The Victoria Centre, Gravesend

The Victoria Centre, Gravesend has been up for auction. The property was offered for sale with a guide price of over £400,000 and sold for over £1.5m. The building formerly belonged to Gravesham Council and for many years was used as an Adult Education Centre. It is in a prime location, overlooking Gravesend Railway Station; most people who have travelled through Gravesend by train will be familiar with it.


The building was originally the Municipal Technical Institute, built at a cost of £6,480. It was opened on 19th July 1893 by Princess Henry of Battenberg - Princess Beatrice, youngest child of Queen Victoria - and Prince Henry. A School of Science and Art had been operating in Gravesend for a few years before, but these were its first purpose built premises, funded by the County Council. 

The Gravesend and Northfleet Standard devoted a full page to the opening ceremony and associated events, the military guards of honour and the local dignitaries attending. The town, it was said, treated the occasion like a holiday, with many businesses closing early and streets decorated. 

There was a detailed description of the building and the rooms within, and their intended purposes. 'The hall is paved with  Roman marble mosaic, cream colour, with a simple classical border and the Borough Arms in the centre.'

Their Royal Highnesses arrived by train from Charing Cross. Instead of walking across the road to the Institute, they were driven to Milton Hall, the home of the Mayor, Mr Arnold, thus giving the townspeople the opportunity to see them. The inmates of the workhouse were brought to Parrock Street to see the procession pass. At Milton Hall they were entertained to lunch by the Mayor and Mrs Arnold, before returning to Gravesend for the opening ceremony. 


Ordnance Survey 25" second edition, 1895-97, 
showing the original footprint of the building
Reproduced with permission of the National Library of Scotland

On 2nd September the Institute was advertising the beginning of the new academic year.

Head of the School of Science was Mr Sidney A Sworn M.A. (Oxon), formerly of Balliol College.
Head of the School of Art was Mr J.T. Dallaway.

The subjects taught were to include:
Practical, plain and solid geometry
Machine construction and drawing
Building construction
Mathematics
Theoretical mechanics
Applied mechanics
Sound, light and heat
Magnetism and electricity
Inorganic chemistry (theoretical and practical)
Navigation
Nautical astronomy 
(the above two subjects offered in recognition of Gravesend's position on the Thames and the importance of pilotage to the town)
Steam
Principles of agriculture

There were to be art classes, including drawing from life and outdoor sketching, and also commercial, domestic and manual subjects. 

The commercial classes were to include: 
French
German
Book-keeping
Shorthand
Italian (if enough pupils applied)

Domestic
A short course of instruction (afternoon and evening) in Cookery
Nursing
Dressmaking
consisting of demonstrations, lectures and practical classes

Manual
A course of instruction (two hours weekly) in the use of tools for woodwork.

In 1902 new classrooms, a carpenter's shop, chemical laboratory and assembly rooms were added, bringing the total cost of the building to nearly £20,000.


Ordnance Survey 25" third edition, 1905-07, 
showing the extended building
Reproduced with permission of the National Library of Scotland

The map shows the statue of Queen Victoria in its original location at the front of the building. The statue was donated by the Mayor, once more Mr Arnold, to mark Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee in 1897. It now stands to the side of the building, and is included in the sale. 

With the closing of the Victoria Centre, over 130 years of education on the site has come to an end. While the statue is listed, it seems the building is not, so the Victoria Centre and the Municipal Technical Institute may in future survive only in memories and archives

Statue of Queen Victoria at
Victoria Centre

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

About this blog

Image
fn many years of researching Kent history , for both academic purposes and personal interest, I've often come across topics or incidents or personalities which don't fit with what I'm actually researching, but which are interesting in their own right. Now so much is available online, it's possible to be diverted down some very deep rabbit holes, going further and further away from the original topic. Sometimes also a news story might spark interest, or just a thought might send one off down a rabbit hole - 'I wonder what/why/when....' The purpose of this blog is to share some of those chance discoveries. John Speed Map of Kent  first edition 1612 The blog will not follow any particular chronology or theme. Topics may be drawn from any period, from the Anglo-Saxon and Jutish period to the twentieth century. The focus will not generally be on great families and major events, but on the farmers, shopkeepers, tradesmen, maritime communities - people whose lives did...
Read more

Campanalogia

Image
As a devotee of classic crime fiction, I first learned about bellringing from Dorothy L. Sayers’ The Nine Tailors. That is where I first heard of Grandsire Triples and Treble Bob Majors.  Recently, when reading an article in an eighteenth century Kent newspaper, I noticed an article on bellringing on the same page. I decided to find out more.  Church bells , and the ringing of them, have been part of English life for many centuries. In 1554-55 Smarden churchwardens paid to have the bell taken down, taken to Canterbury, recast, brought home and rehung with new ropes. They also paid 4d to the ringers to ‘say the bell’. Total cost to the parish was £2 7s 0d, out of a total expenditure that year of £9 13s 9½d. St Michael's Church, Smarden In 1693 the churchwardens of Milton Regis paid for beer for the ringers on 5th November. They paid for the ringers on the day of Thanksgiving for the KIng’s (William III) return from overseas (the country was at war at the time). The ringers had...
Read more