Hugh Oldham - Interest in Education

Interest in Education

As bishop, Oldham showed a keen interest in education, probably influenced by his brother Bernard's experiences in Crewkerne. He donated £4,000 and land in Chelsea towards Corpus Christi College, Oxford, which his friend and former Bishop of Exeter, Richard Foxe was in the process of establishing. In 1513, Foxe's original intention had been for the college to be for monks, similar to the long-established Durham College and Canterbury College, both at Oxford. However, Oldham appears to have persuaded Foxe to found a secular college instead, along the lines of New College or Magdalen, supposedly telling him that "monks were but a sort of bussing flies ... whose state could not long endure"—showing, according to some, that Oldham was well aware of the coming Reformation. In return for his generosity, daily prayers for him were recited in the new chapel at Corpus Christi both during his lifetime and after his death, and the college still has a contemporary portrait of him.

Oldham may also have patronized Brasenose College, Oxford, which his former master William Smyth had founded in 1509. The historian John Hooker stated that Oldham's advances to Smyth were rebuffed, but evidence of the patronage existed in the form of his coat of arms that used to be set in a library window there. He apparently also offered help to Exeter College, Oxford, established in 1314 by one of his predecessors at Exeter, Bishop Stapledon, but in this case there is no evidence to contradict Hooker's statement that his offer was rejected.

Oldham's interests also extended to lower levels of education. He ensured that the younger members of Exeter's cathedral choir attended the city high school, for instance, but his main endowment in this field was made back in his home country of Lancashire. On 2 July 1515 he signed an endowment trust deed establishing the Manchester Free Grammar School for Lancashire Boys which later became the Manchester Grammar School. This deed promoted "godliness and good learning" and promised that any boy showing sufficient academic ability, regardless of background, could attend, free of charge. A site was purchased in September 1516 and construction took place between April 1517 and August 1518. The total cost, as shown by a bill signed by Oldham, was £218.13s.5d, most of which must have been given by Oldham himself.