St. Mary's Catholic College (Blackpool)

St. Mary's Catholic College is a school in Layton, Blackpool, Lancashire. The school is a specialist Arts College.

With over 1800 pupils, it is the largest Roman Catholic secondary school in Lancashire. The school is on the site of the former Convent of the Holy Child Jesus (usually known as Layton Hill Convent, Blackpool), on St. Walburga's Road near to Blackpool Victoria Hospital.

chool history

The Society of the Holy Child Jesus (SHCJ) is a Catholic religious order for women which was founded in England in 1846. It follows the rules of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuit order for men). In 1856, Alexander Goss, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Liverpool (in which Diocese Blackpool then was) invited the sisters of the Society of the Holy Child Jesus to send out a branch from their house in Liverpool to teach in Father Bampton's Poor School on Talbot Road, Blackpool and they had arrived with 12 girl boarders. With accommodation in Queen's Square acquired for themselves and for the girls, the school flourished.

After four years of such success, Bishop Goss agreed that the sisters could be rather more adventurous than their original mandate. So, in 1860, the original St Mary's was founded as a school for girls. This original school was located in a building called Raikes Hall in Raikes Parade, Blackpool. It is now a pub called the Raikes Hotel.

Again success was marked by rapid growth and in 1870 St Mary's moved to the site which the sisters already owned at Layton Hill where were located the original premises, much of which are still extant and form part of the modern school.

The school admitted boys by 1880 but in 1900 they were separated out and St Joseph's College, Blackpool was founded for them in Park Road where they were taught by lay teachers. There were several removals between Park Road and Whitegate Lane (now Whitegate Drive) and back until St Joseph's finally moved to new premises (called Layton Mount) on Newton Drive in 1918. In 1923 Archbishop Frederick Keating (Liverpool had become an Archdiocese in 1911) invited the Irish Christian Brothers in Liverpool to take over the running of St Joseph's and they did so. In November 1924, Blackpool was transferred into the new Diocese of Lancaster. The brothers remained in charge at St Joseph's until their enforced departure in 1975 when a new Lancaster Diocesan rule required all Catholic Schools to become co-educational. As the constitution of the order of the Christian Brothers forbade them to teach girls, they were unable to stay. In that year St Joseph's re-merged with Layton Hill Convent to form St Mary's Catholic College.

Meanwhile Layton Hill Convent had been flourishing as the principal Catholic girls' grammar school in the Fylde and it was it's Head Teacher since 1966, Sister Maureen Grimley (SHCJ) (1932–2007), who became the first Head Teacher of the re-combined school.

In 1977 the administration of the school was taken over by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Lancaster although Sister Maureen remained as Head Teacher until 1984 and sisters of the order still teach there. Initially the reunited school operated on two campuses, but the St Joseph's campus was shut down in the early 1980s and sold for housing development. Further expansion occurred in 1982 when the school was merged with two Catholic former secondary modern schools St Thomas of Canterbury's and St Catherine's. The current headmaster is Mr S Tierney.

Notable alumni

At Layton Hill

*Dorothy Byrne - Head of News and Current Affairs, Channel 4
*Mary Josephine Dunn (Jo Beverley) (b. 1947), a prolific British-Canadian writer of popular historical romance novels under her married name.
*Cecilia Loftus (1876-1943) - Actress, singer, mimic, vaudevillian and music hall performer
*Sheila Quinn (Dame Sheila Quinn) (b. 1920) - Fellow of the Royal College of Nursing and distinguished Nursing Administrator

At St Catherine's

*The Nolan Sisters - Anne (b. 1950), Denise (b. 1952), Maureen (b. 1954), Linda (b. 1959) and Bernadette (Bernie) (b. 1960) who were singing stars of stage and television from the 1970s till 2005.

At St Joseph's

*David Atherton,OBE (b. 1944), youngest ever orchestral conductor at both the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden (where he was resident conductor for 12 years) and at the BBC Proms Concerts (annual appearances for 30 years), regular conductor at English National Opera, Canadian Opera Company and Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Metropolitan Opera in New York, co-founder of London Sinfonietta, and stacks more. His father, Robert Atherton, was Music Master at St Joseph's College
*George Carman QC (1929-2001), distinguished defence counsel in many of the most celebrated criminal trials of the last quarter of the 20th century.
*John Mahoney (b. 1940) - American film and television actor best known for his role as "Martin Crane" on the sitcom "Frasier"
*Tom McNally (Lord McNally) (b. 1943) - politician, political advisor to Labour Foreign Secretary then Prime Minister Jim Callaghan, Labour MP, then SDP MP, then influential political lobbyist and finally Leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords
*Owen Oyston (b. 1934) - Self-made businessman and former owner of Blackpool F.C.; later convicted of rape and sentenced to five years imprisonment
*Paul Sloane (b. 1950) - Business visionary and motivational speaker
*Lawrence Whalley (MD, DPM, FRCP(E), FRCPsych), Crombie Ross Professor of Mental Health at the University of Aberdeen

* *

External links

* [http://www.st-mary.blackpool.sch.uk/index.php St Mary's Catholic College Website]
* [http://www.stjosephsblackpool.com/history.htm St Joseph's College history]
* [http://freespace.virgin.net/mc.storey/mc.storey/index.html/html/st_john_s.html A history of St John's Catholic Church, Poulton-Le-Fylde which includes all the early history of Layton Hill]
* [http://www.stjosephsblackpool.com/about.htm St Joseph's College Blackpool Old Boy's Association website]
* [http://www.blackpool4me.com/Blackpool4Me/Learning/BlackpoolHistory/BlackpoolHistory/BlackpoolHistorySchoolMottos.htm Mottoes and Houses of all known present and past schools in Blackpool with a photo of the old St Joseph's College building in Newton Drive]
* [http://www.st-mary.blackpool.sch.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=313&Itemid=1 Sister Maureen Grimley's obituary from St Mary's website]
* [http://www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/blackpoolnews/Nun-who-reformed-her-college.2856689.jp Sister Maureen Grimley's obituary from the website of the Gazette, Blackpool's daily evening newspaper]
* [http://www.blackpool4me.com/Blackpool4Me/Learning/BlackpoolHistory/BlackpoolHistory/BlackpoolHistoryAppendixO.htm Several accounts of ghosts at St Mary's and at Raikes Parade in a review of ghosts in Blackpool!]