Old boys at Blackrock College include former Archbishop of Dublin Dr John Charles McQuaid, former Taoiseach and President Eamon de Valera, and Sir Bob Geldof. Geldof remembers De Valera's return to Blackrock: "It was sports day and the boys were lined up neatly on the front field facing the balcony over the school kitchens. The priests emerged first, followed by De Valera, a tall, frail and almost blind man, then in his 90s, helped by his aide-de-camp.

"The band struck up the national anthem and De Valera, unsure of his bearings and tottering slightly behind the upright priests, turned around and faced the wall, standing to attention.

"No one noticed that he was facing the wrong way except the assembled boys who were stifling their hysterics. There he stood, inches from the white wall, his back to the band as the national anthem played on." Geldof mischievously asked: "Could he have done it on purpose?"

Almost reminiscing for The Irish Times, last november when the new management body was announced, Maurice Neligan, the surgeon and director of the National Cardiac Surgical Unit in the Mater Hospital and Crumlin, said: "We were a little gang of local children and we went there (he attended the junior school, Willow Park, as well as Blackrock College) together through the years and we're all still friends. Sometimes we'd be scared rigid that something wasn't prepared properly. We'd get the cane or the leather but it didn't leave me any the worse for it.

"I remember running a newspaper called the Castle Echo which got itself banned. It showed our worm's eye view of the world and was meant to be liberal, but after four issues it went beyond what the authorities thought was liberal."

He recalled the strong missionary ethos of the Holy Ghost fathers. "By and large they were liberal, broad-minded and interested in what became of the boys. It was a happy atmosphere. They liked the games like rugby and they took tremendous interest and pride in them."