It was for a time the first school in the village, before being taken over by the then new mining company of Kiveton Park. Hence the name of our building The Old Colliery Offices. In return for taking over the building the mining company agreed to build a new school for the village which is still there today on Station road, now the youth centre.
We are not exactly sure when the Colliery Offices were built.
Rotherham Archives lists the building as being built in 1869.
The following is an excerpt from Michael Sampsons book Kiveton Park Colliery 1866 – 1994
The Colliery main offices were built in 1872 and as there was no school in the district were also used as the local school rooms. The original school bell, dated 1872, was still attached until it was removed to Wales High School for display. On the occasion of the centenary of Kiveton Park Infants School gives a date of 11th January 1869 which could be the date of offices and 1872 the date of the village school. The school was built by the KPCC and the teachers were paid by them until the Education Act of 1911.
The following is taken from the National Heritage List for England.
Office buildings. Dated 1875. For the Kiveton Park Coal Company. Red brick, Welsh slate roof. Irregular U –shaped plan, Gothic-styled details. Main elevation facing the colliery. rregular U-shaped plan, Gothic-styled details. Main elevation facing colliery: 2:3:2:2 bays, the 2 bays on left as a tall gabled crosswing of 2 storeys, the bays on right of 1 storey with attic. Gabled bays on left: chamfered brick plinth, moulded sill band. Buttress between sashes with traceried,round-arched heads with pointed hoodmoulds; corbelling beneath a v-shaped 1st- floor bay window with 2 square-headed sashes beneath a 1/2-pyramidal roof. Asymmetric gable with square clock turret rising on right and having glass- faced clocks on a drum beneath a pyramidal roof with louvred gablets. Offset lateral stack to rear of turret with rebuilt shaft. Lower bays on right, set back: castiron air bricks in plinth with lettering ‘Built in the year/of THE LORD 1875’. Stone sill band linkssashes; buttresses flank gabled central bays which have traceried round-arched heads with hoodmoulds and gable oculus with crossed glazing bars and decorative brick surround. Roof dormers above outer bays; octagonal central lantern with swept roof; original offset end stack on right with corbelled top. Right return: 2-bay end gable on left has inserted pay hatches flanking a 1st-World War memorial in the form of a segmentally- pedimented Ionic aedicule. Door on right with lower link block beyond having front addition and tall stack set to rear. Taller, single-bay block on right has arched-headed 4-pane sash beneath decorative brickwork and 2 slit windows in gable, original ridge stack. Left return: canted, 2-storey, bay-window projection under its own hipped roof. The sinking ofthe colliery began in 1866; these well-detailed and well-preserved offices of 1875 are an unusual survival in the South Yorkshire coalfield.
The Development Trust are caretakers of this uniquely architectural building which still to this day has a working clock tower, that can be heard throughout the village when it strikes the hour. After a long battle the Trust have now finally secured ownership of this building for the community. IT IS NOW A BUILDING OWNED BY US ALL.
We recently carried out a feasibility study with the help of a local architect.
Our future plans are to raise the capital to restore the building and its architectural features back to their former glory and at the same time improve the facilities enabling us to provide a wider range of services for the community.
