Scholarship Boards
The Scholarship Boards which used to grace Heath Grammar School are now outside the main hall at Crossley Heath School.
The Milner scholarships
John Milner of Skircoat attended Heath [1640–1642] and later became the vicar of St John’s Church, Leeds; he had an only son, Thomas, who became vicar of Bexhill; in 1721 he bequeathed a sum of money to Magdalene College, Cambridge to provide scholarships for boys from Westmorland, Leeds and Halifax including Heath. During the 19th century a majority of Heath pupils who went to university went to Magdalene College, Cambridge but we do not know whether they all had Milner scholarships or whether they chose Magdalene College because of its connection with Heath.
The Hastings awards
In the early 18th century Lady Elizabeth Hastings gave some land in Wheldale, better known today as Airedale, near Castleford, to The Queen’s College, Oxford, to fund five students each year selected from pupils of two Cumbrian schools and ten Yorkshire schools.
Taking her inspiration from the account of the selection of Matthias to succeed Judas in Acts 1:26, she instructed the fellows to select eight candidates from the applicants and then to cast lots to select the five who would receive the awards so that the Holy Spirit might have the final say on who would be accepted for an award.
In the spring of 1879 the Provost of The Queen’s College, Oxford informed Thomas Cox that some of the twelve schools in the Hastings scheme had forfeited their privilege and asked whether Heath would be interested. As Thomas Cox did not have any pupils whom he thought he could present, the Provost advised Cox to postpone an application to join the Hastings Scheme until the school had a candidate to submit. Archibald William Reith made a successful application and in 1897 B.E. Taylor [1889–1898] became the first Heath pupil to be a recipient of a Hastings award.
It would appear that The Queen’s College, Oxford was more keen to have Heath join the Hastings Scheme than Heath was to join; after all Heath had access to the Milner Scholarships and had been consistently successful in getting pupils into Oxbridge; so Heath did not need access to another closed scholarship.
But this consistency may have been the very thing which attracted The Queen’s College to Heath; they wanted a school which could consistently put forward candidates for Oxbridge to replace the schools which had failed to do this. Heath’s reputation in this area may also explain why the governors were able to recruit such a well-qualified set of masters when the school reopened in 1887.
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