Students move into new high school building
In 1915, school boards in three grade school districts voted to consolidate for the purpose of providing the opportunity of a high school education for their residents: Jackson School in Minnetrista, Spring Park School on the corner of Dunwoodie and Shoreline, and Mound School.
Some local students who finished 8th grade in June 1915 decided they would attend the new high school. At that time there were more than two dozen local grade schools, one in each township, and all the 8th grade graduates were invited to attend MCHS. Here’s a partial list: Armstrong (Maple Plain), Bederwood (Stubbs Bay), Copeland (Independence), Elm Hill (Medina/Corcoran), Evergreen Grove (Independence), Hoff (Mound), Island Park, Jackson (Minnetrista), Lee (Minnetrista), Lyndale (Independence), Maple Plain, Mound, Oak Knoll (Independence), Spring Park, Ss. Peter & Paul Catholic (Loretto), St. Boniface Catholic (St. Bonifacius), St. Bonifacius, St. Peter Lutheran (Watertown), and Victoria.
These were mostly one-room schools, with one teacher for grades 1-8. Armstrong, as one example, built in 1878, in use until 1949.
Armstrong School, 1878-1949
Photo courtesy of Marvin Johnson
Students from schools as far north as Medina, as far east as Stubbs Bay, as far south as Victoria, and as far west as St. Bonifacius and Watertown, were interested in continuing classes in the new local high school.
For their ninth-grade classes, and then for their 10th-grade classes, they were housed in temporary classrooms on the second floor of the Crocker Building (later Longpre’s Dry Goods).
Crocker Building on Commerce Blvd.
Classroom Voices, p. 266
Finally in the fall of 1917 the new high school building opened, and these students moved in as the junior class, planning to be the first graduating class.
Mound Consolidated High School 1917-1963
Annual, MCHS
They were not to have that distinction. Two young women from the Twin Cities area transferred to Mound as seniors in the fall of 1917 to become the first MCHS graduates: Lulu Siefarth and Frieda Weber. Perhaps when their families came to the lake in April, they attended local schools, as noted in the Mound School Bulletin of April 14, 1920:
“First grade notes: We were glad to welcome Neil Sprague and Edward Heath back to the Mound school this morning. Eugene Hodge will also come back this week. These boys have been attending school in Minneapolis this winter.”
So, the Class of 1918 numbered two students.
Frieda Weber and Lulu Siefarth
Minoway, MCHS’s first annual, 1923
This building was originally built to house about 100 grade school students and about 100 high school students, grades 9-12. The local population continued to grow. The two dozen or so local grade schools began to close, consolidating with the Mound Consolidated High School District, sending both their elementary students and those who had completed eighth grade for high school classes.
Student enrollment continued to grow, with graduating classes increasing from two students in 1918, to 29 in 1928, to 64 in 1938, an addition was added to the original high school building in 1936 and 1938.
