Last week the Lane Cove Public School Year 6 graduating class celebrated the Longueville Building’s Centenary.
The celebrations included putting together a time capsule to be opened in 2120. Naomi Bassford, Local Studies Coordinator, Lane Cove Library, was the guest speaker and gave a fascinating account of the building’s history.
Time Capsule
The Time Capsule really did reflect 100 years of the Lane Cove Public School.
The Capsule included:
- pieces of the Lane Cove Public School Hall destroyed by fire earlier this year (read more here);
- hand sanitiser;
- a bear with a facemask;
- the latest edition of The Village Observer;
- Wonderful wall hangings (that many of the year six parents would have had hanging in their school’s classroom);
- Old Readers;
- A red phone;
- and more
Naomi Bassford’s Speech -100th anniversary of 1920 building and Year 6 Assembly
Thank you to Naomi for allowing ITC to reproduce her speech.
“Good morning, year 6. Thank you for inviting me to talk to you this morning. It’s a real privilege. Did you know the building behind us is 100 years old this year? It is a very important building for the history of your school and I daresay for yourselves as the graduating class of 2020.
When this building was finished in 1920, the population of the Municipality of Lane Cove was about 9,000 people, in comparison, the estimated resident population in June last year was about 40,155 people. In 1919 there were just 1,500 houses, but it was an area that was beginning to grow really fast!
Did you also know that your school wasn’t known as Lane Cove Public School in 1920 when the new building opened? Back then, it was called Longueville Public School. The school wasn’t renamed Lane Cove Public School until 1921.
Conditions here at the school weren’t ideal in the late 1910s; the classrooms were very crowded and in a bad state of repair (the 1891 building is located just in front and to the right of the 1920 building as seen from the yard). In June 1919, Alderman Fraser from Lane Cove Council referred to the school as ‘a disgrace to the Municipality, [it] is unfitted for children, draughty in winter, stuffy in summer, the roof leaks, and the best thing to do is to burn it down and not repair it.’
A deputation was sent to speak to the Minister of Education and it appears that they were successful in getting a new building. Tenders for the construction of the new building were advertised in October 1919.
The new building was officially opened on Saturday the 16th October 1920, just 12 months later. The Minister for Education, Mr Thomas Mutch opened the building and he said in his speech, ‘Education should be further broadened, and no obstacle should be put in the way of any child who possessed sufficient ability to become a professional by means of a university education.’
The building was special, and different for its time. It had two storeys and there were four additional classrooms. The classrooms were divided from each other, and the corridors by folding partitions, so the classrooms and spaces could be made bigger! Can you still do that today? I suspect the inside of the building has been renovated by now and the original partitions have probably gone.
There was a teacher’s staff room on the ground floor with a storeroom. Hats were the order of the day, and there was even a room dedicated to the storage of the student’s hats when they weren’t being worn. There were two entrance verandahs for students and teachers to enter and leave, and the ground and first floors were connected by a reinforced concrete, fireproof staircase.
Following the comments by Alderman Fraser, 12 months earlier special attention had also been paid to lighting and heating the classrooms. One hopes it was a lot less draughty in winter and less stuffy in the summer months.
However, classrooms are just four walls and a roof without students and teachers! I hope you have made this building your own special space and have enjoyed learning here, just as your earlier school mates had done previously. I pray you will remember this building and the space when you graduate and go onto high school next year.
All going well next year should be a lot more ‘normal’ than this year and you will enjoy a new school, new classrooms and a new start! Congratulations on your graduation, you have earned a wonderful summer holiday! Make the most of it and thank you for the kind invitation to speak today.”
Cover Photo
Our cover photo is left to right Mrs Pip King (Assistant Principal), Ms Jessica Comensoli (Yr 6 teacher), Ms Naomi Bassford and Lane Cove Public School Principal Mr Terry McKinnon.
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