Mrs Emily Ward

Foundress of Norland College

Mrs Emily Jane Ward (1850 - 1930), the foundress of the Norland College, was born in Derby on 13 August 1850, in a house built by her grandfather. Early in her life, her parents moved to Lavender Hill, Battersea and later to Falcon Road by Clapham Junction. Her early education was provided by a governess and she was later educated at a boarding school in central London. Little is known of her childhood but in her early twenties Emily Lord became an infant teacher at Notting Hill High School and was attracted to the progressive theories of Friedrich Froebel. She based most of her teaching and later work on the philosophy of this eminent German educationalist.

Emily Lord's ambition was to open her own school and this was achieved in 1876 when Norland Place School began, specifically to educate children aged 3 - 8 years. In 1874 Miss Lord was enrolled as a member of the Froebel Society of Great Britain. In 1879, after spending the summer in Geneva under one of Froebel's most prominent disciples, Madame du Portugal, she implemented this teaching within her own classrooms. The morning was dedicated to formal class lessons and the afternoons were spent in creative work, exercise and nature study. Miss Lord was described by Madame Michael and Mr Kestley Moore as a "bright young form-mistress who took a profound interest in the new teachings of Froebel". Norland Place School was awarded a first class commendation from the Froebel Society in 1879. By 1882 Emily Lord was a lecturer of the Froebel Society herself.

Her marriage to Walter Ward, a retired tea merchant in 1891 surprised many of her friends and colleagues. It was a match bound more by mutual respect than love. She did not bear any children but adopted three children from the Plumer family. One child died in 1900, Claude went into the Royal Navy from Osborne College and Adelaide was married from the Norland Institute in 1919. In 1926 Mrs Ward, by then a widow, celebrated the birth of her grandchild.

Soon Mrs Ward was questioning the fitness of nursemaids to rear the children in well to do families. She considered that it would be more appropriate for such children to be nurtured and tutored from birth by an educated woman versed in such principles as she herself had adopted. Mrs Ward strongly disagreed with the Victorian adage that children were miniature defective adults who should be seen and not heard and felt they should be nurtured by those who remembered what it felt like to be a child and who knew that children thrive on love and harmony.

It was her ambition to set up a suitable training course for gentle women as children's nurses. The idea of such an institute was ridiculed by many of Mrs Ward's colleagues and friends. Who would wish to train for such a menial task and who would want to employ an educated gentle woman to care for their children? However, when Mrs Ward moved out of her suite at the Norland Place School after her marriage to Walter Ward, the vacated rooms provided convenient accommodation for a fledgling Norland Institute. In association with one of her protégés, Isabel Sharman, the Norland Institute opened its doors for the first time on 25 September 1892 with five students. Six more arrived in the New Year - some of them older than Mrs Ward! - and by the summer of 1893 it was clear that Norland would need new premises. From its inception Norland never recognised the need to hurt children either physically nor emotionally, and Norland Nurses were forbidden to use any such form of punishment in the care and discipline of young children.

The Institute moved to Holland Park Terrace (nowadays Holland Park Avenue), then in 1900 moved to Pembridge Square. Mrs Ward was an affectionate, motherly Principal, she would kiss her students "goodnight" and trim all their uniform hat bonnets by hand. She was a committed Christian and it was she who adopted the College motto from 1 Corinthians 13 ‘Love Never Faileth'.

In 1919 Mr & Mrs Ward moved to Bognor, but her contact with Norland remained because she had built a Norland holiday home called Field House in the town and it seldom lacked bookings from both Norlanders in private employment and from the Norland Nurseries. In 1924 Mrs Ward erected a beautiful stained glass window, in memory of her late husband Walter in St John's Church, Bognor, which was demolished in 1971. The window was re-erected in the restored chapel of the Norland College in Denford House, Berkshire and rededicated with the Chapel in 1996. It was moved from Denford House in January 2003 and now has pride of place in the Conference Room at the college in Bath.

Under Mrs Ward's leadership the Norland Institute grew and flourished. It became the model on which all future nursery nurse training was based. Mrs Ward died peacefully on 15 June 1930 after a series of several strokes. A Norland Nurse remembers her: "She has always been so marvellously abreast with the times and wonderful in the way she always saw the difficulties of youth from youth's point of view, which is a great gift accorded only to a few."