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Dissertation Title
How deindustrialisation of the Frog Island area of Leicester has impacted on the heritage significance of Slater Street School.
Cover Image: Slater Street School
Source: University of Leicester Special Collections at http://cdm16445.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16445coll2/id/3782 [accessed 19 May 2015].
Name: Susan Billington
Student Number: 119048984
Word Count: 18942
Degree Subject: Urban Conservation MA.
Date due for submission: 11 September 2015
Supervisor: Mr Mike Taylor
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Abstract
Slater Street School was built in 1874 to serve the children of the workers employed in the factories that dominated the Frog Island area of Leicester from the eighteenth century. The school is located between the River Soar and the Leicester Canal. Both of these water features, natural and man-made, provided valuable infrastructure for the surrounding textile dyeing and hosiery manufacturing industries, as a water supply, a waste outlet, and a transport link. The hosiery trade was prevalent in the area in the Victorian era and when the school was built it was located in the midst of a mixed residential and industrial landscape. Over time slum clearance and industrial demolition has left the school, still functioning, in a mainly commercial area that exhibits a high degree of urban decay. I examine how the process of deindustrialisation has impacted on the heritage significance of the school that is now a Grade II listed building. Starting from a Victorian baseline, through the booming 1960s and 1970s, then onto the urban decay of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries; I have analysed Slater Street School against three key indicators of heritage significance. Firstly the historical and evidential value of the school within its urban context is examined. This is followed by an evaluation of the aesthetic value of the building comparing how it functioned through the generations, from serving the segregated Victorian boys and girls, to providing for the present day multi-cultural, mixed gender cohort. Finally, the school’s communal value is reviewed through the collective experience of the cohort before, during and after deindustrialisation, to establish what part the school has played and continues to play within the community. The conclusion balances the challenges of the building’s location and structure in meeting current educational demands with its historical past. I present an argument that the significant value of the school is at risk and securing its future depends on realising certain options presented in the current redevelopment plan for the area. These options include the sympathetic adaptation of the Grade II listed building and the reestablishment of a residential catchment area to provide a stable cohort.
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Table of Contents Page Number
1. Introduction 4 2. Background to Methods and Data Sources 7 3. Chapter One – The Baseline Part One – Historical Value 9 Part Two – Aesthetic Value 15 Part Three – Communal Value 27 4. Chapter Two - Deindustrialisation Part One – Historical Value 32 Part Two – Aesthetic Value 39 Part Three – Communal Value 44 5. Chapter Three – The Present Day Part One – Historical Value 49 Part Two – Aesthetic Value 53 Part Three – Communal Value 62 6. Conclusion 66 7. List of Tables and Images 70 8. Bibliography 71 9. Appendix 1 – Plan of Slater Street School 76
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Introduction
The aim of this dissertation is to assess how deindustrialisation of the Frog Island area of Leicester has impacted on the heritage significance of Slater Street School. Through a specific lens focused on Slater Street School I have used three heritage values to demonstrate the changes to the building over time, drawing on evidence from the surrounding Frog Island area to support the observations. For the purpose of this study the evidential value, which assesses evidence of past human activity, has been combined within the historical value, as both value assessments are focused primarily on the textile industry and so share much commonality. The combination of evidential and historical value assessments will be referred to as historical value throughout this study of heritage significance. The heritage significance of Slater Street School will be evidenced through a detailed study of its historical, aesthetic and communal value. The Slater Street Board School is now known as Slater Primary School and despite being subjected to several transitions the footprint, the foundations and the physical structure remain relatively unchanged. I will refer to the school during its early existence as Slater Street Board School. For the later years I will use a generic title of Slater Street School as the building has had several name changes over the 140 year time period this study covers. I have divided the research of the heritage significance of this Grade II listed school building into three discrete time periods, with each period focusing on changes to the school in terms of its historical, aesthetic and communal value.
Firstly, through researching the historical value I have evidenced how people’s lives are connected through the school from past to present through association with the surrounding textile industry. Secondly, its aesthetic value is assessed to establish how, located within the Frog Island setting, the building has functioned over time architecturally and has provided stimulus for its occupants. Thirdly, I have assessed the schools communal value to draw on collective experiences and community relationships with, and in association with, the building. The study reports my findings in three chapters each one covering a time period, an overview of each is given below.
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Chapter One – The Baseline
The first chapter provides the baseline for the study commencing with the industrial setting prior to the planning and construction of the school building in 1874, through to the industrial boom in the surrounding area during the 1960s. This section includes the negative impact of the slum clearance programme in the Woodgate and St Margaret’s areas during the latter part of this period.
Chapter Two – Deindustrialisation
The second chapter focuses on the subsequent decades of urban decline caused by deindustrialisation, looking at how and why the school survived its impending closure despite the reduction of its cohort. This chapter evidences the impact of the school as it functioned within the degradation of its immediate surroundings, and assesses how immigration reshaped its status in the 1980s.
Chapter Three – The Present Day
The third chapter looks at the present day heritage significance of the school and examines whether it can and should continue operating as an educational establishment. In looking at the challenges of retaining the Grade II listed building as a school its current cohort is analysed and the impact of its post-industrial location is evidenced. The study positions the argument that the structure of the Grade II listed building is not fit for the purpose of meeting the demands of twenty-first century education, both internally and externally. In this section reference is made to architectural solutions that have been deployed in another Grade II listed school in Leicester, namely Charnwood Primary School, to address similar structural challenges.
Finally, the conclusion draws together the observations from the three time periods summarising the significance of the building in terms of historical, aesthetic and communal value; reflecting on the challenges the school continues to face as its heritage value is impacted by external influences. The study evidences how the historical value is highly significant and has developed through the continual working of the school over the three time periods that have been assessed. The preservation of the building’s aesthetic value is evidenced and evaluated as being conserved in its original state, though arguably at the detriment of present day 6
educational requirements. It is argued that the success of the well preserved aesthetic significance of the building is not mirrored by the present day communal value of the school. The communal significance has been altered greatly over time and its current status is much diminished through the loss of a stable cohort. In looking at options for securing Slater Street School’s future viability, there are three major dependencies. The first, the regeneration of the Frog Island area to reverse the economic decline and the visible urban decay resulting from deindustrialisation. The second dependency that must be addressed to secure a future for Slater Street School as an educational establishment is to create a stable cohort of children, ideally from the local area. Alternatively, adopt a strategy to attract a stable cohort to the school for a particular educational specialism. The proposed redevelopment and regeneration of the Leicester riverside area, in addition to tackling the visual decay in the location, must be focused on providing the catalyst to reinstate the communal value to the Frog Island area. The creation of mixed use residential and commercial developments that provide dwellings for families with school-age children, not purely apartment living, and the provision for good commercial opportunities that allow businesses to thrive in the area would serve towards achieving this. The third dependency concerns the structure of the school building, and while acknowledging the value of retaining a virtually untouched example of a Victorian Board school, innovative and bold architectural solutions are needed to address the structural deficit that exists in the current building in meeting the functionality required for twenty-first century education. Slater Street School needs a future demand to make it a viable proposition to continue operating in its current location as a school. There is a dichotomy in what order changes need to happen to secure the future of the school and this poses a planning dilemma. A building that is made fit for purpose may attract a stable cohort yet without an existing demand for pupil places at the school there would be insufficient funding to make the building viable. The Grade II listed school building, when considered in isolation of its continued use, is at great risk. If the challenges evidenced in this study are not addressed, Slater Street School could follow the fate of other lost industrial heritage buildings in the Frog Island area, being too costly to maintain and too structurally challenging to be converted. It is concluded that only through continued use or reuse can such a heritage asset be preserved. 7
Background to Methods and Data Sources
The primary historical and evidential baseline material was resourced through several visits to the Record Office in Wigston, the Fosse Centre Library in Woodgate, and the Special Collections Library at the University of Leicester. Through focusing on the relationship between working mothers in the local textile industry and the introduction of compulsory education, the history of the school has been captured from Victorian times through to the present day. Contemporary local newspaper reports and access to archived school records have presented a rich seam of information. Through gaining access to the original architectural plans for the school building and by reference to the Leicester City Planning department database, a timeline of changes to the physical school building was established and the output has been deployed in the presentation of evidence in this study. Further support from the Leicester City Council Planning Department was received in the form of a condition survey DVD for the submerged air raid shelter in Slater Street School’s yard. I was granted access to the school premises during the summer holiday to photograph internal architectural features and to record a selection of aesthetic characteristics. The Ward statistics regarding the residential location of the current school cohort were provided by the Leicester City Council Learning Services department and these have been analysed to help present the current pupil demographics.
This research has been greatly enhanced through interviews that were conducted with the current Head Mistress of Slater Primary School, Mrs Cheryl Henderson, and with a retired Head Mistress from the school, Mrs Margaret Bowerman who was in post during the late 1970s. The interviews were conducted under the specifications of the University of Leicester’s ethical approval provision that was granted to me on 4 June 2015; Ethics Reference: 1354-sb561-schoolofhistory.
Mrs Bowerman was located through a request for information regarding Slater Street School in the 1970s that I submitted through the Leicester Mercury newspaper that was published in the Mr Leicester section. In addition, an interview with my older brother Steve Littlejohn who attended Slater Street School from 1951 to 1960 and returned to live in the Woodgate area throughout the 1970s, has provided some insightful triangulation of evidence regarding the slum clearance and the later 8
deindustrialisation in the area. A reproduction of a 1902 Ordnance Survey Map of the Frog Island and Woodgate area1 has afforded useful background that has enabled me to form a picture of the residential changes to the area surrounding the school that occurred during the time period studied.
This research has been supported by secondary sources covering a range of specialisms that included the history of the textile industry, the female workforce, education, place attachment and architecture. These are all referenced in the bibliography. Additionally I have engaged with local history and research through publications of several Leicester specific texts that include a selection of research reports produced by the University of Leicester’s Centre for Labour Studies, authors Goodwin and O’Connor, which are based on oral interviews conducted with Leicester school leavers in 1960. The specific articles I referred to for background research are listed in the bibliography.
1 Godfrey Edition Leicester (NW) 1902, Old Ordnance Survey Maps.
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Chapter One – The Baseline
Part One – Historical Value
In looking at the historical value of Slater Street School it is important to set the school building within its historical context of the nineteenth century textile industry. The East Midlands has been prominent in the textile industry for centuries, with Leicester being renowned specifically for its worsted production and its hosiery manufacture.2 During the industrialisation of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries three core industries featured noticeably in Leicester; textiles, boot and shoe manufacturing, and engineering. By 1850 the hosiery industry was dominant in Leicester, moving away from the domestic system to a factory based production system.3 The Leicester engineering industry included in its portfolio the production of machinery used to manufacture textiles and shoes; the worldwide export of manufacturing machinery was big business for the city. The city’s multi-industry factor has been attributed to offering Leicester more protection than other cities during subsequent periods of financial recession. Magdin supports this by stating that ‘Leicester appeared to cope with the impact of deindustrialisation marginally better than the northern heavy and single-industry cities.’4 The industrial diversity slowed down the impact of the recession as it was not focused on a single industry. The manufacturing and export of machines for the production of textiles and shoes also contributed towards Leicester’s industrial decline. The proactive selling of equipment for the manufacture of goods to overseas markets provided the capability for foreign competition to produce textiles and shoes that in turn would compete with British markets.
Smith notes that most of Leicester’s earliest textile mills were located in the Frog Island area.5 This fact is evidenced by the 1902 Ordnance Survey map that shows eight large textile mills and works surrounding the school site, six positioned along the River Soar and two aside the Leicester Canal.6 In 1857 Leicester’s Medical
2 David M. Smith, The Industrial Archaeology of THE EAST MIDLANDS (London: Dawlish Macdonald, 1965) p.94. 3 Ibid., p.23. 4 R. Madgin, Heritage, Culture and Conservation (London: VDM Publishing House Ltd., 2009) p.35. 5 Smith, The Industrial Archaeology of THE EAST MIDLANDS, p.254. 6 Godfrey Edition Leicester (NW) 1902. 10
Officer, Dr John Barclay, described the new industrial landscape as, ‘On all sides vast blocks of warehouses have arisen… a forest of long factory chimneys’.7
Frog Island had become the heartland of Leicester’s hosiery industry and between 1851 and 1901 the proportion of women working in the hosiery industry rose from 42 percent to 68 percent. The 1891 census showed 48 percent of Leicester women were in paid employment, against the national average of 34 percent.8 Prior to the Factories Acts of the 1850s it was commonplace for children to work in the industry, their value being calculated in more for what they could earn at work than in receiving a school education. Education was not compulsory until 1880, neither was it free of charge until 1891, hence it did not feature generally as a priority for families.9 From the mid nineteenth century the growing emphasis on education was met with resistance from families as the children were not able to work and furthermore they were expected to pay fees to attend school. As an addition to parent opposition, Wells reports that under the Factory and Workshop Acts children under 13 were expected to attend school part-time, and he goes on to report that it was the shortage of schools that caused these acts to be ineffective.10 The Education Act of 1870 was passed by parliament to make provision for elementary education in all districts where facilities were inadequate. As a consequence of the Act the School Boards were set up to address this shortage of schools. The Leicester School Board approved the location of the new Slater Street Board School in Frog Island; it being ideally placed to serve the families working in the thriving hosiery and textile industries. By locating the school right in the heart of the working area at least one obstacle to low attendance was removed, however it was still more financially lucrative for young people to take up the abundant work in the factories. The original documents held in the Leicester and Leicestershire Records Office relating to Slater
7 Marilyn Palmer and Peter Neaverson, Industrial Landscapes of the East Midlands (Chichester: Phillimore & Co. Ltd., 1992) p.168. 8 David Nash and David Reeder, Eds., Leicester in the Twentieth Century (Leicester: Alan Sutton Publishing and Leicester City Council, 1993) p.168.
9 Gillard D (2011) Education in England: a brief history at www.educationengland.org.uk/history [accessed 12 June 2015]. 10 F.A. Wells, The British Hosiery Trade: It’s [sic] History and Organisation (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1935) p.156.
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Street Board School provide a record that the school, built originally for boys, was opened by the Mayor William Kempson Esq. on Monday 13 July 1874.11 It was not until 29 April 1878 that a Girls’ School Room was allocated within the building, and boys under the age of nine attended the Mixed School. The Leicester School Board Managers’ Log Book presented a daily record pertaining to the school and the following extracts provide evidence of school life at the time.12 The biggest issue reported was low attendance, followed by a lack of teaching staff. Records show that teaching staff were borrowed from Elbow Lane and the Great Meeting Hall to supplement Slater Street School’s staff. To illustrate the attendance issue an early log entry states that ‘Four parents have been unable to pay the weekly school fees and have kept their boys at home.’ An entry for one specific week reported the number of attendees as ‘ninety-nine with the total school fees collected of £1·1·4 for the week’. Grants were given to the school for raising attendance and for meeting ‘…standards of reading, writing and figures’.13 This practice was to become the foundation of the funding system that continues today with the government funding of pupils based on schools targeted to meet attendance, attainment and achievement standards. On one occasion only ten boys were reported to have attended school and all were dismissed at 11.15am and all attendances were cancelled. The log book provides evidence of a disconnection between the factory and the school timings that exasperated the attendance issues. It is recorded that the factories commence work a quarter-hour after school is open and the parents do not send their children to school in time. It suggests 9.30 to 12.30 would be better school hours as fitting in with the work hours of the factory.14 While there is no evidence of the timing being amended to suit the factories, the cultural shift that was required to accept the newly introduced education policies is clearly indicated by the preference of workers to allow their children to be late for school rather than they themselves arrive early for work. A report dated March 1877 regarding a boy’s non-attendance quotes; ‘Mother says that compulsion is not expected to apply to respectable people.’15
11 Leicester and Leicestershire Record Office, Record number 39. 12 The Leicester School Board Managers’ Log Book. Leicester and Leicestershire Record Office, Record number 39 reference DE4467/1. 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid. 15 Ibid. 12
Despite the Education Act of 1870 making provision for education to be made available for all children aged five to 13 years old and the subsequent Education Act of 1880 making attendance compulsory, it was reported that there was difficulty in enforcing the compulsory attendance in hosiery districts due to opposition from parents.16 This situation was exasperated by what Wells has suggested was a shortage of schools. The increasing effectiveness of education provision through addressing both the school shortages and the parents’ opposition can be presumed by the following trend showing the decreasing percentage of hosiery workers under the age of 15.
Table 1.1. Hosiery Workers under the Age of Fifteen.
Year Hosiery Workers under 15 years of age 1851 13 percent 1871 8 percent 1881 5 percent
Source: Wells, The British Hosiery Trade p.157.
Following campaigning by the National Education League, the Education Act of 1880 made education compulsory until the age of ten. In 1883 Slater Street Board School’s attendance was reported to have increased to 342.17 Under the Elementary Education (School Attendance) Act of 1893, the school leaving age was increased to 11 and the right to education was extended to deaf and blind children. In 1899 the school leaving age was increased again, to 13.18
From its inception Slater Street Board School would have served the immediate catchment area of Frog Island and Woodgate, evidencing the higher density of population that originally lived in the terraced houses and the courtyards in the vicinity of the school. Children from the courtyards in Grundon Street, since demolished, were known to have attended Slater Street School in the 1950s.19 This is corroborated by the 1902 Ordnance Survey Map that shows the numerous courtyards and rows of terraced houses in close proximity to the school.20 There was another
16 Wells, The British Hosiery Trade, p. 157. 17 School Board Managers’ Log Book. 18 School leaving age at www.politics.co.uk/reference/education-leaving-age [accessed 31 May 2015]. 19 Littlejohn, S. Interview by author, Leicester, UK, 10 June 2015. 20 Godfrey Edition Leicester (NW) 1902. 13
Board School located in Elbow Lane, a vanished street once near the site of the Highcross Centre that served the children in the catchment area around Sanvey Gate. In addition, there was the long established St Leonard’s Church School that served Woodgate and due to the Church school’s close proximity to the newly built Slater Street School, local objections were made by the St Leonard’s supporters. These were evidenced in The Leicestershire Chronicle and Leicestershire Mercury, Saturday 8 September 1877, where concerns were reported regarding the safety of pupils having to cross the river to attend Slater Street.21 St Leonard’s Church School continued to provide an alternative education to that of Slater Street Board School up until the Second World War, when eventually in 1940 St Leonard’s School was merged with Slater Street School. The main reason for the merger was to enable St Leonard’s pupils to make use of the air raid shelter that was located under Slater Street’s schoolyard.22
The historical significance of Slater Street School in the early part of this study can be summed up in a quote in a Leicester Mercury newspaper article published in 1974 regarding the school’s centenary celebrations held in St Leonard’s Church. Looking back the then Head Master, Mr C.J.E. Smith stated;
At one time (1874) Slater Street Primary School was in the heart of a thriving residential area – now it is not possible to see a house from the school thanks to the wall of industry which has sprung up in recent years.23 The school was built in the heart of the industrial setting of the Frog Island hosiery industry to serve the children of the factory workers. In the heyday of industry the school building was surrounded by the smoking factory chimneys, the polluted river full of dyes and chemical discharge, and the railway line that ran almost over the top of the school yard along a massive blue brick viaduct. The residential housing stock that surrounded the school was radically depleted throughout the 1960s. Factory workers moved out of the area to live on the newly built housing estates in the suburbs of Leicester. After hundreds of properties had been demolished, the Housing Renewal Act of 1974 halted further demolition and this resulted in saving some of the existing residential properties in the Woodgate area.24
21 The Leicester Chronical and Leicestershire Mercury article, 8 September 1877. 22 School Board Managers’ Log Book. 23 Leicester Mercury, 18 October 1974. 24 Nash, Leicester in the Twentieth Century, pp.148-9. 14
The revised strategy, changing the focus towards renovating the remaining housing stock, rather than demolition, was too late to stop the conspicuous impact of the demolition programme on the Frog Island area. The resultant reuse of the now cleared space was described by Newitt as being taken up with ‘…a scattering of car parks and utilitarian and commercial industrial buildings’.25
Between 1961 and 1971 Leicester’s New Commonwealth population increased more than fivefold, as the following table shows. Many of the New Commonwealth immigrants moved into the area adjoining Frog Island, taking up residence in the terraced houses that remained in the Woodgate area.
Table 1.2. Leicester’s New Commonwealth Population. Year Population Number 1951 1500 1961 4624 1971 26419 1981 59709
Source: UK census Nash Leicester in the Twentieth Century p.187.
As evidenced, Slater Street School’s historical value was derived from its strong links with the surrounding industry. The location remained commercially active as it transformed from large single ownership concerns into smaller hosiery and commercial businesses that were created within the large, increasingly disused, industrial premises in Frog Island; the impact of which is examined further in Chapter Two. The next section looks at the aesthetic value of the school from its early existence until deindustrialisation.
25 Ned Newitt, ed., The Slums of Leicester (Derby: The Breedon Books Publishing Company Limited, 2009) p.22.
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Chapter One – The Baseline
Part Two – Aesthetic Value
This second section of Chapter One looks at how the industrial setting of Slater Street School has influenced the building’s aesthetic value. The school was built in 1874 in a location set within the heart of Frog Island’s industrial landscape, amidst what some would say were fine examples of industrial architecture; most of which have since disappeared. The suggestion that the industrial past polarises opinion was made by Magdin in her argument regarding the burden or benefit of historic buildings.26 Whether the factories that surrounded the school in the nineteenth century were ugly monsters of manufacturing exploitation, or magnificent architectural monuments to industrial power; what was evident was the skill in the design and craftsmanship that created the buildings as architectural show pieces. These displays of success were part of the business skills deployed by their owners, who were known to have used their premises to impress their customers.27 The school was bordered by factories as shown on the 1902 Ordnance Survey map; an extract of this is shown below in Image 1.3. This details the school, shown circled in blue, as being surrounded by eight large industrial premises. These industrial premises are shown highlighted in red on Image 1.3. and are listed with their references where given as:-
Abbey Gate Mills (Wool) S.P St Leonard’s Works (Wool) 416 1-108 Woollen Mill B.M. 185.5 Worsted Spinning Factory Dye Works North Mills (Flour) Worsted Spinning Factory B.M. 181.0 Bleach and Dye Works 414.967
26 Madgin, Heritage, Culture and Conservation, p.19. 27 Palmer and Neaverson, Industrial Landscapes of the East Midlands, p.170. 16
Image 1.3. MAP of Slater Street School and surrounding Works
Source: Godfrey Edition Leicester (NW) 1902.
Smith reports that the 1838 Factory Returns recorded 23 worsted mills in Leicester. Over a century later his description recorded in 1965 shows the surviving early mills in Leicester, mainly around Frog Island, as being ‘…tall functional red brick structures forming a distinctive element in the urban landscape’.28
Frog Island’s industrial landscape attracted renowned attention as illustrated in Pevsner’s description of the steam powered textile mill being a dominant feature in Leicester’s landscape in the nineteenth century. He stated that; ‘Particularly fine in
28 Smith, The Industrial Archaeology of THE EAST MIDLANDS, p.95. 17
Leicester are…Frisby Jarvis’s mill near Frog Island’. His description goes on to highlight the ‘…fenestration and decorative detail are frequently interesting – and the hosiery industry was at least clean’.29 A supporting description appears in Smith’s The Industrial Archaeology of the East Midlands stating:
Factory of Messrs Frisby Jarvis. On Northgate Street. One of the few late nineteenth-century hosiery works with architectural embellishment. The four-storey frontage has a three-bay section surrounded by a heavy pediment with clock. Other ornamentation includes elaborate cornices.30 Whether viewed as monster or monument, the architectural detail and craftsmanship was clearly evident.
Image 1.4. Frisby Jarvis Mill prior to demolition in 2005
Source: University of Leicester Special Collections [accessed 19 May 2015].
29 Elizabeth Williamson, ed., The Buildings of England: Leicestershire and Rutland Nikolaus Pevsner (London: Yale University Press, 2003) p.67. 30 Smith, The Industrial Archaeology of THE EAST MIDLANDS, p.254. 18
In order to provide a more specific background to the building of Slater Street Board School I refer to the nineteenth century school provision in Leicester. Leicester has a history of Nonconformist influence in its political dealings and the city’s education was proved to be no exception to this custom. Prior to the Education Act of 1870, Leicester’s main school provision was through the Free Church Unitarian Great Meeting School in East Bond Street. The Slater Street School Manager’s Log records several teachers as being recruited to Slater Street from the Great Meeting School.31 Pye reports that the Free Church Unitarian Great Meeting School was large and important yet it closed in 1873, an action that was forced through by the Nonconformists supporting the alternative schools built by the School Board.32 The Education Act of 1870 created an enormous surge of public and commercial commissions for designing and building schools to meet the requirement for providing education for what was a growing population. Dixon states that the scale of commissions served to create a new demarcation between architects and builders/surveyors that led to the recognition of architects as being viewed as professionals in their own right.33 The increase in school building generated great interest from many sources, with Prince Albert taking an active interest in applying a Germanic influence to English education and school architecture.34 The Gothic Revival of the middle Victorian decades provided a powerful alternative to Classical styles, resulting in the Gothic Revival architects dominating design at the time.35 Gothic was thought of by many as being the national architectural style influenced by the perpendicular neo-Gothic design of the Houses of Parliament constructed in the nineteenth century. As part of the plan to impose state education and importantly demonstrating the power of the School Boards, it was proposed that Gothic would be the preferred style for Board School design. This was not a universal agreement, as evidenced by the designs of E.R. Robson, a prominent London School Board architect who rejected the Gothic designs in favour of the more eclectic English Renaissance style. Robson argued that continuation of the Gothic semi-ecclesiastical style would be inappropriate in marking the significance of the great change in
31 School Board Managers’ Log Book. 32 N. Pye, Leicester and its region (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1972) p.481. 33 Roger Dixon and Stefan Muthesius, Victorian Architecture (London: Thames and London publishers, 1978) p.10. 34 Ibid., p.11. 35 Ibid., p.12. 19
national education.36 Robson’s work was highly influential and his designs were made available to other School Boards and their local architects through an instructional book he published in 1874 called School Architecture, being practical remarks on the planning, designing, building and furnishing of school-houses, which illustrated a number of London school designs in his preferred ‘Queen Anne’ style.37 Robson travelled widely to study interior and exterior school design and he was greatly influenced by the Germanic style. His designs revealed a definite function over form approach that would enable the teacher led gender-separate classrooms of up to 60 pupils, to operate effectively. Lighting, noise control and ventilation were important features in the design; although these specifications were not always achievable due to the limited ground space that the British buildings had to fit into due to their city centre locations. The following quote affirms Robson’s influence on Board School architecture:
Robson and the board were determined that these schools should impress their young users and their families. They were large, imposing, and often as many as three storeys high. They dominated their surroundings. Most remarkably of all, and after some initial hesitation, Robson rejected Gothic models in favour of an eclectic English Renaissance style: more fitting, as he suggested, for secular schools. Their elevations, with fancy gables, colourful brickwork, and terracotta ornamentation, were highly fashionable. Their plans — usually featuring separate classrooms entered from a central schoolroom, and separate playgrounds and entrances for boys and girls — would influence elementary school design until the early years of the twentieth century.38 Dixon reports on the changing architectural trend as ‘…many of the younger Gothicists [sic] defected to something different, yet related, the ‘Queen Anne’ Revival’.39 The result of the emerging trend was that in general the ecclesiastical schools tended to prefer the Gothic style architecture and the secular schools preferred the Queen Anne, English Renaissance style. However, this was not a hard and fast rule as many exceptions would affirm.
Acting upon the requirements of the Education Act of 1870 the Leicester School Board was ‘…particularly active’.40 By 1903, 31,000 elementary school places had
36 Ibid., p.239. 37 W. Filmer-Sankey. “Germany presents the finest model in the world”: E.R. Robson and the Influence of German School Planning in Later 19th Century England. In: Originally publish 2000 ed. Berlin, New York: DE GRUYTER SAUR; 2000. p. 43-52. 38 Filmer-Sankey. “Germany presents the finest model in the world”. 39 Dixon, Victorian Architecture, p.23. 40 Pye, Leicester and its region, p.483. 20
been provided in Leicester by the School Board as compared with 13,000 Church school places; affirming Leicester’s switch of support to the School Board’s building programme. Pye reports that the School Board left a clear mark on State Education through its architectural achievements, as evidenced by the 30 new schools it commissioned in Leicester.41
One Leicester commission was for Slater Street Board School which was awarded to R.W. & Johnson Goodacre Architects, of 5 Friar Lane, Leicester. The original plan number 2734 was signed by Johnson Goodacre and dated 6 March 1873.42 A scan of it is appended for reference at appendix 1.
The school was commissioned to be built in Slater Street, a street named after John Slater who held the position of Mayor of Leicester in 1802. The land along the street from Frog Island to Abbey Meadows was split into parcels that were privately owned. One owner, the Reverend Canon Fry, who is listed in the 1875 Barker’s Directory for Leicestershire and Rutland, was a member of the Leicester School Board. 43 The Reverend Canon Fry’s Slater Street land adjoined the Corporation owned land on Slater Street which bordered onto Frog Island. When Canon Fry sold his land to the School Board, it provided a limited sized plot to enable the school to be built. The requirement for a larger plot of land was not met as the adjacent land between the Reverend Canon Fry’s land and Abbey Meadows was not successfully purchased by the School Board, as the asking price was thought unacceptable.44 This decision would prove to have longer term implications on the future workings of the school in terms of restricted playground space and the lack of outdoor sports areas. The Goodacre plan confirms the plot of land for the school as being part given by the Corporation and part being land taken by the School Board. The footprint of the plan shows adjoining land belonging to Mr Edwin Newton at the boundary of the school. It can be evidenced from his name appearing on the plan that he was the owner whose asking price for his land had not been met by the School Board.45 The ensuing space restrictions caused by the reduced plot size are evident from the irregular
41 Ibid., p.483. 42 Leicester and Leicestershire Record Office, Record number 39. 43 Barker & Co.’s Directory for Leicestershire and Rutland 1875. 44 Fosse Library – Local land records [accessed 8 June 2015]. 45 The original plan number 2734, Goodacre Architects. Appendix 1. 21
shape of the ground floor of the school building that makes use of every inch of available space to its boundary. The school was built to accommodate 378 boys, 310 girls, and 243 mixed infants.46 On 23 March 1948 the Sports Day was held at Blackbird Road thus confirming the lack of on-site space within the school’s footprint to provide co-located sports facilities at Slater Street.47
The external appearance of the building has been described in the Historic England listing as Gothic Revival with red brickwork incorporating blue brick and ashlar dressings with a graduated grey slate tiled roof. 48 From a site visit I witnessed that while the building is two storey it has a third storey mezzanine space that can only be accessed internally from three separate parts of the building. This limits the usage of the internal top floor space as there is no single access to these attic floor spaces and as a consequence they have been used to provide oddly located toilet and storage facilities. From an external perspective this third storey space provides the attractive gable sections of the roof with each gable featuring a circular window with iron star glazing decorated with white tracery as shown in Image 1.5. The ground floor casement windows are multi-paned and have brick moulded tall pointed arches. The second floor windows are a mix of multi-paned brick moulded arched casement windows and oblong shaped multi-paned casement windows. The first and second floor windows all have stone mullions. There is an ornate brick and stone band, described as ashlar in the building’s listing, between the two floors, and a denticulated eaves cornice. Along the bottom of the building almost at floor level there is an intricate band feature of blue brick patterning, as shown in Image 1.6.
46 Leicester and Leicestershire Record Office, Record number 39. 47 Ibid., DE4467/14. 48 Grade II Listing for Slater Street School at http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-473096- slater-street-school- [accessed 8 May 2015].
22
Image 1.5. Internal view of circular window in apex
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
Image 1.6. External features - brick and ashlar bands and denticulated cornices
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015]. 23
There are four separate entrances, two on Slater Street, one on the front facing onto Frog Island, and one on the side passage that leads to Abbey Meadows. All entrances would originally have been marked with cast iron plaques stating Boys, Girls, Mixed and Infants. The Boys and Infants entrance signs remain intact and their present day images are shown below.
Image 1.7. Boys entrance
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
24
Image 1.8. Infants entrance
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
These four entrances have pointed arches of moulded brick and wooden doors with stone lintels. The Goodacre plan shows the clear demarcation between Boys, Girls, Mixed and Infant school areas internally and also includes separate external yards, enabling the full segregation of the four discrete groups. Internally the original layout was designed to facilitate the Victorian teaching method of having one teacher at the head of a large group of pupils, with lessons conducted within the 65 foot long classrooms that are situated on both floors facing onto Slater Street. The ceilings are high and vaulted providing an impressive learning space, as shown in Image 1.9. The present day internal layout remains largely unaltered aside from the large classrooms being partitioned into smaller learning spaces to meet current teaching requirements. While today there is no physical evidence of open fires in the classrooms, there is evidence of their existence prior to the installation of central heating as provided in an entry in the School Manager’s Log Book that states; ‘16 November 1896 – Monday morning and no fires lit in the classrooms.’ 49
49 School Board Managers’ Log Book. 25
Image 1.9. Internal vaulted ceiling
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
The internal design of Slater Street Board School was characteristic of the Victorian architecture of education, featuring large separate classroom areas, segregated yards, and details of lighting positioning and ventilation specifications being evident on the plan.50 Though described as Gothic Revival on the buildings listing, there is much similarity with Robson’s ‘Queen Anne’ Revival style, particularly the use of red brick and the roof gables. Dixon affirms that amidst the contemporary debates regarding Victorian style, the architecture can often be described as geometrical rather than Gothic.51 Undoubtedly the design of Slater Street School is a hybrid of styles, but whatever description of style is preferred, it is distinctly recognisable as a typical Victorian Board School.
50 Dixon, Victorian Architecture, p.236. 51 Dixon, Victorian Architecture, p.23. 26
Image 1.10. Slater Street School 1936
Source: University of Leicester Special Collections [accessed 14 July 2015].
In summary, the aesthetic value of Slater Street School was created by the Victorian education system and captures the debates that ensued between the contemporary architects and School Boards. The impressive building stood its ground amidst the imposing industrial architecture and was a symbol of power and progress. Its pupils were subject to compulsory attendance and the regime was strict, as the following example taken from the Punishment Book verifies. In an entry dated 26 April 1912; ‘Arthur Hargreaves (1 stripe) (of the cane) for tripping boys, thus causing them to fall down in the playground.’52 In addition to providing education and social skills, the school was a refuge for working mothers to leave their children while they went to work in the factories. The next section explores the significant communal value of the school during its early life evidencing how people connected with the building.
52 School Board Managers’ Log Book. DE4467/15/2. 27
Chapter One – The Baseline
Part Three – Communal Value
The communal value of Slater Street School was created in large part due to its industrial location, the building being surrounded by hosiery and textile factories. One near neighbour, Frisby Jarvis, operated from an imposing four storey factory located on the same side of the road just along from the school; the two buildings separated only by a paint shop and post office. Across the main Frog Island Road, in view of the school, was another large factory called Frog Island Mills. The school’s closest neighbour was the Frisby Jarvis Farben Dye Works, with its factory door facing across from the school’s Boys entrance door in Slater Street. The close proximity of the factories to the school was a positive benefit for working mothers, allowing them to drop their children off at school and be at their place of work within minutes. In Leicester there was a higher than the national percentage of women workers, who played an important part in the local hosiery industry, thus enabling the many women to reap the economic benefits of paid employment and allowing them to take part in the social aspects of factory life. Nash reports that the culture of factory life provided ‘…pleasant occupation and cheerful company’.53
Image 1.11. Farben works door
Source: University of Leicester Special Collections [accessed 19 May 2015].
53 Nash, Leicester in the Twentieth Century.p.168. 28
A study by Klein of Britain’s married women workers conducted research into working mothers in the 1950s. This has been referred to for data that provides a richer view of working life and to evidence how, in Frog Island, the relationship between the factories and the school was symbiotic. By 1957, 49.3 percent of the female labour force was married.54 Klein reported that by 1960, 32.5 percent of females worked in manufacturing nationally, out of which 55.4 percent worked in the textile industry.55 While Klein researched a national picture, it is argued that with the knowledge that the number of Leicester’s female workers was traditionally higher than the national average, the results of Klein’s study can be taken to be highly indicative of the Frog Island situation.56 Klein’s findings on what arrangements were made while mothers worked outside of school hours showed that 63 percent had a relative or friend to look after their children while they were at work. In this same survey, 21 percent cited school dinners as being part of their childcare provision.57 Another group of mothers said that they did not have to make any special arrangements for childcare, and of those 37 percent reported to have only worked during school hours.58 For this last group of mothers, having their workplace next door to the school would have been a beneficial arrangement. The facility of leaving their children from the age of three years old at the Nursery, and older children to attend Slater Street School, provided an essential service that allowed the Frog Island mothers to work; both delivering for them in terms of the childcare provision and in supplying school meals.
The lower wages attracted by female workers also aided better productivity and profit in the industry as Nash reported that ‘…Leicester women throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries were persuaded by employers to work for wages that men refused to accept’.59 The high number of working mothers in the hosiery industry is affirmed in the article by Goodwin and O’Connor, Families, Relationships and Societies in 1960s, stating that a high proportion of mothers were
54 Viola Klein, Britain’s Married Women Workers (London: Routledge, 1965) p.26. 55 Ibid., p.97. 56 Nash, Leicester in the Twentieth Century.p.168. 57 Klein, Britain’s Married Women Workers, p.57. 58 Ibid., p.56. 59 Nash, Leicester in the Twentieth Century.p.169. 29
employed outside the home, with only 20 percent being housewives. Their employment was frequently in the hosiery trade.60
The school played an important part in the community through two World Wars, at a time when there were many residential courts and terraced houses in the nearby vicinity. There is an air raid shelter located under the rear yard of the school; its existence was validated by a DVD of a Condition Survey that was carried out on the shelter in 2012 by the Leicester City Council Planning Department. At some time around 1939 this shelter would have been constructed to protect pupils, teachers, and possibly local people and workers. An extract from the Slater Street School Manager’s Log Book, 17 July 1940, confirms the shelter’s existence through reports on the dangerous state of the passage leading to the air raid shelter and the poor state of the playground.61 This is further evidenced by the merger of Slater Street School with St Leonard’s Church School in 1940 that was eventually brought about after decades of competition between the two schools, the final decision was based on providing St Leonard’s pupils with access to the shelter.62
Slater Street School continued to provide education for the families of the hosiery workers despite the impact of the Leicester City Council’s slum clearance programme that would have reduced the number of local pupils on roll. Just prior to the Second World War, circa 1938, the slum clearance programme was active in the Frog Island area and 296 houses were demolished in Pasture Lane and Birstall Street; locations that were within the Slater Street School catchment area.63 The activity of the housing programme was suspended during the war and was restarted in the 1950s. The post war house clearance in Frog Island had a dramatic effect on the area and the school because the demolished houses were not replaced with new dwellings; instead the area was left empty and the prior inhabitants were moved out to the new council estates in the suburbs where new schools had been built for the migrating cohort. The clearance programme was aimed at providing better housing facilities for families and the housing stock that was demolished did not have
60 H.O’Connor and Goodwin, J. (2013) Families, Relationships and Societies ‘Beyond ‘Average’ Family Life: at http://hdl.handle.net/2381/31517.
61 School Board Managers’ Log Book. DE4467/14. 62 School Board Managers’ Log Book. DE4467/1. 63 Newitt, The Slums of Leicester, p.189. 30
adequate facilities; having only outside toilets, no bathrooms and being without hot water. Some of the older properties were in courtyards with four family dwellings sharing one outside toilet and cold water supply.64 To highlight the impact of the slum clearance programme on the school, the school’s catchment area on the 1902 Ordnance Survey Map65 has been cross-referred with the records of Leicester city’s house clearances in Frog Island, specifically in the St Leonard’s and Northgate areas.66 The cross-check evidences that during the period 1956 to 1962 there were 12 streets, comprising of more than 400 houses in the Slater Street School catchment area that were demolished; and importantly the housing was not rebuilt. The residential community was moving away from the area yet the factories were still operating. The impact of this activity on the communal value of the school was starting to materialise in the low pupil numbers, despite the rising post war population. The Education Act of 1944 was passed to introduce state funded secondary education, and this was to have a further impact on the number of pupils attending Slater Street School. Delays in enforcing the requirements of the Act due to the war, and slow implementation of the structural changes, for example in building new Secondary schools, meant that the impact of the changes was not widely felt until after 1951; its implementation being completed in Leicester by 1963.67 The main impact on Slater Street School was through the lowering of the elementary school leaving age from 14 to 11 years old creating a further reduction of the number of pupils on roll. By 1960 Slater Street was operating on providing education for the age range of three to 11 years of age, through the provision of a part-time three to five year olds nursery and a full-time five to 11 year olds provision. The Education Committee approved the introduction of part-time nursery education in 1964 and this served to further boost the school’s nursery numbers.68 As Slater Street School’s full-time pupil numbers fell, the roll numbers for the nursery were at maximum with a waiting list.69 This was proof that working mothers who no longer lived locally were still going to work in the Frog Island factories, probably travelling by bus, and taking their children into the nursery. Their older children,
64 Littlejohn, S. Interview by author, Leicester, UK, 10 June 2015. 65 Godfrey Edition Leicester (NW) 1902. 66 Newitt, The Slums of Leicester, pp.189-191. 67 Gillard D (2011) Education in England. 68 Pye, Leicester and its region, p.489. 69 Bowerman, M. Interview by author, Leicester, UK, 17 June 2015. 31
who could make the journey to school on their own, were attending the new local schools that had been built on the council estates. The community that once sent their children to Slater Street School had moved out of the area and the number of pupils attending for full-time education was depleted. The nursery facilities were still in demand as working mothers continued to travel to work in the Frog Island factories. This factor started the decline in the school’s communal value and put the ongoing existence of Slater Street School into question. The continuing impact on Slater Street School’s communal value is examined in more detail in Chapter Two in looking at how deindustrialisation brought about further challenges to the school’s future.
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Chapter Two - Deindustrialisation
Part One – Historical Value
Slater Street School’s historical significance is evidenced through the continuing influence of the hosiery industry throughout the progressive deindustrialisation of the Frog Island area. Chapter Two focuses on the history of the hosiery industry from the 1960s up until the end of the twentieth century; tracking the changes to the school and its surrounding area that were influenced by the economic factors of the 1960s boom and the subsequent economic decline of the 1970s and 1980s. The pressure caused by foreign competition in the hosiery industry was not a twentieth century phenomenon; it had started over a hundred years earlier, with reports from as early as 1870 of competition from Germany increasing.70 This competitive threat from overseas was aligned with trade restrictions that limited export profits from America, the impact of which had started to reduce Britain’s dominance. The physical impact of deindustrialisation on the urban landscape has been amplified in more recent years through its visual presentation of decaying industrial architecture; yet the seeds of the decline of Britain’s hosiery industry had been planted over a century earlier. During both World Wars the hosiery industry had been commissioned to supply the armed forces and this requirement had boosted substitutional work for some factories, serving to cushion the blow from the progressive decline in the industry.71 The subsequent 1960s post-war boom provided a respite to the decline and reversed the trend of deindustrialisation for a period, and one clear indication of strength in the hosiery industry at that time was that there was a surplus of jobs. This was evidenced in Leicester by Beazley; ‘In an ever- developing market the textile industry struggled to attract labour back into its factories.’72 This is corroborated by the Goodwin and O’Connor studies that highlight the over capacity of the factories in 1960 that enabled school leavers to find immediate employment.73 In 1968 Britain’s trade balance in knitwear was still favourable with an extended range of man-made fibres being used in production, and the fashion for shorter skirts created a demand for tights made from acrylics and
70 Wells, The British Hosiery Trade p.170. 71 F.A.Wells, The British Hosiery and Knitwear Industry 1972. Report held in Special Collections University of Leicester. 72 Ben Beazley, Post War Leicester (Stroud: The History Press, 2011) p.77. 73 O’Connor and Goodwin, J. (2013) Families, Relationships and Societies. 33
Nylon.74 The changing market demands for fashion at less cost soon put much of Britain’s hosiery industry into a struggling financial position. The industry’s outdated machinery and traditional processes became a barrier to affording the agility required to compete with newcomers entering into the global marketplace. The overseas competition had the benefit of more modern technology and were able to produce quality goods at cheaper prices. There was an emerging trend for smaller hosiery companies to operate in the Frog Island area, alongside the larger traditional factories. These smaller companies were more agile in their ability to streamline production processes and control their overheads. Some outsourced certain steps in their production processes to keep costs down, such as sub-contracting dyeing and finishing fabrics to other companies.75 One disadvantage of having an increasing number of small firms was the reduction in large training programmes; and this factor was cited has having a negative impact on Leicester’s hosiery industry as a whole with regard to the skilling and training of the workforce. The larger companies continued to run training programmes for their own workforce, and this resulted in the eventual deskilling of some of the workforce employed by the smaller companies. Workers would join the large factories initially to learn the trade and then move on to other companies in the area. While the deskilling issue for Leicester was argued to be negative for Leicester’s hosiery industry; any disadvantages were countered by the view that the strength of Leicester’s textile industry in the 1960s lay in the ‘proliferation of small firms operated by ruggedly independent owners’.76 The economic decline in the hosiery industry was attributed to several factors and its timing was captured by Beazley’s description of 1970 in Leicester being ‘…a bad year for hosiery’.77 Traditionally the larger hosiers had been tied to retail contracts that guaranteed continuity of regular production and provided confidence in securing future orders. However, with the increasing competition from the Far East, Germany and the United States, the traditional contractual relationships started to break down as retailers looked to their British producers to reduce their costs in line with the cheaper and better quality goods that could be sourced from abroad. Beazley reported of local firms being locked into contracts with ‘…the tail wagging the
74 Wells, The British Hosiery and Knitwear Industry 1972. 75 Wells, The British Hosiery Trade p.171. 76 Nash, Leicester in the Twentieth Century.p.67. 77 Beazley, Post War Leicester, p127. 34
dog’.78 Many Leicester firms had relied too much on the promise of ongoing business and were not able to adapt their legacy manufacturing plant to meet the requirement to produce the new and changing fashion products that consumers were demanding. By the mid-1970s, through copying Western fashion designs, foreign imports from Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea successfully undercut prices across Europe. The impact on the economy was palpable and swift as illustrated in Beazley’s report that by 1974 imports from these countries totalled £50m, and by March 1975, 88 percent of Leicester’s hosiery firms were working below full production.79 Between 1973 and 1974, 12,000 jobs were lost in hosiery nationally of which 61 percent were in the Midlands, with Leicester cited as being one of the worst cities affected.80
It would be unfair to say that the Leicester hosiery industry unanimously failed to respond to the changes, as there is evidence that some firms did invest heavily in new machinery to manufacture garments of more modern man-made fibres; including the production of polyester garments to meet the emerging fashion trends. Investment in the 18 gauge machines to manufacture the latest fashions provided a short lived boom, as by 1973 the demand for polyester had started to decline. The flexibility required of producers to meet the ever-changing fashion trends was reported to have caused problems for many hosiery firms.81
The hosiery industry sought new survival strategies to address the decline in the industry and in the 1970s asset stripping and large company vertical mergers were making the financial news. The hosiery industry in Frog Island continued to be a significant yet declining employer in the area throughout the remaining twentieth century, with the hosiers experiencing frequent takeovers and mergers in attempts to secure their commercial viability. Beazley reported on the emerging pattern of local companies being taken over by larger groups.82 The speed of the declining situation hitting local companies can be further illustrated through the following newspaper
78 Ibid., p.126. 79 Ibid., p.131. 80 Ibid., p.126. 81 Ibid., p.127. 82 Ibid., p.172. 35
articles from the Leicester Mercury reporting on the activity of some of the larger hosiery companies in Frog Island.83
Leicester Mercury, 2 January 1973, reported that Hawley and Johnson Ltd. of North Bridge Works, Woodgate, were expanding their factory with new boiler house, a new garage, offices, and a dispatch depot.
Three years later, Leicester Mercury, 16 January 1976, it was reported that Hawley and Johnson Ltd. had been hit by the recent recession and was in a takeover by an ‘unnamed large textile firm. 120 jobs would be saved.’
Leicester Mercury, 5 December 1979, reported that 69 jobs were threatened at Hawley and Johnson Ltd. and closure would take place in the New Year if a buyer was not found. The report added that three years ago the family business had been sold to an unnamed textile firm.
The performance of another large firm in Frog Island can be tracked through the Leicester Mercury archive in articles relating to Frisby Jarvis. The following extracts illustrate the slightly more positive fate of this once prominent family hosiery concern.
Leicester Mercury, 21 August 1970, a takeover was announced by a Manchester firm described as a Jersey Fabric Manufacturer... referring to ‘…a big money deal’.
Leicester Mercury, 28 August 1970, the new owners were reported to be planning an expansion to recruit between 300 and 400 additional workers and at the same time announced redundancies of 72 existing workers through a planned restructure.
Leicester Mercury, 9 and 11 December 1970, featured Frisby Jarvis securing orders from Russia for ‘daring see-through trouser suits’.
Frisby Jarvis continued to trade through the recessions of the 1970s and 1980s, with the company being eventually dissolved in 1992. Other structural arrangements were deployed throughout the economic decline to attempt to secure a future for the industry. One such action was to conduct vertical acquisitions that would legally merge companies from different industry sectors. This strategy saw Courtaulds and
83 The Joan Skinner Collection at Special Collections Department, University of Leicester.
36
the Imperial Chemical Industry (ICI), both located in Leicester, merge. The unprecedented nature of vertical acquisitions prompted an investigation by the Monopolies Commission that concluded in 1968 that vertical acquisitions did not damage the industry. However, vertical acquisitions were short lived due to their disappointing results and the incidence of them slowed down by the early 1970s.84
The root cause of the terminal decline in Britain’s hosiery industry was overseas competition, a cause that was expedited by several other secondary contributing factors including vertical acquisitions and large corporate investors. While the industry was criticised for not keeping up to date with technology, in hindsight this would have served to defer but not prevent the core reason for its collapse. This conclusion is supported by the example of the United States’ textile industry where big investments were made in new hosiery technology to keep abreast of foreign competition; despite this investment strategy the modernisation programme did not prevent the industry’s eventual collapse.85 Britain’s strategy of depending on skills and not automation did avoid the initial outlay cost of updating equipment and was influenced by the abundance of skilled labour in Britain. However, this British tradition of reliance on a skilled workforce, in preference to automation, kept the production costs high and uncompetitive. The increasing predilection of mergers and acquisitions by large companies, who saw the smaller independents as investment opportunities, quickened the pace of deindustrialisation. Where there was no longer the security of family loyalty, as soon as the profits dropped the assets were stripped, resulting in the factories being sub-let or left empty. Dintenfass affirms that this caused an acceleration of deindustrialisation; evidencing that mergers resulted in large concerns that were unable to compete internationally despite their strength in size.86 The family firm ceased to exist and resulted in weakened local loyalty. The factory buildings were left full of redundant equipment, and soon became non-viable businesses owned by corporate investors who readily sold assets without local conscience. These factors contributed to the subsequent change in Britain’s economy
84 Wells, The British Hosiery and Knitwear Industry 1972. Report held in Special Collections University of Leicester. 85 Michael Dinenfass, The Decline of Industrial Britain: 1870-1980 (London: Routledge, 1992) p.21. 86 Ibid., p.11. 37
moving it away from being highly dependent on manufacturing to being one reliant on the service industry.87
The decline in Leicester’s hosiery industry was irreversible as Beazley reported; ‘Companies all over the city and county were either closing down, working short time, or making redundancies on a weekly basis.’88 Through the eyes of Slater Street School the declining surrounding industry in the 1970s was mirrored by the low number of pupils on roll for the main school as it continued to operate well below its original capacity. Deindustrialisation would have contributed towards the reduced school cohort as factories closed and workers moved away from the area. It is argued that the main factor for the low numbers of pupils on roll would have more likely been due to the deferred impact of the 1960s slum clearance programme. Hundreds of families had been moved out of the area and there was no replacement residential building programme, resulting in the eventual reduction in a local demand for education. The fact that some form of industry was still operating in the area throughout the 1970s was evidenced by the number of children attending the Slater Street School nursery. Contrary to the declining trend in main school numbers, the nursery was operating at full capacity with 30 children.89
This fact proves that there were still working mothers in the Frog Island area during the late 1970s. This was affirmed in an interview with the Head Mistress at Slater Street School, Mrs Margaret Bowerman, who held the position from 1976 to 1979. She recalls that the nursery was always full because mothers worked in nearby factories and dropped their children off on the way to work. Out of a total of 100 children on the roll at the time, 30 were aged between three and five years old and attended the nursery. Mrs Bowerman recalled that by 1979 there were still many factories operating in the Frog Island area and the school had developed good working partnerships with the local hosiery factories. These companies proactively engaged with the school, some by making donations and others by inviting the pupils to test new products. Mrs Bowerman recalled one donation made from a local hosier to the school was a huge quantity of brown Crimplene material that a group of volunteer mothers used to fashion the full range of costumes for the Christmas play;
87 Ibid., p.38. 88 Beazley, Post War Leicester, p174. 89 Bowerman, M. Interview by author, Leicester, UK, 17 June 2015. 38
the sole colour creating an unusual production.90 Further evidence of partnership working was corroborated by an article in the Leicester Mercury, 26 November 1980, that reported on local company Richard Kew and Sons Ltd. of Frog Island having recruited volunteers from the school to test out their new trouser braces.91
The prevalence of working mothers and the continuing rise in the proportion of mothers returning to work after childrearing is supported by Yeandle.92 There was a marked trend for mothers of dependent children to take part-time jobs, working 30 hours or fewer per week. An increasing number of women were working part-time in the service sector.93 The increasing trend for part-time work in the service sector was reported by 1979 to be as high as 80 percent.94 Despite a declining hosiery industry, nursery places at Slater Street School continued to be in demand for children of mothers working in the area, with the main school operating well below normal capacity. The twentieth century education policy would have reduced the school’s total operating capacity to 300 pupils, one-third of its Victorian scale. The actual number of pupils on roll fell far short of this with a total cohort of 100 children, including the nursery.95 The school’s historical value was retained throughout the deindustrialisation of the area through the working mothers’ connections with the nursery. The continuing influence of the hosiery industry during this period illustrates that the impact of deindustrialisation was not yet fully evident until much later in the twentieth century. Looking at how the Victorian school building served the needs of the twentieth-century children, the aesthetic significance of the school and its surroundings is examined in part two.
90 Bowerman, M. Interview. 91 Special Collections Department, University of Leicester. 92 Susan Yeandle, Women’s Working Lives: Patterns and Strategies (London: Tavistock Publications Limited, 1984) p.7. 93 Ibid., p.7-8. (reference to Department of Employment 1973-80). 94 Ibid., p.8. 95 Bowerman, M. Interview. 39
Chapter Two - Deindustrialisation
Part Two – Aesthetic Value
Palmer and Neaverson reported in 1992 that Leicester’s industrial buildings were notable for their ‘…high quality brickwork, with cornices and string courses incorporating moulded brick and terracotta ornamentation’.96 At that time more industrial buildings had survived in Leicester than any other East Midlands city.97 The reason for their survival was said to be their adaptability for reuse. This fact was supported by Magdin who stated that, from the 1970s onwards the decision to retain or demolish an industrial building was based on how the building could fit within the contemporary agenda, for example its reuse; aligned with other factors including condition, location, age and ownership issues.98 This decision making process was demonstrated in the proposal made to protect St Leonard’s Works recorded in an appraisal carried out by the Leicester City Council, as detailed in the following report:
On 29 November 1979 Leicester City Council published its Appraisal and preliminary proposals for Frog Island Industrial Improvement Area, under the Inner Urban Areas Act of 1978.99 This report provided a contemporary view of the characteristics of the 25 hectares of Frog Island land as concluded from the analysis that was completed to support the council’s case for declaring Frog Island an Industrial Improvement Area. Frog Island was described as ‘…one of the most run down and depressed areas of the City’. The continuing dominance of the textile industry is evidenced with the report showing 44 percent of employment in Frog Island being in that particular industrial sector, with the predominance of smaller companies continuing to operate in the area; confirmed by the statistic that some 70 percent of firms employed less than 30 people. The report referred to the 1956 Development Plan that had originally allocated the area to be predominantly for industrial use. The result of the deliberate intensification of industry in Frog Island
96 Palmer and Neaverson, Industrial Landscapes of the East Midlands, p.170. 97 Ibid., p.170. 98Madgin, Heritage, Culture and Conservation, p.20. 99 Inner Urban Areas Act 1978, Frog Island Industrial Improvement Area: Appraisal and Preliminary Proposals, 1979 [accessed 1 June 2015].
40
proposed by the 1956 Development Plan was subsequently proven to have been effective, as in 1979 the Industrial Improvement Area Report states that residential accommodation in the area had ‘…effectively disappeared’. The only housing in the area was reported to be in the Woodgate zone, to the north-west of Frog Island.100
Slater Street School was not mentioned in the I.I.A. report due to the commission being focused solely on industrial improvement. Specific mention was made of the former Frisby Jarvis Mill on Frog Island that was described as being of architectural and historic importance.101 The mill building was located in an area described as being visually poor with many derelict buildings. The mill was sited next to Slater Street School. There was specific reference made to the St Leonard’s Works building belonging to Frisby Jarvis, proposing it be retained. The building had been designed by local architects Shenton and Baker in 1867, and had attracted favourable comment from Pevsner.102 In a subsequent action, the Leicester City Council had applied for this building to be listed under the Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas Act of 1990, stating that it was already listed on the City Council’s Register of Buildings of Local Interest. The listing request described the impressive building as dominating Frog Island.103 This request evidences that within a dilapidated industrial area, the City Council was acknowledging the importance of conservation not only by proposing to improve the area’s condition but through protecting the industrial architecture.
100 Inner Urban Areas Act 1978, Frog Island I.I.A. 101 Ibid. 102 Williamson, The Buildings of England,p.67. 103 Special Collections Department, University of Leicester.
41
Image 2.1. Frisby Jarvis St Leonards Works showing school in background
Source: University of Leicester Special Collections [19 May 2015].
The location of the school on an increasingly busy main road was problematic. The issue that pupils, parents and staff experienced in accessing the school was reported in the Leicester Mercury, 25 March 1970, with the headline; ‘Cross this Road at your Peril.’104 The report stated that two policemen and a lollipop lady were on point duty during the morning’s peak traffic period. The I.I.A. proposal described the road on which the school stood as; ‘One of the City’s main traffic arteries, the A50 runs through the area and handles virtually all the servicing and other traffic generated by industry in the area.’105 Mrs Margaret Bowerman, Head Mistress in the late 1970s, recalled the daily danger of escorting the pupils from the school along the Frog Island Road to the church hall where school dinners were served. Although the journey took the pupils only a few metres away to the communal hall facility and it did not involve crossing any roads, Mrs Bowerman recounted that walking along the narrow pavement was dangerous. On one occasion a lorry actually brushed her arm
104 Special Collections Department, University of Leicester. 105 Inner Urban Areas Act 1978, Frog Island I.I.A. 42
has she escorted the pupils, in a crocodile formation, to the hall. She also recalled that there were mice in the hall and as a consequence of the unsafe school meal arrangements she acted in conjunction with the County Education Authority to relocate the school dinner facilities for Slater Street School from the church hall into the school building, making reuse of the nursery hall on the ground floor. Dinners were catered for offsite and brought into Slater Street School for consumption.
In 1974 there was a reorganisation of the Leicester City and Leicestershire County councils that resulted in the responsibility for Education in the city being moved to the county authority.106
The Physical Education lessons for Slater Street School pupils were also held in the separate location of the church hall. In a reorganisation brought about by the same issues as experienced by off-site school meals, the P.E. equipment was moved into a ground floor space on the school site and additional support was drafted in from the County Education Department to redesign the lessons. The Slater Street children were described as being far more adventurous than the ‘well-off Oadby children’. Mrs Bowerman recalled the children being unaware of risk as they ‘threw themselves at the P.E. equipment.’107
There were several other structural limitations described by Mrs Bowerman that posed problems with regard to operating a school within the Victorian building. The nursery children played in the yard immediately outside of the main building in area described as ‘…horrible and dull’.108 During the school holidays an Art student was commissioned to paint nursery rhyme characters on the main wall to brighten the yard up and make the playground a ‘…nice place to be’.109 During her employment at the school, Mrs Bowerman arranged for the Head Mistress’s office that was originally located on the top floor, to be relocated on the ground floor. When asked to describe the geographical location of the school building, Mrs Bowerman said that there were no residential houses in sight of the school. There was a lot of industry in the area, and the school was constantly operating in a noisy environment due to sirens and traffic noise from the main road. A pelican crossing was located outside of
106 Nash, Leicester in the Twentieth Century, p.140. 107 Bowerman, M. Interview. 108 Ibid. 109 Ibid. 43
the nursery classroom and the lessons had to be stopped every time the bleeps went off when someone was using the crossing.
There have been no major structural changes to Slater Street School and despite the school being in continuous use since its inception in 1874 it has retained its original appearance. There is no record of applications for major alterations to the school building on the Leicester City Council’s Planning database and the following extracts affirm the nature of the building alterations carried out before the building was listed. Under the Town and County Planning Act of 1947 there was a record of alterations to Slater Street School for the erection of new juniors’ toilet block and provision of new infants’ playground. (Plan 99733 dated 9 March 1962) Under the Town and County Planning Act of 1962 there was an application granted for the provision of accommodation for the caretaker of the Infants school. (Plan 9458 dated 15 May 1964). The Planning Site History on the Leicester City Council website shows several more recent applications for minor alterations including external fencing and vehicular access.110
The building was Grade II listed on 5 March 1999. Reference: NGR: SK5808805252, describing the building as School, 1874, with minor C20 alterations.111 The aesthetic value of the school has been developed and retained through the lack of structural building alterations. Its original Victorian footprint and character has been well preserved due to the low, declining demand for its educational services having curtailed any need for extending the building.
Prior to the building being awarded a Grade II listing, the school’s future was tenuous with the threat of impending closure being first evidenced in 1970. The more significant threats of closure came in the 1980s during the Leicestershire County Council’s tenure for Education. The communal value of the school is examined in the following section to evidence how it functioned under the impending threats that continued until the school’s eventual reprieve in 1988.
110 Leicester City Planning Site History for Slater Street School at Leicester.gov.uk/planning/ [accessed 17 July 2015]. 111 http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-473096-slater-street-school- [accessed 8 May 2015].
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Chapter Two - Deindustrialisation
Part Three – Communal Value
The Leicester Mercury cuttings in the University of Leicester’s Special Collections department evidence an early threat to close Slater Street School in 1970. Leicester Mercury, dated 25 March 1970, states that Slater Street School must be closed because of the construction of St Margaret’s Way. In looking at how Slater Street School escaped closure, one reason was the reorganisation of the city’s Secondary Modern School model and the county’s Comprehensive School model that resulted in a long dispute between the two models that was not resolved until 1975. The closure of one small primary school in the city was probably a low priority on the education agenda at the time. St Margaret’s Way was built and Slater Street School remained operational; due in part to the prolonged conflict between City and County councils regarding secondary education. The Leicester Mercury, 26 June 1976, reported that ‘Mrs Margaret Bowerman has been appointed headmistress of Slater County Primary School.’112 The change of the school’s name confirms the County Council’s extended educational accountability. The conflict in resolving the secondary education model in Leicester and Leicestershire was reported by Nash as being resolved in 1975 and the comprehensive school system was subsequently implemented; in time to absorb the increasing number of immigrant children.113 The UK census, shown in Table 1.2., confirms the five-fold increase in Leicester’s immigrant population in the 1970s.114 The arrival of immigrants to the Frog Island area was evidenced by Beazley who reported that a large number of immigrants were encouraged into the area by work in the traditional industries, the hosiery industry being one noted. The continuing prominence of hosiery factories, albeit reorganised into smaller concerns, in the Frog Island area supports the theory that immigrants populated the area for reasons of work and residential purposes.115
The interview with Mrs Bowerman provided supporting evidence that the children of immigrant families attended Slater Street School in the late 1970s. She recalled the cohort were from financially challenged families and 50 percent received free school
112 Special Collections Department, University of Leicester. 113 Nash, Leicester in the Twentieth Century, p.143. 114 Ibid., p.187. 115 Beazley, Post War Leicester, p155. 45
meals. The ethnic ratio was two-thirds white and one-third of the pupils being of other ethnicities. The children mainly lived in the Woodgate area and they walked to school; not many pupils came from outside the school’s defined catchment area.116
When she took the post of Head Mistress, Mrs Bowerman recognised the lack of parental engagement with the school. Prior incumbents had preferred a policy of not allowing parents inside the school building, only allowing access into the yard. The Slater Street School Parent’s Association was established in 1978 and received keen support from many parents. The majority of the pupils’ parents worked in the local factories and an early joint activity was to ask for donations for the school from the local factories. Underwear, textiles, materials for costumes for school plays, and paint were among the items gladly donated by the local firms.
The air raid shelter that had been in use during the war was still accessible during the 1970s and Mrs Bowerman recalled that it was used for storing old furniture. An innovative reuse was planned when the school acquired some chickens that were overnighted in the air raid shelter. In a demonstration of communal effort, parents came in and dug up the concrete, laid turf, and wired off a section of land to make a chicken area. The children took turns to collect and keep the eggs. Further communal activities can be evidenced that showed the parents’ involvement in school improvements. Leicester Mercury, 9 July 1977, reported that Slater Street School was ‘…an oasis among the factories’, when describing how parents and staff had got together to organise fund raising to pay for nine tons of top soil and 170 square metres of turf. 117
Despite the proactive communal activity, closure of the school was again being threatened. Leicester Mercury, 17 March 1983, reported; ‘School is doomed to close in three years’ time.’ The closure was reported to be required in order to raise funds for the conversion of Fosse Infant School, another school that was located near to the Woodgate area.118
Leicester Mercury, 4 July 1987, reported of parents’ anger at Slater Street School’s closure, with a quote from a parent stating that, ‘Many of us are from outside the
116 Bowerman, M. Interview. 117 Special Collections Department, University of Leicester. 118 Ibid. 46
catchment area and we choose to pay bus fares to send out children here because it’s such a good school.’119 This indicates that not all children were living in the school’s catchment area at this time.
Leicester Mercury, 7 January 1988, reported that Slater Street School with its 160 pupils, including 30 in the nursery, was to be saved. The then temporary Head Master, Mr Brian Smith, said that the victory was the result of ‘…a considerable battle by parents and staff to keep the school open’. The five year fight against the Leicestershire County Council to stop the closure of the school was attributed to the rising number of pupils in the area helping to secure the school’s viability. 120
The low school roll that was evident in the late 1970s with only 100 pupils at the school, 30 of which were at the nursery, had increased during the 1980s. Newspaper reports in the later 1980s evidenced the reversal of the declining trend that was attributed to the increased immigrant population settling in the Woodgate area. Leicester Mercury, 7 January 1988, reported that there were 160 pupils on roll, an increase of 60 percent.121
The impact of deindustrialisation, the lack of nearby residents, and the economic instability of the 1980s was to manifest into other problems for Slater Street School, despite its future having been secured. On 22 November 1989, vandals had gained access to the school over a weekend and carried out a spate of mindless damage, destroying books, children’s work and equipment. In a demonstration of continuing communal support for the school, staff, governors and parents rallied together to clear up the mess and get the school back to normal for the pupils.122 There was an increased dependency for communal support and a group calling themselves The Friends of Slater Street were proactive in the early 1990s. Leicester Mercury, 10 March 1995, reported that the group had raised £3,000 over a three year period, and they were called upon to support the school in 1995 when it was hit by poor funding.123 Several other incidents of theft and vandalism at the school were reported in 1995. When thieves stole benches and garden equipment from the school a
119 Ibid. 120 Ibid. 121 Ibid. 122 Ibid. 123 Ibid. 47
donation of £100 was received from a local firm, Premier Screws and Repetition, towards the cost of replacements.
The communal value of Slater Street School was evidenced through many examples of collective action during the latter part of the twentieth century. The Parents’ Association that was formed in the 1970s served to unite the community in collective action focused around the school. The threatened closures in the 1970s and 1980s rallied supporters together to oppose an impending danger, as Douglas illustrates the cause of ‘…trying to stay in being’ is a strong bond.124 Communal value determined by how people are joined together through a single place or cause produces what Douglas describes as ‘…a public memory’.125 The supporters of the school formed into a community group through their common affiliation with Slater Street School. By identifying themselves with a group name, i.e. The Friends of Slater Street, they advertised that they were community members offering collective action and support that was centred on the school. In the 1980s Slater Street School provided the public memory, the sense of place for the community; it acted as the hub of communal significance.126
To summarise, Slater Street School survived closure despite the impact of the declining number of pupils and the surrounding deindustrialisation, due to events that delayed and diverted attention away from the school. The school was threatened by closure for almost two decades while priorities of the Education Authorities were focused on secondary education. The time lapse resulted in an unpredicted increase in pupil numbers being brought about by the rise of immigration into the area. The concurrent lack of structural investment served to preserve the Victorian architecture of the school as evidenced by the building’s listing description of having, ‘minor C20 alterations’.127 Slater Street School had operated for an extended length of time significantly below its pupil capacity in a location described as‘…one of the most run down and depressed areas of the City’.128 The school was not serving an immediate catchment area as there were no residential buildings within sight of it; pupils who attended walked from neighbouring Woodgate. There were funding
124 Mary Douglas, How Institutions Think (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd.,1987) p.24. 125 Ibid., p.102. 126 Ibid., p.103. 127 http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk. 128 Inner Urban Areas Act 1978, Frog Island I.I.A. 48
issues due to low pupil numbers and the building had been destined for closure. As a consequence of the lack of investment, the aesthetic value of the school has been preserved through the absence of major structural alteration. Through the proactive community, the communal value of the school has been highly significant during the deindustrialisation period as evidenced in the fight to save the school. Looking next at the school’s present day heritage value, the final chapter examines the challenges of whether this Grade II listed building can and should continue operating.
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Chapter Three – The Present Day
Part One – Historical Value
Leicester’s textile industry has not disappeared completely and still provides employment at a similar level to that of 1987. Statistics show that in 2011 there were 20,584 people employed in Leicester’s textile industry as compared with 19,700 people employed in 1987.129 However this is well below the 170,000 working in the industry during the 1950s. The waning British Manufacturing sector was reported to be without doubt the root cause of the urban decline. The effect of which on British cities has been described as devastating. 130
Frog Island’s industrial landscape is the legacy of Leicester’s deindustrialisation and the area today comprises mainly of derelict buildings and cleared demolition sites where the mills and massive factory buildings once worked. The commercial activity in the area is in the form of small and medium companies that trade from locations set among the urban decay. There are several companies listed as operating in Frog Island covering an eclectic range of trades that include car services, textile manufacturers, and heating, ventilation and air-conditioning firms (HVAC), working alongside third sector organisations.131
Image 3.1. Frog Island landscape
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
129 www.storyofleicester.info/cityheritage/atwork/peopleandcommunity [accessed 29 June 2015]. 130 Yeandle, Women’s Working Lives, pp.7-8. 131 www.leicester.co.uk [accessed 1 August 2015]. 50
Image 3.2. Frog Island wasteland
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
Past Government led strategies deployed to combat the effects of deindustrialisation had failed to make any wholesale improvements although some specific areas, such as the London Docklands, did benefit from investment. The main goal for regeneration has to be to generate employment and to stimulate economies.132 The Area Based Initiative (ABI) was a regeneration strategy that targeted selected areas for improvement, rather than spread funding thinly across many areas. The ABI was reported to have been unsuccessful in making a marked sustainable difference.133 In 1994, Leicester entered into three rounds of bidding for funding from the Single Regeneration Budget (SRB), along with bids from Newcastle. Both cities were said to be similar cases of economic deprivation; however the funding awarded highlighted a major disparity when Leicester was awarded £12M and Newcastle £109M.134 Following the financial crash in 2008, the move towards regeneration funding has been more about integrating social and environmental factors, rather than just being property focused.135 The increasing range of urban regeneration
132 P. Jones and J. Evans, Urban Regeneration in the UK: Theory and Practice (London: Sage Publications inc., 2008) p.54. 133 Ibid., p.59. 134 Ibid., p.60. 135 Ibid., p.67. 51
funding that has become available includes European Union grants, National Lottery grants, and public and private funding. The competition based applications for urban regeneration funding results in winners and losers as cities are forced to compete against each other. Jones and Evans describe this neoliberal approach to urban regeneration as forcing competition between equally worthy applicants, yet resulting in an uneven distribution of benefits.136
The planning system is the core mechanism for delivering sustainable regeneration to areas of urban decay.137 Leicester has been successful in realising some of its city centre regeneration plans, with the Cultural Quarter and the Cathedral and Old Town areas being excellent examples of positive regeneration. The challenge is to find the funding for the regeneration of areas of urban decay around Frog Island to realise the city’s proposals for the regeneration of Leicester Waterside. A supplementary planning document (SPD) was prepared in January 2015 to outline the strategy to transform 60 hectares of land between the River Soar and Leicester City Centre along the A50 corridor, the road that passes directly in front of Slater Street School. The document sets out the vision for the next 10-15 years that will transform the area described as a ‘…priority for investment and regeneration’. The project is a multi- agency partnership being led by the Leicester City Council (LCC) with Central Government and the Leicester and Leicestershire Enterprise Partnership (LLEP).138 The realisation of this plan depends on its flexibility and the clarity of vision. Funding cycles and politics will change over the next decade and a strong local planning focus, with clear leadership, is essential in adhering to the delivery of the vision. In the meantime, strategic decisions will need to be made with regard to the industrial architecture of Frog Island if it is to survive the present day challenges and be part of the regenerated Leicester Waterside. Within the supplementary planning document, Slater Street School appears as a listed building within the scope of the proposal, the vision of which states:
136 Ibid., p.75. 137 Ibid., p.87. 138 Waterside Supplementary Planning Document Final Version Leicester Council at http://www.leicester.gov.uk/your-council- services/ep/planning/conservation/conservationareas/conservationareasleicester/- [accessed 9 February 2015].
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The long term aim of regeneration is to re-connect the Waterside back into the wider city, transforming it into a thriving residential and mixed use community which offers all the benefits of vibrant city life and supports the economic success of the wider city centre as a cultural and economic hub. 139 The historical significance of Slater Street School is evidenced through the constant urban decay of its deindustrialised surroundings. To preserve its value for future generations, the urban decay has to be halted and the Leicester Waterside regenerated. The building’s aesthetic value is also tenuous, having been preserved over the past 140 years through lack of action; it needs a guaranteed continued use to protect its future. The next section looks at the school’s aesthetic value, along with that of some of its near neighbours, to establish how effective the school building currently is in meeting the needs of its occupants.
139 Ibid. 53
Chapter Three – The Present Day
Part Two – Aesthetic Value
Despite deploying the resources and legal mechanisms available for conservation and protection, attempts to protect industrial architecture can be thwarted by competing views. The Frisby Jarvis St Leonard’s Works on Frog Island was a building with architectural features that, as previously stated, attracted note by Pevsner. This near neighbour to Slater Street School was described as a building of great interest by the Leicester City Council in the 1978 Frog Island Industrial Improvement Area proposals.140 After the firm Frisby Jarvis was dissolved in 1992, the building was renamed Riverside Works and the extensive space was occupied by Martins Dyers until 2000. When Martins Dyers moved out of the city to new premises in Oadby, the building was left empty. St Leonard’s Works was awarded a Grade II listing on 15 April 2003 in an effort to protect it from its further dereliction. Over the subsequent two years the empty cavernous space was subjected to several vandalism incidents, including arson. After a severe fire in 2005 the building was declared unsafe and it was demolished. Today, ten years on, the site remains empty with the remnants of the former building still standing. A two-storey extension that adjoined the building alongside the River Soar still remains standing yet in a dilapidated state, serving as a partial reminder of what once existed. In an attempt to cover up the decayed eyesore that faces the busy A50 traffic route into the city, boards have been erected.
140 Inner Urban Areas Act 1978, Frog Island I.I.A. 54
Image 3.3. The Farben Works
Source: S. Billington [29 July 2015].
At the rear of Frisby Jarvis St Leonard’s Works’ derelict site on Slater Street, another Grade II listed building stands facing the main entrance Slater Street School. The Farben Works once belonged to Frisby Jarvis and was Grade II listed for special architectural or historical interest on 28 April 2003. Historic England lists the building as being part of a former worsted spinning and dyeing complex, added as an extension to the Frisby Jarvis Building in 1914.141 The building stands unoccupied and is contaminated due to its former chemical use in the dyeing processes; making any potential reuse or conversion financially restrictive due to decontamination cost.
On the opposite side of Frog Island to Slater Street School, Frog Island Mill seems to have secured a better future. In 2003 a Planning Application, number 20032430, to convert the mill into 24 self-contained flats, was withdrawn. In 2010 another application was made to convert the building into 43 flats; this Application number 20100251 was given conditional approval on 11 March 2011. Unconditional
141 Farben Works listing at https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/1407101[accessed 29 July 2015]. 55
approval was finally granted on 29 December 2014 in Application number 20132281.142 The building has recently been sold in its original factory state, along with the unconditional planning permission for conversion to 43 flats; the guide price for the sale was £800,000.143 The high asking price of this near derelict building reflects the owner seeking some recompense for the length of time taken to acquire planning permission and for working through the requirements to meet the conditions of the Grade II listing.
Image 3.4. Frog Island Mill
Source: S. Billington [29 July 2015].
Another old factory building at 2 Woodgate, across the River Soar from Frog Island Mill, was successfully converted into flats in 2012. Today the building looks secure and its external appearance is much enhanced. This is an example of how old building reuse can improve the industrial architecture and protect its future.
142 Leicester City Planning Site History at Leicester.gov.uk/planning/ [accessed 17 July 2015].
143 Property for Auction at www.shonkibrothers.com/ [accessed 1 August 2015]. 56
Image 3.5. 2 Woodgate
Source: http://www.zoopla.co.uk/property-history/flat-11/2-woodgate/leicester/le3-5ge/32550491 [29 August 2015].
These examples of potential and realised reuse do provide some promise for the protection of the industrial architecture that surrounds Slater Street School. The current surrounding industrial landscape remains bleak and with the Leicester Waterside proposals not being due for realisation until 2026 it is questionable whether Slater Street School will survive another ten to 15 years in order for a mixed use area to be established.
Looking at the present Slater Street School building, the following report evidences how the school building performs aesthetically and physically in meeting the needs of its current occupants. An interview was conducted with Mrs Cheryl Henderson, the current Head Mistress of Slater Street School, who has been in post for four years; and this source provides much of the evidence used in this study regarding the school’s current state.144 The challenge of making any alterations to a listed building is described in Brand’s How Buildings Learn. Alterations are discouraged and are a
144 Henderson, Cheryl. Interview by author. Leicester, UK, 12 June 2015. 57
barrier to adaptivity [sic] in buildings.145 Mrs Henderson explained the challenges that the school faces today with regard to operating in a Grade II listed building; the obvious challenges being the lack of flexibility for any internal and external restructuring. The requirement for a small internal serving hatch was subjected to strict planning conditions hence accentuating the sense that the occupants have to fit in with the building and not vice versa. Accessibility was reported as being a major issue as there are no lifts to the upper floors and no disabled access to the building, with the exception of limited ground floor access for a wheelchair. The original oblong Victorian classrooms are partitioned into smaller teaching areas that, due to the restriction of the original space, limit the class sizes to a maximum of 24 pupils. The external area is extremely limited and there is no communal area large enough to accommodate the whole school cohort. There is a small patch of artificial grass provided as a soft play area and the other playgrounds are of tarmac surfaces. From a site visit I can conclude that the layout is confusing, both internally and externally, with corridors having dead ends and several spaces having a single access with no adjoining routes, creating a maze effect. When asked what positive aspects the building offered, Mrs Henderson said that, ‘The building is quirky and is used to inform the history lessons.’146
Referring again to How Buildings Learn it can be evidenced from Slater Street School that Brand’s view, ‘that almost no building adapts well’, is correct.147 The subsequent changes to services that have been made over the years at Slater Street School have retained a temporary appearance, supporting the theory of Shearings Levels of Change.148 The following image shows how the service level additions have not been integrated into the original structure, there has been no attempt to conceal the infrastructure, and the pipes for central heating and the conduits for the electrical wiring are highly visible add-ons. Whereas many buildings would be demolished if they could not be updated to be fit for purpose, the Grade II listing for Slater Street School prevents any radical change to its interior; yet it has to be adapted to meet the requirements of present day education. In addition to the basic
145 Stewart Brand, How Buildings Learn: What happens after they’re built (London: Phoenix Illustrated, 1997. P 92. 146 Henderson, Cheryl. Interview. 147 Brand, How Buildings Learn, p.2. 148 Ibid.,p.13. 58
hygiene factors of having heating and lighting, the modern education curriculum requires audio visual and integrated technology solutions that have to be cabled into the classrooms. The structural challenge presented in providing the infrastructure for installing equipment in the school results in highly visible, impermanent looking solutions, as illustrated in Images 3.6. and 3.7.
Image 3.6. Internal wiring
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
Image 3.7. Internal lighting infrastructure
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015]. 59
The location of the school in its deindustrialised setting is evidenced in the following images showing the view from inside the school building and the view from outside, illustrating the totality of its commercial and industrial setting.
Image 3.8. View from inside the school
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
Image 3.9. View from outside
Source: S. Billington [13 July 2015].
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The traffic noise continues to impact on learning and the excess traffic can cause accessibility issues for parents and staff.149
The school building is a fine example of Victorian architecture, set in a location that is impractical for its current use and affording an internal layout that does not readily meet the needs of its current pupils and staff. According to Brand, from a physical perspective it is a ‘No Road Building, impressive and useless.’150
There is an example of a Grade II listed school building in Leicester that overcame the challenge of sympathetic modernisation in order to provide the infrastructure required for modern education. Charnwood Primary School, pictured below, is Grade II listed. With the addition of a two-storey extension, designed by Maber Architects, the school has combined the retention of the Grade II building with the accommodation required to house the facilities for modern education; all delivered within a fully embracing design. If there is a desire to retain Slater Street School as an educational establishment then this precedent exists for setting out how this can best be achieved. If there is a will to do this for Slater Street School, its Grade II listed building could be restored back to its Victorian prime, removing the partition classrooms and utilising the resultant vast spaces to provide facilities such as a communal assembly hall and a dining hall. The upper floors could be converted for administration use, a large library, and allocated space for communal services. To provide a modernised area for lessons a new school building could be constructed at the rear of the existing one, incorporating all the features required for twenty-first century education. The land at the rear of the school, owned and in part use by the Leicester City Council, could be reallocated to provide space for the school’s new building and to provide extended external play areas. The following image shows Charnwood Primary School as an excellent example of sympathetic modern extension onto a Grade II listed building.
149 Henderson, Cheryl. Interview. 150 Brand, How Buildings Learn, p.16. 61
Image 3.10. Charnwood Primary School
Source: Maber at http://www.maber.co.uk/projects/education/primary/charnwood-primary-school/ [accessed 29 July 2015].
The next and final section looks at the present day communal value of Slater Street School to assess how the building’s significance is impacted by the changing community it serves and partners with.
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Chapter Three – The Present Day
Part Three – Communal Value
The communal value that was displayed in the twentieth century in terms of community groups and partnerships with local companies has declined greatly. There are institutional community partners and the school has good working relationships with De Montfort University, St Margaret’s Church, and All Saints Church. Two parent governors sit on the school’s governing body and local factory visits have taken place to the Tyre Shop and a book making factory.151
The information collected from the interview conducted with Mrs Henderson confirms the current number of pupils on roll as 167, although this did drop to below 100 in 2011. The pupil churn is very high as the area is not a settled residential one, being described by Mrs Henderson as a twilight area with several homeless hostels. Children come into the area on a temporary basis while permanent residential accommodation is found for their families, resulting in their attendance at the school being on a very temporary footing. Taking the current Year Six pupils as an example; since the year group started at the school in Year One, there are only three of the original 22 pupils remaining at the school. Statistics from the Leicester City Council’s Learning Services Department illustrate the small number of local pupils attending Slater Street School. The school’s current cohort reside in 24 separate Wards in the city and county. The figures in Table 3.11. show that out of 178 pupils recorded on roll, only 17 live in the Abbey Ward, which is the school’s local catchment area. This represents fewer than ten percent of the pupils living nearby. This situation is positioned in the OFSTED report that describes Slater Street School as being ‘…situated in a commercial area of the city. Most boys and girls come from outside the local district’.152 With a current shortage of Primary schools in Leicester, Slater Street School is being used as an overspill and as the statistics show, is providing education for children from all over the city and some parts of the county.
The following table 3.11. reports the number of pupils who attend Slater Street School and the Wards that they live in.
151 Henderson, Cheryl. Interview. 152 Slater Primary School OFSTED report at www.slater.leicester.sch.uk [accessed 8 May 2015].
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Table 3.11. The total number of pupils per Ward of residence. Grand Ward Total Abbey 17 Aylestone 4 Beaumont Leys 19 Belgrave 14 Braunstone Park & Rowley Fields 13 Castle 8 Evington 8 Eyres Monsell 3 Fosse 9 Humberstone & Hamilton 8 Knighton 10 North Evington 20 Ravenhurst and Fosse 1 Rushey Mead 3 Saffron 9 Spinney Hills 1 Stoneygate 6 Thurncourt 5 Troon 4 Westcotes 4 Western 9 Wigston Meadowcourt (Leicestershire) 1 Winstanley (Leicestershire) 1 Wycliffe 1 Grand Total 178
Source: Information provided by S. Welford, Leicester City Council: Based on the Pupils on Roll at Slater Primary in January Census 2015.
The Ofsted report also states that Slater Street School is the smallest and oldest in Leicester. Just under half of the pupils are from a minority ethnic background, mainly Black Caribbean, Asian, Indian, Pakistani, and African. It also states that ‘recently a few refugee children have joined the school’.
Several key measures are reported as being above average and indicating the school’s tenuous position. The measures report Pupil Mobility rate, Free School 64
Meals, English as an Additional Language, and Pupil Churn during term time; and are all shown as being above average.153
The establishment of connections between places and people, the Theory of Place Attachment, highlights the difficulties that Slater Street School faces in creating better communal value. Community action becomes very difficult due to a highly transient pupil population. To promote community action there needs to be collective action around a common cause.154 This is very difficult to generate when the community resides in multiple locations around the city and county. The resultant status at the school, due in part to the lack of residential family properties in the school catchment area, is amplified by the effects of deindustrialisation in the surrounding landscape. The result of deindustrialisation is reported by Manzo and Devine-Wright as being where the economic viability and energy of a place is dramatically impacted.155 The economic viability of Slater Street and its surrounding area is visibly in economic decline and the energy of the place has been negatively impacted. To reinstall a sense of place into the school not only requires the physical improvements to Slater Street School’s topography, it needs permanent people living around it. It requires a stable community to be part of it, to demand its educational and communal services, and to generate collective action centred on the school. Regeneration is not only about the buildings, it’s about the economy, the community, and the resultant vibrant energy that’s created; all of which are required to create communal value. The two main issues that have to be addressed to secure the future of Slater Street School are a stable cohort and a fit for purpose building. Both issues are inter-dependent as the continuation of providing education in an outdated, unsuitable building will deter parents from sending their children there. Conversely the funding for investing in refurbishment and rebuilding is dependent on having a certain demand for education.
In summary, the present day situation for the school is precarious as there is not a stable, sustainable demand. Unless a local, more stable cohort is established the future for the school cannot be guaranteed. The school building would be at
153 Slater Primary School OFSTED report. 154 Lynne Manzo and Patrick Devine-Wright, eds., Place Attachment: Advances in Theory, Methods and Applications (New York/Oxon: Routledge, 2014) p.70. 155 Ibid., p.147. 65
increasing risk of deterioration without it being in continual use. I argue that with a less transient cohort from a more stable residential local community, there are exciting opportunities to make the school fit for modern day use while retaining its Grade II character. This presents the dependency on the regeneration of Frog Island as without this the other factors required to secure Slater Street School’s future will not be created.
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Conclusion
The heritage significance of Slater Street School has been tracked over its 140 year history as an educational establishment that has served the Frog Island community, to evidence the effect of the deindustrialisation of the area’s hosiery industry has had on the school. Over three discrete time periods that cover the early successful industrial years, the deindustrialisation of the industry in the twentieth century, and the present day; the changing historical, aesthetic and communal heritage values of the school have been scrutinised. The study has affirmed that the deindustrialisation of the Frog Island area that encompasses the school was a long slow process. The resultant urban decline was gradual and the industry in the area reinvented itself in different smaller scale guises. The historical value of Slater Street School is reflected in the history of the hosiery industry during its slow decline from the 1870s. The overseas competition, particularly from the Far East, overwhelmed the home market with high volume, cheaply produced, quality garments against which the traditional local industry struggled to compete. The perils of being the first to control the market are exposed through the story of the industry that shows how Britain’s world-leading success in the hosiery and textile industries resulting from the inventions of the industrial revolution only secured its dominant market position until the competition caught up and subsequently overtook. These circumstances are evidenced in many of Britain’s Victorian industries where British invention led the way, for example the railways where successive transport networks are far superior to the original British structure. The initial cost of legacy equipment and infrastructure subsequently inhibits future development and transformation. The market lead is only held until the competition, using the original ideas and the learning of the incumbent, discover improved and more efficient operating methods including cheaper labour. The incumbent fails to respond quickly and affirms that it is often easier to start from new than to restructure and convert existing equipment, processes and traditions. The prohibitive cost of transforming an existing enterprise creates a challenge for any government or company. Many of the Frog Island companies were slow to adopt new technology and depended too much on a skilled labour for their production. This was aligned with traditional contractual arrangements securing a regular demand that cushioned the need for companies to proactively seek new markets. The resultant decline was not immediately visible in the area and as evidenced in the study, 67
hosiery and textiles companies were operating in Frog Island well into the late twentieth century and today continue production on a much smaller scale. As shown, deindustrialisation caused a gradual decline in multi-industry Leicester, unlike the rapid impact it had on cities dependent on single industries. Frog Island’s protracted decline saw the industry in the area experience a dawdling process of change that slowly destroyed its industrial architecture, resulting in much of the area’s heritage being lost before the impact of deindustrialisation was fully acknowledged. The school remained at the centre of a working yet changing industrial landscape throughout the protracted deindustrialisation process and there was no significant change to the physical state of the school building throughout this period. Although the urban landscape was changing and signs of decay were increasingly evident, local companies were still occupying the surrounding premises, workers were still dropping their children off at the nursery, and despite the declining number of fulltime pupils on its roll the school maintained a continuous presence throughout the deindustrialisation of Frog Island. The school’s historical value has been derived through the workers’ children who attended the school. The historical significance of Slater Street School was celebrated in its centenary year in 1974, when its long serving contribution towards the local area was recognised.
The aesthetic value of Slater Street School has been subject to change throughout its 140 year existence. Its original value was that of a new school building marking the importance of Victorian Education. The building was designed in an imposing traditional Board school style to demonstrate the significance of the newly introduced State Education system. The ornate and yet striking architecture and the prominent corner location added to the building’s gravitas. The building’s aesthetic value is captured in its Victorian architecture alongside its recognisable increasingly evident limitations in serving a more modern educational purpose. The school provided stimulation through strong connections with the local area through a meaningful continual association between the school and the hosiery workers through their children. The industrial demise of the area has impacted on the school’s present day aesthetic value, though its significance remains strong for many past pupils. Importantly, the architecture has been well preserved due to the lack of any past major modifications, and is now further protected by the building’s Grade II listing status. At the turn of the twenty-first century there was a heightened focus on 68
the industrial architecture surrounding the school and the preservation of the heritage significance of the Frog Island area was demonstrated through several Grade II listings of industrial buildings; although this could not reverse the urban decay that had already had a marked impact on the school’s topography.
The communal value of the school has been proven to have once been a significant asset of the school and its community. It is argued that the communal value of the school has declined, though the cause has been shown not to be solely due to deindustrialisation. The relocation of residents out of the area through the slum clearance programme aligned with the planned local council policy to industrialise the Frog Island area, placed the school in the centre of a purely commercial landscape. The school’s present day cohort of local residents is fewer than ten percent, causing the topping up of its roll from a wider non-local community; yet despite this it is still operating below full capacity. The declining communal value puts the school in a fragile position and notwithstanding its proven historical and aesthetic significance, there is a dependence on a local community demand to secure its future. One of the proposals in the Leicester City Councils regeneration plan for the Leicester Waterside is to recreate Frog Island as a residential area. However, time is critical and the plan may not be realised for several years, perhaps decades.
I conclude that the delay in identifying Frog Island’s industrial architecture for Grade II listing for its historical significance has jeopardised the protection of many industrial buildings in the area. While hindsight always offers a more favourable and informed conclusion, I have evidenced that the slowly emerging impact of deindustrialisation on the Frog Island area initially masked the physical changes to the industrial landscape as the urban decay gradually crept through the twentieth century. The area continues to be industrially active, with smaller commercial and industrial concerns operating amongst the remnants of urban decay. In the twentieth century some of the large factories that were vacated by their big named firms were occupied by smaller companies that reused and sub divided existing buildings. The reuse and continued activity hid the impact of the gradual decline in the architecture, and masked the need for real investment. There was no wholesale closedown of Frog Island as would have been more visually obvious with a single industry based town. Instead it was the gradual decay of an increasing number of empty buildings that attracted vandals and arsonists and eventually prompted calls for protection. Despite 69
the eventual protection, the Grade II listing status did not succeed in protecting some of the historically recognised architecture, as was proven with the demolition of the Frisby Jarvis St Leonard’s works building. Whether the Victorian architecture of Slater Street School can remain protected as it stands surrounded by derelict buildings and areas of weed-filled wasteland depends on its continued usefulness.
The regeneration of the Leicester Waterside does offer some hope with regards to the long term existence of Slater Street School. The regeneration plan must incorporate the redevelopment of the local economy and must facilitate the relocation of a residential community into the area; not be solely focused on restoring physical buildings. Without efforts to establish a thriving residential area around the school it will remain a building with a past and no guaranteed future. There remains a huge risk to the building due to the length of time it will take to re-establish a residential community in the area. While this study has evidenced that the school has survived threats of closure in the past there is no certainty that it can continue to avoid closure in the future. Slater Street School is at risk of becoming another empty Grade II listed building. Given its proven heritage significance it may still suffer in the interim period from lack of investment funding and lack of sustainable use, while awaiting the regeneration of the Frog Island area. The heritage significance of Slater Street School has been evidenced and affirmed through this study as having survived deindustrialisation mainly intact. I conclude that without the action required to reverse the school’s declining communal value, there remains the risk that its heritage significance may not be enough to guarantee its future.
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List of Tables and Images
Reference Number Title Page Number
Cover Image Slater Street School 1 Table 1.1. Hosiery Workers under the Age of Fifteen 12 Table 1.2. Leicester’s New Commonwealth 14 Population Image 1.3. MAP of Slater Street School and 16 surrounding Works Image 1.4. Frisby Jarvis Mill prior to demolition in 17 2005 Image 1.5. Internal view of circular window in apex 22 Image 1.6. External features - brick and ashlar bands 22 and denticulated cornices Image 1.7. Boys entrance 23 Image 1.8. Infants entrance 24 Image 1.9. Internal vaulted ceiling 25 Image 1.10. Slater Street School 1936 26 Image 1.11. Farben works door 27 Image 2.1. Frisby Jarvis St Leonards Works showing 41 school in background Image 3.1. Frog Island landscape 49 Image 3.2. Frog Island wasteland 50 Image 3.3. The Farben Works 54 Image 3.4. Frog Island Mill 55 Image 3.5. 2 Woodgate 56 Image 3.6. Internal wiring 58 Image 3.7. Internal lighting infrastructure 58 Image 3.8. View from inside the school 59 Image 3.9. View from outside 59 Image 3.10. Charnwood Primary School 61 Table 3.11. The total number of pupils per Ward of 63 residence
71
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Appendix 1.
Plan Number 2734. Slater Street School
Source: Leicester and Leicestershire Record Office, Record number 39