John Lewis Barber, M.A.

John Barber was born on 23 May 1914, the eldest son of the Revd John Barber, then chaplain to Lord William Cecil at Hatfield House. He was educated at Oakham School and in 1933 won a Warren scholarship to St Catherine's College, Cambridge, where he read classics, played soccer for his college, won an oar for rowing and a prize for reading lessons in chapel. After graduation he spent a fruitful year at the British School in Athens as the recipient of a travelling scholarship and then, back in England in 1937, began his teaching career. He taught in preparatory schools until the outbreak of war, which he spent as a captain in signals and intelligence, mainly with the Eighth Army in the Libyan desert. In September 1946 he returned to his old school, Oakham, first as master in charge of the junior school and subsequently, 1959-74, as housemaster of Wharflands (his old house) and finally as second master for his last two years before retirement. Barber's enthusiasm for archaeology was passed on to his pupils, with highly rewarding results. Soon after his arrival at Oakham, in collaboration with E. G. Bolton, headmaster of Casterton Secondary School, Barber organized an excavation at the Roman town of Great Casterton, about two miles north of Stamford, the excavators being boys from both schools. In their first season a complex of buildings was exposed, part of which had a tessellated floor. Such widespread interest was aroused by the dig, especially at the University of Nottingham, that members of its department of adult education arranged a summer school to take over the excavation for its third season in 1950. This phase of the excavation was directed by Dr Philip Corder, F.S.A. with the assistance of Fellows Graham Webster, John Gillam and Maurice Barley. The villa site discovered by Barber and Bolton was placed at the disposal of the professional archaeologists who continued their investigations until Corder's death in 1960. Barber was elected F.S.A. for his original contribution to this important research. In the sixties he took his family for a fortnight every year in August to participate in the excavation of another Roman town, Ancaster in Lincolnshire, directed successively by Maurice Barley, Jeffrey May and Malcolm Todd, again under the auspices of Nottingham University. Publication of Barber's The Story of Oakham School in 1984 marked the quatercentenary of the school's foundation and, on his eightieth birthday in 1994, the Barber Archive Room in the new school library was named in his honour. Barber's commitment to the county of Rutland, its natural history, antiquarian remains and ancient buildings, was as great as his devotion to Oakham School. A dozen silver birch trees were planted on the south shore of Rutland Water in 1995 in recognition of his fundraising activities for the Council for the Preservation of Rural England and, when the Rutland County Museum was established in 1967, Barber master-minded the transfer of Oakham School's collection, of which he was curator, to the new museum. He was a member of the special committee set up in 1965 when the Riding School became available for conversion to the museum, and was elected chairman of the Friends' Executive Committee in 1969, an office he held until 1986, when he was appointed a trustee of the museum. He died on 8 February 1997 following a fall on black ice.