MY good friend Ron Shuard has produced a precise historical and pictorial record of a Worcester girls' school which was a key feature of the city's educational scene for much of the 20th Century.

Over the years, Ron, who lives in Bilford Road, has amassed a considerable collection of vintage picture postcards of old Worcester and of local events, schools, shops, factories and colourful characters.

He has become something of a local historian too, in collecting documentation and records relating to the city's past.

It therefore raised his eyebrows a few months ago when he heard claims that a girls' "grammar" school had existed at the Victoria Institute in the first half of the 20th Century.

He was among readers who wrote to the Evening News during a controversy that developed into something of a "what's in a name" debate.

The Girls' Secondary School at the Victoria Institute was indeed a forerunner of the Worcester Grammar School for Girls but, according to Ron, it is entirely wrong of some people to describe it as having been the girls' "grammar" school.

As a bit of scene-setting, the Victoria Institute was officially opened in October 1896. It was built in two substantial sections - the front half in Foregate Street housing the public library and city museum, and the rear half in Sansome Walk accommodating the School of Art and the Worcester Municipal Technical School.

The latter, says Ron, incorporated a mixed section for advanced scholars but this was disbanded in 1908, the boys going to the Royal Grammar School and the girls remaining at a newly-created Secondary School for Girls.

"There were 80 pupils present on the first day together with the headmistress, Miss Steel and a teaching staff of four," says Ron.

"For two years, however, there were no proper school premises for the girls. They had to use the lecture theatre and odd classrooms, mainly in the basements where engineering and carpentry students worked in the evenings.

"It was a most unsatisfactory situation and led to plans being drawn up for an extension to the Victoria Institute to provide the girls with a separate purpose-built school of their own, with its entrance off Taylors Lane.

"The foundation stone was laid by Mrs Wheeley Lea on October 28, 1909, and the girls and staff moved in on November 2, 1910. The school had an assembly hall and bright new classrooms, a far cry from the dreary basement rooms the pupils and teachers had previously had to endure. Every girl also had her own desk.

"The school gradually became very successful, so much so that the authorities even considered putting up temporary classrooms in the playground, but this was deemed to be totally impractical.

"Instead, in 1920 the city council, as education authority, bought Thames House, a substantial former residence standing on the west side of Barbourne Road, opposite St George's Square. The Upper Sixth girls were initially moved there as an annexe to the Secondary School for Girls at the Victoria Institute.

"The school in general offered a high standard of education and a lot of its students went on to university," stresses Ron.

Not surprisingly, however, pressure continued to mount on the limited accommodation at the Victoria Institute and, in the late 1920s, plans were drawn up for a new school on the Barbourne site.

The foundation stone was laid by Canon J.M Wilson on May 17, 1928, and Thames House was pulled down to make way for the new school. This occupied a three-acre site and was officially opened on May 23, 1929, by the Mayor of Worcester, Lt Col Albert Webb.

"However, it was not until the passing of the 1944 Education Act that steps were taken to re-name the school," emphasises Ron.

"The Act dealt with the classification of schools and ordered that a significant number around the country should be re-named within two years, including the one at Barbourne.

"Thus it was that the governors, meeting in June 1945, resolved that 'it would be desirable to re-name the school as the City of Worcester Grammar School for Girls.' It started under this new title from the autumn term of 1945. By then, the school had 476 pupils and, of 66 students who sat Cambridge Board examinations in 1945, 62 passed."

The next big upheaval did not come until September 1962, when the Girls' Grammar School was moved from Barbourne to Spetchley Road. It was subsequently absorbed into the Worcester Sixth Form College with the re-organisation of education in the city to a comprehensive system of high schools.

Ron underlines his contention over the name of the school featured in this article by pointing to the words still emblazoned over the surviving entrance in Taylor's Lane - "Secondary School Girls." He repeats that the school was not given the title "Grammar" until 1945.

* As a footnote, I have spotted public notices for several Worcester girls' school in the Berrow's Worcester Journal editions for exactly 100 years ago.

They included the Worcester Grammar School for Girls (which was at The Butts in a property at high level on the south side and which still survives today); the Worcester High School for Girls in the Upper Tything (its head a century ago was Miss Alice Ottley, and the school later took her name, which it retains today), and the St John's College for Girls (which stood on the site now occupied by Our Lady Queen of Peace RC Primary School at the corner of St John's and Bransford Road).