We Did Our Homework On the Bus

A social history of St Mary’s Roman Catholic Grammar School for Boys in Sidcup.
Told by those who were there.

We Did Our Homework on the Bus (a St Mary’s joke taken from the school’s Latin motto
In Omnibus Labora) includes the recollections of more than 200 former St Mary’s pupils and around 20 former members of staff.

The school, which was started by the Marist Fathers, began life as St Mary’s College in 1924 and was situated on Main Road, Sidcup, next to St Lawrence’s Church.

In 1957, St Mary’s was granted grammar school status and moved to brand new premises on Chislehurst Road, next to the Sidcup by-pass, opposite Queen Mary’s Hospital and became St Mary’s Grammar School. Most boys came from the London Boroughs of Bexley and Bromley.

In 1979, amid huge controversy, it lost its grammar school status and became comprehensive and mixed sex after merging with St Joseph’s Convent School for Girls in Abbey Wood.

At this point the school became known as St Mary’s and St Joseph’s.

Notable Alumni Include:

– Jim Staples (1977 joiner), who won 26 caps for Ireland at rugby and played for London Irish and Harlequins;

– Actor Adrian Paul (1970), who played the role of Duncan MacLeod in the television series Highlander;

– Patrick Dunleavy (1963) Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at the London School of Economics and;

– Writer and columnist Gerard Baker (1973) who worked for The Times and The Financial Times in London before moving to America        and becoming Editor-in-Chief of the Wall Street Journal.

– The school also produced Kent county cricketers, a scrabble champion, diplomats, top musicians like Ian Moffat (1976), Phil Hall (1977),     Rob Pearce (1971) and Barry Coutinho (1975) and published authors like Phil Whitaker (1977).

Author Matthew Eastley (St Mary’s 1977 to 1982) has spent more than three years researching the school’s history and tracing former pupils and staff all over the globe.

The book is dedicated to the author’s lifelong best friend Peter Varnes, a British Airways captain who died in 2018 aged 52 and attended St Mary’s between 1977 and 1984, and his father Martin Varnes who joined St Mary’s College in 1950.