Jubilee pamphlet introduction

J. Rosser, Esq., B.Sc., Headmaster

The year 1963 has for a long time been a landmark in my mind. Two anniversaries take place simultaneously. Our school will have been open for fifty years and I shall complete a personal record of twenty-one years service in the school.

It is therefore a suitable time for retrospection and I felt that many old boys, former staff and those interested in education would obtain satisfaction from reading an abridged account of the history of the school.

A significant fact, which has struck me whilst compiling these details, is that the history of this school is the history of our town. When the school was opened, our town was a semi rural community. References are made in the school log book concerning holidays given in May and November of each year for Stockton Hirings. The older members of our community will remember the noisy days when farm workers appeared in the High Street trading their labour for the following six months. In recent years the entries in the log book refers quite often to visits of pupils to various factories. The change is almost complete, we are now a highly industrialised community.

To follow these trends the school which at first was opened as an Elementary School, later became a Central School and has now developed into a Technical School. Its further development into an advanced source of technical education should be watched with interest as we proceed into the atomic age.