Title: The Beverly Trade School Records

Creator: Beverly (MA) Public Schools

Date: 1909 - 1995

Size: 3 linear feet

Language: English

Repository: Beverly High School Library (Beverly, MA)

Extent: The collection pertains to the establishment and operation of the Beverly trade schools reflecting several changes to names of the schools; also curriculum variations. Included are the trustee minutes, annual reports, curriculum journals, correspondence, photographs and ephemera including programs and calendars.

Historical statement: The Beverly Independent Industrial School opened in 1909 for the purpose of providing occupational training to selected students not attending the Town High School. Steps to establish a liaison with the United Shoe Machine Corporation were started in 1909. Housed in the noted industrial concrete building designed by Ernest L. Ransome, the Company needed skilled workers for making its product-the shoe lasts or wooden form over which shoes were constructed. Complying with the state mandate of the Douglas Commission Report of 1906 (Mass. General Laws, Ch 505), the Beverly Cooperative Trade School (1925 - ca 1980) was founded with the leadership of George Hervey Vose, a machinist, teacher and director of machine shops, and Robert Orange Small, superintendent of schools. Curricula included auto repair, cabinetmaking, printing, pattern making and machine shop. In 1968 the Claude H. Patten Trade School opened at the new Beverly High School but was changed in 1970 to the Claude H. Patten (noted teacher and trade school director between 1926 - 1962) Vocational High School, staying in operation until 1995.

Subjects:
Beverly (MA) - History
Trade schools
Industrial schools
Shoe Industry - Massachusetts
Douglas Commission Report - Massachusetts

Named persons: Patten, Claude H.
Ransome, Ernest L.
Small, Robert Orange
Vose, George Hervey

Named Corporation: United Shoe Machine Corporation (Beverly, MA).

Geographic: Massachusetts - Industry - Shoe
Massachusetts - Education - Industrial

Genre: Annual reports
Genre: Minutes
Genre: Journals - Curriculum
Genre: Photographs

Organization of collection: By document type and chronological.

Finding aid: Database summary of documents, subjects and location.

Survey completed: May 2002

Surveyed by: Margaret M. Cornell, Archivist, by a grant from the Northeast Massachusetts Regional Library System (NMRLS).