Bourn Hall. The present Bourn Hall is built on the site of a wooden castle that was burnt down during the Peasants' Revolt. A timber-framed house built early in the 16th Century was added to in 1602 by the Hagar family in the form of a three-sided courtyard hall. Rainwater gutters at the front of the Hall still have the initials of John and Francis Hagar. The Hagar family left Bourn Hall in 1733 and the estate belonged to the De La Warrs until 1883. During this period Bourn was visited by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert while they were staying at Wimpole Hall. The last family connection with the village was Lady Mary, daughter of the 7th Earl and wife of Major Griffin, who bought the Hall in 1921 and lived there until 1957. The property was then acquired by Peter and Ann King. Bourn Hall was bought by Patrick Steptoe and Bob Edwards in 1980 and became a world-famous clinic for the treatment of infertility. Just outside the village to the west of Bourn is Wysing Arts Centre, a research and development centre for the visual arts. Wysing Arts operates a year-round programme of public exhibitions, events, schools and family activities, alongside artistic residencies and retreats. Bourn has a history of education in the village from 1520. From 1819, boys were taught in the church tower and girls received a more limited education in a nearby cottage. The Church and the Hall combined to build a school in 1866, designed for 144 children. Within three years, 81 children were attending, paying 2d, 3d or 6d for their schooling. This school was closed in 1958 and became the Village Hall which has recently been extended and improved with grant aid, and is a meeting place for village functions. A new school building was built in 1958 on the edge of the village, adjacent to open fields. It is within walking distance of most of the village. The school serves a large rural area of about 24 square miles. It is designated a Church of England controlled school. Bourn School serves the villages of Bourn, Caxton, Longstowe and Kingston and is in the catchment area of Comberton Village College, one of the best state secondary schools in the country. Following the Norman Conquest, a wooden church at Bourn was given to the monks of Barnwell Priory by Picot, the Sheriff of Cambridgeshire, who built his wooden castle next to it. The current stone church, dedicated to St Mary and St Helena, dates from the 12th century onwards and is built of field stones and ashlar, with dressings of limestone and clunch, in the Transition Norman, Early English and Later styles. Following the Reformation, the church was given to Christ's College, Cambridge, which is patron and responsible for the chancel repairs. The tower has a twisted spire and houses a belfry with a full peal of eight bells. There are some pictures and a description of the church at the Cambridgeshire Churches website. Memorials in the church include one to Erasmus Ferrar, brother of Nicholas Ferrar, founder of the Anglican community at Little Gidding. John Collett, farmer, of Bourn Manor was the husband of Susannah, sister to Erasmus and Nicholas who were frequent visitors to the parish where the family took refuge from the plague. There were Protestant dissenters in Bourn from 1644 and there was a Methodist Chapel active in the village until 1982. The ecclesiastical parish is in the diocese of Ely.