St Monica's High School Administration Building
| St Monica's High School Administration Building | |
|---|---|
St Monica's High School Administration Building, 1996
|
|
| Location | Abbott Street, Cairns, Cairns Region, Queensland, Australia |
| Coordinates | 16°55′03″S 145°46′23″E / 16.9176°S 145.7731°ECoordinates: 16°55′03″S 145°46′23″E / 16.9176°S 145.7731°E |
| Design period | 1939 - 1945 (World War II) |
| Built | 1941 |
| Architect | Vibert McKirdy Brown |
| Architectural style(s) | Modernism |
| Official name: St Monica's High School Administration Building, St Monica's High School | |
| Type | state heritage (built) |
| Designated | 1 July 1997 |
| Reference no. | 601748 |
| Significant period | 1940s (historical) 1940s (fabric) 1941 ongoing (social) |
| Significant components | office/administration building, fencing |
| Builders | VW Doyle |
 Location of St Monica's High School Administration Building in Queensland
Location of St Monica's High School Administration Building in Queensland
|
|
St Monica's High School Administration Building is a heritage-listed private school at Abbott Street, Cairns, Cairns Region, Queensland, Australia. It was designed by Vibert McKirdy Brown and built in 1941 by VW Doyle. It is also known as St Monica's High School. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 1 July 1997.
St Monica's High School (now the Administration Building) was erected in 1941 for the Sisters of Mercy in Cairns. The two-storeyed re-inforced concrete building was designed by South African-born Cairns architect Vibert McKirdy Brown, and was constructed by contractor VW Doyle.
Nearly 50 years earlier, during the height of the 1890s depression, the Vicar Apostolic of Cooktown, Bishop John Hutchinson, had encouraged the Sisters of Mercy at Cooktown to take over St Monica's School in Cairns (established 1890 with lay staff), where the number of pupils had fallen dramatically from 70 to 19. Three of the sisters from St Mary's at Cooktown moved to Cairns in October 1892 and were successful in encouraging Catholic families to return their children to St Monica's School. By 1894 enrolment had risen to 80, and was well over 100 by the turn-of-the-century. They offered a full primary school curriculum and extra-curricula classes in French, drawing, painting, needlework, and music (vocal and instrumental) to older girls.
In the 1930s the work of the convent school expanded to educate girls to secondary school level. Despite a new St Monica's Church-School having been constructed after Cyclone Willis in February 1927, St Monica's secondary school was conducted under difficult conditions. In what was predominantly a primary school, there were no purpose-designed classrooms for secondary subjects.
Cairns boomed during the interwar period, and by the end of the 1930s the need for a purpose-designed high school building at St Monica's had become urgent. Cairns architect VM Brown was commissioned to design a high school, to be erected on land in Abbott Street which the Sisters had acquired in 1922, adjacent to St Joseph's Convent. A former boarding house, which the Sisters had used as a music school, was demolished prior to construction of the new building.
...
Wikipedia