From part-time schooling to comprehensive education
Saltaire has a proud and continuing history of educational provision, from the earliest days of the Factory School hosted in the Dining Hall through to present-day Shipley College.
The Saltaire Collection has many items from this history. We have: photographs of staff, students and classes; documents such as school books, certificates, letters, prospectuses, and reminiscences from teachers and students; and other items including advertising posters and plans of school buildings. They all help to tell the rich story of education in Saltaire.
Dining Hall and the Saltaire Institute
The Dining Hall on Victoria Road was the first public building in Saltaire in 1855. For several years it served as the home for many services, including the Factory School where child employees in Salts Mill were taught part-time. Adult workers and residents could also attend evening school. The school later moved to a purpose-built site further up the road in 1868.
The Saltaire Club and Institute, also on Victoria Road, opened gradually and was completed in 1871. It provided lecture and class rooms, a gymnasium, a reading room, a library and teaching laboratories. It was an early home of the Art School and provided day and evening courses.
Both the Dining Hall (now part of Shipley College) and the Institute have maintained educational links down to the present. Unfortunately, the Collection has very few items about the educational activities of the Factory School or Club and Institute.
View all education items for the Dining Hall and the Institute
Salt High School
Sir Titus Salt founded High Schools for both boys and girls in 1876. They moved into the Victoria Road school building in 1878 when primary education provision moved to a new school on Albert Road. The High Schools became a Grammar school following the 1944 Education Act, and this moved to new premises outside the village in 1963. We have many items from the High Schools.
Photographs include the school buildings, groups of students and staff, sports teams, and drama productions.
Documents and objects include school and student reports, exercise books, examination certificates, attendance registers, letters from various supervising education committees, and swimming medals. More in-depth insight is provided by such items as the reminiscences of Harriet Byles, the second and longest-serving headmistress of the Girls High School, and a well-researched history of the schools by J Waddington-Feather.
Albert Road School
The Factory School became a 'Board' school following the 1870 Education Act. It moved to new buildings on Albert Road in 1878 and has provided primary education down to the present day. As with the High School, the Collection contains various photographs and documents from Albert Road.
Photographs include the groups of students outside the school, in classes, in the playground and waiting for their annual trip to Morecambe.
Documents and objects include reports, leaving certificates, reminiscences of ex-students, and even a vinyl record made by the students in 1969.
Technical and Art School
The New School of Art and Science was opened by Princess Beatrice in 1887 in what is now known as the Exhibition Building. It was soon renamed the Technical and Art School and later the Institute of Technology. It provided scientific, engineering, artistic and other practical education to both children and adults down to the middle twentieth century when it transformed into the Institute of Further Education and later Shipley College.
The Collection contains a large number of photographs, letters, documents, mementos and other items related to the Royal Yorkshire Jubilee of 1887 held next to the Exhibition Road building and organised to try and fund the new school.
We have some student notebooks and examination certificates, and some text books that give an idea of the subjects studied, from spinning to wallpapering and the study of East-Asian designs.
There are a few photographs, mainly linked to prospectuses, posters, notices and other advertising designed to attract students. That includes a set of items for a new Engineering Department opened in 1932.
View Technical and Art School items
Shipley College
Following the 1944 Education Act, the Technical School/Institute was reconstituted as an Institute of Further Education. The Institute eventually became the current Shipley College. It now occupies the Exhibition Building of the Technical School, the High School building, and - circling back to the origin of education in Saltaire - the Dining Hall, now known as the Mill Building.
The Collection contains several items from the 1987 celebrations of 100 years of Shipley College from its Technical School origins in 1887. These include a history of the College by local historian (and founder of the Saltaire Collection) Dorothy Sharp.
There is large set of photographs, some of the College buildings but most related to advertising and promotion and featuring prize-givings, students at work in classes (everything from using lathes to typewriters) and displays of student design, art and textiles.
We only have a few documents for the College, mostly plans and paperwork related to the major refurbishment of the Exhibition Road Building in the 1990s (when it was reopened by Princess Anne).
You may also be interested in
Search the Collection for education
Search and browse our Collection records for items related to education. View school records, campaigning letters and lots more
Education timeline
Travel along our Education timeline to discover more about the long history of schooling in Saltaire
Harriet Byles - headteacher
Harriet succeeded Medina Griffiths as the headmistress of Salt High School for Girls and continued progressive education
Explore other subject themes
View our introductions to the major subject themes in our Collection