🏛️ Lieu
Patrimoine & Culture
L’ancienne école ménagère de Montigny-le-Roi
📍 Val-de-Meuse, Haute-Marne
· 52140 Val-de-Meuse
À propos
In 1902, Emile Cassez (1871-1948), general councillor for the canton of Châteauvillain, founded France's first winter agricultural school (running from All Saints' Day to the end of February), attached to the Diderot college in Lan-gres. In 1907, he conceived the idea of a "girls' home-school". The following year, taking advantage of subsidies obtained by Haut-Marnais senator Léon Mougeot, he drew up regulations for municipalities wishing to host this new course of study in premises provided with lighting and heating. The first schools opened in Châteauvillain and Montier-en-Der in 1908, and a third in the Château de Bourbonne-les-Bains the following year. Further schools were opened in Nogent, Wassy, Saint-Dizier, Langres and Poissons.
At the end of 1912, the commune of Montigny agreed to open a school in the buildings of a hospital created in 1903 on the Place Charles Cornevin, premises that were unoccupied due to a lack of operating funds. However, the declaration of war in the summer of 1914 led to the closure of all these schools, including Montigny's. They were replaced each winter from 1915 to 1920 by a single session in Chaumont for around ten pupils.
On June 22, 1920, the prefect asked the mayor of Montigny to accept the school on a permanent basis, but the mayor did not want to bear the operating costs. He wished to sell the former hospital to the Conseil Général, which would gradually reimburse the substantial Paris Mutuel subsidy from 1933 onwards, originally granted on condition that it be used solely as a hospital.
At the time, the training program included a number of subjects, aimed exclusively at young girls from rural backgrounds: hygiene, horticulture, dairy farming, poultry farming, sewing, cutting, mending, laundry, ironing, caring for the wounded and preparing menus.
In 1940, with the German army occupying the school and stealing the heating pipes and radiators, the school slowed down. After the war, however, the premises were refurbished and by 1950 the school was able to accommodate up to 45 pupils. By 1956, however, enrolment was declining, even though the school was modernizing its facilities for a nine-month course. The following year, the school offered a two-year course, with plans for a third.
However, the opening of the Lycée Agricole in Chaumont in 1967, at the instigation of Edgar Pisani, and the Collège Agricole in Fayl-Billot two years later, sounded the death knell for the Montigny household school, which closed its doors for good in 1973. The buildings are currently owned by the social landlord AMARIS.
At the end of 1912, the commune of Montigny agreed to open a school in the buildings of a hospital created in 1903 on the Place Charles Cornevin, premises that were unoccupied due to a lack of operating funds. However, the declaration of war in the summer of 1914 led to the closure of all these schools, including Montigny's. They were replaced each winter from 1915 to 1920 by a single session in Chaumont for around ten pupils.
On June 22, 1920, the prefect asked the mayor of Montigny to accept the school on a permanent basis, but the mayor did not want to bear the operating costs. He wished to sell the former hospital to the Conseil Général, which would gradually reimburse the substantial Paris Mutuel subsidy from 1933 onwards, originally granted on condition that it be used solely as a hospital.
At the time, the training program included a number of subjects, aimed exclusively at young girls from rural backgrounds: hygiene, horticulture, dairy farming, poultry farming, sewing, cutting, mending, laundry, ironing, caring for the wounded and preparing menus.
In 1940, with the German army occupying the school and stealing the heating pipes and radiators, the school slowed down. After the war, however, the premises were refurbished and by 1950 the school was able to accommodate up to 45 pupils. By 1956, however, enrolment was declining, even though the school was modernizing its facilities for a nine-month course. The following year, the school offered a two-year course, with plans for a third.
However, the opening of the Lycée Agricole in Chaumont in 1967, at the instigation of Edgar Pisani, and the Collège Agricole in Fayl-Billot two years later, sounded the death knell for the Montigny household school, which closed its doors for good in 1973. The buildings are currently owned by the social landlord AMARIS.
