliable support to the succession of Silver Sticks with whom he shared an office. Never having done mounted duty, he had nevertheless to ride on the Birthday Parade every year, an ordeal which he took in his stride, despite a particularly painful accident during his Hyde Park preparations one year.

Although living in London, he kept up his interest in shooting, particularly at Thetford Training Area, where he was one of the syndicate leaders. This demanded a surprising amount of tact in dealing with sometimes difficult keepers as well as the many neighbouring expensive shoot owners whose birds may have strayed onto the training area. He entertained many young officers as well as his old friends. Typically, clashes such as when an unexpected platoon attack happened just as guns were about to be placed round a good pheasant covert, did not deter him at all. There were no apoplectic protestations, just a quiet change of plan and move to the next drive.

Shamus contributed so much to his regiment throughout his life. He deserved a long and happy retirement. Sadly, this was not to be, as he contracted Parkinson’s disease. Having been the most supportive of husbands throughout their long marriage, he needed Sally Anne’s devoted care for the last few years of his life, which were so severely affected by this awful disease. Both Shamus and Sally Anne bore these trials with great fortitude and bravery.

Shamus will always be remembered for his decency, his gentle humour, his consideration for others and the fact that, however dire the situation, he always made people feel better. His soldiers regarded him as one of the finest officers.

Lt Col James Stephen Olivier died on 18th May 2023, aged 79.

BURLEY, CJ (1958, F)

Extract from the obituary published in the Bailiwick Express

A businessman and philanthropist who made Guernsey his home has died, leaving those who knew him with many fond memories of his work, charitable nature, stories and sense of style.

The news that Charles John Burleyknown as John or ‘CJ’ - had died broke yesterday, when people linked with the Freemasons, Guernsey Cricket and the Lord’s Taverners were among the first organisations to pay tribute to him.

His work had brought him to the island originally and he was a director of many companies including notably the Le Riches and Landes du Marches groups.

While living in the island over the course of many decades he also became involved in many aspects of island life outside of the boardroom.

One of his interests involved the Masons, with the St Martin’s Lodge. Mr Burley had been “exalted into Doyle’s Chapter of Fellowship in November 2000” and was appointed as a Steward of the Chapter in 2006 before he was appointed Provincial Grand Tyler in 2015.

As a philanthropist, Mr Burley was a

supporter of many charities – including those linked with his sporting interests of horse racing, and cricket, both of which led him to many friendships during his lifetime. His involvement in horse racing even put him in contact with royalty on many occasions.

Speaking to ITV Channel after the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September last year, he said that his own horses never matched up with those belonging to Her Majesty over the racecourse. David Piesing of the Guernsey Cricket Board recalled Mr Burley’s encyclopaedic knowledge of the sport, as well as horse racing and wine.

Among Mr Burley’s many local business interests was commercial radio station Island FM which was launched by Kevin Stewart in 1992. He asked Mr Burley to be Chair of the board, a role he occupied until his death.

Mr Burley’s death was confirmed through a notice in Friday’s Guernsey Press - to which he was a regular writer. It confirmed he had died on 29th November 2023 aged 78, at his home in Guernsey, just weeks before his next birthday.

He was described as a “much loved brother, uncle, great uncle, godfather and friend to so many.”

Charles John Burley died on 28th November 2023.

KENNARD, MS (1959, G)

Martin died from complications after a thoracic operation. At his service at St Martin’s in-the-Veld, Rosebank, Johannesburg, South Africa on 14th

August, his grandchildren spoke about their Grandpa:

ALEXANDRA: Grandpa was very funny. I’m not sure how to explain it, but he used to really make me laugh. I could always count on Grandpa to make me tea with a Ginger Nut biscuit in the morning on holiday. I loved playing board games with grandpa and grandpa never got bored of playing with me.

CHARLOTTE: Grandpa had a great love and knowledge of nature. He seemed to be able to name every type of African grass and tree. He could identify all the insects and birds, and could tell us all about rocks, mountains and the weather. To me he was like a human version of Google but better! It was always such a treat going to the bush with him because his knowledge of animals and birds was never ending. Even the game rangers appreciated his knowledge. I’ll never forget him politely correcting them when they would get their facts wrong on game drives!

GEORGIA: When I think of Grandpa I always think of him as busy. His nickname at school ‘clockwork mouse’ could not have been more fitting because it was like you could wind him up and he would go on forever. He never used to sit still and was always doing something, fixing something in the house or running errands. I remember Em’s flip flop once broke on holiday and grandpa assured us he could fix it. We came back later in the day and found he had used a screwdriver and screw to put it together! It wasn’t exactly comfortable, but we appreciated the effort and creativity! In my head I will always remember grandpa happily working on a new project and he even continued to work right until the end.

EM: Grandpa never cared for or placed

Martin Kennard

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emphasis on material things and I think that is one of the biggest things I have learnt from him during my life. He lived a life that was rich in kindness and generosity and was someone who valued people rather than possessions. Although I know he sometimes drove Gorgi mad because he refused to buy new shoes and was more than happy driving an old “Uber car” he truly showed me what was really meaningful in life. He really did have a very special gift in making every person he spoke to feel important, valued and heard. Whether young or old, he could connect with anyone and everyone and always listened with genuine interest, making you feel that your thoughts and feelings really mattered.

Grandpa thank you for your love, wisdom and endless kindness. We will miss you so much. We know that you’re at peace now and your love will always be with us.

A letter from Jock Mullard was read:

I wish I was with you all but I am not sure I could survive the eleven hour flight to Johannesburg.

Martin was steadfast, constant, dedicated, dependable, unwavering, loyal and much more – it was impossible to match Martin. He set unbelievably high standards in everything he tackled and, in training for rowing, both on and off the water, he helped drive up the performance of the whole crew.

I rowed with Martin at school at Radley, in the Isis (Oxford 2nd) crew and then for two years in the Oxford Boat Race crew. Rowing with Martin was a very sensible thing to do as it meant we kept on winning.

In 1967 we were the two officers of the University Boat Club. While the Oxford and Isis crews were being selected, we had to inform the oarsmen if they were required for the following day’s trials. Each evening, I drove my mini round Oxford at high speed with Martin, armed with postcards, leaping out at the various Colleges to deliver the relevant cards to the Porters’ Lodges. We were not blessed with email which makes communication very simple for today’s crews.

Just one thing: Martin could also be very

annoying. He could be far too good! For one year I made the mistake of sharing digs with him in Oxford. This was in the days when, if you were living outside your College, you had to stay with a University approved landlady. We lived in a lovely house in Rawlinson Road. I used to stagger downstairs just in time for breakfast. Martin would always be there, way ahead of me, almost certainly having already been for an early run and written an essay. What a feeling of inadequacy – I could not compete with that.

But Martin was far from some kind of robotic trainer – he had a wonderful sense of humour and was enormous fun (I can still hear his laugh) and he was the kindest and most thoughtful person. I feel enormously privileged to have known Martin and shared the strongest bond of rowing with him at school and university. In later years we lived continents apart but when we did meet, we could pick up as though we had seen each other just the other day. What an exceptional and special man!

Martin was also one of the luckiest of men. He was the luckiest because he found Caroline. In Caroline he had an equally special and extremely talented wife who was always there to support him and try to keep him in order! Martin and Caroline were an unbeatable team. Caroline has always been a beacon of strength.

We are all devastated that Martin is no longer with us, but we were so blessed to have known him. Let us celebrate the life of an outstanding and glorious man.

Eulogy for Martin from his daughter, Elizabeth Alston:

Martin Spencer Kennard was born on the 6th of July 1945 in Lancashire England where his father was stationed with the Royal Navy, escorting the Arctic Convoys to the Soviet Union during the war. A few years after the end of the war, the family moved to Kenya for work opportunities, and they settled in Dagoretti just outside Nairobi. It was there that Dad would spend his childhood and where his love for the natural world would begin.

Dad’s early childhood could not have been all easy as his parents divorced when he was very young and as a result, he was enrolled in boarding school at only 5 years

of age and separated from his parents and sister, Penelope. This was most certainly a time that would have demanded great courage at such a formative age, but we as his family were only privy to his resilience that developed as a result as he recounted the MANY adventures at his time at Pembroke House Prep School in the Rift Valley: How he and his peers helped build the school chapel, making the bricks and putting the odd scorpion or spider into the bricks to bake, as only schoolboys would do. They made the stain glass windows out of old beer and milk of magnesia bottles creating the picture outline with lead from old batteries. They were also given rivet tools and sent up to secure the roof aged only 8. The cricket team (together with a basket of homing pigeons) would head to Nairobi for cricket matches in an old, converted Rolls Royce which would be guaranteed to overboil at some point on the journey forcing the boys to push the vehicle. The highlight of this story for my girls was that when the cricket match was over, Dad/Grandpa (as chief scorer) would attach the scorecard to the homing pigeons’ legs so that the score could get back to school before the team (who was travelling on the bus). During this time, the children had to be evacuated from school down to Mombasa for a while during the Mau Mau uprising. For the boys, this was experienced as another great adventure especially as they were guarded by the local community with their real bows and arrows. Dad saw this time as an incredibly enabling time, equipping him with skills both practical and emotional that he would draw on throughout his life.

From his childhood of barefoot freedom and the hot African sun he would then move on to School in England at Radley College – the mere journey to get there was a feat on its own. He would board the Hunting Clan Flight unaccompanied, aged 13 flying via Entebbe, Juba, Khartoum, Wadi Halfa, Malta and then finally London. Being away from home meant that he became particularly close to his grandmother, Uncle Colin, and Aunt Rosemary, his cousins David and Clare and all his many cousins in Dorset. Starting at an English public school in the late 50s seemed to go hand in hand with physical and emotional hardship: a culture of bullying and harsh discipline to surviving bitterly cold winters with no heating in the junior dormitories and having to swim

across the river fully clothed in January to prove you could swim to join the Rowing Club. And so, he developed his stoicism as well as his success and love for rowing and most importantly to him, his lifelong friendships. Friends that were always there for him and friends who would fly to his side at the most tragic of times in his life.

Growing up I was quite amazed at how much this sport of Rowing could be spoken about and there were times when certainly I and probably mum, were quite saturated by the endless talk about it. However, Dad’ s stories about his four years at Oxford and his Rowing there, his friends and their antics were stories I could listen to for hours. His dear friend Jock has painted us a picture of that time in their lives after Radley - undoubtedly one of his happiest and most defining times too. His final year at Oxford in 1968 meant that he would row for the Boatrace Crew for the third time and earn a triple blue, but it was also the year that he decided he would risk possible injury and join the Oxbridge Skiing trip. As fate would have it, according to Dad, this would indeed end up being a very good decision as it was on this trip that he met mum, Caroline. Married in 1970, their early married life (while Dad was teaching at Bedford School in England) saw them living in a small cottage surrounded by Brussel Sprout fields, paying a very sensible rent of 6 bottles of gin a month, something Dad no doubt shared with the Landlord. There was always humour in their marriage and dad could always provide a certain amount of quirkiness and eccentricity to spark the humour. My mother was of course Dad’s unwavering rock of support and more often than not he was guided by her intuition throughout their life together. Two days short of 54 years of marriage they saw the world together and, in the end, had been to every continent. Their love of the bush made for many special walks and trips with special friends. Their priority as parents was James’ and my education and taking us on wonderful holidays allowing us to see many parts of Southern Africa and other parts of the world. I have never been able to fully comprehend the immensity of my parents’ grief at losing James so tragically in 1997. Something I have come to grapple with even more so in having my own children. Their willingness to share their grief with me, their fortitude in the face of despair and their unfailing encouragement of me to live my life again,

I will never forget. Never interfering and always ready to listen, Dad was the most dependable father to me. He had a magic way of making problems feels lighter and casting a wonderful perspective on life. In 1972, my parents came out to South Africa. Dad’s working career saw him in the world of commerce at Gold Fields and Hillaldam and as a teacher and rowing coach at St Andrews College, Grahamstown. Alongside his formal jobs he also coached the Cantabrigians to their success at Henley Royal Regatta in 1984. He helped prepare the Springbok Crew for Barcelona and was involved in coaching and selection for South African Rowing. However, the thread that is sewn through whatever his occupation at any given time was his generosity of spirit and humility. Never driven by ego but rather compelled to share what he had with others. There was always a selflessness about him. He liked success and he liked to do things properly, but his talent was being able to create success by seeing the best in people and drawing that out of them. He was a born teacher but could see beyond the system of the school. He was fair minded as a teacher and saw leaders in boys who didn’t necessarily abide by the system and fought to put them in leadership roles. He had a perspective on the overall development of a person. He was not a disciplinarian but believed in discipline. When boys had broken the rules, the consequence was to run up to the Grahamstown monument, but he was never seen to be shouting orders he was running with them. He had integrity.

Family was enormously important to him. He always kept in touch with his family in England and found incredible comfort in my mother’s family throughout his life in South Africa. He delighted in becoming a grandfather and took great joy in the bond that he and my mum formed with Gavin’s family, David and Ann and Justine. As a family, we have had years of many happy holidays altogether where our girls have witnessed the very special friendship between their two sets of grandparents. Dad was a quiet anchor in our family through his silent strength of actions and instilling in us the importance of unconditional love.

Dad has been remembered as one of the kindest and most gentle of men. He has had a profound and fundamental impact

on those he taught, coached, and mentored and us as a family, touching lives to his very end. He loved us dearly and he was dearly loved by us. His life was deeply fulfilled. May he rest in peace.

Martin Kennard died on 6th August 2024, aged 79.

WINDHAM, D H (1962, D)

Dan and I started at Radley in 1962 in Stuart’s Social (D) but it was not until we were put together in the same small study a year or so later that I began to know Dan a lot better. Each study was unfurnished and could take just an armchair each and a desk. These were usually purchased from the previous incumbent. So, we had an armchair each, facing each other with a solid piece of wood across the arms to do our prep. Dan was a lot brighter than me, so he was extremely kind to be on hand to help with homework!

Another of Dan’s attributes was tidiness, everything had its place and we were always complimented on the state of our study. He also had a wonderful sense of humour, so we were able to laugh a lot about stupid things! I’m glad to say that this continued in later life. Unlike me, Dan was very good at maths and was taught by David Goldsmith (Social Tutor), who didn’t suffer fools gladly, so it was a huge accolade to Dan that he considered Mr Goldsmith a great influence.

Outside work, Dan and I were ‘Wet Bobs’ and spent our time on the river learning to row. We frequently fell out of our sculling boats and had to push the boat to shore to clamber in again! When not rowing, Dan had the physique to excel in gymnastics and represented our Social.

Daniel Windham

OBITUARIES

When we left Radley, Dan went on to University and I started a banking career in London before moving on to South Africa. We sadly lost touch in the intervening years before we met up again at an OR Day at the College. He was just the same amusing chap that I had always known. I loved receiving his emails which always gave me a reason to chuckle.

This appreciation was written by Allan Donner (1962, D)

Dan went on to read Natural Sciences at Magdalene College, Cambridge. He thoroughly enjoyed his time there, was awarded a half blue in gymnastics and was forever proud of his ‘Special’ degree (now termed an ‘Ordinary’, it was deemed below Honours in a Tripos examination and just above outright failure!).

He joined the Irish Rangers and then served with the Sultan’s Armed Forces

in Oman; both gave him an abiding appreciation of different backgrounds and cultures and a self-reliant, disciplined attitude to life.

After marrying Caroline (Cally), Dan established himself in Norfolk as a self-taught cabinet maker; his many fine creations and restoration works abound in Norfolk and around England, in churches, National Trust properties and many private homes. Dan was fiercely independent and the ability to repair a car, a house or a piece of furniture was an essential part of his creed, as was his delight in excelling at croquet and ‘connecting’ people. He had a strong sense of community and service and served almost 40 years as a retained fireman in Norfolk.

Dan and Cally had a son and daughter, William and Alexa. Dan took care of Cally from her diagnosis of breast cancer to her death. A few years later, Dan married Mary (a family friend) and they divided their time between Norfolk and London, with many foreign adventures added in. Dan was diagnosed with the most aggressive form of brain tumour early in 2023 and died on 9th October 2023. At his funeral in Wymondham Abbey on 1st November 2023 (which would have been his 75th birthday), 250 people attended: a true testament, with his works in the Abbey, to the man. He is greatly missed. This appreciation was written by Mary Windham.

Daniel Windham died on 9th October 2023.

BULSTRODE,

C (1963, C)

Extracts from the obituary published in The Times

Chris Bulstrode made his first wife Katherine Homewood laugh more than anyone else she had ever known. He was, she said, outrageous. But there was a pivotal moment when she decided she “wanted to marry him and have his babies”.

They were alone in the wilderness of the East African Rift Valley. The Land Rover battery had gone flat overnight. Bump-starting wasn’t an option, the vehicle was perched on a slight downhill slope above a 1,000ft precipice.

But there was something of Houdini in Bulstrode’s highly creative, brilliant mind. He jump-started the vehicle with their torch batteries. Bulstrode, later professor of orthopaedic surgery at Green Templeton College, Oxford University, showed the same kind of imaginative wizardry as a student, albeit not so constructively. He was linked to giant black footprints that appeared up and down the Tower of the Winds, the 12-metre octagonal structure rising above the old Radcliffe Observatory in Oxford.

More sensationally, he re-arranged the city’s one-way traffic signs to generate an inescapable loop. The jams were enormous. By the time the police arrived to interview him, Bulstrode was Scotland-bound for two weeks climbing while the dust settled.

Non-conformist, left-wing, attentionseeking, Christopher John Kent Bulstrode was born in 1951, one of three children of Dr John Bulstrode, a radiologist, and his wife Jacqueline. They lived on Guernsey but Chris boarded, latterly at Radley College; initially at Cheam prep school, with the future King Charles.

Precociously bright, Bulstrode took a year out before he was old enough to take up his Oxford medical scholarship. Unlikely as it may seem for a 16 or 17-year-old, he developed a passion for studying geese and other birds, thanks to work experience with the Nobel prizewinning zoologist Konrad Lorenz at the Max Planck Institute in Bavaria.

In a process that became known as ‘imprinting’, Lorenz had found that geese and other newborn animals formed an attachment to the first large moving object they met. When one group of geese hatched, he imitated a mother’s quacking sound. The hatchlings then regarded him as their mother.

The inspired Bulstrode dropped medicine for zoology at Oxford, leading undergraduate expeditions to Iceland to study geese and to South America to study plankton in river mouths. But, deciding against a career in ornithology or marine biology, after graduating he reverted to medicine, qualifying in Cambridge and Oxford.

Driven by wanderlust and an uneasy, restless spirit, Bulstrode began his medical career by driving across the Nubian desert to the

Examples of Dan’s work.

Sudan-Ethiopia border with a colleague. Bulstrode became a GP in Mombasa, and a lecturer in veterinary pathology in Dar es Salaam, before returning to Britain to train in trauma and orthopaedics and complete a thesis on leg ulcer treatment. Appointed a professor in 1992, he evoked mixed feelings among senior colleagues, from admiration for his kindness and compassion to intense dislike.

Believing that medical education lacked compassion, Bulstrode and Victoria Hunt, a medical educationist who became his partner and finally second wife, devised a training programme to encourage medical students to discuss mutual problems. It was adopted in many countries, including the US, Australia, New Zealand and India.

When he volunteered for the army as a trauma surgeon, the response was positive, until he revealed his age was 56. The recruiting office erupted into laughter, but he finally persuaded them he was serious. What made his application surprising was that he was, supposedly, a pacifist.

Bulstrode’s adventurous, buccaneering spirit shrivelled under the harsh demands of the royal military academy at Sandhurst, where he gained one distinction, as its oldest officer trainee. He became a junior frontline doctor at Camp Bastion, in Helmand, Afghanistan. After completing his scheduled three-month tour, he spent six months restructuring the Helmand healthcare services and working in refugee camps.

‘Retiring’ after Afghanistan, Bulstrode retrained as an emergency doctor in Invercargill, New Zealand, before working with Doctors of the World. He travelled to Haiti after the 2010 earthquake and to Sierra Leone during the 2014-15 Ebola outbreak. He also worked as an Antarctica cruise ship doctor.

His Sierra Leone homecoming reflected his characteristic, sometimes dark humour. In a British Medical Journal blog, he described leaving the house to see a neighbour walking her dog. Fearing he was infectious, she dropped her dog lead and ran. Bulstrode commented: “I have never seen her run before or since. It was a splendid sight and made me roar with laughter for the first time in weeks.”

Dr Chris Bulstrode died on 7th December 2023, aged 72.

PEGLER, P (1963, C)

Peter Pegler sadly passed away on 22nd June 2024 at 74 years of age in his hometown in Scotland. He often spoke of his time at Radley College and his fond memories of the school. Over the years he has thoroughly enjoyed hiking, photography, travelling to Europe and steam trains. He will be greatly missed.

Peter Pegler died on 22nd June 2024.

SLOCOCK,

RJ (1965, C)

This appreciation is written by Simon Eliot (1965, C)

Richard followed his father and three brothers to Radley where he developed his love of sport, especially cricket and he became a life-long member of the MCC. Great teachers like Dave Fielding and David Hardy inspired Richard’s affinity for the countryside and landscape and Radley also provided him with a group of lasting friendships which he cherished. Above all, Richard loved fishing from an early age.

After Christ Church and marriage to Sally in 1973, he farmed in Devon and Dorset before making fishing his career. He excavated lakes in the Piddle valley and offered guest accommodation at their Wessex Fly Fishing School for over forty years. Richard became a campaigner for chalk streams throughout the UK and, with a group of like-minded people who were fed up with modern fisheries, stocking, over-abstraction and intensive agriculture, he formed a society to champion the very opposite, which eventually became the Wild Trout Trust of which he was chairman for many years. He fought to preserve the countryside against what he saw as damaging developments, including against the introduction of beavers, and he successfully challenged and shifted the approach of both Wessex Water and the Environment Agency.

A gentle, thoughtful man who combined the skills of an entrepreneur, a teacher and a craftsman (he was a dab hand at DIY), he and Sally were a wonderfully close team for fifty years. He was a much-loved father of Katherine and Jennifer and an adored grandfather to Archie, Jack, Molly and Harry. Unselfconscious, amusing and interesting, Richard embodied the best of traditional values with a modern outlook and a steely determination.

Richard touched many lives and it was a fitting tribute to him and his beloved family that more than 350 people gathered to remember and celebrate his life at Milton Abbey in April 2024. He was a great countryman who has left a lasting legacy to the rivers and landscape of the Southwest.

Richard John Slocock died on 13th January 2024, aged 72.

REEVE, JET

Extract from the obituary published in Variety Online

Jim Reeve, a British entertainment executive and producer with more than 40 years’ experience in the business, died on 27th February; he was 64.

Reeve founded and was chair of UK media company Great Point. “It is with profound sadness that Great Point must confront the sudden and unexpected loss of our founder, mentor and friend, Jim Reeve, who passed away on Tuesday 27th February, 2024,” the Great Point team said in a statement. “Jim had a storied career in the entertainment business spanning 40 years, and his passing will be mourned by a great many.”

Prior to founding Great Point in 2013, Reeve served as senior investment director at the Ingenious Group. Reeve has more than 120 credits as a producer or executive producer, in projects featuring top British and international talent, beginning with thriller The Whistle Blower, starring Michael Caine and James Fox, in 1986. An early TV credit was The Wars of the Roses (1989-91), where the entire cycle of Shakespeare’s history plays were performed by the English Shakespeare Company, with a cast that included Colin Farrell and Michael Pennington.

Another highlight was John Irvin film

Richard Slocock

Shiner (2000), starring Caine, Martin Landau and Frances Barber, where the past catches up with a ruthlessly ambitious boxing promoter. In Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles (2001) Paul Hogan’s titular character travels to the U.S.

Reeve was a co-producer on David Mackenzie’s Young Adam, starring Ewan McGregor and Tilda Swinton, which bowed at Cannes in 2003, and an executive producer on Evelyn Waugh adaptation Bright Young Things the same year, which marked the directorial debut of Stephen Fry. He produced rom com The Wedding Date (2005), starring Dermot Mulroney, Debra Messing and Jack Davenport.

In recent years, Reeve backed the BAFTA nominated and British Independent Film Awards (BIFA)-winning Lady Macbeth (2016), Golden Globe-winning The Mauritanian (2021), BIFA winner Blue Jean (2022) and BIFA and BAFTA nominated Scrapper (2023). Most recently, Great Point supported Sundance winner Kneecap (2024).

Jim Reeve died on 27th February 2024, aged 64.

CHISHOLM, JRE (2015,

A)

Jack Chisholm achieved more than most in 21 years.

Born in London on 13th January 2002, Jack soon moved to the Cotswolds. Shortly after the move, his younger brother Harry was born. As Jack grew older, the move

proved ideal for his developing love of nature and laid-back way of life. Jack attended Cothill House prep school for five years, solidifying many great friendships and forming a fundamental part of his life. Starting in the bottom sets and sports teams, Jack’s determination led to continual improvement. A term at Sauveterre in France, filled with croissants, newfound attention from girls (absent at Cothill), plenty of sports, and minimal academic demands, proved especially beneficial. By the end of his time at Cothill, Jack had grown significantly in both stature and success, earning a place at Radley. He advanced from the D’s rugby team to the 1st XV, outran the headmaster in cross-country, became a prefect, and won the ‘Victor Ludorum’ cup for the most improved sportsman.

Jack was well-prepared for his journey at Radley. He excelled in rugby, rowing, and shooting. However, the challenges of teenage life soon emerged. Jack preferred beagling over rowing, enjoying the thrill of chasing hounds across the countryside and the quirky company of farmers. He savoured brews from tins over teapots and often returned with the lingering aroma of a bonfire. Jack’s organisation and knack for avoiding trouble made his spontaneous trips to Oxford memorable. Despite COVID-19 cutting his last year short, he earned respectable A levels and secured a place at Newcastle University.

Jack’s ability to remain unphased was evident at the start of his gap year. He worked as a groundsman on a new smart motorway near Southampton to save money for his travels – a unique job compared to his peers. He kept his food budget under £1 a day, excluding beer. Used to sharing a dorm room, Jack earned the respect of his coworkers and received a send-off with a final night out in his honour. He then added bartending to his skill set by attending bar school in Berlin. With global travel restrictions, his main adventure was Costa Rica, which exceeded all expectations.

Jack began his time at Newcastle University living in the well-known Castle Leazes student accommodation, which at first glance was little more than mud and concrete. However, he made his room feel homely, hosting games of cards and backgammon with his homebrewed

beverages. Jack loved a good party, and Newcastle was perfect for it. Towards the end of year one Jack met a great match for himself up in Edinburgh. Fortune favoured him and she soon became his girlfriend. Despite the challenges of a long-distance relationship their bond grew ever stronger.

Jack was an exceptional young man, always eager to chat with anyone, and known for his beloved cheeky grin. These qualities were evident at his memorial, where the chapel at Radley was packed with those who cherished his memory.

A note from Tania Chisholm

The Mongol Rally fundraising effort by Louis Giffard-Moore (2015, J) and Harry Chisholm in aid of #JackTheLad and Cool Earth

Their adventure started with a suitably grey and damp day from bucolic England, progressed through Eastern Europe and on into Asia. A fair few formerSoviet countries were navigated before embarking across the great expanses and spectacular landscapes of the ’Stans, finally waving farewell to Periwinkle, their trusty automobile, at Almaty in far flung Kazakhstan. It has certainly been a stupendous journey.

Memories were made and most importantly funds were raised to bring some positive meaning to the sudden and unexplained death of a brother and friend to many at Radley and beyond. At the time of writing, a very impressive £20,000 has been raised. Thanks to the additional generosity of sponsors, mysterious oil leeks, dropped engines, cracked wheel rims, raised suspensions to navigate some very questionable ‘roads’ did not halt the steady progress of our valiant fundraisers.

Should any Old Radleians be curious enough to have a peep at their stories on Instagram #ladsforjack, or in a generous mood, any top ups to the big fundraising effort are most welcome and certainly appreciated at www.gofundme.com/f/jackchisholm

Jack Chisholm died on 10th June 2023. Jack is survived by his wonderful family: his parents, Martin and Tania, and his brother, Harry.

Jack Chisholm

CELEBRATE YOUR RADLEY REUNION

OLD RADLEIAN DAY 2025, SAT 13TH SEPTEMBER

WHICH YEAR GROUPS ARE INVITED?

• 2010–2015 (10 Year Reunion)

• 2000–2005 (20 Year Reunion)

• 1990–1995 (30 Year Reunion)

• 1980–1985 (40 Year Reunion)

• 1970–1975 (50 Year Reunion)

If you have friends in these year groups but it’s not your reunion year you are still welcome! Get in touch if you want to come along and celebrate. FIND OUT MORE ABOUT

We will be inviting ORs celebrating their decade reunions to celebrate in style by joining your year group back at the College for a day of fabulous food & drink, tours (including your Social!), and reconnecting with friends and dons.

Old Radleian Day is also open to all ORs. So, gather your Radley friends and pop the date into your diary!

2025 EVENTS CALENDAR

SPORTS EVENTS

• Heads of Sports Clubs Dinner – January, London

• Sportsman’s Social – February/March, London

BUSINESS EVENTS

• Made in Britain – March, London

• Careers in Law – November, London

ARCHIVES EVENTS

• Radley Then & Now: 1960s – February, Online

• Radley Then & Now: Shop – May, Online

CELEBRATIONS

• Livery Dinner – March (TBC), London

• Radleian Society AGM & Lunch – Saturday 26th April, Radley College

• Parents’ Drinks Parties – May/June, London

• Wags’ Retirement Hog Roast – Sunday 29th June, Radley College

• Old Radleian Day – Saturday 13th September, Radley College

• OR Dinner, in honour of Wags – Thursday 9th October, Lord’s Cricket Ground

• Young OR Christmas Drinks – December, London

RADLEY FOUNDATION EVENTS

• War Memorial Fund Celebration – Sunday 27th April, Radley College

• Hugo Rutland Memorial Fund Golf & Cricket Day – Friday 11th July, Radley College

RADLEIAN SOCIETY

Radley College, Abingdon, OX14 2HR