History
Wimbledon High School opens on 74 Wimbledon Hill with 12 students and 3 members of staff. Buildings on Mansel Road follow in 1887.
Miss Edith Hastings was the first Headmistress at Wimbledon High School in 1880 aged 29 and she remained Headmistress until 1908.
School roll reaches 231 students and WHS alumna, the Duchess of Atholl (Kitty Ramsay) composes the music for the School Song, which we still sing today, and whose refrain: 'forward to the unconquered peaks above' gives rise to the name of our student magazine and blog, Unconquered Peaks.
Re-purchase of No.74 Mansel Road and the building is opened as Preparatory School. A year later, boys are allowed to enrol for the Prep.
Miss Ethel Gavin becomes Headmistress.
Three years later, the school name is changed to Wimbledon Hill School.
In 1914, Miss Gavin finds herself in Germany at the outbreak of World War One and it takes her 17 days to make it back to Wimbledon.
In 1917 the Mansel Road building was destroyed by fire and it took the fire trucks 40 mins to arrive from Wandsworth. The school temporarily relocated to Grosevenor Hill and Ridgway place during rebuild. There dates of the rebuild are carved into a stone outside the main entrance to the school.
Having spent a great deal of time at the site clearing away the debris after the fire, Miss Gavin becomes unwelll and sadly dies due to health complications.
Miss Mabel Lewis becomes Headmistress
A year later, the school acquires houses No. 70 and No. 72 Wimbledon Hill Road.
School is reopened by alumna, Duchess of Atholl, following the fire and changes its name back to Wimbledon High School.
£6,000 is raised by parents and alumnae to purchase the former grounds of the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club at Nursery Road as the school's playing fields after the club (now AELTC / the Wimbledon Championships) moves to Church Road in 1922, where it still exists, albeit much expanded.
(You can see commemoration gates to the tennis grounds, installed in 1935, at our Nursery Road site today.)
In 1927, a new Sixth Form building is built (on stilts!) at the end of Mansel Road.
School celebrates its 50th Birthday and in a landmark legal case, heard in the House of Lords, is declared a public school for tax purposes.
A year later, Draxmont Acre is purchased, at the top of the school site (pictured here in the 1960's).
On the outbreak of WWII, some of the Junior School and Preparatory are evacuated to Hanford House near Blandford in Dorset (between September 1939 and July 1940). The rest of the school carries on in Wimbledon despite the bombings.
The war causes damage such as bomb-shattered glass in the senior hall roof and you can read fascinating accounts of student and staff fire watch patrols in (alumna) K.M Peyton's book 'When the Sirens Sounded'.
After 22 years as Headmistress Miss Mabel Lewis retires and Miss Kathleen Littlewood is appointed Headmisstress
A Junior School is built and two year later, the Prep School stops accepting boys.
In 1962 Wimbledon High School was reported to be the top girls' school in England.
Avon House is purchased and in 1974 an outdoor swimming pool is built, along with a science block.
Direct Grant scheme ends and the school completes its first fully independent 11+ entry.
School celebrates its Centenary with concerts and a service of Remembrance in Southwark Cathedral
Computers were first introduced to Wimbledon High School in 1982.
Opening of Piper House by alumna Dame Mary Smieton.
Indoor Swimming Pool opens, followed by the sports hall two years later.
Mrs Elizabeth Baker becomes Headmistress.
Dr Jill Clough takes on the role of Headmistress.
A purpose-built Junior School opens.
Mrs Pamela Wilkes becomes Headmistress.
The Hastings Centre opens, housing Design and Technology workshops, and the school celebrates its 125th Birthday.
A new theatre is opened and named after alumna and actress Dame Margaret Rutherford (WHS 1905) - the Rutherford Centre for the Performing Arts.
Mrs Heather Hanbury becomes Headmistress.
New science laboratories are built and old labs refurbished.
In 2014 Sixth Form House was flooded due to extreme weather conditions that year.
Mrs Jane Lunnon becomes Head.
The School celebrates its 135th Birthday and new school gates and a garden at the entrance are added to Mansel Road.
The newly refurbished sports pavilion opens at Nursery Road.
Building starts on Project Ex Humilibus to create a new STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Maths) Tower, Dining Hall, Auditorium, Sixth Form Centre and Playground in the Sky.
Wimbledon High marks its 140th Birthday
School fully closes its site for the first time in its history and moves to Guided Home Learning, due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Ms Fionnuala Kennedy becomes Head.
STEAM Tower opens in September; students and staff return to school in 'bubbles', amidst Covid restrictions.
Hastings Dining opens, more than doubling the dining space for student and staff lunches (DT having moved to the STEAM Tower two years previously.
New Sixth Form Centre, Auditorium and Playground in the Sky open in September.
The Mansel Road Garden is completed in September.
