Comments & Editorials 17
Editorial (1975)

The close of the 1974-75 school year saw the retirement of Dr. R. F. E. Watson after twenty years as headmaster of the school.

Dr. Watson was appointed when the school opened in 1955 and it is mainly to his wise direction of policies and to his scholarly ideals that the school owes its success and its standing as an educational establishment. Not the least of Dr. Watson's special talents in this respect was his ability to select men and women as his colleages on the staff who could work together in good fellowship, each bringing his or her particular interest and enthusiasm to the service of the school, so that it would be difficult to find a school which combined high academic standards with so varied and numerous extra curricular activities. In fostering the growth of the Parents' Association and maintaining the closest bonds of interest between it and the life of the school Dr. Watson gave St. Nicholas one of its greatest assets. The encouragement which he gave to the development of music in the school was another significant personal contribution.

It would be commonplace and facile to speak of Dr. Watson's retirement as the "end of an era". Dr. Watson would be the first to reject the cliche as an irrelevance. In his parting words to the school at assembly on the last morning of the summer term he looked to the future, a future which will inevitably entail far-reaching changes and in which the character of the school is bound to be modified. The high ideals of the past twenty years will, however, be needed as much as ever, and the achievements of those years may serve as a springboard for future success. It would be more accurate, therefore, to speak of Dr. Watson's headmastership as having helped to lay the foundations of what we all hope will continue to be a first-rate school.

Dr. Watson will continue to live in Hillingdon and we may look forward to seeing him as a frequent visitor on school occasions. We wish him and Mrs. Watson a long, healthy and happy retirement.