Warwick State High School is a heritage-listed state high school at Palmerin Street, Warwick, Southern Downs Region, Queensland, Australia. It was designed by Thomas Pye and Block A was built from 1914 to 1915. It is also known as Warwick Technical College and Warwick Intermediate School. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 28 June 2018.
History
Warwick State High School opened on this site in 1914 as the Warwick Technical College and High School, accommodated in new buildings; having relocated operations from an earlier site in Guy Street. It grew to include Queensland's first intermediate school in 1929, accommodated in a new building in 1932, and developed further to cater for increased high school enrolments in the 1950s and 1960s in new buildings. The buildings were purpose-designed by the Department of Public Works (DPW) and form an attractive cohesive group of state educational buildings from the early to mid-20th century. These are:
Technical College and High School Buildings
Main Building, Block A (1915) Workshops Block, Block B (1914) Intermediate School Building Block C (1932) High School Buildings: South Connecting Wing (1958) North Connecting Wing (1959) Block F (1963) Block D (1968/9)
Prior to British settlement, the open country of the Darling Downs, named by Allan Cunningham in 1827, had been carefully and deliberately maintained by its Aboriginal owners in an annual pattern of controlled burns to preserve pasture for native grazing animals. British settlement of the Darling Downs, began in 1840 with the Leslie Brothers who were closely followed by other graziers. The town of Warwick, which grew to become the business centre for the southern Darling Downs, was surveyed by James Charles Burnett in 1849, with the first sale of crown land in July 1850. Warwick was declared a municipality in 1861 and was subsequently transformed from a squatters' town into the principal urban centre of this prosperous pastoral and agricultural district. The construction of the Southern railway line linking Brisbane, Toowoomba, Warwick and the tin mines of Stanthorpe reached Warwick in January 1871, and fuelled further development. As Warwick grew, its local industries remained related to primary production including: flour milling, butter and cheese production, bacon processing, sawmilling, coach and wagon works, followed in the 20th century by motor repairs and engineering works. All of these industries required a skilled workforce.
Throughout the 19th century, the only avenue for technical education in Queensland was through the local schools of arts where courses in trades were conducted. The quality and variety of instruction depended on the competence and enthusiasm of committee members. During the late 1880s, several committees established technical colleges in existing school of arts buildings, but as the range of courses and number of students increased, separate accommodation was necessary. Queensland's first purpose-built technical college was the Queen Victoria Silver Jubilee Memorial Technical Collegewhich opened in Ipswich in 1901, followed by Warwick's (1906), Mount Morgan Technical College (1909), and Toowoomba Technical College (1911) . Reflecting the importance of the mining industry to Charters Towers, the Charters Towers School of Mines was established in there in 1901, which fulfilled a similar role to a technical college but with a focus on mining.
In the early 1900s the Queensland Government began to take a more active interest in technical colleges. In the late 1890s through to 1914, Queensland's manufacturing sector grew substantially, creating a need for a more skilled workforce in a variety of trades.
The Board of Technical Education was established in 1902, replaced by a Technical Education Branch within the Department of Public Instruction in 1905, and the Technical Instruction Act 1908 empowered the government to take over existing technical colleges. Locally managed technical colleges gradually came under departmental control and the government also established new colleges in several centres, including Maryborough, Bundaberg, Rockhampton and Mackay.
Technical education in Warwick began with the formation of a school of arts, which initially met in the courthouse before establishing itself in a building in Palmerin Street in 1869. A technical college began in the School of Arts boardroom in 1895. This space was soon inadequate and a site was acquired on the corner of Fitzroy and Guy Street where a new building was opened in 1906, financed through local subscriptions. A two-storey extension facing Guy Street was completed in 1909.