History

Dame Catherine Harpur’s School was set up as a charitable trust in 1744 by benefactress Dame Catherine Harpur, to provide free education for the boys and girls of Ticknall and the surrounding parishes.

Two hundred years later, the village school was still going, and in 1944 it was taken over by Derbyshire LEA. It became a ‘voluntary controlled parochial primary school’, and continued as such until 1987, when the LEA closed the school because of insufficient pupil numbers. There were just 9 children at that time.

Parents and local people felt the village school was just too good to let it just disappear, and so they reopened it straight away, independently of the LEA, under the terms of the 1744 trust. Since then, it has at times been a battle to make ends meet – it’s not cheap running a school! – but the commitment, ingenuity and enthusiasm of all those involved has kept Dame Catherine’s going from strength to strength through the years.