At the end of the 19th century, associations for the protection of animal rights already existed, but there was little mention of the protection of children. This changed in 1892 when a young gendarme, Lieutenant Loppens, organized a campaign and founded the 'Association for the Protection of Child Martyrs'.

Jules Lejeune, the then Minister of Justice, was inspired by the young lieutenant's actions and launched the first ministerial circular concerning the protection of children that very same year. It is he who would also be instrumental in the creation of the first law on the protection of young people, which was passed twenty years later in 1912.

For 'undisciplined' children who could not be placed elsewhere, the Society for the Protection of Child Martyrs opened this farm school. 'Ferme école Jules Lejeune', opened in 1912 and was named in memory of its protector. The goal was to establish a farm school for 40 boys and a domestic science school for the same number of girls within these buildings.

However, due to the rapid increase in the number of children, the facilities soon proved to be insufficient. The domestic science school was also not established until 1913. In 1914, war broke out. Most of the children were evacuated, but in 1915, following the intervention of the Child Protection Agency, the institution was reopened.

In 1920, the domestic science school was transferred to a neighboring municipality. From then on, the agricultural school was used exclusively to help and educate orphaned or abandoned boys. The children received training in horticulture and agriculture there, two subjects that were very well known and taught extensively in this city. In 1957, the state purchased the site to turn it into an agricultural physics and chemistry station, which fell under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Agriculture.

The Station de Chimie et de Physique Agricole (SCPA) was part of the independent research institution known as the Faculté Universitaire des Sciences Agronomiques de Gembloux. Since 2009, this institution has been directly affiliated with the University of Liège. The research station itself consisted primarily of offices and chemical, microbiological, and even nuclear laboratories. They were all intended for agricultural research and for studying the environmental factors influencing agriculture.