Thomas PricePrint Page

Price Memorial Hall commemorates Thomas Price, Premier of South Australia.  A plaque was unveiled in 1911 at the school which was situated in Grote Street. The school was moved to new premises in West Terrace in 1976.

Thomas Price (19 January 1852 – 31 May 1909) was a stonecutter, teacher, lay preacher, businessman, stonemason, clerk-of-works, union secretary, union president and politician. He served as Labor's first Premier of South Australia from 1905 to 1909, and was the first leader of a stable Labor government in Australia.

He introduced many social reforms including free state secondary schools, the formation of wages boards and a minimum wage, establishing the Municipal Tramways Trust through nationalisation, the costly administration of the Northern Territory was surrendered to the Federal government, and reform (though limited) of the upper house.

Adelaide High School was founded in 1908 as the result of several years of planning by the Honourable Thomas Price, Premier and Minister of Education. During 1908 the Pupil Teacher School, the Grote Street Model School and the Advanced School for Girls amalgamated to form the Adelaide Continuation School in Grote Street under the leadership of Mr. W. J. Adey. In July the name was changed to Adelaide High School and thus began the South Australian High School System and "the first free High School in the Commonwealth."

An impressive ceremony took place at the Adelaide High School, Grote-street, at noon on Thursday, on the occasion of the unveiling of a handsome tablet in the Price Hall, in memory of the late Mr. Price. The tablet, which was carved out of blackwood at the Adelaide School of Art, bears the following inscription in copper repousse work:-"In memoriam. The Hon. Thomas Price, M.P., Minister of Education. S.A., 1905-1909. Erected by the students and staff, Adelaide High School, 1911."
The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 15 December 1911.

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