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The inter scholastics between 1900 and 1903 had been a success if the number of schools showing an interest had anything to do with it.   If column inches were the key factor, then they had been more successful than many other single sporting occasion.   If the area covered were most important, then the schools, and pupils, involved came from a very wide area – Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dundee had all been represented with Aberdeen being the only city which had not; participating schools came from Rothesay, Dumbarton, St Andrew’s, Irvine and Greenock and more besides.   The total list of schools that competed is as follows.

Allan Glen’s, Ardrossan Academy, Ayr Academy, Bellahouston Academy, Clifton Bank (St Andrews)

Dollar Institute, Dumbarton Academy, Dundee High School, Edinburgh Institute, George Watson’s,

Glasgow Academy, Glasgow High School, Greenock Academy, Hamilton Crescent, Hermitage School  (Helensburgh),

Hillhead HS, Hutcheson’s Grammar,  Irvine Royal Academy,  Larchfield Academy, Morrison’s Academy (Crieff),

North Kelvinside, Rothesay Academy, Royal High School, Stewart’s College, St Aloysius,

St Mary’s (Greenock), Whitehill Higher Grade.

There were 27 schools who had been keen enough to take part in the venture, yet the four years to 1913 had respectively 10, 14, 10, 14 schools.   The first meeting had had eight schools, all private schools taking part.   Had there been a logical progression built on these schools to more private establishments with a gradual inclusion of State Schools to the total of 27, a massive meeting, dwarfing the SAAA Championships themselves would have been the result.   

The problem of attendance seems to have been the withdrawal of such as George Watson’s Dollar and Glasgow Academy from the competition.   Why was this? 

*Was the standard of competition low?   No, there were some very good athletes competing with each other.   

*Was the selection of events and age groups not suitable?   That does not appear to have been the case either, but had it been, appropriate changes could have been made.   

*Were the facilities unsuitable?   Nor was the fault there – in Edinburgh the schools’ own grounds were often used and the football grounds in Leith were also used; in Glasgow Hampden Park, Ibrox and Partick Thistle’s facilities appeared on the list.   Officials too were of the appropriate standard.

The problem appeared to be with problems of status between the various private schools – particularly in Edinburgh.   Fettes College just refused to be involved as did Merchiston Castle.   This seemed to act as a deterrent to others who had been enthusiastic and successful contestants in the beginning.   Glasgow Academy seemed to follow on because they also decided to boycott the championships – the only Glasgow school to do so.    The boycotting schools were almost entirely fee-paying schools – Watson’s,  Dollar, Glasgow Academy, Dundee HS, Clifton Bank being the main ones.   

The scene seemed to change after the 1914 – ’18 war: Watson’s led the way and most of the private schools found their way back in and they were joined by the State Schools, initially in small numbers but they grew from there.   The post-war scene is a different story to be looked at in its own right.   But first what was the situation during the War?

There had been 14 schools competing in 1911 but only eight in 1912.   The item below tells the story for 1913

It was back to fourteen.   Four from Edinburgh, two from Glasgow and eight from the ‘provinces’.   The question of numbers had been exciting the interest of schools, journalists, reporters and letter writers since the championships started but more particularly after the first three had been held.   The withdrawal of several fee paying schools, mostly in Edinburgh, and the total non-appearance of Fettes College, was almost always quoted and other schools referred to as ‘lesser’ schools.    After the 1913 version was over the following contribution appeared in the ‘Scottish Referee’.   It analyses the situation and proposes the writer’s own solution to the issue.

The sports did go ahead on 17th May at Ibrox Stadium and the State Schools newspapers covered them well, if briefly.   For instance the following appeared in the ‘Port Glasgow Express’ the Wednesday after the meeting.   There is a pride  and aspiration for the future there that deserves commendation.

There was a poor attendance on the day – maybe not all to do with the weather since previous inter-scholastics had also fared in a similar fashion in past years – but the sports went ahead.

With no team award, the individual winners are summarised below.

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Several new schools winning medals – Dumbarton Academy in their first appearance in the event, Ardrossan too.   It’s a bit of a mystery where the Glasgow schools from 1911 went since the meeting was ‘on their own patch’ with no Hamilton Crescent, no Whitehill or Hutcheson’s Grammar to be seen.   Were we to see all the schools that had shown interest from the start with Dollar Academy, George Watson’s and Glasgow Academy all involved it would indeed be a fairly large meeting.    

The 1912 championships were held on 18th May in Stewart’s College fields in Edinburgh – and the number of competing schools was down to eight.   A disappointment after the 14 of the previous year.   Allan Glen’s, Ayr Academy, Bellahouston Academy, Edinburgh Institution, George Heriots, Royal High School, Rothesay Academy and Stewart’s College were the participants.  There was also a change in the age groups in 1912 with the Under 13 age group now being the Under 14 age group.  The ‘Scottish Referee’ had a number of articles, paragraphs, etc, on the event including a straight account of the results.

There had been many very good athletes taking part over the years and none were written up as the Stewart’s athlete R Cruickshank was. 

The above is from the  justly proud ‘Grantown Supplement’ 0f  20th May. 1912 but even more space is given of the athlete’s performances and ability.

The Edinburgh papers of the time clearly served their readers well and the Edinburgh Evening News too leapt on the Cruickshank bandwagon.  

A good meeting with excellent performances but a fair drop from the previous year’s participants leaving us with the question of where would next year’s venture take us?   

Meanwhile the individual winners  are noted here.

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Lots of good performances there but how did the schools do?    The home team, Stewart’s, had six,  Royal High had four  Allan Glen’s had three, Heriot’s had three, Ayr had two.

In the years leading in to the 1911 version of these championships there was a great play being made of the fact that many of the private schools followed the lead of Fettes College in ignoring them and not taking part at all.   What was to be the future of the event?   The ‘Scotsman’ and the ‘Scottish Referee’ both printed the list of entries which  showed a record number of entries.   The ‘Scotsman’ paragraph is reproduced.

Where there were in the first few inter-scholastic championships more entries from Edinburgh than from the west of the country, there were in 1914 three from Edinburgh, six from Glasgow and four ‘Provincial’ schools would be there.   Note too that not all were private schools.   Less than a third of the entered schools were from the capital.  The meeting might be saved from distinction despite the absence of some of the originators by the expansion across the country and to a wider range of representative schools.    However the trend was not welcomed by all.   Note the condescending tone of the following article in the Edinburgh Evening News.

State schools do not possess the same public interest?   The statement itself is interesting.  As is, “the business is in lesser hands, good of their kind . . ”   No further comment is called for.

The sports themselves went off well at Hampden Park in Glasgow on 20th May and the following report and results are from the ‘Scottish Referee’ of the following Monday.

The complete results  without comment reads.

It is worth noting that of the fourteen schools entered, the three from Edinburgh were all private, of the Glasgow schools three were private and three were not, and of the four from the provinces, Irvine Royal Academy ceased being fee paying in 1927, Greenock Academy was initially fee paying, while Rothesay and Dumbarton were not.    We do not have a note of any school winner.

The winners of the individual events were as follows

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The teacher coaching high jumpers certainly knew his stuff – two pupils sharing first place in the Open events, another being equal first at Under 15 and one more being equal first in the Under 13 age group.    Allan Glen’s had six first places, George Heriot’s had fives,  Hamilton Crescent had four, Royal HS had three, and Rothesay Academy one .

It was a successful meeting with a record number of schools entered and a reasonable number of spectators.  Reports of its demise had probably been exaggerated.

As the above para from the ‘Scottish Referee’ the day before the inter scholastics tells us, there would be ten schools competing on Saturday 21st May in Edinburgh before a bigger crowd that had turned out for the event in Glasgow in 1909.   There were schools who did not, but could have, fielded good quality teams holding their own sports that day and on the previous Saturday, and the ‘Glasgow Herald’ also commented on this.

“Although competitors from 10 schools were forward, the list could not be termed a representative one, especially as such leading schools as Fettes College, Merchiston Castle, Loretto, Edinburgh Academy and George Watson’s College did not give their support to the meeting.”   Names were named but they were all Edinburgh schools and a Glasgow school was omitted – Glasgow Academy who actually held their own sports on the same day as the Inter-Scholastics.

but the entries above showed that there was an interest from Rothesay in the West to Edinburgh in the East, from Ayrshire, Clackmannanshire and Glasgow and the entry was about par for the course.   There was an article about the meeting which read as follows.

The complete results were also printed:-

The rumbling about the absentee schools continued with the continued absence of such as Fettes, Loretto, Merchiston and Glasgow Academy, with the note below published in the ‘Referee’ of Monday 23rd.  

Where would it all end?   The individual winners are noted below.

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Note the new entry – Hamilton Crescent.   New to the prize winners but also a new establishment taking part.

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The tenth Scottish Schools Championship took place as usual on the third Saturday in May at Ibrox Park in Glasgow.   The ‘Scottish Referee’ lamented the support given by the public to what they clearly viewed as a very worthwhile athletics venture.   Read this.

The Sports were held on Monday 17th May and the ‘Referee’ had three separate pieces on the day’s events.   Before we came to the results we read this one.   Note that there was a champion school contest this time round.

Then we come to the results.

The winners are noted below.

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* indicates meeting best performance.   Note the schools winning events for the first time and no fewer than five different schools appearing in the Open category.

1908 was the most dramatic in the nine years that the championships had been running.   Comment has been made of the absence of Glasgow Academy and other schools in recent years but the comment below from the Scottish Referee of Friday 15th May, 1908, on the meetimg to be held the following afternoon.

It says that efforts to bring Watson’s and others such as Dollar back into the event had failed but stops short of saying why this was the case.   Nevertheless the sports went ahead on the Saturday and the Edinburgh Evening News reported as follows on that day’s procedings up to their ‘going to print’ time.

However, the ‘Scottish Referee’ on the following Monday followed the theme of the article on the Frida (above).

There was no team contest despite nine schools contesting the meeting.   That was certainly a step back.   The Edinburgh Evening News followed this up on the Monday with the following comment.

Make what you will of that but Fettes does not emerge well, nor do the other private schools who decided to boycott the meeting.   We know that the inter-scholastics were still doing well in the SAAA half centenary in 1933.   What made the change?    Meanwhile, the results in full were only printed by the ‘Glasgow Herald’.

There being no team winners, the individual winners are noted below.

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There were six schools represented on the winner’s rostrum including Allan Glen’s High School, Bellahouston Academy, Dundee High School, George Heriot’s School, Glasgow High School and Stewart’s College: three from Glasgow, two from Edinburgh and one from Dundee.

The sports of 1907 were contested by 12 schools but there were some notable absentees.   First, the notice that appeared in the papers begore the meeting. 

Unlike the previous year, the weather was forecast to be good but this preview in the ‘Scottish Referee’ was a bit on the gloomy side.   Talk about ‘faint praise’?

There was a brief review of the sports with interesting notes on some of the participants before the actual results were printed.

But what of the schools championship?   Not printed in either the ‘Glasgow Herald’ or ‘Scotsman’ nor even in the ‘Referee’.   A bried view of the individual champions is below.

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In the absence of definite results at school level, we can note that Allan Glen’s won four events, Stewart’s College won 4, Dollar Institute won four, Glasgow High School won three and Edinburgh Institution won two.   Glasgow High also had 10 second places, Allan Glen’s had seven and Dollar Institute had two.

The Glasgow High School won the competition in 1906 from Allan Glen’s High School

Above is the school badge with the Glasgow coat-of-arms incorporated in it.

The weather on the day in June was much better than the day in May!

The results of the meeting in brief, winners only is below.   

The team contest resulted in a victory for Glasgow High School with 30 1/2 points, from Allan Glen’s High School (22 1/2), Irvine Royal Academy (22 1/2), George Heriot’s (14), Greenock Academy (13) and Edinburgh Institution (5).   The individual results –

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The asterisks after the names indicate a championship best performance.   The number of schools contesting the revised date for the championships might have been small but the standards had not fallen off at all.

Allan Glen’s High School was the winning school in 1905.

Founded in 1850 , it was a remarkable school with an emphasis on science and its management merged with that of Anderson’s College which eventually became the Royal College of Science and Technology and then Strathclyde University.   For many reasons, the school merged with the City Public School but had to close down as a school in 1989.    

The Inter-scholastics championships sixth meeting took place in Glasgow at the Scotstoun grounds but with fewer schools taking part.   Surprisingly, with the event being so close to their own premises, the Glasgow Academy did not take part although two other Glasgow schools – Allan Glen’s and the High School – filled the first and second places.   We start with the report from the ‘Glasgow Herald’.

Cartoon from the ‘Scottish Referee’ of 22nd May, 1905 beside the comments below

So far, so good.   The meeting was described and factual details outlined then there is a brief review of the actual sports.   However, the ‘Scottish Referee’ drew critical attention to one factor not yet mentioned.

The Referee had already listed some dignitaries present at the Scotstoun meeting in this comment.

Unfortunately, despite the fine comments, we could not find the results anywhere in that issue of the ‘Referee’.

The results above are from the ‘Daily Record’  The results, winners only, are in brief below..

Nine schools took part.  First five were Allan Glen’s HS with 50 1/2 pts, second Glasgow HS with 31, then came Irvine Royal Academy 13 1/2 pts, Greenock Academy 7 pts and Stewart’s College with 5 points.   Neither Glasgow Academy nor Dollar Institution were present at this running of the championships.

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