July 23, 2009: When the Rembrandt school was torn down in 2002, the gym was left and the former edge sided up. An identification stone from the building was preserved.
An alumnus of the former Rembrandt High School has created a comprehensive history of school reorganization around the tiny town in Buena Vista County. There’s an article about it in the Storm Lake Pilot Tribune (which is how I found it). The link is 404’d but if you go to the site you can find the PDF — heads up, it’s a Google Document.
The history contains all the major news articles about the area’s history from country schools to the present, including the carving up of the nearby Highview district in the late 1950s, a failed attempt to merge with Albert City-Truesdale, the lengthy timeline and legal thicket that preceded creation of the Sioux Rapids-Rembrandt district, a failed tripleheader merger that pulled Clay Central in, and AC-T’s sending its 7-12 students to Sioux Central through 2025.
This heavily researched document contains basically everything I want to know and look for on a school district. I wish there were more like it.
The history contradicts the Sioux Rapids school district’s website on the last year for South Clay High School; South Clay began sending 7-12 students to other schools in 1993, not 1998. The earlier year is also backed up by a Spencer Daily Reporter article from 2009. My timeline has been adjusted accordingly.
There is also a PDF about historic roads and construction in the Storm Lake-Sioux Rapids corridor, including the history of IA 351. Rather than direct-linking to the very large file, I’ll point to the page it can be found.