On 6 October 1928 The Northampton Independent carried an article about the new Boot School which was due to be opened the following day by Lord Eustace Percy:

To the far sighted generosity of the Rushden and District Boot and Shoe Manufacturers Association much of the credit is due for the foundation of the third County School of Boot and Shoe manufacture, which Lord Eustace Percy, President of the Board of Education, will open tomorrow (Saturday). Classes in the principles of boot and shoe manufacture have been established by the county education authority since 1892 but until comparatively recently these classes have been held in Elementary Schools, in the absence of more suitable quarters, with the effect that the scope of these excellent institutions has been greatly restricted. A proposal to establish a central instructional factory at Wellingborough was set aside on the outbreak of war and in 1920 the Northamptonshire Education Committee adopted an even better scheme to provide three small instructional factories at Kettering, Rushden and Wellingborough.

In 1921 the Wellingborough centre commenced activities in the premises of the old Commercial School which had been adapted and equipped at a cost of £1,512, and in response to a generous offer of £1,300 from the Kettering and District Boot and Shoe Manufacturers Association and Mr C.W.Clarke, the County Education Committee founded the second instructional factory at Kettering in 1924. A similar offer of £1,250 was made in 1927 by the Rushden and District Manufacturers and a small factory in Victoria Road was immediately purchased for £2,850.

The adaptation and equipment of the building has been carried out at the cost of a further £2,000. Lord Eustace Percy will be met by a scene of gratifying activity when he visits the school on Saturday, for although not officially “opened,” the miniature factory has already commenced operations with 150 students and the prospect of further large enrolments from the surrounding villages. The contents of the building are a model of efficient compactness, including a lecture room, a room for pattern cutting and clicking, a closing room and another for bottom stock cutting and preparation and hand lasting and welting. In the large machinery hall instruction is given in all the mechanical processes with a complete and up to date machinery lent by the British United Shoe Machinery Company Ltd and the Singer Sewing Machine Company Ltd.

The scheme of work provides systematic courses of instruction for all who are entering or who have already entered the boot and shoe industry, and the work, which is divided into junior, senior, advanced and honours courses, touches every aspect of boot and shoe production, ranging from the elementary processes to the study of design, pedal anatomy and economics.

Addressing a teachers conference a few days ago, Lord Eustace Percy said that today educationists were focusing their attention on a system that would provide facilities for graduated courses of education from childhood to adolescence, and which should, thereafter, provide ample opportunities for the student to continue his study at manhood along one of two common paths.