School Building Project 08
(1963-64)

On Saturday, July 6th, 1963, a simple ceremony inside the building itself officially transformed the "School Building Project" into the "St. Nicholas Junior Common Room", removed the year-old anomaly of a private building on County Council land, and marked the culmination of years of endeavour on the part of parents, boys, staff, and friends of the School.

The meeting, very well attended despite the torrents of rain (traditional St. Nicholas summer weather, in the view of the chairman), was under the chairmanship of Mr. R. W. Deacon, Chairman of our Parents' Association--that vital and vigorous body to whom the School owes an incalculable debt for its foresight, determination and prolonged hard work. Local Councillors, the Divisional Executive and teachers from neighbouring schools were all represented, and among the audience, unidentified, were many of those whose generous loans and gifts had supplemented the money raised from successive Fairs in order to keep pace with (and finally overtake) the steady rise over the years of the estimated costs of this ambitious project.

Mr. Richard Sharp, Rugby Union International and 1962 Captain of England, declared the building open in a serious but witty speech. He admired the building itself and the spirit it represented, both as a token of splendid parent-school co-operation, and as an acknowledgement of the needs of sixth-formers for privacy and some degree of self-determination.

Mr. F. C. Sabin, Education Officer of North-West Middlesex, accepted the gift of the building on behalf of the School governors and the Divisional Executive. He was well aware of the uniqueness of the occasion; he had no personal knowledge of any previous comparable munificence on the part of a Parents' Association. He congratulated the Association warmly, and thanked them, and felt sure that in the long-term their gift to the School (and thus, in effect, to the local authority) would bring them a return in the shape of the improved facilities for their sons.

The Headmaster made clear the gratitude of himself and the Staff to the Association. He gave a short account of the history of the project, and indicated the immense value of such a building to the School as a whole, as well as to the Sixth Form itself. Brief speeches and votes of thanks were also made by an Old Boy (Mr. L. K. Spragg), a past Chairman, now Vice-President, of the Parents' Association (Mr. E. J. Hilburn), and the School Captain (Stephen Bacon) before a dash was made with umbrella escort for distinguished guests!) to the dining-hall for tea.

At the risk of both compromising his amateur status and endangering his physical fitness, Mr. Sharp accepted a commemorative gift of an engraved silver tankard.

J.S.K.