Gympie State High School buildings are a heritage-listed group of buildings at Gympie State High School at 1 Everson Road, Gympie, Gympie Region, Queensland, Australia. They were built from 1933 to 1937. They were added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 September 2018.
History Gympie State High School, established in 1912, opened on its current site in Gympie in 1917. The school is important in demonstrating the evolution of state education and its associated architecture. It retains:
two timber school buildings with timber floor trusses (Block B, 1955–56, and Block C, 1956–57) a timber school building with open web steel floor trusses (Block D, 1958–59) and its Agricultural Science extension (1960–61) a former partially enclosed gymnasium (Block K, ) a temporary classroom building (Block T, 1951).
The school has a strong and ongoing association with the Gympie community.
Gympie, part of the traditional lands of the Kabi Kabi people, was established after the discovery of gold in October 1867. The alluvial gold was soon exhausted and shallow reef mining commenced in 1868, followed by deep reef mining from 1875. During 1881 Gympie's mines began yielding large amounts of gold. An intensive phase of underground reef mining followed, facilitated by the injection of capital into mining companies for machinery and employees. Local gold production peaked in 1903, and Gympie was declared a city in 1905. As gold production declined to cessation , Gympie was transformed into a service centre for its highly productive agricultural district, noted for dairy farming and fruit-growing.
By 1912, Gympie had four state primary schools: Gympie Central State School (1869), One Mile State School (1869), Monkland State School (1884) and Southside State School (1910). That year, it also became the site of one of Queensland's first three state high schools. The Grammar Schools Act 1860 had provided scholarships for high-achieving students to attend elite grammar schools, but it was not until 1912 that the government instituted a high school system.T Blake, "Educating Queenslanders" in Queensland Historical Thematic Framework, 2007 (rev.2013 by EHP), pp.9-11P Burmester, M Pullar and M Kennedy, Queensland Schools: A Heritage Conservation Study, a report for the Department of Education, November 1996, pp.32-35. By 1940 there were only 17 high schools in the State of which two were in Brisbane.An additional 14 State schools had "tops" (Project Services, "Bundaberg State High School", in Queensland Schools Heritage Study Part II Report, for Education Queensland, January 2008). In late January 1912 state high schools opened in Gympie, Warwick, and Bundaberg; followed a week later by high schools in Mackay, Mount Morgan and Charters Towers. In the 1950s the number of high schools in Queensland increased significantly.In accordance with government policy, high schools were not opened in towns with existing grammar schools (such as Brisbane, Ipswich, Toowoomba, Maryborough, Rockhampton and Townsville), although the government planned to take over grammar schools at a later date. Capricornian, 23 September 1911, p.20Telegraph (Brisbane), Tuesday 30 January 1912, p.4'Week (Brisbane), 17 January 1913, p.39Bundaberg State High School: 75th Anniversary Celebrations, 1912-1987, p.6Gympie State High School 1912-2012, Gympie, Gympie State High School, 2012, p.13.
In January 1912, Gympie State High School's first students were accommodated in a building at Gympie Central State School.'State High Schools' three opening today', Telegraph, 20 January 1912, p.4'First annual report', Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette, 12 December 1912J Eshuys, (Ed), Gympie State High School: an historical analysis, 1912-1982, Gympie, Gympie State High School, 1982, p.15. This building was soon overcrowded. In 1914 the Gympie City Council donated of land, known as Tozer Park, for a new high school. This land (Portion 19, R670) was located west of Cootharaba Road and south of Tozer Park Road. An additional of land (Portion 21, R689) was then obtained just north of Tozer Park, to provide level ground on which to site the school building.Tozer Park had previously been donated to the Gympie Town Council in the mid-1890s by Sir Horace Tozer. "Gympie High School, a public meeting", Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette, Tuesday 7 October 1913, p.2'Gympie High School, new building wanted', Daily Standard, 16 July 1914, p.2'Notes and News, New Gympie High School', Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette, 6 August 1914, p.3DNRME Survey Plan G14780, 1914DNRME Survey Plan MCH1096, November 1915Queensland Government Gazette, 26 February 1916, p.945'New high schools, at Gatton and Gympie', Telegraph, 19 April 1917, p.2. Portion 21 was gazetted as a state school reserve in 1916, with a realigned section of Tozer Park Road (later Hamilton Drive) surveyed diagonally through it, north of where the school buildings were constructed.
The first two purpose-built high school buildings in Queensland were opened at Gatton and then Gympie in 1917, and were larger versions of a standard design introduced for primary schools in 1914.This 1914 type was the "Suburban Timber School Building" (C/T8). Burmester et al, Queensland Schools: A Heritage Conservation Study, a report for the Department of Education, p.40Telegraph (Brisbane), 13 April 1917, p.2 (Gatton building to be officially opened)Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette, 20 October 1917, p.2 (Gympie building opened). To help ensure consistency and economy, the Queensland Government developed standard plans for its school buildings. These were continually refined in response to changing needs and educational philosophy.Burmester et al, Queensland Schools: A Heritage Conservation Study, pp.84, 120-1.
Construction of the new Gympie State High School occurred between August 1916 and May 1917. Classes commenced on 3 September 1917 and the highset timber school building was officially opened on 19 October 1917, during Gympie's 50th anniversary celebrations, with an enrolment of 146 students. A separate carpenter's workshop and store (the manual training building) was located south of the school building.Under Secretary and Government Architect [Alfred Barton Brady] to T Dunstan, MLA, 15 October 1917, in Queensland State Archives Series 17828 'Batch Files - "A" Series - High Schools and Technical Colleges', Item 128045, "Gympie State High School and Technical College" [1916-1970]'New high schools, at Gatton and Gympie', Telegraph, 19 April 1917, p.2'Gympie High School, the official opening, description of the building', Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette, 20 October 1917, p.2Eshuys, Gympie State High School: an historical analysis, 1912-1982, pp.19, 31Gympie State High School 1912-2012, pp.29-30Report of the Department of Public Works for the year ended 30th June 1917. The manual training building can be seen behind the main building in a photograph taken in 1917 ('Gympie High School', Telegraph, 23 June 1917, p.13).
Gympie State High School's facilities were improved in the 1920s and 1930s. A caretaker's residence was built in 1920;Inspector of Works, 18 November 1920, in QSA Item 128045, "Gympie State High School and Technical College" [1916-1970]. and the first school oval (in 2018 named Hangar Oval), was constructed through the fundraising efforts of the school's Sports Committee, and officially opened in 1931.'Gympie', Brisbane Courier, 10 August 1928, p.12'Gympie', Brisbane Courier, 11 February 1929, p.3Letters during 1930, in QSA Item 128045, "Gympie State High School and Technical College" [1916-1970] (Thomas Hangar, the school's principal from 1916-40, was also the Honorary Secretary of the Sports Committee)Gympie State High School 1912-2012, pp.4, 31.
The grounds of purpose-built high schools were larger than those of primary schools, being over , and provided ample room for sports facilities. For many years school committees had to raise funds for construction of such facilities, which included tennis courts, gymnasiums and swimming pools. Teachers in the 1950s requested that high schools include gymnasiums, but these did not become a standard design or inclusion until after the 1960s.Burmester et al, Queensland Schools: A Heritage Conservation Study, p.79. Numerous newspaper articles of the late 19th and early 20th century refer to fundraising efforts by schools to provide gymnasiums, swimming pools or tennis courts, amongst other facilities.
Gymnasiums were regarded in the late 19th century by Victorian society as a way to maintain physical fitness and beauty, and pursue self-improvement (and Muscular Christianity) in the industrial age. Typical gymnasium equipment included ropes and rings; parallel bars, horizontal and sloping ladders, wooden horses and mats. Gymnasiums were provided at Queensland state schools, where the community could afford them, from the late 1870s.'The importance of athletic exercises'. Darling Downs Gazette and General Advertiser, 25 August 1859, p.4'Muscular exercises', Queenslander, 17 February 1866, p.11. Tenders were invited, or fundraising was in progress for, gymnasiums at Sherwood State School (1878, fundraising), Fortitude Valley (1879), Lytton (1886), North Bundaberg (1886), Ingham (1888, tender for a playshed and a gymnasium), "South East" Bundaberg (1891), the Central State School for Girls in Brisbane (1899, for a playshed and a gymnasium), Cordalba (1910, a playshed combined with a gymnasium), and Goondiwindi (1917, fundraising). Some schools had gymnasium equipment in their playsheds.DPW plan, barcode 16050826, "Playshed at State School Sherwood", October 1915).
A gymnasium was built at Gympie State High School in the 1930s. In 1933 the school's Sports Committee planned to erect, with their own funds, a "partially enclosed sports shelter shed", that could be used as a gymnasium and for social functions (with a preliminary estimated cost of £260), and the Committee requested design assistance and building supervision from the Department of Public Works. This was approved in July 1933 and the gymnasium was built sometime before its gymnastic equipment was installed in 1937. The gymnasium (in 2018 named Block K) accommodated Intermediate classes during the school day - Gympie having become a High and Intermediate School in 1933 - and was used as a gymnasium during lunchtime and after school.Letters from Thomas Hangar, Honorary Secretary of the Sports Committee, and the DPW's Architectural and Estimating Branch, March–July 1933, in QSA, Series 17828 'Batch Files - "A" Series - High Schools and Technical Colleges', Item 128046, "Gympie State High School and Technical College" [1933-1959]Gympie State High School 1912-2012, p.31 (gymnasium equipment installed 1937). The gymnasium, labelled "pavilion", is shown to the south of the manual training building in a November 1938 plan of the school grounds, in QSA Series 17828 'Batch Files - "A" Series - High Schools and Technical Colleges', Item 128048, "Gympie State High School and Technical College" [1942-1944]. Different letters in 1933 refer to dimensions of 60ft by 40ft (18.3m by 12.2m), and 54ft by 36ft (16.5m by 11m). However, in 1952, it was noted the existing building was 64ft by 36ft (19.5m by 11m) (Report by VE Stewart, Supervisor, DPW, in QSA Item 128045, "Gympie State High School and Technical College" [1916-1970]).