St Johns School, Blackboy Hill - early 1900s and 2014 For more than 160 years the diamond-patterned tiled roof of St John’s School has been an iconic landmark to travellers crossing the Downs to the top of Blackboy Hill. Built in 1851, St John’s Church of England School was a foundation of All Saints Church in Pembroke Rd. In 1886 a separate Board School was opened in Anglesea Place and at the turn of the century the two schools amalgamated. The C of E pupils were known as “St John’s Angels”, although there are not many angelic faces in the early 1900s photo of some of St John’s pupils posing for the camera on the Downs in front of the school. The school building, in its key triangular site at the site at the top of Blackboy Hill, was threatened with demolition in 1960s, when a roundabout was planned here, but fortunately the plans were dropped. The Blackboy Hill school eventually shut in 1978, when it transferred to a new school building on the old Worrall Rd/Anglesea Place site - some of the walls of the 1886 school were incorporated into the new building. The Blackboy Hill site was taken over by the City Council and used as offices and a social service centre for more than 30 years. It has now been sold and has been converted into seven luxury homes in a complex known as School House, so the future of this familiar landmark seems secure. As today’s photo shows, many of the building’s original features have been preserved, including the school bell in its tower. St John’s School in Worrall Rd has already outgrown its 1979 building, and last year the Infant School relocated to the converted former Redland Police Station in Lower Redland Rd.
Posted on: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 21:27:24 +0000
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