Crystal Palace School of Art, Science, and Literature, also known as Crystal Palace Company's School of Art, (1854–1936) was opened in 1854 by the

Crystal Palace Company A crystal or crystalline solid is a solid material whose constituents (such as atoms, molecules, or ions) are arranged in a highly ordered microscopic structure, forming a crystal lattice that extends in all directions. In addition, macros ...

as a new enterprise, to occupy part of its buildings when it re-erected the Crystal Palace in suburban

Sydenham Sydenham may refer to: Places Australia * Sydenham, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney ** Sydenham railway station, Sydney * Sydenham, Victoria, a suburb of Melbourne ** Sydenham railway line, the name of the Sunbury railway line, Melbourne ...

in 1853. The civil engineer and later first director of the

Royal College of Music The Royal College of Music is a music school, conservatoire established by royal charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, UK. It offers training from the Undergraduate education, undergraduate to the Doctorate, doctoral level in a ...

George Grove Sir George Grove (13 August 182028 May 1900) was an English engineer and writer on music, known as the founding editor of ''Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians''. Grove was trained as a civil engineer, and successful in that profession, ...

, was appointed secretary. It was a part of the great movements for educational and social reform in nineteenth century Britain. The main buildings were destroyed by fire in 1936.

Ladies' division

The overwhelming majority of classes were for women:Musgrave, ''passim'' * Music – later the Crystal Palace School of Music, 1880,

Arthur Sullivan Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan (13 May 1842 – 22 November 1900) was an English composer. He is best known for 14 comic opera, operatic Gilbert and Sullivan, collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including ''H.M.S. Pinaf ...

taught piano and singing and was a part-time Professor of Theory, Harmony and Transposition at the school in the 1860s and 1870s. * Art – watercolours, sketching, figure drawing and modeling, painting in oils, later Crystal Palace School of Art * English language and literature * Literature of other nations especially French, German and Italian * History – English, European and Biblical * Sciences – zoology, botany, chemistry, physical geography, maths and arithmetic * Woodcarving * Dressmaking * Cookery

Notable faculty

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (15 August 18751 September 1912) was a British composer and conductor. Of mixed-race birth, Coleridge-Taylor achieved such success that he was referred to by white New York musicians as the "African Mahler" when ...

August Manns Sir August Friedrich Manns (12 March 1825 – 1 March 1907) was a German-born British conductor who made his career in England. After serving as a military bandmaster in Germany, he moved to England and soon became director of music at London' ...

Edward Milner Edward Milner (20 January 1819 – 26 March 1884) was an English landscape architect. Early life and career Edward Milner was born in Darley, Derbyshire, the eldest child of Henry Milner and Mary née Scales. Henry Milner was employed at C ...

Ebenezer Prout Ebenezer Prout (1 March 1835 – 5 December 1909) was an English musical theorist, writer, music teacher and composer, whose instruction, afterwards embodied in a series of standard works still used today, underpinned the work of many British cl ...

* Harry Windsor–Fry *

Christopher Dresser Christopher Dresser (4 July 1834 – 24 November 1904) was a British designer and design theorist, now widely known as one of the first and most important, independent designers. He was a pivotal figure in the Aesthetic Movement and a major cont ...

Notable students

Music students

* John Maughan Barnett * Marion Margaret Scott

Art students

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale (25 January 1872 – 10 March 1945) was an English artist known for her paintings, book illustrations, and a number of works in stained glass. Life Fortescue-Brickdale was born at her parents' house, Birchamp Vil ...

* René Jules Lalique

Literature students

* Mary Ann Harriet Margaret Hooper * Jessie Laidlay Weston

Speech and drama students

Elsie Fogerty Anne Elizabeth "Elsie" Fogerty (16 December 1865 – 4 July 1945) was a British teacher who departed from the customary practice of “voice and diction” also called elocution. At that time “Voice and Diction” focused entirely on the mou ...

Gentlemen's division

Classes for gentlemen were limited to the School of Engineering, later Crystal Palace School of Engineering 1872. The South Tower was demolished in the early 1940sHenry Petroski, ''An Engineer's Alphabet: Gleanings from the Softer Side of a Profession,'' Cambridge University Press 2011 Cambridge UK but a surviving part of the School of Engineering's premises is now the Crystal Palace Museum.

Notable engineering students

* William Beckett *

William Warwick Buckland William Warwick Buckland, FBA (11 June 1859 – 16 January 1946) was a scholar of Roman law, Regius Professor of Civil Law at the University of Cambridge from 1914 to 1945. Life William Warwick Buckland was educated in France, at Hurstpierpoint ...

* Joseph Day *

George Furness George Furness (31 October 1820 – 9 January 1900) was an English Victorian construction engineer and benefactor. He described himself as a "contractor of public works". He worked all around the world, on railways, drainage, and brickwo ...

* Charles Grey *

Geoffrey de Havilland Captain Sir Geoffrey de Havilland, (27 July 1882 – 21 May 1965) was an English aviation pioneer and aerospace engineer. The aircraft company he founded produced the Mosquito, which has been considered the most versatile warplane ever built,D ...

Reginald Walter Maudslay Reginald Walter Maudslay (1 September 1871 – 14 December 1934) was a British car manufacturer and founder of the Standard Motor Company. Born in Paddington, London, Maudslay was the son of Athol Edward Maudslay, "gentleman", and Kate, daughter o ...

H. F. S. Morgan Henry Frederick Stanley Morgan (1881–1959), known as HFS, was an English sports car manufacturer and founder of the Morgan Motor Company (MMC) and its chairman from 1937 until his death in 1959. Biography Henry 'Harry' Morgan was born in Mo ...

David McKee Wright David McKee Wright (6 August 1869 – 5 February 1928) was an Irish-born poet and journalist, active in New Zealand and Australia. Early life Wright was born at Ballynaskeagh, County Down, Ireland, the second son of Rev. William Wright, D.D. (1 ...

The South Tower also contained John Logie Baird's transmitter and studios.

The end of the Crystal Palace brings to mind memories of the School of Engineering which was housed in the South Tower, fortunately still standing firm as a rock. This school, founded by J. W. Wilson, M.I.M.E., an engineer who helped to build the Great Exhibition of 1851, sent many of its students to the four quarters of the globe. The curriculum of the school included mechanical and civil courses and about five of the circular rooms were used. There was a fitting shop, pattern shop, and drawing office. Those in the mechanical section built a 4 h.p. vertical engine which was generally exhibited at the head of the stairs on the south side of the Palace. In the Civil Engineering section we surveyed the whole of the grounds, and drew plans and made estimates for an imaginary railway which extended from one side to the other. This entailed all the necessary estimates for embankments, a cantilever bridge etc. Then there was the Colonial section presided over by a most congenial superintendent, who had no doubt seen much of a pioneer's life and infused his enthusiasm into those who belonged to his section. Concerning the rigidity of the South Tower, I was working in a high storey soon after joining the school when there was a strong wind, and, feeling giddy, I mentioned it to the superintendent. He informed me that it rocked several inches at the top, which made it safer than absolute rigidity.
:Mr F. C. Bell, 74, Berners Street, Ipswich., Letter to The Editor, ''The Times'', Monday Dec. 07, 1936. page 10, issue 47551

Examinations

The school was a centre for the examinations of the Oxford and Cambridge syndicates.

Notes

References

*Musgrave, Michael. ''The Musical Life of the Crystal Palace'', Cambridge University Press, 1995, Cambridge, UK