Elementary Schools

The Episcopal Diocese of Oregon established the first school in the Central Park area after Dr. William Graham donated four lots bounded by Madison, Monroe, Seventh, and Eighth Streets and required that the building include a chapel for Sunday services. The Chapel School for Girls opened in 1871 in a two-story frame building with classrooms and a chapel on the first floor and a dormitory on the second floor, enrolled sixty pupils in its first year, and charged tuition by level with additional fees for piano instruction and use of the piano. It closed in 1873, partly because of competition from Corvallis College and the State Agricultural College nearby, though the chapel continued to be used for church services. Around 1873, District 38 bought lots at Seventh and Jefferson Streets from Bushrod W. Wilson, and that purchase later supported a property exchange that benefited both the public schools and the Episcopal Church. After Corvallis's two school districts merged in 1887, the growing Episcopal parish traded lots with the school district, dismantled Chapel School, and used some of its lumber for a new church at Seventh and Jefferson Streets, while voters approved a $25,000 bond issue for a large new school on the former Chapel School site. The new frame building, with a full basement, two floors, a tower, four large classrooms on each floor, and a grand staircase facing Seventh Street, was accepted on November 11, 1888, and named Central School. By 1890, 271 pupils were enrolled in its eight grades. As enrollment grew, a new primary school was built by 1903 on what is now the east block of Central Park, later moved to Eighteenth and Polk Streets as North School and eventually known as Franklin School, and in 1909 the first Corvallis High School occupied the vacated Sixth Street site. Central School continued serving elementary pupils as primary classes gradually shifted to schools across town, became the Junior High School by 1925, and after a new high school opened on North Eleventh Street in 1935 and the junior high moved into the old high school building on Sixth Street, Central School was dismantled in 1935 after serving the Corvallis community for 46 years.

Corvallis, Oregon · United States