A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



it properly with so many, as any increase above that number rendered the 

 engagement of a third master imperative,while there was no money from 

 fees or endowment to pay him a proper salary. The commissioners were 

 unable to attend to Northamptonshire at first. So in 1872 Mr. Keeling 

 sought and obtained the head-mastership of the grammar school of Brad- 

 ford, which he has conducted with singular success. He was succeeded 

 at Northampton by the Rev. Samuel John Woodhouse Sanders, who was 

 appointed in February, 1873. Proposals were initiated for the increase 

 of the endowment and the provision of leaving exhibitions by the conver- 

 sion to educational purposes of charities wasted in doles and obsolete ap- 

 prenticeships, largely for the decaying body of ' freemen,' one of which 

 called Neale's charity was founded in 1596 for the quaintly-phrased 

 purpose of ' refreshing the poor people of Northampton.' But it was 

 not till 4 February, 1879, that the scheme was passed, with another recon- 

 stituting the governing body of the school. The governing body was 

 to consist of thirteen members : the mayor and chairman of the school 

 board of Northampton ex-qfficio, two persons appointed by the town 

 council, two by the quarter sessions of the county, and seven named by 

 the old governing body — the Municipal Charity Trustees. By an un- 

 fortunate concession to crude theories then rife, the scheme cut the school 

 into two parts, a classical school and a commercial school, with tuition 

 fees at the rate of j^8 to ^16 a year in the former, and ^2 to ^4 a year 

 in the latter ; both to be conducted in the same buildings and under the 

 same head master ; while more than the whole value of the new endow- 

 ments was dissipated in scholarships. 



The scheme therefore proved a failure. In 1876, before the scheme, 

 there were no boys, of whom 96 were day-boys and 14 were boarders. 

 Though at first, under the impetus of the new scheme and the great per- 

 sonal influence of the head master, the numbers rose to 1 60 in all in 1888, 

 yet of these only 64 were in the classical school, 96 being in the com- 

 mercial school, which they left at the immature age of fourteen. By 

 1892 these numbers had fallen to 42 on the classical and 53 on the 

 commercial side. Further, while before the scheme the school, low as 

 were the fees, managed to pay its way, the great relative increase in the 

 teaching staff caused by the two departments produced increasing annual 

 deficits in the working of the school. The experiment of two depart- 

 ments at different fees in the same school giving practically the same 

 education, for only forty-five boys in the so-called ' classical ' school learnt 

 Greek, while all learnt science, for which good new buildings had been 

 provided, was pronounced a failure, even by those who had promoted it. 

 The result was a completely new scheme, approved by Queen Victoria 

 in council 28 May, 1894, under which new money was brought in by 

 new bodies. The school has now the long title of the ' Northampton 

 and County Modern and Technical School.' It is under a governing 

 body of 2 1 members ; appointed, seven by the municipal charity trus- 

 tees of Northampton, two by the school board of Northampton, five by 

 the town council of Northampton, seven by the county council of North- 



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