Bringing Scotus Academy back together, pupil by pupil!

This month’s Star Story comes from Lindsay Wilson in Edinburgh in the UK, who in 2005 undertook the mammoth task of computerising his school’s register. This has meant him getting in touch with a whopping 800 former pupils and apparently, we’ve been able to help along the way!

Lindsay, 62, explains:

“Scotus Academy aka Beechwood House, in Corstorphine Road, Edinburgh, first opened its doors in 1953 and I was the first boy registered. Over the next 25 years that followed, Beechwood House welcomed a further 1269 pupils.

I will always remember my first days at Scotus. We were assembled in rows in front of the main steps and our names were called out. It was like the lists of United Nations ambassadors. We were then marched off to our various classes in the main building (the blocks at the rear were not built then).

The house itself was, and still is, a magnificent Georgian building steeped in history, and the grounds covered an extensive 22 acres. There were playing fields at the front and rear of the building, eventually a tarmac area for play, tennis and field sports, and the holy of holies, Bro. Hastings’ walled vegetable garden. It was almost certain death to anyone who dared put their foot over the threshold to retrieve a ball or similar object!

Adjacent to the grounds was the zoo and many a time we used to jump the walls at lunchtime to visit the animals. We were their best customers! And likewise, sometimes the animals would return the courtesy, especially the zebra who used to graze on our playing fields where the walls had crumbled!

I was a pupil at Scotus Academy for the next 11 years and left in 1964. Thereafter, while studying for a degree in Chartered Accountancy, I returned to help with the rugby and used to referee the school matches on a Saturday morning.

Then in 1972 I became the school auditor right up until the sad day when it closed in 1978.

Once a place of learning and fun for over a thousand innocent and not-so innocent young boys, Beechwood House, once Scotus Academy, is now home to a private health company.

But although the school is gone my memories live on, and by computerising the school’s records, I hope they’ll live on long after I’ve gone.

My aim is to contact every FP (former pupil) in a bid to bring the whole school and all who attended back in contact. Sadly there are a number of pupils who are no longer with us, but I do have contact details for close to 800 FPs thanks to sites like yours.

In fact WRM has been particularly helpful in putting me in touch with former pupils now living abroad, and because of events at the time, the Second World War had not long ended, there were several American, Italian and Polish pupils, not to mention Scots who later emigrated to other parts of the world, who I may have had great trouble finding otherwise.

As each year passes we hold a reunion and each year the number of FPs attending increases. I’m hoping 2009 will be our most successful year yet.

Your help in finding former pupils and making these reunions possible has been invaluable. Thank you.”