To Save a Tree

 We now move westwards from the Senior Central School (Fleetville Juniors today) on the third field to be sold by the Grammar School, but rather later than the fields incorporating the Fleet Works and Fleet Ville.  Called Poor Six Acre Field we assume the name to reflect the quality of its top soil.  [Further along the road at the cemetery this top and sub-soil is brought to the surface when new burials are due]. So selling for development would have been an easy decision to make.  During and following the First World War the field, or at least a part of it, was delineated into allotment plots "for the war effort", partly to avoid the recreation ground being utilised for the same purpose, which was certainly a real risk. 

To fully understand which plots today occupy the front of this field, the first to the west of the school's vehicular entrance is Grimsdyke Lodge, then BC Cycles and Magnet.  Although Topps Tiles is also part of the modern range of development this will form part of the next post.

The Valuation Office records from 1910 to 1915 reveal that during the lifetime of its data, W H Lavers, the owner of the timber yard nearby, also acquired the frontage land to the west of the school entrance, 206 to 202 and possibly 208 as well.  So, we will consider number 208 first.  It is doubtful if many current residents of the district recall a detached house to the west of the school entrance, but a photograph in the St Albans' Museums Archive shows one to be there.  

The house behind the railings was built for the school caretaker.  The large detached house behind
the bus stop had two owners in its short lifetime before being demolished shortly before 1967.
It is possible the tree in its front garden may be the one referred to in the text below, but it
certainly did not survive the next stage in the site's life.
COURTESY ST ALBANS MUSEUMS

It was erected shortly after the First World War and its first occupant was Mrs Bell; her name appears as the occupant in the 1930 and 1934 street directories.  From then on the occupant was Mrs Wilkins.  In both cases we only know their names.  If Mrs Bell was the owner of the house she may also have purchased the adjacent  land, the plots taken over by Mr Lavers from the Grammar School.  From then on numbers 208 to 202 were treated as a single plot of ground even though no further houses were built there.  However, a row of lock-up garages existed at the back of 206 to 202 from c1930 until 1967.

An article in the Herts Advertiser 19th April 1973 revealed that Mrs Wilkins had planted an oak seed on her land in 1935 to celebrate the Silver Jubilee of George V and Queen Mary.  She very much wanted to protect the tree from development by Fairview Estates to whom she had sold her property in 1967.  Your Editor cannot recall such a tree being present, although a photograph from the archives of St Albans Museums proves it was growing in the front garden. The oak tree – which would now be 86 years old – is not within the boundary of Grimsdyke Lodge today.

The left section of Grimsdyke Lodge was the location of the former detached house.

Grimsdyke Lodge, a development of eight 1-bed flats, dates from 1967 and a central throughway gives access to rear parking.  It is thought that the name of the building came from Grimsdyke Developments, a development arm of Fairview Estates. 

Three of the four eventual sections of the ironmongery (DIY) shop begun by James Andrew, and successively by the Tuckett family and then Leon Reed. On the left is part of the open ground
owned by Mrs Wilkins of the detached house, now part of Grimsdyke Lodge.
COURTESY ST ALBANS MUSEUMS

Numbers 200, 198 and 196 were created in 1910 by builder James Andrew, who also occupied the western end of this multi plot.  He also had a shop on the north side of the road directly opposite from which he sold building accessories and fittings.  Mr Andrew  constructed a two-bay unit consisting of shops on the ground floor  with living accommodation above – often the upper floors were converted into storage areas, but it is not certain whether that was the case here. Two ground-floor-only shop units were added later, one on each side of the original structure, and this part of Hatfield Road became a very successful DIY centre managed by Leonard Reed – until the industrial estate DIY warehouses popular from the 1980s motoring boom, and suddenly Reed's became no more.

The fullest four-section extent of Leon Reed's DIY Centre shortly after its closure.
COURTESY DIANA DEVEREUX

But this is putting the cart before the proverbial horse, because one of the original shop units, number 200, remained a drapery and then ladies' outfitter from c1912 through to the 1960s. Number 198 was held by builder James Andrew until he opened his shop opposite, and was then taken on by Harry Tuckett, whose family had previous ironmongery experience working at Hallam's, a well-known ironmongery on the corner of Chequer Street and High Street (the giant letter H still features on an external wall of this building, now a bank).  The Tuckett family also managed a general store in Camp Road on the premises which later became John Dearman's ironmongery, now private houses.

Leonard Reed took over in the mid-1950s and gradually expanded into the ladies' outfitter unit and then built first one wing on the eastern side, followed by a second on the western side, on the land previously occupied by James Andrew's open depot for his building trade, although that must have gone by the time I first knew Fleetville in the 1950s.

200 and 198 were demolished and replaced by the modern Richmond House, home to Weddings Unlimited and now BC Cycles. It is a mixed site incorporating retail and apartments.

This part of Hatfield Road has seen plenty of variety in its urbanisation since it was a field with poor soil, with many changes too.  And Mrs Wilkins' oak tree was only one of the oaks failing to survive to the modern day.  Seven mature oak trees quietly growing  in the field were felled and offered for sale, possibly to make sale for development much easier.

Next time we will be introduced to a member of a very well-known family.

Workshops and Motors

 In the previous post we finished with a memory, for some, of the hardware shop known as The Handy Stores.  Although a few shops have never altered what their owners, or subsequent occupiers, traded through more than one hundred years of Fleetville retailing, there inevitably comes a point when change finally arrives

Numbers 222 (formerly a cafe), 220 ( one half of The Handy Stores) and 218 (the original
unit of The Handy Stores) in 2012.

Domestic servicing has given way to car servicing, one half of the current premises of Prestige
Experience.

We should remember that these units were treated much like houses in that they had back plots – gardens – though they did not survive long as such. Behind number 218 was a workshop called St Albans Plating, whose owner also had the frontage shop unit. As a child the Editor used to wonder what he might buy with his pocket money if he was to walk through the shop doorway? To my recollection I do not recall seeing anyone with business to transact here, and certainly not leave with any plates!

The first premises to be built on the front part of the field, as seen on a white winter's day.  This
name is Carter's Garage at number 212 in 1934
COURTESY CAROLYN HAYWARD

Charles Mears Carter with his wife Daisy, off on honeymoon on Charles' motor bike.
Daisy was a teacher, so she may have taught at the Central School, Fleetville or 
Camp.
COURTESY MARK CARTER

The next premises was quite another matter. In the 1950s this was Hobbs Garage. But until 1934 it was just another open space, land not yet developed. Then, engineer Charles M Carter arrived in the district. He was the brother of nurseryman Thomas W Carter from the partnership of Sear & Carter further along the road. While Charles, and wife Daisy, were living in a small house across the road. Charles set up his car servicing and repair business. Charles' business may have been one of the first in Fleetville to dispense petrol from the forecourt; although Charles Tuck may have beaten
him to it.

Number 214 was acquired by Alfred Hobbs.  Carter's garage business was also purchased by him
c1946 and the site modernised in the 1950s.  He continued to dispense petrol.
COURTESY ST ALBANS MUSEUMS

In the 1950s Alfred Hobbs, from Colney Heath Lane and owner of agricultural machinery factory Tractor Shafts, acquired Charles Carter's business, rebadged the shop as Hobbs Tools and later still rebranded it HobbCo.  The frontage of the garage premises was modernised and rebuilt in red brick, with a glazed first floor.  The frontage extended over the access to the rear workshop, joining onto the tool shop building – most of us today have forgotten that arrangement.  Neon lighting for Hobbco Tool Company and Hobbs Garage was fitted to the side and front walls, bringing some colour to the street in the evenings. No doubt it was also intended to attract younger customers and their new post-war cars.

The site was cleared once more when Kwik Fit opened a service branch here.
COURESY GOOGLE STREET VIEW

In the 1980s the premises became a branch of Kwik Fit.  The Hobbs frontage, in fact the whole building, was replaced, presumably to enable shorter servicing periods to take place and therefore faster turnarounds.  So for almost a century number 212 has been home to car-owners in need of servicing, replacement tyres, motoring technical advice and inspections.  Charles Carter started that.

Meanwhile, the editor continues his quest to discover more about the St Albans Plating business, where it moved to, if anywhere, and who it served.

Kwik Fit completes the range of plots which sit in front of the Central School.  Next time we move across the school's vehicular entrance to a building no longer extant.

The Handy Stores

 Following a brief break we return this week to the south side of Hatfield Road where a new replacement building for the Girls' Central School was opened in 1931.  The County Council had no need of a road frontage in its day-to-day management of a school, and so from now on many of these sites would make use of passing trade and all would be developed in the same period as the school, around 1930.

The first property west of Morrison's car park, the timber yard of former times, is the Campaign for
Real Ale (CAMRA) building.  It was formerly West & Sellick, motor accessories and repairs. From above the plot is almost wedge-shaped and there is no back land the business can use.

Next door to the timber yard of W H Laver was the motor accessories and repair shop of West & Sellick.  Although today it is a headquarter building for the organisation Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) no changes have been made to the external structure, remaining as built.  Internally,  evidence of the original workshops and warehouse stores can still be detected, although today's use is administrative. The forecourt provided good space for parked cars and vans, but there was always room for stacks of tyres, presumably used ones which the company would not have minded disappearing overnight, so saving on disposal costs!

Businesses occupy the frontage plots while the school sits behind them.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

Next door was the entrance to the school.  It has come to be referred to as a pedestrian entrance, but when first opened it was the only entrance.  However, the number of vehicles would have been few in number and such routines as "the school run" non-existent   But a  separate vehicular entrance was created later in the decade.

This photo is from 1964.  The police pillar phone box is to the left of the school entrance, followed
by a pair of semi detached houses, in recent years replaced by a residential building in similar but more   modern style. Beyond is a group of three shops.  This is the period of Pat's Cafe and a year after Geoffrey Golding's business opened here. In this period the bus stop, minus lay-by, was still further along the road.  Today, it has moved to where the car is shown parked.
COURTESY ST ALBANS MUSEUMS

From memory many of us imagine a small number of shops following on, but there has always been a residential building next to the school pedestrian entrance, a sizeable semi-detached pair, remarkably similar in design to the current building, although these are now apartments.  First identified in the 1928 street directory and soon named St George's and Moorshill by their respective owners, ex military camouflage officer Howard Edwards moved into St George's at the end of the war and launched his sign and screen painting business, which included substantial exhibition panels and murals. As the business grew – and included back screen cloths for major exhibitions at London exhibition centres –  lack of space forced him to move to former straw hat premises in Victoria Street as Falcon Displays.  The firm remains today though not in St Albans.

Adjacent premises went up at the same time, c1928, and became a group of three retail premises, 222, 220 and 218.  The first spent the majority of its time pre-millennium as a cafe.  As The Rendezvous it was a popular weekend meeting spot for cycling groups, and was later taken on by Jack Hart who also ran a cafe in Verulam Road. There were other owners in succession, including the Timms family who also used the premises as an aquatics shop – restful ambiance while sipping a cup of tea!  Today it is Claims Solutions.

The parade as it was in 2012 ...

... and recently.  In pulling the camera lens back a little the symmetry of this block is revealed,
with the soaring roofline of the two ends. An added point of interest is the inclusion of boundary
railings which was a feature of the next door cafe for many decades.
COURTESY GOOGLE STREETVIEW

The 1950s during the period of the twin units.

Looking eastwards in the era when ironmongers' shop windows often spilled onto the footpath,
although in this case it would have been the front garden!
COURTESY ANDREW FREEMAN

The Royal Warrant above Mr Golding's business.

Although G D Golding comes next today, the first three decades at 220 and 218 belong to a different trade.  Percy Sharp opened as the first retailer at number 218, calling it Household Stores.  Within three years Cyril Etches, who had successfully run bus services in the district with partner W Flowers, were bought out by London Transport in 1933.  They had a small bus garage at the eastern end of Wychlands Crescent.  Using his share of the buyout Etches purchased the household business from Sharp.  Within a short time he also moved in next door.  It took him a few years before his next move, renaming the business The Handy Stores.  However, he encountered strong competition, especially from Leon Reed a short distance away, who had eventually spread into three shop units, and so The Handy Stores returned to a single unit. In 1963 began the business opportunity taken on by Geoffrey D Golding.  Golding's bespoke tailoring business has remained at number 220 ever since and there can be few people unaware of the accolade of Geoffrey being awarded a Royal Warrant which he displays proudly above the shop front.  In 2021 Mr Golding announced his retirement, although he has ensured his business continues.

The closure of The Handy Stores also begins the consolidation of services to car owners, which will be detailed in the next post.

A Better Entrance

This week we pause to consider a few of the issues which come about when a site is purchased and a note on a planning map: "future school", or in the case of Hatfield Road "future schools".

Whether primary or secondary there was a huge difference between what was provided in an educational building. In today's terms the facilities to be found in the pre 1902 Board schools or the later elementary establishments can be considered very basic , where even effective winter heating might be absent.  The County Council, on its formation, became responsible for building and maintaining schools where they were needed.  In the early years after formation in 1889 the Council engaged an architect for each individual school, but in the 20th century it set up an increasingly sophisticated architect department to develop standards common to groups of schools; and these standards developed and improved with time.

The Rural School Board were responsible for creating a school for the widely-spread child
population in surrounding hamlets.

So, using just a few select examples, what did we discover from actual experience?

You would have thought a mains water supply was a basic requirement, but Camp Elementary School was opened without a water supply extended this far from the nearest supply; and in Sandridge senior boys were detailed to carry water buckets from the village pump when required.

In 1908 (Fleetville Elementary School) lavatories were strictly outside at the far end of the playground; and the playground surface was gritted.

When the land was purchased for senior education in Fleetville the space was deemed sufficient for one boys' and one girls' school.  Ten years later when the girls Central School was built only one school could be accommodated.

The County Architect Department developed a building style with interchangeable components
This style of building is widely distributed across the county.  Staff at Beaumont Boys' School
in 1959.

By 1938 when the two senior schools were required even more urgently, Beaumont got its pupils in one building, girls upstairs and boys on the ground floor, with the absolute minimum of sharing!  Playing field space, according to the government, was required to be even greater.  The site reserved for a girls' grammar school in Brampton Road was instead used for a boys' school, while new housing hemmed the school in on all sides.  The regulations required more playing field acreage for boys than for girls; which is why the pupils of the Boys' Grammar School (now Verulam) have, since 1938, walked to their remote site in Sandpit Lane, and continue to do so.

A hall was multi-purpose in the early days, with a requirement to divide into two classrooms, even in the 1920s (London Colney).  It must also double up as a gymnasium in 1930 (Central).  Even Beaumont (1938) was in build when the next advance came, and a separate gymnasium with changing rooms became a new requirement.  This facility was also added to Central later.

When Beaumonts Girls' and Boys' Schools were designed a gymnasium what not required 
separate from the hall.  This new requirement was added as the schools were nearing completion.
Changing rooms were included.  When more modern sports hall facilities were later built the 
gymnasium was converted into a library centre.

From 1930 a platform suitable for drama was added to the hall at Central, and at Townsend an adjacent room was included for teaching and changing purposes, and by 1938 (Beaumont) two small classrooms were added for changing rooms.  Similar improvements were made for staff facilities and administration.  And considering many school still closed at lunchtimes down to the 1920s, catering facilities weren't added until post-war with many schools being supplied from central kitchens elsewhere in the city.

A detached house was included when required for the caretaker and his/her family.  This is at the Fleetville Juniors site, formerly Central, Girls' Grammar, Beaumont Girls, Sandfield; all names
applied to schools occupying the Hatfield Road school site since 1931.  The house no longer
serves its original function.

When schools might be built further away from the urban area and where caretakers need to be close at hand, the authority either acquired a nearby house or had one built in a part of the site.  This added provision was in place by the mid 1930s (Central – detached house), Marshalswick  (bungalow in 1959) and St Albans College (flat in 1959).

The main entrances to schools were also given a more prominent statement where possible.  Central was added in 1937 when the caretaker's house was built.  The need for parking, visitors, staff and other vehicular pressures often limited the possibilities, and Beaumont was only significantly improved within the last two or three years.

Camp and Fleetville schools have had to squeeze more onto their fixed plots even, in Camp's case the removal of a former head teacher's house, and in both cases removal of part of the schools' infrastructure onto new sites (Fleetville Juniors across the road onto Central,  overcrowding of Camp to form Windermere, and overcrowding of Fleetville to form Fleetville Extension School, renamed Oakwood).

Battle From Hastings

 Occasionally, this blog takes a diversion from any series of posts which is currently running.  As regular readers already appreciate we are steadily working our way along the south side of Hatfield Road, but the previous post gave us a rare opportunity to explore a newly discovered turnpike mile post.  It came about through an exploration of what would, in the 1920s and 30s, have been a small rural school along Watford Road which was under threat of closure.  After that closure had taken place shortly before World War Two, the children having transferred to the new Mount Pleasant School, Bricket Wood, the building seems to have re-opened again in 1940.

A weekend camp by children from Hastings Grammar Boys' School while in Hertfordshire
during 1942.
COPYRIGHT UNKNOWN

St Albans played host to two groups of schools (and at least one college) for at least part of the duration of the war.  The first group arrived with the Pied Piper evacuation in September 1939 with schools from Camden, among them Princess Road, Haverstock Hill, Rhyll and New End.  The following year a second wave of evacuations arrived from the Hastings area, including the town's grammar schools. No definitive list of all schools who moved has been located, nor their host schools in the receiving areas, in our case St Albans.  So when a new school is discovered it is a cause for celebration, partly because it still triggers personal memories, and partly because it is part of the story for both host and evacuated schools and their towns.

Children from St Mary-at-the-Castle School, Hastings enjoying a meal at St Stephen's
Parish Hall in November 1940.
COURTESY HERTS ADVERTISER

In November 1940 the Herts Advertiser published a photograph of children and staff of St Mary-in-the-Castle School, Hastings.  They are seen enjoying a meal sitting in St Stephen's Parish Hall.  So far we do not know to which local school they were attached, but it is possible that the parish hall and St Stephen's closed school could  have been sufficient to accommodate them; St Mary's was not a large establishment.  From the above photograph it is clear that at least some of the children were of junior age, and as with many schools at the time St Mary's was an elementary School with all three departments, infant, junior and senior located in very old and outdated buildings in the cramped centre of Hastings.

We know the name of three adults from the caption: J W Brittain was the Head who accompanied the children, along with member of teaching staff Miss F A Poole.  Mrs Foster was the cook, who may have been local, or an adult – perhaps a parent – who came with the school.

The red roofed building in the centre, the former St Mary-in-the Castle School, still stands
in the centre of Hastings, but a current school with this name no longer exists, no doubt
having been subsumed into one or more larger establishments during the post-war period.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

Some south coast schools returned to their home towns in 1942 when the bombing threats had subsided and it is assumed St Mary's did likewise. Before the school moved to St Albans the Sussex local authority had been planning a re-organisation of its schools and buildings.  When that process resumed after the war the original intention of retaining the original St Mary building came to nothing owing to its poor condition, and under new names and sites this and other schools became part of the Ore reorganisation in the 1950s.

Nevertheless, the people of St Albans were no doubt pleased to have hosted St Mary's-in-the-Castle School during its wartime evacuation. Equally, it is to be hoped the St Mary's children and their teachers enjoyed their time with us.  We know that many former evacuee children, as well as their hosts, remain in contact with each other via bespoke organisations, some with their own regular newsletters.  It may yet be possible to recover some memories of the connection between St Mary-in-the-Castle, Hastings, and St Albans.

More Turnpike Evidence

 The former Reading & Hatfield Turnpike road in the 18th and 19th centuries divided the north and south sides of Ellenbrook, Oaklands and Fleetville before the tolls were removed and the road was maintained at public expense by the Country authority.  Today we call it Hatfield Road which continues on its way through St Albans, St Stephen's Hill and Watford Road to Watford and Reading.

The mile marker along Hatfield Road outside Popefield Farm, near Smallford.

There is plenty we don't know about the turnpike's workings and toll collecting, but most of us are familiar with the Listed mile markers, still in position along the north side of the road.  If you wish to know more about the road in its toll days visit: 

http://www.stalbansowneastend.org.uk/topic-selection/turnpike-road/

The mile markers shown on that webpage are the only ones remaining; most of those following St Stephen's Hill through to Rickmansworth are missing, although they are referred to on the 1937 survey of the Ordnance Survey maps, and it is therefore assumed they remained by the roadside at least until then.  Many people are also aware that road signs were removed as a defensive measure at the beginning of WW2.  However, since no-one seems to recall those east of St Albans being removed and then returned, can the local authority be relied on to have treated those south of the city in the same way, even if it was the same authority?  Clearly not, since they are still not in place.

It has been suggested that the easiest method of managing such heavy metal objects when trying to remove them was to dig a hole beside each one, tip it in and cover it – job done!  But was that the full story and are the posts still there, below the ground nearby?

The focus of this post is the former mile post close to the Noke Hotel.

This section of the 1937 OS map shows the St Albans bypass (North Orbital Road) joining the Watford Road from the top right, at the location everyone knows as The Noke. The red circle identifies the position of the turnpike mile post to the left of the first and only carriageway when the new road was first built.  Lye Lane is the minor road crossing the bypass from the lower right.
COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

Quite by chance recently the Editor was following proposals during the 1930s for Hertfordshire County Council to close small rural schools and move any residual pupils into nearby town schools.  One such building was the school room in Watford Road which languished with 30 children by the time it closed in the 1930s, which is strange on two counts.  First, the Burston estate was being broken up and developed for housing, becoming the formative Chiswell Green.  The council, meanwhile pressed on with a new JMI school at Mount Pleasant, Bricket Wood; quite a distance for walking children from new St Stephen's and Chiswell Green homes.

The second consideration the council did not take into account was the completion of the St Albans By-Pass, linking up with Watford Road as far as the A41.  When first built it was a fast traffic single carriageway, but children from Chiswell Green and St Stephen's would have needed to cross this bypass to reach their new Mount Pleasant, for which the council provided a crossing patrol four times a day to supervise up to one hundred children across the bypass.

The lunchtime crossing patrol from the Lye Lane side. Between the second and third child from
the right can be spotted the light coloured turnpike mile post along the far fence line.
COURTESY HERTS ADVERTISER

Even today the road infrastructure has a dropped kerb and a fenced-off central reservation to enable
pedestrians to cross both carriageways.  This is where the children crossed in 1939.
COURTESY GOOGLE STREETVIEW

For our evidence it was fortunate the council elected to make the crossing point opposite Lye Lane; and it was also fortunate the Herts Advertiser considered the decision worthy of sending a staff photographer to the site.  The picture was taken as the children returned home at lunchtime and was standing where the bus layby is today.  It was taken at the beginning of June 1939.  What a responsibility for Mr H J Cornwall, the crossing man holding the board announcing "STOP. Crossing Patrol".

Now, just look between the second and third children from the right.  Along the fence line, and sitting just where the map says it should, is the turnpike mile marker, 3 miles from St Albans and 5 from Watford.  The Herts Advertiser has proved it.

An altogether more complex junction today for even faster traffic, buses, crossing
pedestrians (probably after leaving or boarding a bus) and vehicles leaving/joining one of
the side roads. The newer carriageway is on the left.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

However, there is no point using a metal detector at the site today in the hope of locating the buried object.  Several improvements have been made to the bypass since then, including a second carriageway on that side of the road.  It may now be under the newer tarmac, or may have been removed from the site along with countless tons of rubble and subsoil in the construction of the dualled road.

But at least we still have photographed evidence it was present at the correct spot along the road in June 1939 and that several times a day it was passed by dozens of children on their way to and from Mount Pleasant School.

The location of the next turnpike mile marker was here (MP), along Watford Road, opposite its
junction with Laburnum Grove, just where the main road was a little wider.  Before
World War Two houses had not been built on the west side of Watford Road.
COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

The Watford Road/Laburnum Road junction today.  Do you think anyone took a photograph here
sometime before 1939?
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

And if anyone has a collection of photos pictures taken along Watford Road in Chiswell Green and taken in the 1930s, evidence of the next marker would be useful.  It stood opposite the end of Laburnam Grove, where Watford Road was always a little wider and where there is now a service road.  Before the war no new homes had been built opposite Laburnum Grove so the view would have been of open fields.

The account this week may not be be about the East End, but it is the same road which connects the two.  Let's try and solve the puzzle of  another turnpike mile marker.

Educational Future

 While we can way find our way along Hatfield Road by means of the frontage shops, we now have a choice: the premises which line the south side of the road, and the occupier of the back land.  We have reached the next of the fields owned by the St Albans Grammar School.  Hertfordshire County Council planned a three-stage re-organisation of schools which had been a mix of board and elementary schools, which had themselves been borne from an earlier collection of British and National schools.  One desperately urgent need was to separate senior pupils from infants and juniors to provide senior schools and distinct Junior Mixed and Infant Schools.

In 1925 Fleetville and Camp districts possessed no schools for senior children of either gender, and the council agreed to purchase a site of less than five acres for a pair of senior schools.  Quite what it thought would fit on this acreage for two schools and its attendant playgrounds is debatable, quite apart from a playing field.

The 1924 map shows the cemetery and a large undeveloped space to its east.
COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

Timber yard – see previous post – and a number of shops and business to the west by the time the
1937 map was published.  Behind is the site of the Central and Senior Girls' School in its original
square building and the separate handicraft building.
COURTESY NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND

From around 1918 a central school for girls had been operating in a rather ramshackle set of buildings in Victoria Street – partly a former  library, an arts and technology centre, boys' handicraft rooms and a school for girls who would benefit from a full four-year curriculum not limited to the existing leaving age of thirteen.  Most of these spaces had to be shared and were not for the exclusive use of the school.  And as the number of qualifying girls increased the available space became crowded.

New premises was desperately needed for the school and for practical rooms which could be shared with elementary schools lacking in these facilities.  So, new central school buildings came to Hatfield Road, and a search for a new pair of senior schools for the eastern districts would continue (and was eventually found at Oakwood Drive in 1938).

A cooking lesson in one of the practical classrooms.
COURTESY JENNY BOLTON

The new Central and Senior Girls' School school had no need of a frontage to the main road and so was not included in the sale to the education authority.  One pedestrian entrance, still used as such, was created at the eastern end between a motor factor (then West & Sellick and now CAMRA), and a further entry at the western end, later improved for access to the ancillary buildings, parking and a caretaker's house.

A typical HCC architectural design from the 1930s, of expanded buildings at Hatfield Road.
COURTESY JENNY BOLTON

By 1938 the school was changed to become a secondary St Albans Girls' Grammar School, with attendant increases in accommodation and for an increase in places.  In 1951 a new site was built for STAGGS in Sandridgebury Lane, originally intended to become a boys' secondary modern school – the county council changed its mind several times during this period!

Original handicraft and pupil teacher buildings, now unused on the site.

Overcrowded Fleetville JMI school earnestly hoped the former girls' school buildings would be available for them, but the inadequate Beaumont schools, new in 1938, became a boy's secondary modern and its girls formed a new school in Hatfield Road, first as Beaumont Girls school, and then altering its name to Sandfield Girls to avoid the name Beaumont being used for two sites in different locations. All of this new accommodation was required for an increase in the leaving age to 15. Instead, Fleetville Overflow School was constructed in Oakwood Drive, being named Oakwood JMI School in 1958 when it opened.

Aerial view of the current school, playing field, ancillary buildings and the former Family Centre.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

Sandfield School later merged with Marshalswick Boys' School at The Ridgeway; and the parents of Fleetville JMI made a further attempt to move from their, by now, even more overcrowded Royal Road location.  This time they were more successful and the Junior department became custodians of the Hatfield Road buildings in 1975, enabling the infant department to spread out in Royal Road.

Fleetville Junior School is therefore the longest of the five occupiers of the buildings at forty-six years.  The first two occupiers would even have experienced the occasional passing of a train on the southern boundary!