St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1913-02-12
FOR MANUAL TRAINING
School Directors Propose New
Building Facing Summer
Street Common.

Last week the School directors
published a statement of facts per-
tanning to conditions in our public
schools.
The question confronting us is,
How shall we provide proper school
accommodations for the 631 child
rem who are located in or near the
part of the incorporated village of
st. Johnsbury, west of the Passump
sic River and at the same time hold
our school expenses within reason
able limits?
When we provide room enough to
house these children in the section
where they live, we shall have re-
lieved our other buildings SO that
all children in town will have ali
the school-room space they need.
This problem is one TO which the
directors have given much careful
thought and hard work. Many plans
and propositions have received con-
sideration. Suggestions from vari-
Gus citizens have been gratefully re-
ceived and made use of and a great
many different possible solutions
have been carefully investigated.
Continuing the policy of previous
years, We have first considered what
additions or improvements might be
made to the property we now
have to make it adequate to our
present needs.
Condition at Summer Street
We have two buildings at Sum-
mer street which, from the outside,
apear to be large enough to take
care of all the children who would
naturally attend there. These build
ings were constructed with little re-
gard for economy either in space
or material and about one-third of
both space and material was vast
ed. We have 10 the two buildings
only nine class rooms.
An architect examined these two
buildings, investigating the feaslb1l1-
ty of remode-ing them to obtain
additional class rooms. We also ask
ed this architect to consider a plan
proposed by one citizen of uniting
the two buildings with an addition
between them. This proved to be
impossible on account of the entire
ly different style of construction OF
the two buildings.
The architect showed us, how
ever. how each of these build
ings could be remodelel and space
economized to provide some add1-
tional class rooms, but the expense
of this work would be large and
we should not have as much room
as we need after the change should
be made.
Maple Street Building
We have a two room wooden build
ing at Maple street which houses SO
primary grade children. We also
have a two room wooden building
at Fairbanks Village for the pr1-
mary children of that neighborhood.
Extensive repairs have been made to
this building recently. Adequate
fire escapes were provided, new
roof was put on and steam heat was
installed so that the building is now
comfortable and safe for the little
children who attend there.
The small building at Maple
street is conveniently situated for the
three primary grades we have there,
] but could not be enlarged sufficiently
to meet our requirements.
The school board finally consider
/ ed a new building. The first question
was the location We need a level
plot of land large enough for the
! building and a playground. AFTER
a long and careful search, we found
that either the site of our present
Maple street building or one near
the Summer street common were the
only feasible ones in the congested
area. Bear in mind that we neeo TO
! accommodate 214 children who i've
! between Main street and the Pas-
sumpsic River and All from MAIN
street west.
Maple Street Expensive
A new building located at or near
either Summer street or Maple street
would supply our need. OF these
two sites we were inclined toward