The lost Hulme School ……

So, tomorrow I am on the trail of the lost Hulme school.

The Memorial Stone, 2023

On the surface I thought it would be a daunting task given that over the last century and a bit there have been lots of schools in Hulme, most of which disappeared in the transformation of the area in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The School, 1940

Added to which the redevelopment swept away the old street pattern substituting new roads with different names which are often realigned differently to the old plan.

But after half an hour I located Board School No. 1 which was at the corner of Vine Street and Junction Street.

I have a description of the school just after it was opened in 1874, some photographs from 1940 and 1962 and this remarkable stone inscription, which once would have adorned the exterior of the building.

It now lies on the ground between Old Birley Street and the Brooks Building of the M.M.U.

My old friend Pierre who worked there sent over the picture and I was immediately hooked.

The Manchester Guardian reported that. "Mr Herbert Birley, the chairman of the Manchester School Board, laid yesterday the memorial stone of the first school which the Board have built. 

The site is at the corner of Junction Street and Vine Street, Hulme, on a plot of land of irregular shape and presenting considerable difficulties to the architect. 

The Board selected the designs of Messrs Medland and Henry Taylor, of this city, and the contract has been taken by Mr G Napier for a sum slightly exceeding ,3,000. 

The school, 1962

On the ground floor is a large room 30 feet wide. 

Immediately adjacent, under cover, are convenient offices; and just beyond, through a porch, are the respective playgrounds. The entrance for girls is from St Mary’s Street, and for boys on the opposite side, from Junction Street”. 

On both floors are private rooms for the schoolmistresses, and on the upper floor a room for the pupil teachers, and besides the library, a good book store. 

In the basement is a kitchen, 18 feet by 24 feet, with all appliances for tea parties etc. There are large places for storing fuel, with convenient shoots from the street above, and all the rooms are warmed by open fireplaces and are thoroughly well ventilated. 

The school, 1894

The walls are faced to a certain height with glazed bricks, which can be easily cleaned, and on which writing or other defacement is impossible. 

Round both school rooms run bands of encaustic tile, bearing Shakespearean mottos. The exterior design is simple scholastic architecture but so treated as to present a handsome appearance. 

Besides the children’s entrances there is a good porch for the entrance of the members of the School Board or other visitors. A belfry rises to a height of about 70 feet. 

The unusual irregularity of the site gives occasion for exceptional and picturesque features, particularly in the elevations to Mary Street and Junction Street, and care has been taken that there shall be no 'shabby' back view, though of course the best elevations are to the principal streets”*

The site, 2023

The article is a long one and includes speeches and thought from the dignitaries on the importance of education.

All of which I think will be in part two of the lost Hulme School.

Leaving me just to think I might follow up on the names of the head teachers in 1911, when our school was Vine Street.

The school, 1911

Location; Hulme

The school, 1962

Pictures; memorial stone of Board School No 1, 2023, from the collection of Pierre Grace, and views of the school in 1940, m64821, and in 1962, H. Milligan, m64822, m64824, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and the site 1894, from the 1894 OS map of Lancashire and the 1894 OS map of South Lancashire, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/ 

*The First Board School in Manchester, Manchester Guardian June 12th 1874 

Part Two; More on the school ......

Who buried Mr. Birley in an open space in Hulme?

I should say that it’s not just who buried him but it’s who then found him.

What was lost is found, 2023

At which point I should point out that it is not Mr. Birley as such but the memorial stone commemorating the opening of Manchester’s first Board School in the June of 1874.

It is a story I have already visited but always promised myself a second go. *

I had thought I would crawl over the newspaper accounts of the opening, featuring the speeches of the good and worthy and their observations on the importance of education and in particular the features of Board School No. 1.

The school, 1962

These included a basement kitchen “with all appliances for tea parties”, “large places for storing fuel, with convenient shoots from the street above, so that all the rooms are warmed by open fireplaces and are thoroughly well ventilated”. 

Added to which the Manchester Guardian reported “The walls are faced to a certain height with glazed bricks, which can be easily cleaned, and on which writing or other defacement is impossible. 

Round both school rooms run bands of encaustic tile, bearing Shakespearean mottos”.**

But one Victorian worthy’s speeches on the value of education are pretty much like another so instead my thought turned to how the stone got there and who decided it should see the light of day again.

Walking to the Brooks Building 2023

Manchester Board School No.1 or Vine Street School as it became was situated close by and so it is entirely possible that when the school was demolished the memorial stone was just part of heaps of building spoil.  Just a little distance away developers found the original sunken baths of the Leaf Street Swimming Baths which were back filled after the walls of the building had been knocked down.

Or it may have been carefully stored away ready for the moment when a new educational institution was built in Hulme close to the old school.***

Someone one will know, and perhaps also reveal who decided to put it on display in a small area of land left to grow wild.

We shall see.

Location; off Old Birley Street, Hulme

 Pictures, memorial stone of Board School No 1, 2023, from the collection of Andrew Simpson, and the school, 1962, H. Milligan, m64822, , courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass  

*The lost Hulme School ……, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-lost-hulme-school.html

**The First Board School in Manchester, Manchester Guardian, June 12th 1874

***The Brooks Building, part of the MMU.