The school was constructed in the 1870's and opened in 1875. It was a fine example of victorian architecture with its tall windows and beautiful parquet flooring.
The Street layout from 1875 was different in many ways to today. Duke Street ran parallel to Evelyn Street and the original name of the school I believe was Duke Street school. Later Duke Street became Alverton Street and the school changed its name also to Alverton Street school in 1919, before finally settling on John Evelyn School in 1930. The flagstone ( see left ) clearly shows Alverton Street school as an earlier name, this was located on the west face of the building and can be seen in the picture of the school taken from Evelyn Street.
The whole area to the south and east of the school has changed dramatically. Hundreds of houses existed to the south of the school and one can only presume these were similar in construction to the houses in Rolt Street, Etta Street and Gosterwood Street. These houses were demolished in the 1960's to make way for the Evelyn Estate and Dorking Road is gone altogether. From the ordnance survey maps ( see pictures ) it can be seen that even the eventual playground of the school originally contained housing.
In 1972 the Infants School was built next to John Evelyn School. In the process Alverton Street was cut in two, now joining only Etta Street and Gosterwood Street on one side of the infants and becoming an extension of Rolt Street on the other side. The Infants School was named John Evelyn Infants School, possibly to take infants away from the main school, but this is not certain yet. The head of this school Mrs Ann Rosen was there from its opening, later to become Head of the Primary School - replacing Mrs Broad in 1978.
The Primary and Infants school combined into one, under one head teacher - Mrs Rosen. From Autumn 1978 the top floor of the old building ceased to be used by the school. By the start of the 1979 term both the first and second floor were no longer used and were reallocated to South East London College as an Annexe. The ground floor was still used along with the substantial playground. At the start of term 1980 the school relinquished the ground floor as well to the North Lewisham Secondary Schools support unit while the top two floors saw the Ravensbourne Adult Education Institute move in. Again the playground continued to be used by the primary & infants which was now entirely housed in the new building.
With pupil numbers continuing to dwindle the Infants building finally closed in 1986 as a primary & infants school and saw the end of Mrs Rosen's reign as head teacher. The Infants school then became Clyde Street Day Care School for very young nursery age children and effectively both buildings ceased to teach Primary education any more. It is unclear where the pupils went after this and who exactly continued to use the old building but it may have continued as an Adult Education centre for a few years afterwards.
John Evelyn School was finally Demolished in 1994? as part of the Evelyn Estate revamp. In its place we have nothing but a few unremarkable houses. I'm sure many people feel disgusted that so much history is lost for nothing. Sure the school will now gradually fade from memory over time, but it's worth trying to keep it 'alive' for as long as possible with a little effort from those who spent time there.
If you have memories of the history of John Evelyn Primary School please use the form on the main page and send them in to the site.
