{"id":13249,"date":"2021-08-27T10:00:55","date_gmt":"2021-08-27T15:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/?p=13249"},"modified":"2021-09-01T21:44:14","modified_gmt":"2021-09-02T02:44:14","slug":"school-timeline-mega-update-1980-84","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/2021\/08\/school-timeline-mega-update-1980-84\/","title":{"rendered":"School timeline mega-update: 1980-84"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Plus some auxiliary before-and-afters.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Oakville\u2019s school closed in 1980 (<em>Wapello Republican<\/em>, 4\/20\/95, via <a href=\"http:\/\/iagenweb.org\/louisa\/schools\/oakville-school_building.htm\">IAGenWeb<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>Rodman\u2019s school closed in 1980 (<em>West Bend Gazette<\/em>, 12\/13\/79)<\/li>\n<li>Bedford Elementary, which I think was the original high school, had a bat infestation in 1980 (<em>Clarinda Herald-Journal<\/em>,\u00a07\/17\/80). A bond issue passed 19 months later (<em>CHJ<\/em>\u00a02\/18\/82), with construction finished by 1983, meant the end of Conway\u2019s and Gravity\u2019s schools.<\/li>\n<li>Randall\u2019s school probably closed in 1980? <em>Webster City Daily Freeman-Journal<\/em> stories aren\u2019t quite conclusive, though residents approved sale of the property in a vote in April.<\/li>\n<li>Conesville\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<em>Columbus Gazette<\/em>, 2\/12\/81 and 9\/3\/81; <em>Washington Evening Journal<\/em>, 3\/19\/81)<\/li>\n<li>Dawson\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<em>Perry Daily Chief<\/em>, 2\/18\/81)\n<ul>\n<li>Perhaps ironically, seven years later, as the city of Dawson voted to tear down the school, Perry faced an elementary overcrowding problem. It would have rented a church basement but the Iowa Civil Liberties Union threatened to sue (<em>Perry Chief<\/em>, 6\/9\/88).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Fertile\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<em>Forest City Summit<\/em>, 7\/24\/80)\n<ul>\n<li>The <em>Summit\u2019s<\/em>\u00a0online archives appear to be photographs of pages rather than transferred from microfilm, which makes an <em>enormous<\/em> difference in seeing what a photograph in the paper actually was. Unfortunately, it makes the PDFs six times as big.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Vincent\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<em>Eagle Grove Eagle<\/em>, 2\/11\/81)\n<ul>\n<li>But not until after the Iowa Department of Public Instruction heard 6\u00bd hours of testimony, including grilling school board members, as the town fought to stop it (<em>EGE<\/em>, 5\/13\/81).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Hansell\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<em>EGE<\/em>, 1\/21\/81 and 2\/11\/81)<\/li>\n<li>Floyd\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<a href=\"https:\/\/educateiowa.gov\/sites\/files\/ed\/documents\/book2dec284.pdf\">IDOE archives<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>Gray\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<em>Atlantic News-Telegraph<\/em>, 6\/15\/79)<\/li>\n<li>Low Moor\u2019s school closed in 1981 (<em>DeWitt Observer<\/em>, 6\/24\/81)<\/li>\n<li>Melvin\u2019s school closed in 1981, immediately upon merging with Hartley (<em>Hartley Sentinel<\/em>, 8\/13\/81). However, 40% of the Melvin district ended up in what\u2019s now Sibley-Ocheyedan (<em>HS<\/em>, 7\/31\/80).<\/li>\n<li>Scott Township school southeast of Winterset closed in 1981 (<em>Winterset Madisonian<\/em>, 5\/13\/81). It was built in 1957 to replace K-8 township schools and became part of Winterset in 1960. This is one of my &#8220;discovered&#8221; buildings.<\/li>\n<li>West Delaware closed both Dundee\u2019s and Greeley\u2019s schools in 1981 (<em>Manchester Press<\/em>, 1\/16\/80)<\/li>\n<li>Anamosa&#8217;s West Elementary, its 1885 high school, was closed in 1982 and demolished immediately (<em>Anamosa Journal-Eureka<\/em>, 1\/20\/82 and 1\/26\/83)<\/li>\n<li>Blencoe\u2019s school closed in 1982 (<em>Onawa Democrat,<\/em> 8\/7\/86)<\/li>\n<li>Elkhart and Sheldahl both lost their schools when new North Polk elementaries in Polk City and Alleman opened in April 1982 (<em>Des Moines Tribune<\/em>, 4\/16\/82)<\/li>\n<li>Washington Township, at the intersection of F31 and P58 southwest of Minburn, was closed by the Central Dallas district in 1982 (<em>Perry Daily Chief<\/em>, 1\/14\/82)<\/li>\n<li>Wayland\u2019s original high school building, later WACO Middle School, closed in 1982 (<em>Winfield Beacon<\/em>, 5\/30\/82) and\u00a0was torn down in 1986 (<em>Winfield Beacon and Wayland News<\/em>, 6\/19\/86).<\/li>\n<li>Malcom\u2019s school <em>probably<\/em> closed in 1982 (<em>CRG<\/em>, 1\/16\/82), but there was a need for new space at Brooklyn to hold the third- and fourth-graders (<em>CRG<\/em>, 5\/11\/82) so it might have been 1983.<\/li>\n<li>I mention Meservey\u2019s 1983 closing in the opening of the page, but never put it on the list.<\/li>\n<li>Union Township, the latter partner in Remsen-Union, closed in 1983 (<em>Le Mars Daily Sentinel<\/em>, 5\/20\/83). It had served as the combined district&#8217;s high school in 1961-65 until a new building at Remsen was completed (<em>Remsen Bell-Enterprise<\/em>, 9\/2\/65).\n<ul>\n<li>The 1912 Remsen school had a cupola and &#8220;a gymnasium 28&#215;38 in size&#8221; (<em>RBE<\/em>, 5\/2\/12 and 5\/25\/61).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Superior\u2019s school, which closed in 1959 as its area was divided among Estherville, Spirit Lake, and Terril (<em>Spirit Lake Beacon,<\/em> 7\/16\/59), was demolished in the summer of 1983 (<em>SLB<\/em>, 6\/30\/83).<\/li>\n<li>Cardinal school district:\n<ul>\n<li>Added Batavia and Selma in 1960, just before the present building north of Eldon opened (<em>Ottumwa Courier<\/em>, 5\/31\/60)<\/li>\n<li>Closed Selma in 1974 (<em>OtmC<\/em>, 6\/21\/74)<\/li>\n<li>Closed Batavia and Eldon in 1984; \u201cbricks were falling off the Batavia structure\u201d (<em>OtmC<\/em>, 8\/2\/84)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Rock Falls\u2019 school closed in 1984 (<em>Shell Rock Valley Times<\/em>,\u00a08\/19\/99)<\/li>\n<li>Fenton\u2019s school <em>in town<\/em> closed in 1984 (<em>Algona Upper Des Moines,<\/em> 4\/22\/84). After that, all students were in the school 2 miles east of Fenton, which is now one of two elementaries for North Union.<\/li>\n<li>After a bond issue passed in late 1984, Central Lee\u2019s elementaries in Argyle, Donnellson and Montrose had to have closed in 1986 (<em>Mt. Pleasant News<\/em>, 12\/5\/84 and 4\/14\/87). The present K-12 complex is on US 218 halfway between IA 27 and US 61.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>UPDATE 9\/1\/21: Corrected date of <em>Manchester Press<\/em> story on Dundee and Greeley.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Plus some auxiliary before-and-afters. Oakville\u2019s school closed in 1980 (Wapello Republican, 4\/20\/95, via IAGenWeb) Rodman\u2019s school closed in 1980 (West Bend Gazette, 12\/13\/79) Bedford Elementary, which I think was the original high school, had a bat infestation in 1980 (Clarinda &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/2021\/08\/school-timeline-mega-update-1980-84\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-schools"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13249"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13485,"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13249\/revisions\/13485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}