The End of a Tenure:
d av i d y e o m a n s
It seems that the secret
of David’s popularity
was a clever blend
of teenage discipline
interspersed with
adult conversation.
44 The Wykeham Journal 2019
I
t seemed to an outsider to be all corridors —
long and thin, with nothing that resembled
a core. Even yard was off to the back. So,
it was with some trepidation that I agreed to
meet with David Yeomans, the redoubtable
and very popular Phil’s Housemaster, to
discuss 150 years of Phil’s and its position
within the wider house system.
It’s a tough gig, writing about a rival house,
but I have to admit to being won over. Maybe it
was the immediate offer of breakfast as we passed
through Grubbing Hall — a super tempting
medley of fried eggs, bacon, black pudding,
baked beans and fried bread — or maybe
the warmth with which David was greeted
everywhere we went. But when we sat down
to chat in the library, I knew we were in for
a fun hour of conversation.
‘I first set foot in Phil’s in September 2004
when as a new don I was invited for lunch’ says
David. Since then, he has been a House Tutor,
Assistant Housemaster, and Acting Housemaster,
before taking over the House formally in 2007.
‘I had a very good apprenticeship,’ he says.
David left school at 16. He went to Art
College for two years, then to Wolverhampton
Polytechnic to do a design degree, and then to
Brighton Polytechnic to do a teaching degree.
His first job was at a comprehensive school in
Reading, and he joined Win Coll in the Design
& Technology department in September 2004.
One of the first jobs for any new Housemaster
is to think about what needs modernising. The
answer to David, it became clear, was almost
everything. The last major update had been done
nearly 30 years before, and the House needed
re-wiring, re-plumbing and central heating that
worked more than occasionally.
It was a huge job. The House now has
65 beds, automatic lights along the corridors
and the garden path, 12 showers (all but one
of the cast iron baths have now gone), Dyson
air blades in the swanky new bathrooms, and
efficient central heating; the laundry room is now
twinned with “Changers”, and there is smart
new accommodation for the Relief Matron or
Assistant Housemaster. Grubbing Hall has been
extended into the old flamingo courtyard and
the House kitchen has been completely renovated.
Even the netting over Yard has been renewed.