tuition to boys only; in 1894 the first girl was signed up – Maria Bes, daughter of the mathematics teacher. She passed her exams in 1899 and went to Delft to study engineering. She became one of the first female engineers in the Netherlands. In the 1920s electric light and central heating were installed in the building and the 50-year-old desks were replaced. In 1934 the school moved, for lack of space, to a new location at the Ringbaan Oost in Tilburg. City hall Alteration of 1934–1936 In 1934 the palace was 85 years old and for about 70 years it had functioned as a school. The building was totally decrepit and had to get renovated and altered. In 1931, when the building was still used as a school, the city council already considered using the palace as the new city hall. , an architect from Nijmegen, was commissioned by Tilburg city council to alter the decrepit school into a representative Palace-Council House. Leeuw tried to restore the original character of the building. He brought back the long lost merlons and made the building more gothic than it ever was by replacing the square windows with lancet windows. The thin and slender towers near the entrance with the pinnacles on top were replaced by a middle risalit, with an entrance made in art deco style. On 1 August 1936 mayor reopened the reconstructed Palace-City Hall. Interior The alteration of the Palace-City Hall also changed its interior. The basement got a separate entrance at the east side. The piano nobile was completely rearranged. In the northern wing two wedding rooms were built. In the southern wing the mayor’s office was constructed. At the east side, above the entrance to the basement, a half circular balcony was built. With a similar half circular extension, a new and elegant stairwell was made, which contains a broad marble spiral staircase. The circular extension have stained glass windows made by stained-glass artist Joep Nicolas. The scenes in the stained glass express the virtues of a number of administrators and figures from classical antiquity. On the second floor three halls were built. One big wedding room in the north wing and a big hall for the city council itself, complete with a press gallery in the southern wing. A smaller room between the wedding room and the council chambers was made for the aldermen. On the