In my 2014 Des Moines Register column about Manilla’s school, I invoked the evolution of a “typical” school complex in small-town Iowa. At the core, you have a two- or three-story symmetrical brick structure from 1913-28. An elementary wing comes in the late 1950s or early 1960s, along with a gymnasium if there’s not one from the ’30s. More ancillary rooms or areas — or a replacement of the original structure — are built in the 1980s and 1990s. To all this I would add one more round of additions and extensions from the 2010s, often built with Physical Plant and Equipment Levy money, that may have come at the cost of the smallest town in the district that still had a school losing it.
In a few places, there wasn’t an elementary wing attached to an existing site, but a whole new structure in the middle of nowhere. I have found at least three from the 1950s: Scott Township, southeast of Winterset; Pymosa, northwest of Atlantic; and East River, southeast of Clarinda.
The 10-room East River Township school opened in 1956 after a bond issue for $65,000. It was built on the site of “Thompson School No. 5,” at the intersection of blacktopped County Road N14 and 240th Street.
East River opposed area reorganization in early 1959, while in August the consolidated South Page school district opened for its first year. Clarinda followed in 1960. It was the Iowa Legislature’s K-12 decree that spelled the end of East River. In 1966, nearly all of the non-high-school district became part of Clarinda. Grades 3-6 of Garfield Elementary School went to East River.
In the winter of the 1967-68 school year, in preparation for opening a new junior high building, Clarinda decided to close East River and engage in a district-wide redistribution of students. About 60% of the student body, 900 kids in all, went to a different building in the fall of 1968 than they had in 1967.
In May 1970, the Clarinda school board voted to demolish the East River school building. Iowa law requires that rural land used for schools revert to the previous owner when the land no longer serves that purpose. The building was stripped and the steel was salvaged.
There was still $12,000 left in debt to be paid on a structure that did not last 15 years. Part of its concrete floor remains on a space now housing four grain bins.
Clarinda Herald-Journal stories used for this blog post:
- “Propose $65,000 East River Twp school,” 11/3/55
- “East River school board turns thumbs down on reorganization,” 3/12/59
- “South Page schools to open first year of merger Aug. 31st,” 8/6/59
- “East River area divided among three districts,” 7/18/66
- “Special areas expand in Clarinda’s schools,” 8/15/66
- “Board considers future for East River building,” 11/16/67
- “900 in new building on first day of school,” 8/26/68
- “East River school building to be demolished in summer,” 5/21/70