Warwick State High School is a heritage-listed state high school at 15 Palmerin Street, Warwick, Southern Downs Region, Queensland, Australia. It was designed by Thomas Pye and Block A was built from 1914 to 1915. It is also known as Warwick Technical College and Warwick Intermediate School. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 28 June 2018.
History
Warwick State High School opened on this site in 1914 as the Warwick Technical College and High School, accommodated in new buildings; having relocated operations from an earlier site in Guy Street. It grew to include Queensland's first intermediate school in 1929, accommodated in a new building in 1932, and developed further to cater for increased high school enrolments in the 1950s and 1960s in new buildings. The buildings were purpose-designed by the Department of Public Works (DPW) and form an attractive cohesive group of state educational buildings from the early to mid-20th century. These are:
Technical College and High School Buildings Main Building, Block A (1915) Workshops Block, Block B (1914) Intermediate School Building Block C (1932) High School Buildings: South Connecting Wing (1958) North Connecting Wing (1959) Block F (1963) Block D (1968/9)
Prior to British settlement, the open country of the Darling Downs, named by Allan Cunningham in 1827, had been carefully and deliberately maintained by its Aboriginal owners in an annual pattern of controlled burns to preserve pasture for native grazing animals.Eleanor Crosby, From Run to Ruin and from ruin to restoration: an archaeological perspective of Glengallan: a report for the Glengallan Homestead Trust and Department of Environment and Heritage, Nerang: Turnix Pty Ltd, 1995, p. 12. British settlement of the Darling Downs, began in 1840 with the Leslie Brothers who were closely followed by other graziers. The town of Warwick, which grew to become the business centre for the southern Darling Downs, was surveyed by James Charles Burnett in 1849, with the first sale of crown land in July 1850. Warwick was declared a municipality in 1861 and was subsequently transformed from a squatters' town into the principal urban centre of this prosperous pastoral and agricultural district. The construction of the Southern railway line linking Brisbane, Toowoomba, Warwick and the tin mines of Stanthorpe reached Warwick in January 1871, and fuelled further development. As Warwick grew, its local industries remained related to primary production including: flour milling, butter and cheese production, bacon processing, sawmilling, coach and wagon works, followed in the 20th century by motor repairs and engineering works. All of these industries required a skilled workforce.Kerr, John, Triumph of Narrow Gauge, A history of Queensland Railways, Brisbane: Boolarong Press, 1990, p. 22Bennett, Helen, Warwick Shire: Thematic Historical Overview, Queensland Department of Environment, Cultural Heritage Branch, 1996, p.48
Throughout the 19th century, the only avenue for technical education in Queensland was through the local schools of arts where courses in trades were conducted. The quality and variety of instruction depended on the competence and enthusiasm of committee members. During the late 1880s, several committees established technical colleges in existing school of arts buildings, but as the range of courses and number of students increased, separate accommodation was necessary. Queensland's first purpose-built technical college was the Queen Victoria Silver Jubilee Memorial Technical Collegewhich opened in Ipswich in 1901, followed by Warwick's (1906), Mount Morgan Technical College (1909), and Toowoomba Technical College (1911) . Reflecting the importance of the mining industry to Charters Towers, the Charters Towers School of Mines was established in there in 1901, which fulfilled a similar role to a technical college but with a focus on mining.
In the early 1900s the Queensland Government began to take a more active interest in technical colleges. In the late 1890s through to 1914, Queensland's manufacturing sector grew substantially, creating a need for a more skilled workforce in a variety of trades.
The Board of Technical Education was established in 1902, replaced by a Technical Education Branch within the Department of Public Instruction in 1905, and the Technical Instruction Act 1908 empowered the government to take over existing technical colleges. Locally managed technical colleges gradually came under departmental control and the government also established new colleges in several centres, including Maryborough, Bundaberg, Rockhampton and Mackay.Blake, Thom, Queensland Cultural Heritage Context Study, 1996, p.103.
Technical education in Warwick began with the formation of a school of arts, which initially met in the courthouse before establishing itself in a building in Palmerin Street in 1869. A technical college began in the School of Arts boardroom in 1895. This space was soon inadequate and a site was acquired on the corner of Fitzroy and Guy Street where a new building was opened in 1906, financed through local subscriptions. A two-storey extension facing Guy Street was completed in 1909.Warwick Examiner and Times, 2 January 1869, p.2Warwick Examiner and Times, 24 August 1895, p.4Warwick Argus, 1 February 1896, p.2Warwick Examiner and Times, 12 May 1906, p.5Telegraph, 24 September 1906, p.13Brisbane Courier, 1 October 1906, p.2Warwick Examiner and Times 15 May 1909, p.5Warwick Examiner and Times, 27 September 1909, p. 5.
Concurrently, an approach had been made to the Minister for Public Instruction to offer high school education in Warwick at the technical college. This phase of education was referred to as a Day School. The Warwick Day School began classes in the Guy Street technical college on 1 July 1910. Warwick was the first town in regional Queensland to have a technical high school under government control. The Warwick Technical High School was officially opened on 8 August 1910. It was noted that during the previous 4.5 years, £5,812 had been spent on technical college works in Warwick, £2,450 of which were raised locally and that the college had been handed over to the government free of debt.Warwick Examiner and Times, 1 August 1906, p.3Warwick Examiner and Times, 15 May 1909, p.5Brisbane Courier, 6 April 1910, p.4Warwick Examiner and Times, 1 August 1910, p.3Warwick Examiner and Times, 10 August 1910, p.3.
Demand for further education was high and by December 1910 it was evident that a new site was needed for a larger technical college and high school. After a local referendum in September 1912, two acres (0.8ha) of land was resumed from Cunningham Park in 1913 for a new technical college and high school. Cunningham Park was originally part of the Town Reserve surveyed in 1849, dedicated as a reserve for Public Recreation in 1855 and gazetted as a Recreation Reserve in 1868. In 1901, this reserve was divided into two 10 acre (4.05ha) reserves creating Leslie Park in the southern section and Cunningham Park in the northern section.Warwick Examiner and Times, 31 December 1910, p.5Darling Downs Gazette and General Advertiser, 21 December 1867Government Gazette, 30 December 1868, p.466Brisbane Courier, 12 October 1912, p.5Telegraph 30 May 1913, p.4Titles #10704067 and #11275137Survey Plans DD15, W3064Warwick Argus, 9 March 1901, p.7Moreton Bay Courier, 1 December 1855, p.2 .
Queensland prosperity grew in the first decades of the 20th century from a mineral boom and agricultural pursuits, enabling the government to implement a campaign of construction of large public buildings.Paul Burmester, Margaret Pullar and Michael Kennedy, Queensland Schools A Heritage Conservation Study, a report for the Department of Education, 1996, p.18. This included substantial brick or timber school buildings. From the beginnings of purpose-built education buildings until the 1950s, brick school buildings were far less frequently built than those of timber. If brick was employed, it was only in prosperous urban or suburban areas with stable or rapidly-increasing populations. Like Queensland's private schools, technical colleges and schools of arts, rather than being built to a standard plan, all brick and some timber school buildings were individually designed with variation in style, size, and form. These few were given generous budgets, resulting in impressive edifices. Light and ventilation was still a primary concern for the architects but compared to contemporary standard education buildings, these buildings had a grander character and greater landmark attributes.Paul Burmester, Margaret Pullar and Michael Kennedy, Queensland Schools A Heritage Conservation Study, a report for the Department of Education, 1996, p.99.
Queensland Government Architect Thomas Pye called tenders for the new Warwick Technical College and High School buildings in July 1913. HD Miller's £11,500 tender was accepted in August, but the contract was later awarded to Donald James Hutchings. The foundation stone was laid 28 February 1914 by the Queensland Governor, Sir William McGregor.Brisbane Courier, 3 July 1913, p.2Brisbane Courier, 6 August 1913, p.4Warwick Examiner and Times 1 October 1913, p.4The Week, 6 March 1914, p.17.
The main Technical College and High School building (in 2018 named Block A) was a two-storey masonry structure on a Greymare granite base, with a Marseilles tiled roof with a fleche. The walls were face brick and roughcast stucco with Yangan freestone dressings. A carved sandstone coat of arms over the doorway featured the motto of the school: "Virtute et Labore" (by hard work and excellence), carved by the art master Charles Astley. The interior, with its wide entrance hall with reinforced concrete staircase, provided teaching space for commercial subjects, chemistry, and a lecture and examination hall. The building included a two-storey toilet block joined by a first floor walkway. The block had an iron fire escape stair and a concrete septic tank was added to the rear (western side) of the block in 1923.DPW Annual Report 1914, p.6Warwick Examiner and Times, 2 March 1914, p, 4Architecture and Building Journal of Queensland, August 1929, p.44.
A separate two-storey Workshops Block (in 2018 named Block B) was built prior to Block A, standing to its west. It was completed in May 1914 when classes commenced, while the earlier Technical College in Guy Street, remained in use for some time. Block B housed a blacksmithing and plumbing workshop and two forges on the ground floor, with a carpenter and joinery workshop and a geometric drawing room on the first floor.Warwick Examiner and Times, 11 October 1915, p.5Warwick Examiner and Times, 20 May 1914, p.4
Both buildings were heated by gas, and served by electricity, with synchronised clocks. The buildings cost in excess of £12,000 and were officially opened by the Queensland Governor, His Excellency Sir Hamilton John Goold-Adams, in October 1915. The school buildings complemented existing substantial masonry structures in Warwick, many also built using Yangan freestone. Pye was acting Government Architect and responsible for numerous substantial government buildings including the Toowoomba Technical College, Mackay Technical College, Rockhampton Technical College 600789 and Brisbane's Central Technical College. The granite and sandstone were locally sourced with the granite coming from Greymare, about 30 km west of Warwick.Brisbane Courier, 3 July 1913, p.4Brisbane Courier, 16 August 1913, p.4Brisbane Courier, 23 April 1913, p.7Warwick Examiner and Times, 1 October 1913, p.5Telegraph, 16 October 1915, p.16Architecture and Building Journal of Queensland, 10 August 1929, p.44E-plans #16005352, 16005330Warwick Daily News, 5 November 1920, p.3Seymour, James Stewart, "Warwick a sandstone building tradition", Architectural thesis, University of Queensland, 1985.