Famous Names

Bootham School – old scholars of note who have attended the school since its foundation. The list is based on the entries that are found in Wikipedia website. Please feel free to add more names to this list.

Please email oldscholars@boothamschool.com with your suggestions.

Horace Alexander (1889–1989), Quaker envoy and mediator

Geoffrey Appleyard (1916–1943), engineer, skier, oarsman, soldier

Sir Michael Barber, Head of the Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit responsible for implementation of priority programmes in health, education, transport, policing, etc. (2001 - 2005)

Geoffrey Barraclough (1908–1984), Professor of Medieval History, University of Liverpool, 1945–1956, Stevenson Research Professor, University of London, 1956–1962, Chichele Professor of Modern History, University of Oxford, 1970–1972, and Professor of History, Brandeis University, 1968–1970, 1972–1981

Richard Bevan Braithwaite (1900–1990), Knightbridge Professor of Moral Philosophy, University of Cambridge, 1953–1967

John Bright (1811–1889), Rochdale mill owner, Anti-Corn Law League leader, President of the Board of Trade, 1868–1870, and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, 1873–1874, 1880–1882

John Theodore Cash (1854–1936), physician, pharmacologist, Regius Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeutics, University of Aberdeen, 1886–1919

Alfred Joseph Clark (1885–1941), physician, and Professor of Pharmacology, University of Cape Town, 1918–1920, Professor of Pharmacology, University College, London, 1920–1926, and Professor of Materia Medica, University of Edinburgh, 1926–1941

Sir Alec Clegg (1909–1986), Chief Education Officer of the West Riding of Yorkshire, 1945–1974

James Watson Corder (1868-1953). A historian best remembered for documenting family history in Sunderland.

John Crosfield (1832–1901), chemical manufacturer

Christopher Dow (1916–1998), economist, Assistant Secretary-General and Chief Economist, OECD, 1963–1973, and Executive Director (Economics), Bank of England, 1973–1981

Richard Fell (born 1948), British High Commissioner to New Zealand, and the colonial Governor of the Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno Islands, 2001 - 2006

Robert Goodwill (born 1956) Conservative member of Parliament for Scarborough and Whitby, 2005-

Edward Grubb (1854–1939), pacifist and social reformer

Sir Edmund Happold (1930-1996), structural engineer - designed Bootham School Hall in 1965, founder of Buro Happold. 

Thomas Maxwell Harris (1903–1983), palaeobotanist, and Professor of Botany, University of Reading, 1934–1968

Jeremy Heywood (attended Bootham from 1973-1980), Cabinet Secretary from January 2012. Having previously worked with Conservative ministers such as Norman Lamont, he was then chosen by Prime Minister Tony Blair to be his Principal Private Secretary at 10, Downing Street. Subsequently he has served both Gordon Brown and David Cameron in the same role. He was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) in the 2012 New Year Honours. 

Eric Holttum (1895–1990), Director, Singapore Botanic Gardens, 1925–1949, and Professor of Botany, University of Singapore, 1949–1954

Sir Joseph Burtt Hutchinson (1902–1988), Geneticist, Empire Cotton Growing Corporation, 1937–1957, and Draper's Professor of Agriculture, University of Cambridge, 1957–1969

Jamie McKendrick (born 1955), poet, named as one of the Poetry Society's 'New Generation' poets in the 1990s, with the Society selecting his 1997 collection Marble Fly as a Poetry Society Book Choice. Marble Fly also won the 'Best Poetry Collection of the Year' award at the Forward Poetry Prize ceremony.

Charles Hesterman Merz (1874–1940), electrical engineer

Sir Ashley Miles (1904–1988), Professor of Bacteriology, University College Hospital, London, 1937–1952, Deputy Director, National Institute for Medical Research, 1946–1952, Director, Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine, 1952–1971, and Professor of Experimental Pathology, University of London, 1952–1988

George Mosse (1918–1999), historian

Egbert Morland (1874–1955), physician, medical writer, and tuberculosis specialist

Peter Murray-Rust (born 1941), chemist

Sir George Newman (1870–1948), Chief Medical Officer to the Board of Education, 1907–1919, and Chief Medical Officer to the Ministry of Health, 1919–1935

Philip Noel-Baker, Baron Noel-Baker (1889–1982), Secretary of State for Commonwealth Affairs, 1947–1950, Minister of Fuel and Power, 1950–1951, and Nobel Peace Laureate

Francis Oliver (1864–1951), palaeobotanist, Quain Professor of Botany, University College, London, 1890–1929, and Professor of Botany, University of Cairo, 1929–1935

Sir George Pepler (1882–1959), town planner

Hilary Pepler (1878–1951), printer, puppeteer and social reformer

Sir Alan Pim (1871–1958), administrator in India and adviser to the Colonial Office

William Dent Priestman (1847–1936), mechanical engineer

John Wigham Richardson (1837–1908), shipbuilder

Lewis Fry Richardson (1881–1953), mathematician, physicist, psychologist, and pacifist

Brian Rix, Baron Rix (born 1924), actor and charity worker

Sir Stuart Rose (born 1949), Chief Executive, Marks & Spencer

Joseph Rowntree (1836–1925), chocolate manufacturer

Joshua Rowntree (1844–1915), politician and social reformer

John Wilhelm Rowntree (1868–1905), chocolate manufacturer and Quaker activist

Benjamin Seebohm Rowntree (1871–1954), chocolate manufacturer and sociologist

Michael Ruse (born 1940), historian and philosopher of science

Frederic Seebohm (1833–1912), banker and historian

A.J.P. Taylor (1906–1990), historian and left-wing campaigner

Frank Thistlethwaite (born 1915),Vice-Chancellor of the University of East Anglia (1961-1980)

Silvanus P. Thompson (1851–1916), Professor of Physics, University College, Bristol, 1878–1885, and Principal and Professor of Electrical Engineering, Finsbury Technical College

Victor Watson (born 1928), former chairman of John Waddington, the producers of board games Monopoly and Cluedo.

Bootham's most famous athlete was Philip Noel Baker who was a silver-medallist runner in the Olympic Games in Stockholm in 1912 (and was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1959 for his work on disarmament and international peace).

In more recent times, former scholar Sophie McGill has worked wonders for the fortunes of York City Football Club, just round the corner from the school!