Bentham Grammar School


Bentham Grammar School was an independent school in Bentham, North Yorkshire, England. The school was founded in 1726 but closed in 2002 due to dwindling pupil numbers.

History

Bentham Grammar School was founded as a charity in 1726 in the village of Bentham by William Collingwood, a gentleman of York. It educated, first the boys of the local villages and later, in the twentieth century, also fee-paying boarders from a wider area. Girls were educated in small numbers until the 1930s when the school became fully co-educational. The first school was situated on School Hill in High Bentham, but after the 1870 Education Act the building was required for state elementary education and the school moved to a site at Moon's Acre in 1878. In 1948 under its new post-war headmaster John Webb the school moved again, this time to the beautiful Norman Shaw rectory building in Low Bentham. In its earlier days the school educated about 40 - 50 local boys. After 1946 numbers steadily grew until the school was admitting between 200 and 400 boys and girls. The school provided a full range of academic and practical subjects from nursery to A-level.

Closure

The School closed in August 2002.
After its closure, the school was taken over by Sedbergh School as its junior department, which was later transferred to Sedbergh itself in 2008. The building is now in use as the Cedar House School, a school for children with behaviour, emotional and social difficulties, communication difficulties and complex learning difficulties.

Notable alumni