2021.87.99

SOLD, DOUGLAS’S FINEST HISTORIC BUILDING Built in 1866 and now saved for community-wide use through purchase by the Saugatuck-Douglas Historical Society. Michigan’s oldest multi-grade school (“union school”) and one of America’s finest examples of mid-19th century school architecture. ... Just after the Civil War the people of Douglas had a dream: A new form of education as an investment in the community’s future. The plan was to reinvent the village’s educational system by abandoning the nearby age-old one-room school in favor of a new multi-room/ multi-grade school—complete with improved teacher-training standards—as a part of the State of Michigan’s innovative “union school” program. On a happy fall day in 1866, village kids walked across Center Street from their tiny old tumble-down school house (still standing) to a magnificent two-story structure—which stood proudly on a steep sand hill overlooking Kalamazoo Lake. Overnight the number of Douglas children enrolled in school increased from 112 to 229. We are told that, like many local carpenters at the time, those who built the new school house were shipbuilders; thus, the workmanship was the best. Looking up to the gleaming white structure, those first children set their eyes on enormous elaborately carved brackets connected to a frieze band that extends around the entire building below the eaves. The tall widows must have been the largest in the village. The double front doors led to two internal stairs—one for boys and one for girls. The cupola/belfry, topped by a white finial, could be seen for miles around. Newspaper accounts confirm its prominence as an icon of the village. One of the earliest benefits of the new school was music; the second floor had a stage and was used for concerts for children and adults from both villages. And within a few years the school had its own library—the first in the village. For many years the head teacher was known as “professor” and the school was also a teacher training school. At the beginning it has separate stairs for boys and girls. The structure was used successfully until it was closed in 1957 when it was converted into apartments. Because the Old School House of Douglas was built as a progressive outreach in education, it is fitting that in 2007 it will become once again what it was intended to be—a revolution in learning. By Jim Schmiechen

Remembering When

Winthers, Sally

01/07/2022

11/18/2023