Head’s
With space for 75 day boys, Head’s is the largest House in the school. First occupied in 1857 as the Head Master’s boarding House, it has since been converted into generous accommodation for the day boys at Lancing. Its purpose is to provide the day pupils with a House of their own to give them parity of facilities and pastoral structures to the boarders. Its principal aim is to allow them to properly experience the immersive and rewarding richness of boarding school life (and see their parents every day!).
Younger boys in the Third to Fifth Forms have their own alley (desk), and in the Sixth Form have individual pitts (rooms), as well as access to communal facilities such as common rooms, lockers, a pool room, showers, etc. spread over four floors. These facilities were refurbished in 2016.
Head’s boys are unashamedly ambitious and show strength in all areas of the academic and co-curricular life of the school, but that is not to say that the House is in any way elitist: non-polymaths are encouraged and nurtured in equal measure. The mantra here is very much to handle people as individuals, rather than types, and we take great pride in the diversity of background and interests within the House.
On a practical level, Head’s is very close to the Dining Hall and the sports fields, so the House has a tradition of attracting those with healthy appetites. In recent years Head’s has achieved notable successes in the fields of sport, drama, literature and music, with numerous OLs going on to study these subjects at Russell Group universities, or to excel as professional sportsmen and musicians. Even more importantly, great emphasis is placed on promoting the happiness and success of every boy; and we firmly believe that one leads to the other. We pride ourselves on being a sociable, caring and friendly community where humour, tolerance, excellence and liveliness of mind are celebrated.
Meet the House Staff
History of the House
The Head Master’s House was opened on 15 July 1857 by the Founder, Nathaniel Woodard. Forming the south wing of the Lower Quad, it was the first building on the site to be occupied. The upper two floors were dormitories and in the attics lived house tutors, matrons and domestic staff, including the butler.
The Head Master was nominally the Housemaster until 1929; he occupied the whole of the building above the present Head Master’s Office. There were always resident bachelor house tutors and from 1898 they were, in effect, Housemasters; but successive Head Masters and their families were closely involved in the life of the House, as well as living and entertaining there in some style. This particularly applies to Dr Sanderson and Canon Bowlby and their families. Several of the house tutors went on to distinguished careers at Lancing and elsewhere. Among them were Adam Fox (see Field’s), J F Roxburgh (see Sanderson’s), E B Gordon (see Second’s) and W B (Dick) Harris, later Headmaster of St Ronan’s Prep School. Basil Handford (see Handford House) was the first to be Housemaster from 1928 until his marriage in 1931.
Since then there have been only seven, including Christopher (‘Duck’) Walker, Sam Jagger, who ran the squash with great success, Terry Kermode, Ron Balaam, Jeremy Tomlinson and Adrian Arnold. While other parts of the school were being constructed, parts of Head’s were used as Chapel, Dining Hall and classrooms. When a new house was built for the Head Master (see Teme House), a flat was created on the first floor of Head’s for the Housemaster. The boys’ House was gradually expanded with a wing of studies being built on and others developing within the House in the 1970s and 80s.
Although it worked well as a boarding House, when day numbers increased Head’s was an obvious choice to become the first boys’ day House in 2002, being at the front of the school and impossible to adapt to modern residential requirements.
The novelist Evelyn Waugh wrote about his experience as a boy in Head’s in the early 1920s. Other well-known alumni of the House include the tenor Sir Peter Pears, the historian Sir Roger Fulford, the artist Frederick Gore, the Arctic explorer Gino Watkins, Judge Peter Birts and the footballer Andrew Frampton.