A local history society has vowed to carry on campaigning to save a former school building despite attempts to safeguard it from demolition being turned down.

The Baildon Historical Society applied for listed building status for the former Woodbottom School, Otley Road, Baildon, after Bradford Council put the site up for sale in November last year.

But the Department for Culture, Media and Sport refused the request on the grounds that the building has been altered too much since it was built in 1877.

A spokesman from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport said the school is not well preserved and as an example of one of the very earliest Bradford Board schools it has been "seriously compromised."

And, he added, the later additions are not of any architectural interest.

He said: "Many early Board schools have been listed in England but only if they survive unaltered.

"This locally interesting example of a Board school has been too altered to qualify for inclusion on the list."

Secretary for the society, Stewart Main, said: "The rejection centres around the fact that the school has been altered over time but no visit was made to the site.

"It is upsetting that the decision takes no account of local feeling for the school and the building. The application had a lot of support in Baildon."

But Mr Main said the group now hopes the building will be maintained and used either as offices or flats.

He added: "The history society wants the building saved as it reflects the past in an area which has changed."

Mr Main said the school was one of the first to be built in Bradford after the passing of the Education Act of 1870, which introduced free state education to England.

Former Bradford MP William Forster was instrumental in getting the Bill through Parliament in his role as vice-president of the committee of council on education.

After the school closed in 1980, the building was used by Bradford Council's child guidance and school psychological services before they moved out last July.