iii. EDUCATION IN THE CITY OF 

 NOTTINGHAM 



BY 



A. H. WHIPPLE, M.A., B.Sc. 



DIRECTOR OF EDUCATION. 



Education can never stand still, it must either go onwards or it will slip 

 back. This has been and is still clearly recognised in the City of 

 Nottingham. In the past, Nottingham has done its part in initiating ad- 

 vances, and it is still continuing to do so. It was from Nottingham in 

 1873 that the first request was sent to Cambridge University to aid the 

 higher education of the working classes, and from this request sprang 

 the University Extension Movement. The first course of the University 

 Extension Lectures was given in the Mechanics Institute, Nottingham, 

 in October 1873. 



The Nottingham Corporation was the first Corporation in the kingdom 

 to take over the administration of a University College and to become 

 responsible for its maintenance. The decision was made in 1881; in that 

 year a penny rate (£2,575) was voted for the purpose. The actual cost of 

 maintenance was then £6,515. In 1888 it was one of the earliest to be- 

 come responsible for the conduct and maintenance of a School of Art. 

 This is now the City College of Art. 



The system of Recreative Evening Schools which later formed the 

 basis of the Social Institutes, had its rise in Nottingham in 1883. 



Nottingham's Education owes great debts to its public-spirited citizens 

 and to generous donors. 



The earhest benefaction for secondary education was that of Dame 

 Agnes Mellers, who endowed in 1513 the school now known as the 

 Nottingham High School for Boys. Dame Agnes was the widow of 

 Richard Mellers, Bell Founder, Mayor of Nottingham in 1500 and 1506. 

 In the foundation deed of the school, she provides for an annual service 

 at St. Mary's on the anniversary of her husband's death, to be followed 

 by distribution of bread, ale and cheese to the Mayor, Aldermen and 

 certain others who, if they had attended the service ' from the beginning 

 to the endinge thereof ' were to receive certain sums, including sixpence 

 for the Mayor. This picturesque ceremony is still carried out each year. 



This original endowment was later increased by eighty Citizens of 

 Nottingham and by Sir Thomas White, a Lord Mayor of London. Further 

 benefactions have been received from time to time, especially in and after 

 1868, when the School was moved to its present commanding position on 

 the sandstone ridge north of the city centre, between two public parks. 

 Additions have been made to the buildings at frequent intervals, recent 



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