High School of Montreal

The school was founded in 1843 by a group of Montreal professionals and merchants who saw the need for a Protestant secondary school which respected 19th-century ideas of education. It was modelled on the Royal High School, Edinburgh. Several of the founders, led by James Ferrier, with William Lunn, William Collis Meredith, David Torrance, and the Rev. Henry Esson, were of Presbyterian Scottish origins, and one of their purposes in establishing the school was to provide a solution to the growing influence of Anglicanism in education at the time. In short, they saw a need for a means of access to McGill College not controlled by supporters of the Church of England. In August 1843, ''The Gentleman's Magazine'' reported, under 'Civil Preferments', "Rev. G. F. Simpson to be Rector of the Public College of Canada, about to be established at Montreal", suggesting that the name of the school still remained to be decided. The school was first organized as a private institution, under a board of directors. ==History==

The school's first Principal, the Rev. George Foster Simpson, M.A., was a young Englishman, a graduate and former scholar of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, born in 1811. He opened the school in November 1843 at Bingham House, which had been leased by the directors of the school, and within a few months 167 boys had been enrolled. The end-of-year ceremony in the summer of 1844, presided over by Peter McGill, with Lord Metcalfe to present the prizes, was held in the large hall that had been the ballroom of Bingham House. The boys at the school in its early days included Thomas White,(and so the Principal of the new school was titled "Rector and Master of the Royal Grammar School" for over a century). Newton Bosworth, describing the school in a guide to Montreal of 1846, reported that it had accommodation for between three and four hundred pupils, that the Rector had several able assistants, and that the fees were £10 a year "in the higher branches" and £6 a year in "the preparatory branches". Shortly afterwards the directors received £98-3s-6d as the balance of the grant for the year 1846, and also £141-2s-3d for the six months ended 30 June 1847. In 1850, Foster resigned as Rector and returned to England, where he became headmaster of Lincoln Grammar School, but died suddenly in 1857. In 1864, during the American Civil War, on hearing of the St Albans Raid from Montreal into the US by Confederate soldiers, the school organized a company called the Montreal High School Cadet Rifles. This continued to operate for some twenty years and was disappointed not to be mobilized at the time of the Fenian raids between 1866 and 1871. In September 1870, control of the school was transferred again, this time to the Protestant Board of School Commissioners. Soon after that, J. W. Dawson, principal of McGill, began to press the Protestant Board to create a high school for girls, and in 1875 this came into being as a separate division, with its own "lady principal" and four other teachers, all trained at the McGill Normal School. This was made possible by a local school tax and was the spur for the planning of a new building, opened in 1878. To begin with, the girls' classes had been taught in private houses. The separate girls' school continued to exist in shared buildings until 1965, when for the first time the divisions for boys and girls were united under one principal. The boys' High School provided elementary as well as secondary education, with a junior division called the Preparatory High School. The girls' school did not at first include elementary classes, which came a few years later in the new building, No cause was ever identified for the fire. The school has been described as "the secondary school for the city's Protestant elite", but as reported by Margaret W. Westley, "By 1906, the Protestant Board of School Commissioners was operating fifteen publicly financed elementary schools and three secondary schools, some of which were located conveniently close to residents of the Square Mile. Most renowned was the High School of Montreal. One of the comments made most frequently by graduates about the High School of Montreal is that there one met and knew people from all walks of life and all backgrounds, something not true of the private schools." However, in 1906, the Rector and Master, Wellington Dixon, who had succeeded Rexford in 1903, reported "The High School is not free. It is supported by fees paid by the pupils, a Government grant of $2,000, and by grants from the rate. In return for the Government grant of $2,000, thirty free tuitions are ordered by the Lieutenant-Governor, not on the results of examinations, but on certain conditions of good conduct, etc... The High School (Protestant) does not confine itself to advanced pupils. As before said, the Elementary Schools are free, but the High School takes young children in the Kindergarten and Elementary Departments if the parents are willing to pay the fees. The High School, except in the case of the scholarships already mentioned, is a school for the children of parents who are willing to pay fees. Out of the 1,200 pupils in attendance, 550 are in the High School proper, and 650 in the Kindergarten and Elementary Departments, all of the latter paying fees. In 1906, the school had three separate courses of instruction for pupils, the first two being Classical and Scientific, which ran in parallel, and the other Commercial. One former schoolboy, Dr F. A. C. Scrimger, was awarded the Victoria Cross in 1915 for outstanding bravery under enemy fire. In the late 1970s, with the school under the control of the Protestant School Board of Greater Montreal, the decision was taken to close it with effect from June 1979, largely the result of a decline in the English-speaking population in the area. Subsequently, the mostly French-speaking F.A.C.E. School (Fine Arts Core Education) moved into its empty premises. Like the former High School, FACE is both a primary and secondary school. ==Buildings==

after the high school's time there The school's first home was Bingham House, a former vice-regal residence at the corner of Notre Dame and St Denis Streets. In 1845 a new school building was begun in La Gauchetière Street, with an entrance on Belmont Street, later to become the McGill Normal School, with its cornerstone being laid by Lord Metcalfe, the Governor General, and in 1846 the High School moved into it. The new school building, designed by John Ostell, was described as "in the Domestic approaching to Tudor style of architecture" and was sixty yards by nineteen, not counting a portico which projected thirteen feet, with a Lecture and Examination Hall nineteen yards square. Shortly afterwards, the Royal Grammar School joined the High School of Montreal there, following the death of its Master. When the school was transferred to the Protestant School Commissioners in 1870, the building came with it. In 1878, to bring the boys' and girls' schools together under the same roof, a new building on Metcalfe Street was constructed, but Burnside Hall was not sold until 1883. In 1890, the school's building on Peel and Metcalfe Streets burned down, probably a case of arson, but the cause was never determined. A new school on the same site was opened in 1892. In the meantime, classes were divided between schools in Metcalfe Street and Berthelet Street and the Fraser Institute. The new building on Peel Street had thirty-two classrooms, those in the south wing for girls and in the north wing for boys. The corridors both led to an administrative heart at the centre, with gates topped by iron spikes to separate girls and boys. The site at 1455 Peel Street was later occupied by the Mount Royal Hotel, which in the 1980s was converted into the present-day Les Cours Mont-Royal. In 1911, with the school continuing to expand, a site for a new building was acquired, and in 1914 construction began of the school's final home, at 3449 University Street. The school was able to move in during September 1915. There was also a shooting gallery, where sixteen people could shoot at targets 25 yards away, but at first it was used only by the boys, as was a room for sloyd. The library was common ground, but the physics and chemistry laboratories were in the boys' wing. Art was taught in separate rooms, and although the swimming pool was shared, girls and boys used it at different times. At first there was only one gymnasium, for boys, but soon the school's auditorium was converted into a girls' gym and a new auditorium was added behind the H-block. There were two sports rooms in the basement and two large recreational areas on the school's flat roof, each with views of the city and nearer views of each other. ==Rectors==

The full title of the school's principal from 1846 until the mid-20th century was "Rector and Master of the Royal Grammar School". In practice, the title of "Rector" was usually used. By the 1960s, the word "Principal" was in use. • 1922 to 1929: Dr Isaac Gammell LLD • 1929 to 1935: Rev. Canon James E. Fee MA • 1935 to 1945: Thomas Sommerville MA • 1945: Leonard Unsworth BSc • 1956 to 1974: Henry E. Wright ==Principals of the High School for Girls==

• 1875–1880: Louisa Scott • 1894–1896: Miss Maria E. Findlay • 1896–1903: Rev. Elson I. Rexford • 1911–1930: Miss Lillian Hendrie • 1939: Miss Catherine I. Mackenzie • 1946: Miss J. Grace Gardner B.A. • 1952: Miss E. C. Rorke B.A. • 1962: Miss Carrie L. Brodie (becoming Vice-Principal of the united school in 1965) ==Notable staff==

• William Raphael (1833–1914) taught art at the school • Guillaume Couture (1851–1915) taught music at the High School for Girls from 1885 to 1914 ==Notable pupils==

In chronological order. by "Spy" for Vanity Fair (right) on a Bank of Montreal banknote • Thomas White (1830–1888), journalist and politician • George Holt Henshaw (1831–1891), engineer • George Washington Stephens, Sr. (1832–1904), business man and politician • Andrew Frederick Gault (1833–1903), industrialist and philanthropist • Charles Hamilton (1834–1919), Archbishop of Ottawa and Metropolitan of Canada • Isidore Gordon Ascher (1835–1914), British-Canadian novelist and poet • William Watson Ogilvie (1835–1900), miller and soldier • John Lorn McDougall (1838–1909), Ontario business man • Henry Birks (1840–1928), business man • William Dawson LeSueur (1840–1917), civil servant and author • Henry George Vennor (1840–1884), geologist and ornithologist • Henry Aylmer (1843–1918), soldier and politician • Charles Blackwell (1843–1906), civil engineer • Frederick Montizambert (1843–1929), physician and civil servant • George Campbell MacDougall (1843–1892), stockbroker • Christopher Benfield Carter (1844–1906), politician • David Ross McCord (1844–1930), lawyer and founder of the McCord Museum • Sir Charles Rose, 1st Baronet (1847–1913), race horse breeder, yachtsman, and politician • John Thomas Finnie (1847–1925), physician and politician • George Mercer Dawson (1849–1901), geologist and surveyor • Sir Edward Seaborne Clouston, 1st Baronet (1849–1912), banker and financier • Edward Black Greenshields (1850–1917), business man and art collector • Jeffry Hall Brock (1850–1915), business man • Sydney Arthur Fisher (1850–1921), politician • John Stewart McLennan (1853–1939), publisher and politician • William Henry Drummond (1854–1907), humorist and poet • Charles Henry Gould (1855–1919), librarian and musician • Alexander Webb Morris (1856 –1935), business man and politician • Sir Frederick W. A. G. Haultain (1857–1942), politician and judge • William Douw Lighthall (1857–1954), lawyer, historian, novelist, poet and philosopher • James Fielding Sweeny (1857–1940), Anglican Bishop of Toronto and Metropolitan of Ontario • William Alexander Weir (1858–1929), lawyer, politician, and judge • Frank Dawson Adams (1859–1942), geologist • Charles Ernest Gault (1861–1946), politician • Frederick George Scott (1861–1944), poet, chaplain, author (The Great War As I Saw It) • Ernest J. Chambers (1862–1925), Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod • Peter Samuel George Mackenzie (1862–1914), lawyer and politician • Sir Mortimer Barnett Davis (1866–1928), business man and philanthropist • James Edward Le Rossignol (1866–1959), professor of economics • George Washington Stephens Jr. (1866–1942), politician • Edward Maxwell (1867–1923), architect • Sir Charles Blair Gordon (1867–1939), banker, manufacturer, and diplomat • Octavia Ritchie (1868–1948), High School for Girls, physician and suffragist • Charles Allan Smart (1868–1937), politician • David Robertson Brown (1869–1946), architect • Charles Monsarrat (1871–1940), bridge engineer • Wilfred Lucas (1871–1940), actor, director, and screenwriter • William Sutherland Maxwell (1874–1952), architect • Graham Drinkwater (1875–1946), ice hockey player, business man and philanthropist • Andrew Ross McMaster (1876–1937), politician • Walter George Mitchell (1877–1935), lawyer and politician • George Allen Ross (1879–1946), architect, partner in Ross and Macdonald • Francis Alexander Caron Scrimger VC (1880–1937), doctor honoured with the Victoria Cross • George Washington Kendall (1881–1921) sports promoter • Talbot Mercer Papineau (1883–1917), lawyer and soldier • George Gordon Hyde (1884–1946), lawyer and politician • John Goodwin Lyman (1886–1967), American-born modernist painter • Orville Sievwright Tyndale (1887–1952), judge and Chancellor of McGill University • Irene Pavloska (1889–1962), mezzo-soprano and composer • Joseph Cohen (1891–1973), lawyer, academic, and politician • Anne Savage (1896–1971), artist • George Buchanan Foster (1897–1974), First World War flying ace and lawyer • Norma Shearer (1902–1983), actress • John Bland (1911—2002), architect • Albert Chartier (1912–2004), cartoonist and illustrator • Davidson Dunton (1912–1987), journalist, administrator, and Chairman of the CBC • Louis Dudek (1918–2001), poet, academic, and publisher • Edward Nower (1921–2006), footballer • Ghitta Caiserman-Roth (1923–2005), artist • Oscar Peterson (1925–2007), jazz pianist and composer • Christopher Plummer (1929–2021), actor • Tom Manastersky (1929–2012), Canadian Football League halfback • Mort Ransen (1933–2021), film and television director and screenwriter • Robert Silverman (1933–2022), cycling activist • Alvin Cramer Segal (born 1933), business man and philanthropist • Christina Perks (born 1935), architect • Victor Malarek (born 1948), journalist and author ==References==