St Peter’s School’s head boy boarding George Edwards-Heeney and deputy head girl Regan Gallien deliver a 90th birthday celebration cake.
Celebrations marking St Peter’s School’s 90th year have started.
Oxford scholar Arthur Francis Brooks Broadhurst scoured the globe for 10 years to find the perfect site for his boys’ preparatory school, which he opened on February 22, 1936.
Students clustered on the school sports fields to capture this aerial photograph on 2026 Athletics Day.
“Broadhurst was possibly a bit eccentric, which added a bit of fun, life and character to the environment,” said Jason Speedy, current head of school.
“I heard a tale that he had some of the senior boys driving his car into Cambridge every day, and he was sitting in the back giving them driving lessons. He would land his Tiger Moth on the cricket fields.”
Now, nine decades on, a range of events are planned to celebrate the school’s history.
They got underway on Monday last week with the return of one of the campus’s oldest traditions – the daily raising and lowering of the St Peter’s flag.
Two days later a whole-school celebration was integrated into athletics day. The birthday bash began with two year 7 students cutting an anniversary cake.
Other highlights included the re-enactment of a historical slow bicycle race – where cyclists battled it out to see who could travel the least distance in 90 seconds – and a performance of the school song ‘When The Saints Go Marching In’ by a student band.
Students also gathered for a commemorative aerial photo, clustering together inside a giant ‘90’ – lines painted by the school’s field-marking robot.
Adding to the festival atmosphere, an enormous gumboot was inflated near a cluster of navy-blue marquees to advertise a limited edition of boots branded with the school’s owl logo.
More than 10,000 students have walked through the school gates since St Peter’s opened in 1936.
Speedy said the school’s boarding houses were full and its roll was “basically at capacity”, with 1230 students.
“If Broadhurst could see St Peter’s today I think he would be blown away positively,” he said.
“To have a world-class environment in Cambridge is amazing, and he couldn’t have picked a better place.”
An event on this year’s birthday celebration calendar will be the opening of the St Peter’s Room in October. Work is underway to renovate a large area above Speedy’s office in the school’s main block.
Speedy said the room would display a collection of photos and treasures accumulated over 90 years of education and would provide a gathering space for past alumni visiting the campus.
St Peter’s School’s head boy boarding George Edwards-Heeney and deputy head girl Regan Gallien deliver a 90th birthday celebration cake.
