Wellington School was founded in 1837 to provide a commercial, mathematical and classical education for boys. It was supported financially by the county authorities from 1902 and acquired its present name in 1913. The school admitted girls into the Sixth Form in the early 1970s and became fully co-educational in 1978, the year it returned to full independence. The school occupies a 35-acre site in the centre of the market town of Wellington in Somerset and, in 2000, a purpose-built junior school was opened on an adjacent site. This was renamed Wellington Prep School in September 2014.