Moves to found a new school in the North Carlton district began in earnest in March 1887, when a delegation of concerned Princes Hill residents led by John Gardiner approached Education Minister Pearson and impressed on him the urgent need for a school. The population in Princes Hill, they argued, was growing rapidly; suitable land was becoming scarce and expensive.¹

Named in honour of Prince Alfred’s visit to the district in 1867, Princes Hill was part of Victoria Ward in the City of Melbourne. Although the district was little more than a kilometre from the heart of Carlton, the Melbourne Cemetery and Princes Park had insulated Princes Hill from the rapid, dense urban development that had been occurring in Carlton since the 1850s and 1860s.² Writing in 1888, ‘Garryowen’ described the area around Royal Park as having recently been ‘a vista of hill and dale, well-wooded and grassed’.³ This situation changed rapidly in the late 1870s and 1880s. Settlers rushed to Melbourne, attracted by its reputation as the financial and industrial capital of the Australian colonies. By 1889, Carlton had 33,000 inhabitants, and many businesses and industries were located there. The laying of the cable tram along Lygon and Rathdowne Streets and the opening of the Inner Circle railway line with a Carlton station in 1888-9 added to the area’s appeal for city commuters. Although Melbourne as a whole lost population in the early 1890s as the result of a severe economic depression, Carlton continued to grow. By 1895, the population of Carlton’s two wards, Smith and Victoria, numbered 35,703.⁴

In 1876, the Crown land between the Melbourne Cemetery and Pigdon Street had been subdivided, much to the delight of land speculators. Aware of the demand for cheap accommodation, investors promptly built rows and rows of cheap, single-storey brick workers’ cottages. The Carlton Gazette was full of advertisements for real estate. In 1879, a new subdivision was declared on the low-lying land north of Pigdon Street. Although there was still a sizeable swamp in the middle of this new area, between 1889 and 1890 some 200 houses were erected at the north end of Wilson Street and on the far side of the swamp.⁵

After John Gardiner and his delegation had interviewed the Minister, the Department of Public Instruction began to investigate whether it was desirable to establish another school in Carlton and how it might clash with others in the district. In two reports of May 1887 and May 1888, Inspector Charles Tynan concluded that Princes Hill, although close to Carlton, was in an isolated pocket that separated it from nearby schools: it was enclosed by the railway reserve to the north, by Princes Park to the west, by Lygon Street to the east and by the Melbourne Cemetery to the south. Furthermore, although there were only 160 children on the ‘Hill’ in May 1887, that number was soon expected to exceed 500. Despite these factors, Tynan turned to SS 1073 Lygon Street as an alternative solution. Opened in 1870 to accommodate 700 scholars, the Lygon Street school only had an average enrolment of 560. Tynan recommended that Lygon Street be enlarged to accommodate a total of 1000 scholars, its own and Princes Hill’s. In the second report, in spite of the district’s increasing population, Tynan advised the Department to wait another year. Children of school age, he suggested, could attend school elsewhere. The distance they would walk, he added, was not significant: the roads were ‘perfect’.⁶

Meanwhile, application no. 2946 for a new school had been lodged, and the Department of Lands and Surveys was instructed to seek and reserve a site for a school in the Princes Hill area.⁷ The search was successful. On 28 September 1887 lots 4, 6 and 8 of section 122, Sullivan (Arnold) Street were bought from Mr William Linacre for the sum of £1782. The price was high - equivalent to about twelve and a half years’ wages for a skilled worker - but it was justified by the site’s advantages. It was on high ground with excellent natural drainage, it was a good distance from Lygon Street and Brunswick South schools, and it was seen as being likely to hold its value.⁸

The new school’s supporters must have been relieved: a major hurdle had been overcome. But their rejoicing was short-lived. They soon learnt that the Department had deferred its decision to build a new school. When James Robertson, as Chairman of the Carlton Board of Advice, requested information on the progress of the new school, his representations were met coolly. He was informed that, although the Department had purchased the land, it was not obliged to build a school on that site, and it might at any time change it for another.⁹

Confronted by this opposition, the pro-schoolers stepped up pressure. The Carlton Board of Advice regularly pestered George Brown, the Secretary of the Department. On 2 November 1887, Lt. Col. W.C. Smith, the long-serving member for Ballarat and a former Minister for Education, joined the fray and asked that all papers relevant to Princes Hill school be tabled in Parliament.¹⁰

The most persistent lobbyist was John Gardiner, politician, champion footballer and local real-estate agent. Gardiner’s reputation as captain of Carlton Football Club had helped him win the Legislative Assembly seat of Carlton in 1880 after only one week’s campaigning. Gardiner represented Victoria Ward on the Melbourne City Council between 1891 and 1894, and again from 1904 until his death on 24 October 1929. In a memorial address for Gardiner, the Lord Mayor of Melbourne praised Gardiner’s jealous and dedicated protection of Melbourne’s prestige and his involvement in Carlton’s local affairs.¹¹

Between 1887 and 1890 Gardiner’s primary concern was to see Princes Hill School established. Besides leading the delegation that met Pearson in March 1887, he willingly and regularly offered the Minister his expertise on the value and availability of land in Carlton. He inspected sites that the Department was considering, and recommended others; he followed the eventual sale through to completion, and pestered the Department to pay the vendor speedily. During 1888, he questioned why a school was not being erected; during 1889, he monitored the building’s progress. With that finished, he insisted that the Department purchase extra land to enlarge the school grounds. In 1890, he began to campaign for additions to the school building.

It was no easy matter to persuade the Department to build a new school. Overcrowding and inadequate facilities were endemic in Victorian schools. The newspapers of the time were full of complaints about the lack of school accommodation. The Education Act of 1872 had placed intense pressure on the Department of Public lnstruction. The McCu1loch Government elected in 1871 had centred its campaign on promoting the implementation of free, secular and compulsory education. The resultant Act revolutionised education in Victoria. The Department was compelled to absorb and maintain 453 National Board schools and 590 denominational schools.¹²

The pressure on the Department was compounded by the rapid growth of small-scale rural settlement. The Land Act was amended in 1873 to make small ‘selections’ available on easy terms, leading to an immediate land rush. In the 1870s and early 1880s, the greatest need was for rural schools to satisfy selectors throughout Victoria. In the 1880s, this need shifted to the inner suburbs, which were growing rapidly in line with the expansion of the manufacturing, construction and transport industries. In 1885, Inspectors’ reports show overcrowding at South Melbourne, Prahran, Essendon, Kensington, East and North Brunswick, Maribyrnong and Flemington.

Under Duncan Gillies, and with the zealous Pearson as Minister, the Victorian government embarked on a major construction programme. The results were striking. In 1872, there had been 1048 schools and 135,962 new students, of whom 68,436 attended regularly. By 1891, the numbers had increased to 2233 schools, 253,469 enrolments, and 141,126 average attendance.¹³ In 1889, the total building program expenditure was £128,470, more than half the overall Education Department budget of £214,266. Sixteen Metropolitan schools were established to accommodate 4000 new enrolments. One of them was Princes Hill.

The constant pressure had eventually won out. A memo dated 25 October 1888 informed Gardiner that tenders would be called as soon as money became available. The contract to build a school of 2960 square feet for 300 students at the allocated space ratio of 10 square feet per child was signed on 23 February 1889. A week later the new school was officially listed on the roll as SS 2955.¹⁴

The opening was originally scheduled for June. or July, but the usual delays associated with building projects postponed that event until September. In August, the Department threatened to take legal action against the contractor, C. Campbell, for neglecting to complete the building. In September, the schoolyard still needed levelling and screening; there was no asphalt on the girls’ playground, the path to the front entrance or the paths between the school and the out-offices. For some reason District Inspector Swindley, who had been sent to examine the building and assess the works needing completion, recommended that the estimated £82 required to pave the girls’ playground would be a waste of money, and the job should not be proceeded with.¹⁵

There were other, potentially more serious worries. In a letter to the Department on 22 August, Mr B.Jackson of Garton Street complained that the lane between the unfenced school grounds and the backs of the Garton Street houses was a quagmire of unsanitary filth. The freely flowing drainage from the houses, he argued, endangered the health of children and residents. Diphtheria had already claimed one victim. The lane was finally paved by the Melbourne City Council on 10 February 1890.¹⁶

The events between March 1887, when the proposal for a new school was raised, and September 1889, when the school was opened, set the pattern of the schools’ history for the next century. If the Education Department was reluctant to build a new school until all alternatives had been explored and building was absolutely necessary, it was also parsimonious in the space it provided. The 1889 building was designed to house 300 pupils, even though Tynan’s 1887 report had predicted enrolments of over 500. The school’s local critics had objected that Princes Hill would take students from elsewhere. They were right. The unfortunate children who hitherto had walked the long distances along ‘perfect’ roads to Carlton and Brunswick flocked to the new neighbourhood school.¹⁷ Within six months, the 250 scholars who had assembled at the opening ceremony were fighting for space. With a capacity of 300, the school ’ had 338 students in February 1890, 372 in March, 379 in April and 416 in May. The 1890 enrolments peaked at 442 in June.¹⁸ More space was urgently needed. Two rooms were added in 1891 to accommodate another 206 students. By that stage, however, average attendance was already in the high 400s, and it continued to rise. Acting Head Teacher Louis McNab reported on 20' August 1895 that 609 scholars were at school on that day. Since 1 July, he added, 686 different children had attended Princes Hill: the numbers only dropped below 600 on particularly wet days.¹⁹ On 11 September 1901, Head Teacher Richard Skewes outlined the school’s plight. The infant room, which had been built to accommodate 120 children, now had to cater for 156. When weather permitted, the extra thirty-six were being taught in the playground; a further twenty-eight children were waiting to be admitted.²⁰ The Education Department did not respond rapidly. Even when the school was built, Victoria was poised on the edge of a severe economic depression. Over the next two years, funds began to get tight as the supply of loan capital from Britain dried up. Early in 1891, it became clear that" the situation was critical. The Victorian government was rebuffed in its ‘attempt to raise a £3-million loan in London, and was left with no option but to make heavy expenditure cuts. School construction was one of the first casualties. Where the Gillies government had spent £128,470 on buildings in 1889, in 1892 the new Minister of Public Instruction, Alexander Peacock, cut expenditure to £28,272. In 1893, Queensberry Street and Rathdowne Street were among thirty-two pairs of schools amalgamated to save a paltry £16,519. By 1894-5, annual building expenditure was down to £6651; by June 1896, 221 schools had been closed.²¹

The colony’s economic problems, however, were not the only obstacle. The Education Department archives contain considerable evidence of bureaucratic inertia. The signs are to be found mostly among internal memoranda commenting on requests from schools for assistance, whether it be space, repairs, staff numbers, equipment or materials. These are characterised by slow responses, requests for further information, another opinion, costing, files passed back and forth, deferred decisions.

Despite clear signs in 1887 and 1888 that a school was needed in Princes Hill, the Education Department adopted Tynan’s stop-gap recommendations that Princes Hill children attend other schools. Other such temporary measures included leasing suitable space, lowering the space allocation per student, refusing new enrolments and adding to the existing building. The Department had a long history of this kind of thing. As early as 1874, it was renting 457 buildings - including halls, churches, and former private schools - to accommodate the student overflow.²² By 1890, the Department was an experienced tenant and property seeker, with guidelines to direct rental procedure. After complaints of overcrowding and requests for more space were lodged with the Department, and attendance patterns had stabilised, the Head Teacher would be instructed to seek out suitable buildings for rental. A report was submitted, preferably accompanied by a ground plan of the proposed building, and sometimes a street plan showing the proximity of the building to the school.²³ The lease would be signed after approval of the District Inspector and the Board of Advice representatives.

The first instance of ‘dispersed education’ at Princes Hill came in April 1890, when the average attendance of 430 was causing acute overcrowding.²⁴ Inspector Tynan, sent to investigate the situation, reported that space for another 200 students was required; that no suitable buildings were available for leasing, but perhaps a ‘portable’ from SS 1896 in Prahran could be sent to Princes Hill.²⁵ Gardiner, however, was not far from developments and quickly found a shop for rent in Richardson Street.²⁶

Inspector James Laing, sent to assess the shop’s suitability, rejected it, as well as another building in Rathdowne Street: the rooms of the former were too small, and the latter was too close to SS Lee Street. He did, however, recommend a shop in Lygon Street, between Paterson and Pigdon Streets,²⁷ well-known to today’s students and residents as the local fish-and-chips shop. It had two large rooms that could house grades 5 downstairs and 6 upstairs. The Carlton Board of Advice also approved, and a lease was entered into with Mr J. Purvis, Ironmonger, for 30 shillings per week from 7 August 1890 until 24 December 1890.²⁸ The shop was finally surrendered to Mr Purvis, together with a payment of £4 to compensate for damages, in December 1891, when grades 5 and 6 returned to-Arnold Street.²⁹

The decade from 1895 ushered in the next spate of dispersed education at Princes Hill. During those years, the Department was inundated - often weekly, even daily with missives from the school concerning the acute overcrowding, aggravated by the growing flood of enrolments. By August 1895, Head Teacher McNab was compelled to refuse new admissions.³⁰ The only solution was another extension. But before the Department would agree to this, it juggled alternative options - zoning, reduced space allocation, leased buildings - to win time.

These ad hoc measures could not solve long-term problems. On two occasions, in February 1895 and June 1899, the Department instructed the Head Teachers to forward lists of grades 4 and 5 classes recording dates of birth, addresses, distance from Princes Hill, and the distance and direction of the nearest alternative school to their home. The purpose was to determine whether amalgamation with another school was feasible, and what further accommodation should be considered for Princes Hill. (In this context, it is hard to understand why information was sought on grades 4 and 5 rather than the junior school, where the potential growth was.)³¹ Twice, in 1889 and 1903, the Department instructed the Head Teachers to draw up lists of students who could be transferred to Lygon Street and Brunswick South respectively. In 1903, Head Teacher Skewes resisted the directive, arguing that only seven of the 123 children attending classes at Christian Chapel, Pigdon Street (which was being used as an annexe) were from Brunswick; the Inner Circle railway line, which ran parallel to Park Street, was dangerous and difficult to cross; nor was it sound to separate brothers and sisters attending Arnold Street.³² In August 1895, when McNab complained that burgeoning enrolments were forcing him to turn students away, the Department reduced the space allocation from ten square feet to eight square feet per student, thus increasing the school’s capacity from 500 to 625 scholars.³³ Unable to repeat that solution in 1899, when the complaint was again voiced, the Department ordered Skewes to arrange transfers to Brunswick South and to refuse new admissions.³⁴ The instructions were repeated in 1903 and 1904.³⁵ Sent in 1899 and 1902 to investigate the situation, District Inspectors S. Swindley and H. Shelton confirmed the obvious: short-term measures did not help. Princes Hill was not the only overcrowded school in the area. Only Lygon Street had space, but access to it was barred by the cemetery. Therefore, zoning or refusing admissions was not the answer. Nor was leasing space a viable solution: there were obvious problems of distance and supervision. Only extensions to the school building, Shelton concluded, would improve the situation.³⁶

While the Education Department deliberated alternative solutions, the scholars of Princes Hill attended school in leased classrooms about Princes Hill and North Carlton. In November 1899, the school began a six-month lease of St Michael’s Hall on the corner of McIlwraith and McPherson Streets, five minutes’ walk from the main school. Here, one large classroom (54 feet by 31 feet 6 inches) and two smaller classrooms accommodated the 240 students in grades 1 and 2.³⁷ In September 1901, the infant school returned to Mr Purvis’ shop in Lygon Street.³⁸ In February 1904, after almost five years of negotiations, the Christian Chapel in Pigdon Street, between Rathdowne and Drummond Streets, was again leased, for £52 per annum. This was eight minutes’ walk from Arnold Street. It provided two large rooms (33 by 40 feet) and two smaller rooms.³⁹

Nevertheless, the economic pressures were at last beginning to ease. By the turn of the century, government finances had improved sufficiently for public works programmes to resume. With a new Education Act and a new Director, Frank Tate, the Department began to do something about what Tate described as the ‘appalling heritage’ of nine years’ penny-pinching. In 1908, £40,000 was spent on new buildings and the remodelling of old ones. In 1909-10, the sum increased to £130,000.⁴⁰

The effects of the new policy were soon felt at Princes Hill. In March 1901, the Department held preliminary discussions to consider extending the school to accommodate another 250 children at a cost of £2350. In February 1902, at the suggestion of the Public Works Department, the proposed extensions were expanded to house 427 children at a cost of £3450.⁴¹ On 17 July 1902, Inspector Shelton reaffirmed the need for extensions, adding that at least a portion of the project should be built. Despite internal Departmental agreement that additions were necessary, work did not commence until 1906.

The Arnold St building that was destroyed by fire on the morning of 8 February 1970 had been erected in three stages. The 1889 structure, which remained the central portion of the final building, was positioned on an east-west axis, approximately in the centre of the block, which had a frontage of 188 feet and a depth of 159 feet; The cube shaped, double-storey building was Gothic in style, with a polychrome brick facade and a slate roof. It cost £2221 and provided 2960 square feet of floor space.⁴² Newspaper reports describe it as commodious and handsome. The four classrooms - two downstairs and two upstairs were well lit and ventilated.⁴³ The prominent bell tower that dominates photographs of the old building stood above the front upstairs classroom. The two downstairs rooms were positioned one behind the other. The front classroom was entirely a gallery room. Based on the English system, the room was filled with long backless desks, between six and twelve feet long,, each row standing on a platform three inches higher than the one in front. The rear room used by the infants was partly furnished with desks and partly with a gallery. Beside the front room was the Head Teacher’s office, a draughty, stone-floored, boxed-in passage. Although the first Head Teacher, John Russell, asked that any future plans for extensions to the school incorporate a proper office, the Department was not favourably disposed. The space, he was informed, would have to do: it was not anticipated that in a school of Princes Hill’s size the Head Teacher would be spending much time in the office. If the school was enlarged, an office would be considered.⁴⁴ In 1889, the two upstairs rooms accommodated grades 4, 5 and 6. In July 1890, the two senior grades were moved to Lygon Street under the care of Mr McShane.⁴⁵

Arnold Street, after the last phase of additions in 1906.

Although extra land was purchased from Mr Lawrence Ward for £891 in October 1889, the second phase of building was not approved until August 1891. Completed in December by H. Franklyn, it added two large rooms to the south wing, at a cost of£1005.5.8. The 2090 square feet of floor space provided accommodation for 200 students, and the grades at Lygon Street returned to Arnold Street.⁴⁶

The third phase, first mooted in 1901-2, was built in 1906. It was designed by Samuel E. Bindley according to specifications determined at the 1904 Conference on Hygiene.⁴⁷ The two-storey enlargement to the north wing provided an extra 6132 square feet, doubling the school’s space. Even at the new ratio of twelve square feet per student, the school could now accommodate 511 scholars. The additions cost £5327.6.11. Signed on February 1906, the contract was won by W. H. Deague and Sons of Albert Park. Work was to be completed by 29 September. Delays in June and a strike in early December delayed completion. The building was officially opened on 23 March 1907.⁴⁸

The infants occupied the central hall (60 feet 6 inches by 24 feet) and four surrounding classrooms downstairs.⁴⁹ The floor plan was repeated upstairs except that the northern corridor reduced the length of the central room above the 15 hall. The Head Teacher’s office was appended to the northern end. Internally, the floors were bare timber; the walls were drably painted in greenish grey and divided by dados painted a few shades lighter. Some ceilings were lined with pressed metal, others with white-painted, tongue-and groove lining boards. There were two staircases, one in the centre of the building and the other beside the Head Teacher’s office. The ‘dux’ honour board was at the head of the northern stairs.⁵⁰

Reconstruction of the ground and first floor plans of Princes Hill School, c. 1906. The original architectural plans no longer exist. The plans were drawn by Mr Lawrence Burchell. KEY: A: General classrooms (1889); B: Infant classroom with gallery (1889), C: Gallery classroom (1889); the galleries were removed c. 1905, D: General classrooms (1891); E: Classrooms with dual desks on stepped floors (1906); F: Head Teacher’s office (1906); G: Top-lit classrooms ([906); H: School hall (1906).

Six-foot-wide corridors lined with pressed tin directed movement within the school.⁵¹ Externally, the decorative features that adorned the central upstairs windows of the 1889 building were not reproduced in the extension. It is clear that the Education Department responded belatedly to current community needs rather than planning so as to anticipate future growth. The first stage of Arnold Street was built to accommodate 300 scholars; 250 arrived on the first day. The second stage added another 200 places, when figures were already 500 plus. The third stage provided 502 seats, when the average attendance was 1000. It was to be another seventeen years before the students of Princes Hill would have room to spare.

The ‘Little’ School

In February 1911, after the new enrolments for the year had stabilised, Head Teacher Skewes notified the Department that the junior school was again becoming overcrowded. The space for grades 1 and 2 had shrunk to only eight square feet per student and for grade 3 to six and a half square feet. As a temporary measure, Skewes recommended that St Michael’s Hall be leased to accommodate 100 students.⁵² This pressure on the junior classes heralded the beginning of the campaign that culminated in the building of the Pigdon Street school.

In the first decade of this century, the population of Princes Hill, North Carlton and Brunswick South continued to grow, and with it the pressure on the school’s accommodation. Attendances increased steadily: in June 1908 they averaged between 830 and 870; by 1912 they were in the mid-900s; by December 1913, 1100.⁵³ From July 1912 the School Committee, the District Inspectors and the local politicians began again to lobby the Education Department for more accommodation. It would take twelve years to accomplish.

This phase of Princes Hill’s development also had its stalwart champions. Pre-eminent among them were Henry Sebire, Head Teacher from 1 September 1913, T. Fleming Cook and George Dore, Correspondents of the Carlton Board of Advice, Robert Solly, the Labor Member for Carlton, and George Prendergast, Labor Member for North 17 Melbourne and Leader of the Opposition. The obvious solution to Princes Hill’s accommodation problem, they argued, was to add another storey to the south wing. This proposal was first mooted in June 1912 by Dore in a letter to the Minister, Alfred Billson.⁵⁴

The Department’s initial response in 1912 seemed promising: it investigated the feasibility of adding a storey to the south wing.⁵⁵ But these measures appear to have been no more than an attempt by the Education Department to divert community pressure. The Department was financially unable to help Princes Hill. Even the erection of a shelter pavilion had to wait until the next financial year.⁵⁶

In October 1913, the newly arrived Head Teacher, Henry Sebire, entered the fray. Sebire complained that 156 children were being housed in a classroom designed for 100. The school had not been able to accept enrolments for infants under the age of 6 years since April. Sebire reminded the Department that St Michael’s Hall, which would accommodate 100 students, was available for 30 shillings per week. Acting positively, the Department advised the Head Teacher to lease St Michael’s Hall for six months. (Clearly the Department hoped that some magical act in those six months would relieve the pressure that had been intensifying for more than two years.) The hall was leased, and the 100 pupils in grade 3 moved there.⁵⁷

Perhaps frustrated by the slow pace of developments, and undoubtedly seeking some political mileage, Prendergast had raised the matter in Parliament on 18 September 1913. Using the plight of Princes Hill as an example, he ridiculed the conservative Watt Government’s education policy. How could the Government, he sallied, display Princes Hill to visiting dignitaries as the show-school of the metropolis? The school was horribly overcrowded, so much so that it threatened the health of children. The neighbourhood was growing and the need for more space would not go away. It was not enough to take stopgap measures, such as renting or buying small premises in the neighbourhood. The school was choking without adequate playing space for the children: yet promises to upgrade the grounds remained unfulfilled. The government encouraged immigration, he continued, but it was not providing new arrivals with adequate schooling.⁵⁸ 

On 21 April 1914, Prendergast led a deputation of local politicians, including Councillors W. Bell and W. Brunton, to meet the Minister for Education, Sir Alexander Peacock. Their complaints were familiar: the school needed another 250 places; St Michael’s Hall and the old shoe factory in the lane behind Arnold Street, which were being used as extra classrooms, were badly ventilated and poorly lit; the school’s furniture was old-fashioned; because the meagre grounds could not accommodate the students, the children were forced to play in the street. Echoing the proposals raised in Prendergast’s speech, the delegation recommended that Arnold Street be converted into a high school and a new school be built for the primary students perhaps on land near the railway reserve.⁵⁹

The debate in Parliament and the delegation to the Minister galvanised activity. In April 1914, Peacock diplomatically visited the railway site and the school. In 1915, the Department, having decided to erect a new building rather than add a second storey to the existing school, moved to acquire land and design a new junior school. Meanwhile, to alleviate accommodation pressure, it provided three pavilion classrooms.⁶⁰

The First World War brought new pressure to reduce education expenditure. School building took the brunt of the cuts; expenditure was slashed from £315,868 in 1914-5 to a mere £62,532 in 1917-8.

As life slowly returned to ‘normal after the ‘Great War’, the building of new schools resumed. By 1924-5, the Education Department was spending £350,000 annually on buildings, £219,321 on suburban schools alone. Almost every week the Department could announce that a new school had been opened, or an old one refurbished.⁶¹ In Princes Hill, attention again was focused on the school’s plight. In 1920, after six years of negotiations with the Melbourne City Council, the State and Federal Governments, the Education Department finally netted a former army site for a new school. The five-acre site, bordered by McIlwraith, Pigdon and Wilson Streets, was locally known as ‘the swamp’.

In June 1921, the Education Department advised Prendergast that the Public Works Department had been asked to furnish a plan and cost estimates for a building that would house 400 pupils.⁶²

Pigdon Street School. Opened as the Infant School in 1924, it became Princes Hill Primary School in 1959 when Arnold Street became the high school

In February 1922, a kindergarten room for 50 children was added to the plans.⁶³ By December, the plans were ready for tender.⁶⁴ In April 1923, Prendergast proposed that the architects consider a novel feature for the school a moveable roof to allow ventilation. Unimpressed, Public Works rejected the innovation,⁶⁵ but the Department did accede to Prendergast’s request for gas rings and a kettle to be provided in the teachers’ room.66 In the mean time, the students were despatched back to St Michael’s Hall until the new building was ready.⁶⁷ By that stage, daily attendance at Princes Hill was around 875.⁶⁸

Designed by W. Kerr, the new school was opened on 16 April 1924 by the Mayoress, Lady Brunton. The new single-storey, red-brick building cost £10,598 to construct, and would accommodate more than 450 scholars at 12 square feet per student. Its centrepiece was a large, airy assembly hall measuring 64 feet by 34. Around the hall were eight classrooms, an office, and a teachers’ room. Dignitaries present at the opening included the Mayor, Sir William Brunton, the Minister for Public Instruction, Sir Alexander Peacock, the Director of Education, Frank Tate, Cr Bell and George Prendergast.⁶⁹ The school population was now divided between the ‘little’ and the ‘big’ schools. Kindergarten to grade 2 attended Pigdon Street under the charge of a Head Mistress, while grades 3 to 8 continued at Arnold Street.

Funding, however, remained a problem. With the advent of the Depression in the early 1930s the government began to cast around for ways of cutting its expenditure, and education was an obvious target. A Board of Inquiry into the administration of the Department was appointed in 1931, with C. S. McPherson as chairman. The Board found that in the past decade consolidated revenue per head of population had risen by 24 per cent, while educational expenditure had increased by 40 per cent. The Board recommended that control over the education system be centralised in the hands of a three-member Board, chaired by the Director of Education, which could take steps to eliminate overlapping and inefficiency. Meanwhile, the government had resorted to the usual expedient of slashing building expenditure from £429,652 in 1928-9 to £45,743 in 1931-2. It became difficult to winkle even the smallest improvements out of the building fund. In 1939, for example, Princes Hill School was refused money to build an internal women’s toilet, and to put up window guards to stop vandals breaking window panes.⁷⁰

The Maintenance Problem

The maintenance of school buildings and grounds was the bane of every Head Teacher’s life. Thorough half-yearly inspections were made by the District Inspectors to ensure that acceptable standards were sustained.

To catalogue every item of school maintenance attended to by the Head Teachers of Princes Hill over a hundred years would waste time and space. It is enough to allow imagination free rein: grubby hands, rushing, scuffing feet, careless use and abuse of equipment, stray footballs, vandalism, young egos determined to leave their mark on desk tops, faulty workmanship, vagaries of time and acts of God (where hands and feet could not reach), took their toll day 21 after day, year after year. The principal had to attend to a multitude of maintenance jobs: smoking chimneys, defective spouting, blocked eaves and downpipes, flooded rooms, crumbling and falling brickwork, weakened handrails, loose roofing tiles, defective drinking taps, greasy, dirty walls, flaking paint or peeling wallpaper, muddy playgrounds, falling fences, heating that was inadequate for cold and damp rooms, worn floor matting, piping for the stove, the endless blocked ‘out-offices’ (lavatories) and broken cisterns, and even the bell chain, which was regularly pulled off by over-enthusiastic bell monitors. The list goes on forever. There are hundreds of requests for school furniture such as desks, blackboards, drawing models, rifle racks, map stands, tables and chairs for teachers, cupboards, and even heaters.

The Department did not give the Head Teacher freedom of action to discharge these responsibilities. Instead of arranging to have a particular problem fixed by as local tradesman, the Head Teacher was required to submit a request to have it repaired. Each request was assessed by the Department, costed by the Public Works Department, and the fault rectified eventually. If a Head Teacher initiated his own repairs, for example in cases where there was an immediate threat to health or to the running of the school, the Department was not happy, as McNab discovered in May 1895. Ordered by the ‘Inspector of Nuisances’ to have a leaking closet pan fixed within two days, McNab had new pans fitted and passed on the bill to the Department. Their reply was uncharacteristically swift: the Department, he was informed, has a contract with a supplier of cheaper and superior earth pans. In the future, the Head Teacher should take care to follow proper channels. ⁷¹ In August 1933, Head Teacher Ernest Mylrea was similarly chastised for using a local plumber to repair a blocked sewer without first consulting the Department’s Building Branch.⁷²

Additions to the school’s building, particularly those of 1906, alterations to accommodate more students, or Departmental changes to classroom design, added to the Head Teacher’s consternation. The north wing built in 1906-7 displayed signs of Frank Tate’s influence on education, with his emphasis on adequate lighting and high standards 22 of cleanliness and hygiene. The old dark green frosted window panes, designed to cut out glare, were replaced by blinds. Glass panes replaced wooden panels in doors, and seating was arranged so that natural light fell over the pupil’s left side. Rooms had to be kept free of dust, even if this meant leaving the room devoid of wall or mantle decorations. Hats and cloaks were no longer to be brought into the classroom, but were to be left outside in the newly erected cloakrooms. The old galleries - twelve-foot-long seats arranged in stepped rows above one another were to be replaced by New Zealand-style dual desks with backed seats, also arranged on stepped floors. The stepped arrangement of galleries took up air space and teachers could not move freely to attend to-individual students. The number of pupils per classroom was now set at fifty. Curiously, an earlier proposal in 1902 to convert the school’s gallery room into one with desks had been refused.⁷³

Further improvements were introduced in 1910. The inner walls of classrooms surrounding the central hall were fitted with glazed doors and screen-panels, enabling light to fill the hall. The size of classroom was fixed at 26 feet 6 inches by 24 feet; ceilings were repainted flat white and the plastered walls a light green. A level floor, with only a platform at the front, replaced the stepped classroom. Hyloplate blackboards dominated the rooms.⁷⁴

Skewes quickly took on the spirit of change. He made an extensive, detailed appraisal of the 1906 additions and his recommendations for further alterations. The old portion of the school was disrupted when carpenters were brought in to alter and refurbish the tiered rooms in line with the new proposals. Rooms were re-floored, desks installed, windows enlarged and frosted glass panes replaced by blinds. Internal brick walls, which hitherto had only been painted, were plastered over and repainted, thus erasing the threat to health posed by greasy and dirty walls. The brown ceilings were repainted white.⁷⁵

Classroom decorations became acceptable again. A letter to the Argus from an ex-pupil led the way at Princes Hill. Comparing the ‘handsome collection of masterpieces’ adorning the walls of SS Macarthur in Ballarat with the blank and barren walls of Princes Hill, Donald McDonald exhorted all past students of Princes Hill to show their appreciation of their old school by purchasing pictures and presenting them to Princes Hill.⁷⁶ Requests for money to buy pictures were made periodically to the Department. In 1956, a subsidy of £50 was used to purchase sixteen prints for the Infants’ Department. Among them were Heysen’s ‘Summer’ and, ‘A Summer’s Day’, Corot’s ‘The Bent Tree’, Young’s ‘Evening Sunlight’, and Wood’s ‘Seascape’.⁷⁷ Scientific and technological developments also made an impression. Despite the general use of electricity in the community, and even though wiring had been installed some time before 1936. (defectively, as it transpired), in 1945 the Department refused to install electric lighting in the classrooms at Pigdon Street. Electric lighting had been connected at Arnold Street in 1912 to provide light for the evening classes. A wireless was bought in 1936, a film projector was promised for 1946, a public-address system was installed in 1947, and a strip projector was supplied in 1959. But here, as in so many other areas, the facilities provided at Princes Hill lagged far behind the times.