SCHOOLS 



INTRODUCTION 



LANCASHIRE is a county of late de- 

 velopment. It did not become in 

 the early or later Middle Ages the 

 ^ site of a church of first-rate import- 

 ance, and for the same reason was 

 not the home of a school of any magnitude. 

 Mountainous, and therefore thinly peopled, with 

 small industrial development, boasting no ports 

 of any size, with little or no intercourse with 

 France, Germany, or the Low Countries, it 

 lagged far behind the commercial and industrial 

 development of the south, the east, and the west, 

 and even of the Midlands. Lancaster, a port 

 (though trading only with Ireland and Scotland) 

 as well as a fortress, gives specific evidence of the 

 existence of its school as early as the beginning 

 of the thirteenth century, and the school of 

 Preston, the next great port, is conjecturally 

 almost as early. Liverpool Grammar School can 

 be traced no higher than the sixteenth century. 

 Lancaster had no hinterland. The hinterland 

 of Preston gives us Middleton School in the 

 beginning of the fifteenth century, and Blackburn, 

 Leyland, and Whalley, all of the early sixteenth 

 century. The hinterland of Liverpool probably 

 boasted of Manchester School from the time 

 when the church was collegiated in the first 

 quarter of the fifteenth century, though its present 

 endowment dates from nearly a century later. 

 Prescot is ascribed to the same period. Farn- 

 worth, Warrington, Bolton le Moors, St. 

 Michael's-on-Wyre, Winwick and Kirkham, 

 complete the tale of pre-Reformation Grammar 

 Schools in the county. The reign of Edward VI 

 was singularly barren of new foundations here as 

 elsewhere. Penwortham, which was more of an 

 elementary school — being primarily for children 

 in the *Absay, catechism, primer, and accidence,' 

 and only secondarily for 'others in grammar,' 

 seems the sole product of the days of the reputed 

 father of Free Grammar Schools. Clitheroe 

 received its charter from Queen Mary. The 

 Elizabethan era saw two archbishops and two 

 bishops (one of them afterwards an archbishop) 

 found grammar schools at Rochdale and Riving- 

 ton in its earlier, and at Hawkshead and Warton 

 in its later development, while Blackrod, Urswick, 

 Halsall, Wigan, Heskin, and Churchtown had 

 lay founders. Burnley was a chantry endow- 

 ment converted to educational uses. In the reign 

 of James I, Standish, Ormskirk, Oldham, Chorley, 

 Leigh, Cartmel, Crosby, Bispham, Bury, Bolton 

 le Sands were all, except Crosby and Bury, the 

 2 56 



result of joint parochial effort. The earliest 

 elementary schools whose endowments have been 

 traced — Astley in 1630 ; Hindley, Haigh, 

 Ringley, Rumworth, and Much Woolton be- 

 tween that year and the outbreak of the Civil 

 War — were Caroline efforts. From that time 

 until the passing of the Technical Instruction 

 Act, 1890, the Grammar or Secondary founda- 

 tions were few and far between. Upholland, 

 Over Kellet and Cockerham under Charles II, 

 Newchurch under William III, Ulverston and 

 Tunstall under George II, none of them of any 

 importance, seem the only examples. In the 

 days of George III Stonyhurst College was 

 created by a contingent of English Catholics 

 flying from the French Revolution to Lancashire. 

 The middle of the nineteenth century saw the 

 rise of a ' Public ' School of the second order in 

 Rossall. The beginning of the twentieth has 

 witnessed the conversion of some modern sub- 

 stitutes for the extinguished grammar school at 

 Liverpool from proprietary into municipal and 

 endowed schools ; while the manufacturing towns 

 are humming with what were formerly called 

 Science and Art, and now Secondary Schools, of 

 all sorts and for both sexes, separate or mixed. 

 It has been found impossible for lack of space to 

 treat these as their promoters might wish, and as 

 their educational activity deserves. It is satis- 

 factory to know that most of the old schools 

 also have been restored to light and leading by the 

 aid of new endowments, notable instances being 

 Lancaster by Miss Bradshaw's gift, and Bolton 

 through the benefactions of Mr. W. H. Lever. 

 Never in the whole history of education in 

 England could the historian have given a better 

 account of their present prosperity and future 

 prospects. 



THE ROYAL GRAMMAR SCHOOL, 

 LANCASTER 



At Lancaster, as we might expect, we meet 

 with the earliest school in the county — how 

 early we can but guess, but no doubt as early 

 as the title of Lancashire, which is not one of 

 the earliest counties. As is usual with the early 

 schools, we first hear of it in a casual men- 

 tion, Thomas of Kyrkeham, schoolmaster of 

 Lancaster ^ [maghtro scolarum de Lancastria), 

 appearing as witness to a deed in the chartu- 

 lary of Lancaster Priory. The deed is undated, 

 but is with others of the early thirteenth 



' Hist, of the Church of Lane. (Chet. See), ii, 316. 

 I 71 



