Site:  

Former Literacy & Scientific Institute, Church Green West, Town Centre

Grid Reference:    

SP 0419 6764

Description:

Former Scientific and Literary Institute. Dated 1885 and by G.H. Cox of Birmingham. Brick with plain clay tiled roofs and parapets with kneelers on corbels. Long rectangular range later extended to provide frontage onto Church Green West. 2 storeys with double chamfered plinth, sill strings, string at first-floor level and mahicolated decoration to eaves. Stone-mullioned windows with transoms on ground floor. Gothic style. Church Green end elevation has two 3-light ground-floor windows and two large pointed-arched windows with Geometrical tracery on the first floor. Circular window in gable apex. Entrance to right with pointed archway of 3 moulded orders and nookshafts with foliated capitals. Elevation to Church Road is of 7 bays and similarly detailed. Gabled entrance in second bay has stone oriel window above with cusped window lights. Turret with octagonal spirelet and tall finial. Interior includes a fine open well staircase.

Significance:

This is a fine Victorian public building. Its facades are well-balanced with varied detail that gains optimum benefit from its corner site. The building makes an eloquent statement on the west side of the church green and forms a good group with the adjacent Smallwood Hospital (qv) that contributes much to the character and appearance of the Church Green Conservation Area.

History:

The forerunners of institutions for technical education were the Mechanics� Institutes and the Literary and Scientific Institutes, and in 1850 a Literary and Scientific Institute was opened in Redditch. The Library and Reading Room were first housed in 4, Prospect Hill, on the second floor above the shop of William Hemings, the printer and stationer. The working man�s ticket was issued at four shillings a year, or one shilling and sixpence per quarter and entitle addmission to the Working Man�s Reading Room, use of the library and admission to back seats at lectures.

There was no room in the shop for lectures, so the Managers of the National School, St. Stephen�s, in Peakman Street gave permission for lectures and entertainment to take place in the school buildings for an annual fee. Actual classes began in 1859 when a �night school� first opened in the National School. The first examinations, in 1862, were in arithmetic and grammar, but by 1868 there were also science classes. In 1872 the School of Art opened on Unicorn Hill and remained there for fourteen years.

It was later felt that the Institute needed more space, so building began in Church Road in 1885, when Lieut. Col. the Hon. George H. Windsor-Clive, MP laid the foundation stone. The new Institute building cost �2,400 and this money was gained from voluntary subscriptions and donations. In 1886 Earl Beauchamp opened the new premises for the School of Art, the Institute and its library.

The new building consisted of a library reading room, elementary, advanced and modelling rooms. There were also a master�s room and a caretakers apartments and office.

The Redditch Literary and Scientific Institute

The forerunners of institutions for technical education were the Mechanics� Institutes and the Literary and Scientific Institutes, and in 1850 a Literary and Scientific Institute was opened in Redditch. The Library and Reading Room were first housed in 4, Prospect Hill, on the second floor above the shop of William Hemings, the printer and stationer. The working man�s ticket was issued at four shillings a year, or one shilling and sixpence per quarter and entitle addmission to the Working Man�s Reading Room, use of the library and admission to back seats at lectures.

There was no room in the shop for lectures, so the Managers of the National School, St. Stephen�s, in Peakman Street gave permission for lectures and entertainment to take place in the school buildings for an annual fee. Actual classes began in 1859 when a �night school� first opened in the National School. The first examinations, in 1862, were in arithmetic and grammar, but by 1868 there were also science classes. In 1872 the School of Art opened on Unicorn Hill and remained there for fourteen years.

It was later felt that the Institute needed more space, so building began in Church Road in 1885, when Lieut. Col. the Hon. George H. Windsor-Clive, MP laid the foundation stone. The new Institute building cost �2,400 and this money was gained from voluntary subscriptions and donations. In 1886 Earl Beauchamp opened the new premises for the School of Art, the Institute and its library.

The new building consisted of a library reading room, elementary, advanced and modelling rooms. There were also a master�s room and a caretakers apartments and office.

After the first Technical School opened in 1892, the Institute lost the income from technical classes. (A new Technical School was built in Easemore Road, and it was opened in 1900.) Financial difficulties increased in spite of efforts to make the Institute more attractive. Such efforts included, in 1910, the �open access� system for the issue of library books. Films came to Redditch in 1913 and provided an alternative form of entertainment. The Institute�s buildings and assets were passed over to the Redditch Urban District Council in 1929 for the purpose of a public library.

The library building was extended and modernised in 1956. One of the things that delayed completion was the realisation that the School of Art, which occupied the top floor, would require a fire escape. There was a dispute as to who should pay for it. Eventually it was decided that Redditch Council should pay for it, and the County Council and the School of Art should pay a rent equivalent to the debt charges on the loan that the Redditch Council took out. The newly formed County of Hereford and Worcester administered the Library from 1974, and the new Library was officially opened in Market Square in January 1976. From the early 1980s the Church Road building housed the Training Restaurant of Redditch College and from 1988, after the college merger, North East Worcestershire College. It is now occupied by offices of the Redditch Standard.

An Institute Trust Deed, however, safeguarded the position of the School of Art. It was laid down that the School of Art would retain all its privileges, even if the building was handed to the Public Library Authority. By 1961 the School of Art had become a department of Redditch College, but remained in the same premises, as the college already had insufficient rooms. In 1972 it moved to the building in Peakman Street vacated by st. Steven�s firist school.

The Public Hall

Dr. Gilchrist had left enough money and assets for an educational trust to be formed in Redditch. The Redditch Indicator remarked that the "Trustees had assembled a body of eminent men to whom they had entrusted the duty of delivering lectures"

The 1894 publicity leaflet shows the six lectures were concerned with the telescope, volcanoes, Midland coal fields, the heart and circulation, spiders, and magnets and electric currents. The lecturers were Professors from Cambridge, London, Birmingham, and Glasgow Universities. The lectures were held in the Public Hall in Church Road, which was to the left of the Institute building.

The Public Hall had extensive alterations including improved heating and lighting and 600 plush lift-up seats before it became a Bosco�s Picture House in August 1913. It was later replaced by the Gaumont Cinema and later a Bingo Hall. It is now a night club.