HISTORY HIGHLIGHT

THE ORIGINS OF WHITTIER SCHOOL

In June of 1927, School District No. 14 was one of three new districts created out of School District No. 5 following a violent two-year legal battle concerning the construction of an addition to the Cork Grade School. In the ensuing months, the newly elected School Board of District No. 14, consisting of Arthur Wittchow, H. Mikelson, and E. H. Mahoney, began making plans for the what would become Whittier Grade School. They hired Mabel Buswell as head teacher and principal, and began soliciting bids for the construction of the school building in early August.

Authorization by the township of Pleasant Prairie to hold School Board meetings for District No. 14.

Courtesy of the Kenosha Unified School District

Classes were slated to begin on September 19, but there was a problem: construction had only begun on August 30, with the building’s walls scheduled to be erected on September 10. Until the completion of the school building, classes were held on the nearby Dunmovin estate, then owned by Chicago Business man and Horticulturalist R. E. Bell, who had purchased the property in 1925.

The two-room Whittier School building was completed that winter, and a dedication ceremony was held by the Parent Teacher Association on February 22, 1928. The ceremony was attended by several hundred people, and included an address from Kenosha County superintendent R. S. Ihlenfeldt, a flag presentation by the Ladies of the Grand Army of the Republic, and a show put on by the school’s students. 

The original 1927 Whittier School building still exists today as part of the eastern wing of Whittier Elementary School.