IN CROSSBOROUGH Hill, Eastrop stands a school building which most local people would remember from the 60s as the Girls’ High School.

But the history of this school goes back much before that. In fact, the founding of this school was in 1908 in Brook House which was in long gone Brook Street, situated where Churchill Way is now.

The Brook House building consisted of four rooms on the ground floor which were used for classrooms and the headmistress, Miss Hinton’s, sitting room.

More classrooms were on the first floor and rooms used as laboratories in the attic.

The Iron Room was in the garden which was used as a gym and an assembly room for the girls, about fifty in number.

In 1912 a new school was built amongst the open fields of Crossborough Hill, backing onto Basingstoke Common.

Accommodating 120 pupils, the number was quickly reached and by 1968 the numbers topped six hundred.

Miss Hinton resigned as headmistress in 1915 and the role was filled by Miss Costello who remained in the post for twenty years.

During her tenure temporary buildings were erected which became known as The Black Huts, and upon her retirement in 1935 the former pupils and staff presented the school with a portrait of Miss Costello which still hangs in the school today.

In 1959 the house next door, owned by Mr and Mrs Weston, was purchased by the County Council and amalgamated into the school as classrooms for the Upper Sixth forms, becoming known as Weston House.

As pupil numbers increased, space was once more a problem with pupils having to travel to The Shrubbery Girl’s and Queen Mary’s school, Basingstoke Technical College and Sarum Hill Domestic Science Centre, for laboratory and specialist classes, which necessitated a complicated programme of buses and taxis to transport the pupils.

Obviously this could not continue and so in 1961 a large building project was initiated at the school adding a laboratory, assembly hall complete with stage, a kitchen, foyer and a gymnasium with changing rooms.

Four acres of common land were utilised for playing fields.

The following year, due to the generosity of parents, governors and friends, along with funds raised by the school, a swimming pool was added.

In 1972 the school was opened up to accept boys and renamed The Harriet Costello School, and in 2002 the school gained technology status; again renamed to The Costello Technology College but, on the December 5, the following year, a fire destroyed twelve classrooms in the technology and mathematics blocks.

Following rebuild the new blocks were opened in 2007 in time for Centenary celebrations in 2008.

The school was converted to an academy in 2012 with a change in uniform and another renaming to today’s Costello School which is now headed by headmaster Mr Jull.