In 1864, Reverend John Wise, Vicar of St. Mary Magdalene Church, applied for permission to build a new schoolroom in Lillington. The building was completed in 1865.
On 1st March 1897, the school inspectors’ report said that the infants’ room was overcrowded and that “suitable accommodation” was urgently needed.
The Waller family
The Waller family had inherited the Wise family lands and on 6th May 1898, Lady Beatrice Waller donated the school buildings in Lillington and the land they stood on, together with some additional land so that new buildings could be added to provide more space.
She asked that religious instruction at the school be supervised by the Vicar in line with Church of England doctrine. The new buildings opened for lessons on 28th October 1898. In July 1899 the Inspector reported that the infants were now taught in a “large and pleasant room.”
For further information see Warwickshire County Record Office reference CR 2167/1/1.
Text taken from the Warwickshire County Record Office leaflet Wise and Waller in Lillington, produced with the help of the Lillington Local History Society.
Comments
I went to school here in the early 1970s. It was referred to as the “Big Infants” then as we were all in our final year at Lillington Infants School before moving up to the junior school next door.
There were two classes. I was in Mrs Vivien’s, which was in the room immediately to the right of the main door in the photo. (The one with the 4 high windows, which seemed enormous when you were 6 or 7). I remember it being quite dark in there and the only heating was a stove in the middle of the back wall, surrounded by a wire cage presumably to stop us burning our hand. I can’t remember who taught the other class. We had assemblies in the small hall to the left of the front door. The toilets were in a separate block outside and I hated them as they were cold and full of spiders!
We were taught in mixed classes but segregated at play time – the boys’ playground was the one you can see in the photo and the girls’ playground was the one at the back.
I went to cubs there in the evenings sometime around the early 1970s and moved on to the scouts in the later 1970s. Just outside and heading down the hill a few feet was i believe a chemist and next to that a shop that sold sweats to us kids, the lady would sit on her stool with the big apron on and deal out the 4 for a penny sweets, every town had a lady sitting with a big apron on selling sweets.
The other classes in 1968-9 were Mrs Woodward’s and Miss Penner’s. I think Mrs Mays taught needlework and craft. I remember that Mrs Vivian also played the piano for the whole of that part of the school, which we called the Old Section.
I went to the infants school from 1958-1960. The left-hand part of the building is an 18th century cottage. As other recollections above recall, that part of the building was the school hall. I remember in the summer of 1958 being fascinated by the seeds of the marigolds which grew against the wall of the old cottage. I think the headmistress’s office was above the hall, reached from the boarded-in stairway at the extreme left. My teacher in the first year in 1958 was Mrs Joy. In the second year I moved into Mrs McDougal’s class, in a wooden hut which was actually on the junior school site, but still an infant school class. It leaked and there were buckets to catch the rain. She was a brilliant teacher, very involving and kind. Miss Williams, a slightly intimidating redhead, was the head. I remember her reading really thrilling Grimm’s fairy tales to my class -particulary Jorinde and Joringel in which a young girl is caught and turned into a nightingale. I have two bricks from the school, that I begged off the builders when they were knocking down parts and converting the rest to housing in the 1970s/80s. They are stamped Leamington Brick Company,
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