OUR STORY
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE HARPER ADAMS CLUB

The first official gathering of the Harper Adams Club, a meeting of around forty people, took place at the Grand Hotel in Birmingham on the 30th November 1920. An earlier Club had been started in November 1913, at a meeting in Birmingham which coincided with the Fat Stock Show, but the First World War ended the meetings.

An extract from a 1921 edition of ‘The Cat-a-Mountain’ entitled "The Harper Adams Club" states….

"At a general meeting of the old students of the Harper Adams College, held at the Grand Hotel, Birmingham, on November 30th 1920, it was unanimously decided to form an old students' association’’

Membership enabled ex-students to maintain the traditions of Harper Adams, but more importantly, in these early days, it allowed them to keep in touch with agricultural progress.

AT HARPER...

The first meeting of the Club at the College took place on 21 July 1921, when the College Jazz Band performed and there were recitations, sketches and songs.

The next summer meeting took place two years later, in 1923, and enjoyment was such that dancing did not draw to a close until after two o'clock in the morning!

By the 1930s low attendance at meetings was a problem so it was decided to hold future open days in association with the College Sports Day. The 1933 open day proved a success with forty alumni attending on 9 May 1933 and concluding with twenty-six dining at the Lamb in Edgmond.

At a Special General Meeting at the College on Sports Day 1940, the Club resolved to carry on in a modified form during the War, run by an Emergency War Committee. It was decided to send gifts to Club members serving in HM Forces and an immediate donation of £5 was made to the Agricultural Red Cross Fund with a further £5 sent later.

General Club activities were suspended during the war but started again soon afterwards with a meeting in Birmingham in 1946, the first London meeting after the war being held at the Charing Cross Hotel in 1953.

A War memorial fund was set up, to which Club members contributed generously, eventually raising £116. The original intention was for this money to finance a new sports pavilion but instead the Club paid for the refurbishment of the College library (now Haydock room), including a memorial plaque dedicated to former students who died in the War.

To mark the centenary of the death of the first former Harper Adams student known to have died in the Great War, Second Lieutenant Guy Barnett (5th Bn. Attd. 1st Bn., Worcestershire Regiment), the Harper Adams Club held a service of dedication for a new memorial, honouring more alumni who died in the First World War. The service took place on the 12th March 2015, in the Haydock Room.

In investigating the names listed on the war memorial, the Club became aware that the list was neither accurate nor complete. As a result of further research, a further nine names were identified, bringing the total to forty known World War One deaths. A 10th name had been recorded incorrectly on the original board and has now been included correctly.

THE ROYAL SHOW PAVILLION

Club members had often met in a Club/College Tent at Agricultural shows. On 1st July 1969, the Harper Adams Club Pavilion was opened at the Royal Show in Stoneleigh by the Earl of Bradford, chairman of the Board of Governors. The cost of £2,200 was funded jointly by the Club, Fisons Ltd and the remainder by the College. Although the pavilion was theoretically owned and staffed mainly by the Club, Principal Kenney recognised the importance of the venue to the College and arranged for it to be decorated in the Club colours and maintained by the college estates staff.

From 1972 onwards nearly 300 visitors were regularly signing the Royal Show Visitors' Book each year. Members of the College's estates staff provided floral decorations and the head porter Pryce Cadwallader ran the bar. He continued to act as Bar Steward until his retirement in 1980 when Club committee members manned the bar so that he and his wife could look around the show for the first time.

Through the early 1980s the pavilion continued to be a popular meeting place, so much so that it created problems with overcrowding. By 1986 the situation had reached such a pitch that the decision was taken for the Harper Adams pavilion to go "dry". The response was varied ranging from high praise to deeply critical, particularly noticeable in the comments from the 1987 Visitors' Book.

By the following year the situation had calmed down and the pavilion was refurbished in 1988 with the assistance of a donation of £200 from the Club, but from then on the College assumed full financial responsibility for its upkeep. The Harper Adams pavilion remained a well-known meeting place for past, present and future students attending the Royal Show and an important marketing event for the College until the closure of the show in 2009.

Opening of the Harper Adams Club Pavilion at the Royal Agricultural Society showground, Stoneleigh, 1 July 1969

REGIONAL DINNERS

The London/Birmingham meetings ceased in 1965 and from 1966 an autumn dinner was held each year at a hotel in Newport, to coincide with the Rag Dance at College. This continued until the late 1970’s.

At this time an attempt was made to hold autumn dinners at different venues to allow members living in different parts of the country to attend. Regional dinners were successfully revived from 2011-2015, taking place in Yorkshire, Exeter, Huntingdon and Edinburgh.

VOLUNTEERS

From the late 1970s the Club was run by a small band of enthusiastic volunteers, most notably Roy Jefferson and Dick Woodward. Ros Barsley (nee Forrester) was recruited in the 1970's as Social Secretary and is the longest serving Committee member to date, becoming an Honorary Life President of the Club in 2015.

The Club ran into difficulties again in the 1980s with an increasing membership came increasing administration and without much support from the college and a dwindling committee, the Club struggled on.

Following the 1990 AGM and with the resignation of the secretary, the Harper Adams Club went into a period of complete stagnation. The Club was in real danger of ceasing to exist.

The President Elect, Bob Ackroyd, had a meeting with the Principal to discuss the situation and as a result called an emergency committee meeting putting forward a radical revision of the rules.

It was at this point the club began a revival, due mainly to Bob Ackroyd's enthusiasm and determined hard work supported by Principle Tony Harris, who was himself awarded Honorary Life Membership on his retirement in 1994.

In 1997 the Club Committee elected Bob Ackroyd as Honorary President for the Colleges Centenary year, but tragically Bob became ill and died only months later in April 1998. The early 1990s had also seen the loss of another Club stalwart, Mr. Frank Dudley, who had been involved with the Club since joining the College as a member of staff in 1926. He had been particularly helpful in running the Life Membership fund and advising on Club investments and had been associated with the College for 66 years either as a member of staff or Club Committee member.

There was a real need to set up a database of ex-students' addresses. Much of the ground work in locating former students was done by Maurice Lancaster, a member of the library staff, and eventually another co-ordinator, Julie Brook, was employed part-time in October 1991, to maintain the database and assist the Club. Under the revised membership system numbers soon increased to over 3,000 and the post of Club co-ordinator was eventually formalised as Alumni Officer. Julie helped the Club, on behalf of the College/University, for over 27 years.

REGIONAL ASSOCIATIONS

The 1990s saw the formation of regional Harper Adams alumni associations, most notably Harper Adams in Ireland. As early as 1984 Basil Bayne and Ann Newell had discussed holding a reunion in Ireland. This finally came to fruition when the first meetings of Harper Adams in Ireland were held on 28th and 29th April 1995 at Hillsborough and Omagh.

With the appointment of Principal Wynne Jones in 1996, it was not long before a welsh branch of the Harper Adams Club came into being. Harper Cymry had its inaugural dinner at the College in autumn 1997 and twelve months later a student organisation was also established.

The Club hosted Principle Professor Wynne Jones's retirement party in 2009, 'Gone with The Wynne', which was attended by over 500 former students.

2012 saw the Club’s first international event, a dinner in New Zealand on 13 October 2012, attended by approximately 30 ex-Harper. The Club’s first strategic plan was also launched that year, with the aim of making the Club more relevant to and supportive of University initiatives.

SPORTING RIVALRY

Club members have had a healthy sporting rivalry with current students since the first combined Club meeting and College sports day of May 1933.

By the 1950’s this had grown into alumni weekends with technical lectures and demonstrations in the mornings, cricket and tennis in the afternoon, followed by tea, a general Club meeting and culminating in a dance.

The sports competitions became so significant at the time that Club members donated and raised funds for the provision of sporting cups. Some of these trophies are now on display in the main building at Harper Adams.

As the Club grew and times changed, the sporting fixtures gradually dropped away, at least until the turn of the century. On 15th October 2000 the Club revived the competitive rivalry between former and current students with the introduction of the Hobgoblins rugby match.

THE HOBGOBLINS

The Hobgoblins (Harper Old Boys and Girls) event grew to include other sports including cricket, shooting and hockey. Organised by the Club and Students Union, the event proved very popular and a great opportunity for alumni to return to Harper.

On the 25th February 2023, the Hobgoblins took on the students in a memorial rugby match, to honour former alumnus Chris Scurfield. The winning team, (the Hobgoblins), were presented with the inaugural Christopher Scurfield Cup, provided by the Harper Adams Club.

The Hobgoblins weekend is now a permanent fixture on the SU calendar, with healthy sporting competition and entertainment in the Harper bar.

DONATIONS

Over the years the Harper Adams Club has made many financial contributions to the College. The Club has donated towards the refurbishment of the College library in the 1950s; funds for the old tennis court in 1959; to the swimming pool in 1963; the building of the Royal Show Pavilion in 1969; the squash court in 1984; various donations to the SU Rag Appeal in the 1980s, and in 1993 £500 was given towards restocking the College library following a fire.

The College Centenary fund appeal in 2001 raised over £30,000, launching the Club’s scholarship programme. Since then, the Club has awarded over £135,000 in Scholarships and awards to some of the most talented and deserving of students.

Unable to properly celebrate the Club’s own Centenary in 2020, due to the global Covid-19 pandemic, the Club donated £2500 each to the Farming Community Network (FCN) and RSABI.

The Club now has over 17,000 members worldwide.

You don’t have to look far to see the impact that the Harper Adams Club has made in just over 100 years.

TRUE BLUE SINCE 1920...