Happy New Year! As another year passes and we enter 2021, many of us will be looking forward to the future and (hopefully) a much happier year than 2020. However, we in the archives love to also look to the past and reflect on how much has changed over the years. Therefore, to kick off the year, we are travelling back 100 years through our Oakhamian Magazines to look at how the school was in 1921.
Oakham School Archives Blog
Welcome to the Oakham School Archives blog. Here we will update you on news and projects from the archives. If you have any particular interests about the archives or history of the school, please email ArchivesUser@oakham.rutland.sch.uk or call 01572 758 608
Leavers 2020 booklet announcement.
Swimming has had nearly 140 years of history here at Oakham School.
Oakham School Archives remembers all of those who fought and died in conflicts around the world. Form 6 A Level History pupils Danny, Peter and Lally read out a letter from OO Basil Mogridge, written from the front lines (held in Oakham School Archives).
November 2020 sees Oakham School celebrate the 40th birthday of girl’s boarding house, Rushebrookes. This is the third house this year, along with Buchanans and Wharflands, which is celebrating a milestone birthday.
Last month, we celebrated the 100th anniversary of Wharflands House. This month we turn to the second of our houses who have a special anniversary this year: Buchanans. This year celebrates the 45th anniversary of Buchanans as a school boarding house.
We are very pleased to announced our first video exhibition focusing on sports at Oakham School.
On the 80th Anniversary of the Battle of Britain in 1940, Oakham School archives remembers the four Old Oakhamians who were part of The Few.
This year, we celebrate Wharflands' 100th birthday. In this blog post, we take a look at how Wharflands has evolved over the past century.
Did you know that pupils had been able to do Basketball, Boxing, Girls’ Cricket, Cycling, Fencing, Fives, Golf, Gymnastics, Rugby 7s, Sailing, Shooting, Squash, Boys’ tennis here at Oakham School? In this month's blog post, we will explore the history of Football at the school, a sport played and enjoyed by our boys and girls.
Throughout the years, pupils have been writing about their time at Oakham School, whether in diaries, in letters or in articles published in the school magazines. This month post is written by our Volunteer, Mr. Webb, who looked at Robert Wade-Gery's memories of his time at school in the 19th century.
This year again, I had the pleasure of accompanying the Form 3 Battlefields Trip to France. The Archives contributed to the Form 3 Inquiry skills in the winter term, producing booklets on Old Oakhamians who fell in the Great War. This trip is an opportunity for pupils to learn about the First World War, and the Battle of the Somme, and to remember and honour the OOs’ and soldiers’ sacrifice. You can read here some of the highlights of the tour.
Shakespeare’s Macbeth has been performed no less than four times at Oakham School. It is remembered as a play of “firsts”.
As Christmas draws closer and we all prepare to break up for the festive holidays, here in the archives we thought that we would reflect on the previous term and what we have been up to!




It is a tradition over the August month for our school sports teams to go abroad on a sporting tour. Many countries have been the destination for our pupils but perhaps one of the most exciting and lengthy tours in recent history has been the 2001 World Tour.

This month's blog post has been written for the Archives by School Historian, Brian Needham. Mr Needham explores two families who have had four generations come to this School.

At the beginning of the year, the Archives team helped with the Form 3 study skills project in which pupils were given a booklet on an Old Oakhamian and had to use this as a gateway into researching the First World War.
Rugby has always been an important part of school life here at Oakham. As the Guinness Six Nations Championship started last weekend, we are looking this month at OOs who took part in the competition.


Christmas is an exciting time of year for everyone. Oakham School certainly gets into the festive spirit each year with one of the oldest traditions: decorating a Christmas tree.


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