State School, Townsville.

New of the day

Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser,

 Tuesday 13 November 1894, page 5

Suspected Incendiarism.

TOWNSVILLE CENTRAL STATE SCHOOL ON FIRE.

(By Electric Telegraph)

 (FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

TOWNSVILLE, November 12.

Last night about 7 o’clock the Girls' Central State School was discovered to be on fire by Drynan, an employee of the Post Office. After some time he succeeded in extinguishing the flame. He discovered that a hole had been burned through the floor joist, and the partition was charred. There seems little doubt that the fire was the work of an incendiary. There is no clue. The police are investigating the matter.

Background

The Townsville Central State School, first established as the National School in 1869, was relocated to its present site in Warburton Street in 1955 and incorporates the remains of the first Townsville gaol which was established in 1878 and relocated to Stuart Creek in 1891.

In March 1869, 4 years after the settlement of Townsville, the first recognized school, the National School was opened in a building that had been used as the Burdekin and Flinders Hospital on the Strand. The school commenced with 48 students with an average attendance for the year of 53. The school expanded in 1873 to include a Girls School for which a new building was erected in 1874 and an infant school was established in 1876 with its new building erected in 1879. In 1878 over 200 girls were attending the school.

A new boys' school was erected in 1889 and the two schools became known as the Townsville Central Schools. The school buildings suffered cyclone damage in 1896 and 1903 and a long history of the school not being adequately maintained is recorded in school records.

Courtesy of the Queensland Heritage Register

 

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