VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake
VCH Nottinghamshire
On-line Texts in Progress
BEFORE 1870
A school was built at East Leake in 1724 by John Bley. Having had to walk to Hoton (Leics.), four miles away, for his own education in the 1680s he realised the importance of schooling and, after he had made his fortune as a distiller in London, wanted to provide for the children of his native village.
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He is thought to have bought the land for the school soon after he had built a house in the village in 1718. A Victorian photograph shows a two-storey building with a central doorway. It was built of brick with stone quoins and window dressings. There were three dormer windows in the attic where living accommodation may have been provided later.
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When Bley died in 1731 he left
£450 in the hands of trustees to purchase land, the rents from which were to keep the school in good repair and to pay the master. Free education was to be available for both boys and girls of East
Leake only, although children from other parishes who paid were also taught there. Land was bought at Burton on the Wolds (Leics.) and Wymeswold (Leics.) to provide the income.
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Unusually there was no specific religious requirement when the school was set up but after
1733 the master was required ‘to read and instruct them in the principles of the Christian religion according to the usage of the Church of England, and in other useful learning, for ever’.
In 1743 it was reported that a schoolroom and a master’s house had been erected using the funds left by John Bley. Up to 80 children were taught to read and write there.
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In 1818 the master
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K. Hodgkinson and R.& I. Flynn, John Bley of East Leake & London 1674-1731: distiller &
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4 benefactor (2012), 21.
Hodgkinson & Flynn, John Bley, 119-122.
Hodgkinson & Flynn, John Bley, 194.
Visitation Returns, 86.
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VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake of the school received £48 a year. There was also a Baptist Sunday school with 149 children. It was observed that ‘there was a [Church] Sunday school consisting of 20 children but they all left it latterly because they were made to attend the church, the parish consisting chiefly of Dissenters’.
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In 1829 it was reported that ‘The master instructs in reading writing and arithmetic, all the poor boys and girls who are legally settled in East Leake. They are also taught to repeat the
Commandments and to read the Bible and those whose parents do not object to it are instructed in the Christian catechism. The children are, by a regulation of the trustees, admitted at four years of age and allowed to remain until the age of 14. The sum of one shilling is paid on admission of each and sixpence or (when fuel is dear) a shilling a year is paid for firing. Their parents provide them with books. The school, which is conducted with the assistance of an usher, is held in a room in the master’s house; and in another room other children are instructed, whose parents pay for their tuition’. At that time there were 42 pupils.
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Nonconformity was widespread in the district, which accounts for the catechism not being compulsory. It also seems that girls were no longer admitted.
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In 1833 there were three daily schools. The endowed school had 42 boys and 15 girls and a further 38 boys and 5 girls were paid for by their parents. Another school taught 23 girls, paid for partly by the rector and partly by their parents. Another school which began in 1826 had 24 boys and 10 girls, all paid for by their parents. There were also three Sunday schools. The Church Sunday school, supported by the rector, had 20 boys and 42 girls. The Wesleyan Methodist Sunday school had 46 boys and 37 girls and the General Baptist Sunday school had 59 boys and 61 girls. Both nonconformist Sunday schools were supported by annual subscriptions.
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A collection of 20 books completed by boys of the Norman family of East Leake and Costock, who attended the Bley school, was discovered in 2003. They span five generations from 1723 to
1861. Several are of arithmetic with complicated problems while others are of handwriting. They appear to be fair copies of work as no marking or corrections are shown.
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Digest of Returns (1819), 129.
Rep. Char. Comm.
xxi (1829), 448-50.
Hodgkinson & Flynn, John Bley, 196.
Educ. Enq. (1835), 251.
T. Grundy, ‘The Norman Boys, pupils at the John Bley Endowed School, Leake Historian
No. 8 (2004), 6-12; Notts. Archives, DD 2533/1-21.
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VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake
In 1850 the parish built an infants schoolroom on glebe land. It was said to be the gift of the rector,John Bateman. A plaque over the doorway bore the date 1850 and the initials EB, perhaps for the rector’s wife, Emily.
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The diocesan inspector recorded in 1860 that there were 29 boys and 38 girls at the school.
They paid 1d. a week and were taught by just one mistress. The inspector also reported that 80 children attended the Sunday school where the five male and four female teachers were stockingers, labourers, small shopkeepers, higglers or widows. Some of the younger children also attended the infant school and some of the older children attended a night school two evenings a week. There 20 boys and 9 girls were taught writing, reading, spelling, singing and arithmetic by the curate. The inspector commented that the schoolroom was newly built and well supplied with books and apparatus. He was refused permission to visit the endowed school.
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In 1862 the inspector’s report was not good. The lower classes were ‘imperfectly taught’ and arithmetic was ‘not satisfactory’. Only needlework was ‘pretty good’. The inspector commented
‘It is easy to discover why this school is in such a bad state – there is only one mistress with no assistance to teach 90 children – 26 of them being infants – the place was a perfect Babel of niose and confusion. … Dissent is all powerful here – only four children in the whole school can say the catechism. The Endowed school for boys is still closed to your inspector. There is a good Sunday school here of which I hear a good account’.
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The following year the inspector stated that ‘The mistress is anxious to do her duty but the result is very poor, yet with such extraordinary people to labour amongst she has not a fair chance. She requires assistance but there is not a girl in the first class capable of affording assistance’.
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FROM 1870 TO 1903
A school board at East Leake first met in July 1871 when ‘A discussion took place as to the transfer of the Free School to the Board and it was ultimately resolved that the School Board is willing to accept the school belonging to the Trustees of John Bley’s charity and to carry on the same as a Public Elementary school if the Trustees will take the necessary steps to terminate the
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S. P. Potter, A History of East Leake (1903), 103.
Lincs. Archives, DBE/9/17/153.
Lincs. Archives, DBE/9/17/161.
Lincs. Archives, DBE/9/17/165.
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VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake appointment of the present master and transfer the school to the School Board under Section 23 of the Elementary Education Act 1870’.
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The master was reluctant to leave and it was not until June 1875 that the board school opened with a new head and his wife as assistant. Sixty children attended but the master stated that
‘the great majority had never been to school and were completely ignorant’. It must have been a difficult beginning as it was not until August that 72 desks, reading books and stationery were received.
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In 1876 the school building was inspected and found to be in such a poor state of repair that it was decided to demolish it and build a new one.
In March 1877 HM Inspector reported that ‘The master seems to have taken great pains with his pupils. They are in good order and intelligently taught. The premises are merely used temporarily pending the erection of new rooms’.
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The school was closed in May and June and on
25 June the infant school was used while the new school was being built. In October they were holding some classes in the clubroom of the Three Horse Shoes Inn. By February 1878 the number of pupils had increased to about 190, including some from another local school which had recently closed. The inspector reported that ‘The school is at present in so chaotic a state that it is well nigh impossible to foresee what it will become when the teachers have had more time to work on the mass of children now at length compelled to attend. The rooms require serious alterations to fit them for school purposes’.
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In 1879 the new building, with a house for the master, was opened on the site of the old endowed school. In both 1879 and 1880 the inspector reported that the upper classes had creditable results but the infants were still poor and the needlework ‘very defective’. One of the recurring problems was poor attendance and in April 1882 the master recorded that ‘Attendance has been bad beyond precedent, weekly average 53.5’.When a new head arrived in January 1885 he
‘examined the children and found them in shocking condition’. However, by May the inspector was able to report that ‘ The order is greatly improved and though much yet remains to be accomplished for the attainments of the children there is promising evidence that if regularity of attendance is more strictly enforced great improvement will be effected by the present teachers’.
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Notts. Archives, SB 18/1/1.
Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/1.
Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/1, 26 Mar. 1877.
Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/1, 22 Feb. 1878.
Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/1, 13 Mar. 1879; 14 Apr. 1880; 24 Apr. 1882; 1 May 1885.
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VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake
FROM 1903 TO 1944
The last meeting of the board was held in June 1903 and the school was taken over that year by Nottinghamshire County Council. Outbreaks of diphtheria during 1903, 1904, 1905 and 1908 caused the school to be closed for several weeks at a time and in 1904 all the books had to be burnt to try to stop the spread of the infection. In 1905 the inspector reported that they ‘laboured under great disadvantage – that they should have learned so much in such a limited period is most creditable both to them and the teaching staff’.
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During the next few years there were several changes of headteacher and the inspector’s reports appear to encourage the newcomers. In 1908 it was reported that ‘Although the continuity of the work has been repeatedly broken yet the school is in a more satisfactory condition than for some years past’.
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In 1914 the inspector reported that ‘A remarkable improvement has been effected in the condition of this school since the present master took charge and it should not be long before it becomes one of the best in the county’.
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SINCE 1944
The school continued in the premises on The Green after 1944 with the old board school becoming East Leake secondary modern. Lantern Lane primary school was opened in 1952 and was one of six in the county constructed as a prefabricated building in aluminum by the Bristol Aircraft
Company. The first phase consisted of four classrooms and an assembly hall. There were 200 children and so an extra class had to be accommodated in the hall. In 1955 two further classrooms were built and in 1961 two more and a craft room were added. In 1977 a 40-place nursery unit for children aged three and four was opened.
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In 1995 the school suffered severe fire damage.
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A few years later a new building was erected on a site east of the existing one as part of a Private
Finance Initiative (PFI) scheme, to accommodate 280 children aged 5-11 with a 40-place nursery.
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It was fully opened in January 2003. In November 2012 it was rated good by Ofsted inspectors.
In 1956 the Harry Carlton secondary modern school was built on a site west of Lantern Lane primary and senior pupils from the old board school building were transferred there. As it was the only secondary school in the extreme south of the county it took children from neighbouring villages
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Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/2, 15, 34, 65, 68, 69, 86.
Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/2, 141.
Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/2, 236.
Local info.
Nottingham Evening Post, 19 Dec. 1995.
Nottinghamshire County News, Spring 2002.
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VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake as well as East Leake. Children who passed the 11+ examination went to West Bridgford Grammar
School or the High Schools in Nottingham or Loughborough.
In 2003 the secondary school was rebuilt on the site of the old Lantern Lane primary school as part of the PFI scheme. The old Harry Carlton school site was sold for private housing. As well as the school the scheme included community leisure facilities such as a swimming pool, gymnasium, sports hall and all-weather flood-lit pitches. In 2013 the school became East Leake Academy.
As numbers at Lantern Lane primary school were increasing the old board school building became an annexe for the village children. This continued until 1966 when a new building was erected on the site behind the old one and became a separate establishment. Brookside primary schooll opened on 25 April 1966 with 165 on roll but as workmen were still there only one class was able to move into the new building. The children had to have a picnic lunch as the gas had not been connected. The headteacher of Lantern Lane school sent stationery and pencils as these had not arrived. Gradually over the next few weeks equipment and apparatus were received.
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In 1969 phase II of the building began and by January 1971 there were 282 on roll. The figure had risen to
435 by April 1978 and so the catchment areas were rearranged to make numbers in the two primary schools more even.
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In 2010 the school was given a good report by the Ofsted inspector. Also in
2010 a Sure Start children’s centre was moved into a new room at the school, with places for 16 children aged 2-5 at each session. In 2013 the school was refurbished. The old church schoolroom was later known as St Mary’s Hall and became a church hall.
PRIVATE SCHOOLS
The Parents’ National Educational Union school in Nottingham was evacuated to East Leake in
1939. The children were accommodated in several houses, Rushcliffe Lodge, the Hall, Arley, The
Gables and the Rectory. In 1941 it became possible to buy Arley House on West Leake Road. Classes were held at first in the Methodist schoolroom. After the war some children returned to Nottingham but many stayed on at East Leake. Gradually buildings were added or converted and the school was recognized by the Ministry of Education. In 1973 the two schools became an educational trust with a single board of governors. The last boarders left in the late 1970s and more day children were
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Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/2, 1-3.
Notts. Archives, SL/54/1/2, 75, 171, 319, 418.
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VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake accepted. Further building enabled 90 children to be taught there.
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It was taken over by Trent
College c .2007 and closed in 2009.
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CHARITIES OF WRIGHT & SPENCER
In 1828 it was recorded that a tablet in the church noted that John Wright, who died in
1681, gave £5, the interest of which was to be used for bread for the poor on the first Sunday after
10 February. It also noted that Thomas Spencer, who died in 1686, gave £6 for a dole of bread on St
Thomas’s day. In alternate years 22s. was distributed by the overseers and churchwardens, according to a list made at a vestry meeting, to poor people of the parish, at Christmas.
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By 1903 it was recorded that the money had been placed in the hands of ‘a supposed substantial person. This man failed & the charities were lost.’ Parish accounts have entries for payments for dole bread up to
1823.
Mary Attenborough, who died in 1855, bequeathed £100, of which £10 plus the interest was to be distributed every 26 December, until the money was expended, to the poor of the parish.
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No further record of this has been found.
TOWN LANDS
The Town Lands Trust was set up in 1642 with the purchase of about 25 acres of land ‘to be used for ever for the general good and ease of the inhabitants of East Leake.’
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After enclosure in
1798 the trust was allotted probably the same lands, which were at the northern end of the parish, bordering Stocking Lane and Gotham Road. Trustees were appointed as custodians of the land. In the 1890s the Great Central Railway was built through the lands and paid the trust £556. During the
20th century British Gypsum made several attempts to purchase the land but were refused. Finally it was agreed to lease the area under the fields for gypsum mining for 20 years, for which the trust received royalties which were invested. Since 1926 the trust has funded many village improvements and activities.
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In 2013 the trust had an income of nearly £6,000 a year of which £3,453 was spent.
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Information from a former headteacher.
C. Cleaver, ‘Memories of Arley House PNEU School, Leake Historian No.14 (2012), 30.
Rep. Char. Comm., 451.
S. P. Pell, A History of East Leake (1903), 69.
Rep. Char. Comm., 450-1.
M. Jacques, The History of East Leake Town Lands Trust (2009), 2-4 and following
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VCH Nottinghamshire: Texts in Progress: East Leake
JOHN BLEY
John Bley, who died in 1731, left in his will £10 to every farmer and £5 to every householder in East Leake; a further £10 was paid ‘for the use and benefit of the poor of East Leake in the severities of winter’ for three years. He also left a similar £10 to each of the seven parishes bordering East Leake. These bequests were in addition to those to the school.
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In the early 19 th
century the village feast was held on Whit Monday. In the same period there were two sick clubs, one for men and one for women, and two
lodges of the Odd Fellows.
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In the 21st century East Leake was the largest community in the area and consequently had the largest range of clubs and organisations. The leisure centre and other venues provided space for many sporting activities including badminton, bowls, cricket, football, rugby football, kickboxing and angling. Rushcliffe Golf club was situated at the northern end of the parish. Meadow Park provided a wildlife area for walkers to enjoy.
There were organisations for young people including Scouts and Guides as well as groups for older people, such as the Evergreen club. East Leake amateur players performed regularly and there were carers and bereaved friends groups. There was a thriving local history society which as well as meeting regularly published several volumes of articles about the district. The Women’s Institute and Rotary had branches and there was a section of the Soar Valley U3A. The East Leake Community
Care Association published regular leaflets with information of all the organisations in the area.
Special events such as the village show and a carnival, as well as other functions were held from time to time.
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36 pages for a detailed account of the Trust.
Char. Comm . Reg. no. 242405.
Hodgkinson & Flynn, John Bley, 175-6.
White’s Dir. Notts. (1832), 650.
Local information.
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