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Built in 1882 to replace Tustin’s first school,
an unoccupied house,
this two-story school building complete with
bell tower cost
just a little more than $5,000. Photo courtesy
Tustin Area Museum
Tustin schools will
mark their 137th anniversary next week, Feb. 5
to be exact.
Soon after his
wife and five children arrived in Tustin City,
Columbus Tustin set about establishing a school
for the area he had designated as the School
Block on the settlement’s first plat map in
1870. A block between C and B and Second and
Third streets, the property had a small
one-story house on the southwest corner, on the
north side of Third, close to B, which could be
used as a school house.
On Feb. 5, 1872,
the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors
(Orange County did not exist) established a
school district, calling it Sycamore School
District because of the native sycamores growing
on the site. Minutes from meetings of the board
of trustees show that Miss Anna Cosad was hired
as the first teacher for a salary of $60 a
month.
E.C. Utt, who
attended this first school, recalled in later
years that about 28 students from a dozen or so
families were enrolled in grades 1 through 8,
although their attendance was irregular.
Miss Cosad didn’t stay too long. Salaries were
raised with some men receiving as much as $100
while women were paid between $50 and $80, but
few teachers lasted more than a year and many
quit after a month or two.
The district paid
Tustin $8 per month rent until about 1875 when
they purchased the building for $700. In 1882 it
was replaced by a two-story school with two
classrooms on each floor. A bell tower held the
school bell that is now displayed in front of
the Tustin Unified School district office on C
Street. This two-story school was enlarged about
1890 when Sycamore School District became Tustin
School District.
My mother, my
aunts and uncle attended Tustin Grammar School.
They often recalled how they and other students
from outlying areas traveled to school by horse
and buggy, arriving early to unhitch, feed,
water and tether their horse for the day in the
school stable. They also remembered that the
boys and girls had separate play yards divided
by a fence.
This building was
used until 1914 when a single-level primary
school and a two-story grammar school were built
. Students graduating from eighth grade went to
Santa Ana High until Tustin High School District
formed and built a high school in 1922.
The district
adopted the neighborhood schools format in the
1950s, closing the primary and grammar schools
and razing the buildings. The Senior Center now
occupies the elementary school site and the
Presbyterian Church has expanded into the area
used by the primary school. The original Tustin
High School buildings were replaced in 1960 and
Foothill High School opened in 1963.
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