Former Troutsdale School House

School, circa 1870-75. Brick in English garden wall bond with the lower part in coursed stonework making up the fall in the ground surface, stone slate roof laid to diminishing courses with a simple stone ridge.

EXTERIOR: the north-west side, facing the road, has a triple light window to the left of a small open porch with a lancet headed doorway and a flat roof. The south-east side has a centrally placed triple light window. The northern gable has a central, stepped chimney stack flanked by single windows. The southern gable has a large, high window with jambs forming a 2 centred arch, and a stone cill. At the time of the survey the window retained glazing bars but little glazing. The gable is topped by a plinth supporting an ornate iron cross.

All of the windows, apart from the south gable window, are similarly detailed: Internally they have typical cambered arches of rubbed bricks, but externally the springs are replaced with finely dressed stones with simple deep chamfers that turn the window heads into shouldered arches. The chamfer to the stone springs is carried around the brick reveals and the bricks forming the jambs and cills are slightly broken forward from the wall face to imitate stone quoining. The windows in the side walls are in the form of 3 light mullioned windows. At the time of the survey, none of the inward opening timber casements to the windows survived complete.

Modern maps depict a small, later extension to the northern gable of the school house that no longer survives. This is believed to have been a timber toilet block that lacked plumbing, utilising chamber pots instead.

INTERIOR: the building is a single room with unplastered walls which retain evidence that they were originally white washed, with the lower portion coloured pale green up to a joint course at dado height that was marked in black. The room is open to the simple purlined roof structure. There is a floor board floor. At the time of the survey the fireplace was missing leaving the opening intact.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: the cylindrical stone pillar on the roadside to the north east of the school house is not thought to be associated with the school and is not included in the listing. It is one of at least three similar pillars within the valley that are thought to have been erected in the mid-C19 by the Whartons of Rock House Farm as bollards to guide farm vehicles.