THE HISTORY OF OUR SCHOOL & LOCAL AREA

THE FIRST 100 YEARS  1805-1905

     
 Middle St. School 1805-1905 and its author -Mr G.Haffenden -Headmaster 1905

Click on the pictures below to see excerpts from this history of the first 100 years of Middle Street School :
 

In the mid-19th Century the school was very much run on the schooling system created by Joseph Lancaster. Click the picture to find out about Lancaster and read his booklet on 'The British System of Education'.

THE SECOND 100 YEARS  1905-2005
Click on the pictures to view photographs from the second hundred years of the school's history:
 

                
Pre-1920s                                1920s                                     1930s                                 1940s

                 
         1950s                                1960s & 70s                           1980s & 90s
 

BICENTENARY ACTIVITIES & CELEBRATIONS
Activities and celebrations linked to our bicentenary in 2005:

 Click the picture to see some of the models of people and incidents from the first 100 years of our school's history that our children made for display in Brighton museum. 

Click to see the models and other artefacts on display at our 'Old School' exhibition at Brighton museum. For Brighton & Hove Museum's record of the exhibition- click here

Click for photos of our Bicentenary Celebration Day.

Click for press coverage of our celebrations.

Year 4 children also produced an animation of some of the above characters and incidents. Click to see the video.

Click for photos & video of Year 4's as Victorian day.

Test Yourself!

When you've read all about the history of the school - test yourself by playing the 'Fling the Teacher' game. Change the teacher's face. Answer all 15 questions correctly and catapult the teacher through the air! Click the picture above.

Children on CBBC TV

For a video clip of four of our children talking to the editor of the Reader's Digest book (shown below)
on the CBBC TV channel click here

Whole School Photograph

To celebrate the bicentenary we took a photograph of everyone in the school.

Old Pupil Memories
Read some fascinating memories of 'old pupils' here
For interviews with ex-pupils from the 1930s & 40s click the play buttons below (interviews are by Robyn, Stanley, Esme & Chloe and last 15-25 minutes each).

     Joyce Hill      Pat Sprinthall
     Peter Guy     Sheila Dyer  
  For a transcript of sections of the interviews click here
 

Uncovering two hundred years of a seaside school


This double-page spread on our school history appears in 'The Story of Where You Live' published by The Reader's Digest.

 

MORE SCHOOL HISTORY

150th Anniversary

Click for details of our 150th anniversary (1955).

School Buildings

Middle Street School 1905
Click to see more photographs and drawings of the building over the years.

Ghosts near our school!
 

Here is Kai's description of the Ghost Walk in the Lanes around our school. Click the Play button-

The Green Man

A Brighton character that the first pupils at the school in 1805 would certainly have been familiar with was 'The Green Man of Brighton', who promenaded the seafront and Steyne near to the school.

  Click the picture for more details.


 

HISTORY OF THE SURROUNDING AREA
Click on the pictures:

The sea-front end of Middle Street in 1833

Historic pictures of Brighton

   
Animated Postcards of Brighton

Historic maps of Brighton

See how many people lived in the houses opposite our school in 1891, and what sort of jobs they had.

Postcards by Flora White
 

Zoomable views of Brighton seafront in 1900

HISTORY OF BRIGHTON - WEBSITE LINKS

Brighton & Hove in Pictures

My Brighton & Hove

History of Photography in Brighton & Hove

Old Sussex Mapped

Brighton & Hove - Black History

Brighton's Architecture

Romans in Sussex

The Regency Town House

An education pack based on the QueenSpark books archive

A vision of Britain through Time - Brighton

Books on Archive.org
These complete books are readable online using the Internet Archive book reader.

Life beneath the Waves & a Description
of the Brighton Aquarium 1871

The Brighton Chain Pier  - In Memoriam
It's History from 1823 to 1896

Holidays at Brighton or Sea-side Amusements 1834

Round About a Brighton Coach Office 1896

The History of Brighton and Environs 1871

History of Brighthelmston 1862

A Peep into the Past
Brighton in the Olden Time  1892

Brighton and it's Coaches
A History of the London and Brighton Road 1894

A2A - Access to Archives

allows you to search archives held throughout England. For example searching
with 'Middle Street school' as Keywords and 'East Sussex Record Office' as
'location' brings up several results, including:

Middle Street County Primary School, Brighton
      Photographs
         FILE - Middle Street School Boys' Brigade - ref.  E/SC/24/7/1  - date: 1889
         FILE - Middle Street School Old Boys' Club group photographs, 1909-1913 and cameos of founders, 1913 - ref.  E/SC/24/7/2-9  - date: 1909-1913
      Other records
         FILE - Middle Street School roll of honour - ref.  E/SC/24/12/1-8  - date: 1914
 FILE-List of Middle Street School records and notes for the history of the school - ref. E/SC/24/20 -date: 20th century

Historical Directories
Try using this site to search old trade directories for details of particular streets.
For example the Boyce's Street entry from Kelly's Directory of Kent, Surrey & Sussex, 1891 reads:

Google Book Search

The book search on Google lets you search the growing archive of complete books and texts.
For example here are links to a few with references to Brighton from the mid 19th century:

The Spas of England, and Principal Sea-bathing Places - 1841 - has a chapter on Brighton
Memoirs, Letters, and Comic Miscellanies in Prose and Verse, of the Late James Smith - 1840 - has a poem about Brighton
The Penny Cyclopædia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge - 1843 - describes Brighton at the time
The Elements of materia medica and therapeutica. v.1, 1854-57 - suitability of Brighton for various types of invalid