The Latymer School is a selective, mixed grammar school in Edmonton, London, England, established in 1624 by Edward Latymer. According to league tables, Latymer is one of the top state-funded schools in the country.
History and traditions
Latymer was established in 1624 on Church Street, Edmonton by bequest of Edward Latymer, a London City merchant in Hammersmith. Although most of his wealth passed to the people of Hammersmith and the Parish of St Dunstan's (now Latymer Upper School), he named certain properties and estates to fund the education and livelihoods of "eight poore boies of Edmonton" with a doublet, a pair of breeches, a shirt, a pair of woollen stockings and shoes distributed biannually on Ascension Day and All Saints' Day. Pupils wore the red Latymer cross on their sleeves.
The school has formal links with St John's College, Cambridge (Edward Latymer's College) and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge (the College of Edward Latymer's father, William Latymer) which have endowments which may be used for the furtherance of the studies of former Latymer pupils at those colleges.
In 1662, John Wild of Edmonton made a bequest for the annual maintenance of a schoolmaster and a poor scholar at Cambridge. In 1697, Thomas Style extended the bequest to fund the education of "twenty poor boys ... Grammar and Latin tongue." Several similar benefactions produced about £550 per annum, which funded the instruction of more than one hundred boys, of which sixty were clothed. In 1811, Ann Wyatt, a widow from Hackney, willed her Navy Annuities for the construction and maintenance of a new school. The school-room was built in 1811 in accordance to her will.
The school did not take on Latymer's name for some centuries, when it finally did, it was known as Latymer's School. At some point, the apostrophe was dropped and the name modified to the Latymer School. It has been situated on its present site since 1910, when it also became coeducational. The school motto, Qui Patitur Vincit ('Who endures wins'), was also adopted in 1910 by Richard Ashworth, then headmaster. Prior to this, the motto was Palmam Qui Meruit Ferat ('Let he who bears the palm (of honour) deserve it').
In 1967 the school switched to a comprehensive intake as a result of Circular 10/65, a request from the Labour government to local education authorities to plan for conversion to a fully comprehensive education system. However, a certain amount of informal selection still took place in liaison with local primary schools.
In 1988, Latymer took advantage of the Education Reform Act 1988 to become a Grant-Maintained school with selective entrance exams once more. Grant-maintained status was abolished by the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 and Latymer reverted to voluntary aided status.
School site
Much of the north end of the school (principally the Small Hall and surrounding rooms) was built in 1910 after the Old Latymer Schoolhouse (Built mainly by Ann Wyatt and extended in the time of Charles Dolbé) in Church Street was abandoned. The buildings on the present site were provided by Middlesex County Council at a cost of £6,782, and accommodated 150 pupils. Twelve classrooms built in 1924 in the North Block allowed pupil capacity to triple.
The Great Hall, science laboratories and South Block were opened in a ceremony in 1928 by the Duke and Duchess of York. Fully equipped with stage and seating for over 1,000 people, the hall is used for school assemblies, concerts, drama productions and other major events. It is home to the Davis organ, which was repaired and upgraded in 2005.
The gymnasia, art studios and technology block were opened in 1966 by Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother. The 12 science laboratories and 6 technology rooms (including facilities for graphic design, product design, textiles and cookery) were re-equipped and modernised in the late 1990s.
Much of the school was modernised in the time of Dr. Trefor Jones. The balconies were altered in the Great Hall so that the pillars were not so obstructive to the view of the stage and the balustrade removed and replaced with panels of fluted light oak. Dark green tiles adorned the walls below the dado rail in much of the older parts of the school which were removed and the walls refinished.
The Ashworth library holds approximately 20,000 volumes and is run by a chartered librarian. A separate Learning Resources Centre (LRC) contains a further 2,000 reference volumes, a selection of periodicals, and computing facilities.