Pioneer School House | |
Alaska Heritage Resources Survey | |
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| Location | 3rd Avenue and Eagle Street, Anchorage, Alaska |
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| Coordinates | 61°13′12″N149°52′32″W / 61.22000°N 149.87556°W Coordinates: 61°13′12″N149°52′32″W / 61.22000°N 149.87556°W |
| Area | 1 acre (0.40 ha) |
| Built | 1915 |
| Built by | Alaska Engineering Commission |
| NRHP reference No. | 80000747 [1] |
| AHRS No. | ANC-244 |
| Added to NRHP | December 3, 1980 |
In the 1914-1915 Anchorage's population grew quickly when workmen and their families moved to the area to work on building the Alaska Railroad. In 1915 Frederick Mears' wife, Jane Mears, organized the Anchorage Woman's Club specifically to facilitate establishing a school for the children of the workers. [2]
The Pioneer School House is a historic former school building at 3rd Avenue and Eagle Street in Anchorage, Alaska. The two story building was designed and built by the Alaska Engineering Commission in 1915 during the first year of the city's growth. It is a hipped roof building 30.3 by 48.3 feet (9.2 m × 14.7 m) in plan, covered by shiplap siding. [3]
The school served about ninety elementary and high school students in 1915 and 1916. Orah Dee Clark was the first superintendent of the school. The town quickly outgrew the original schoolhouse and a second school was completed in 1917. The Pioneer School House was moved across the street to its current location in 1917 or after. [3] The disused original schoolhouse was then used as a social hall by the Pioneers of Alaska Igloo 15 from the 1920s until 1964. [3]
The building was saved from demolition after the earthquake of 1964 through the efforts and funds provided by the Anchorage Woman's Club. [2]
The building was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1980. [1] Its NRHP nomination notes:
In its era, the school was labeled "entirely inadequate," "insanitary," and was characteristically "of an order of the early eighteenth century." The school lacked paint, restrooms, running water, a satisfactory heating system, and a solid foundation. The unheated, outdoor toilets did not meet town site standards. Despite the shortcomings, the school was able to launch public education in Anchorage. [3]
The Oscar Anderson House Museum is a historical museum at 420 M Street in downtown Anchorage in the U.S. state of Alaska. Located in Elderberry Park, the structure was built in 1915 by early Anchorage resident Oscar Anderson. Anderson claimed to be the 18th person to set foot on what is now Anchorage. The structure was the first wood-frame house in Anchorage, and was occupied by Anderson until his death in 1974. The house was completely restored to a 1915 appearance between 1978 and 1982, and is now open as a historic house museum.
Government Hill is a neighborhood in the northwest part of Anchorage, Alaska, sitting in between Anchorage's downtown area and the western reaches of Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, specifically the portion formerly known as Elmendorf Air Force Base. The neighborhood is named for the "hill" it sits on of about 115 feet (35 m) bearing the same name, which is actually a bluff which rises alongside the northern banks of Ship Creek. The origins of the name date to 1915, when a federal land reserve was created in the area for the Alaska Engineering Commission, then heavily involved in constructing the Alaska Railroad nearby.
The Republican Schoolhouse, also known as Little White Schoolhouse or Birthplace of the Republican Party, is a historic former schoolhouse at 305 Blackburn Street in Ripon, Wisconsin. Built in 1853, it was designated a National Historic Landmark for its role in the 1854 founding of the Republican Party. It is now a local history museum.
The Brick Schoolhouse is a historic colonial school building at 24 Meeting Street in the College Hill neighborhood of Providence, Rhode Island. The structure is noted as one of the home of one of the first free schools in the United States and the first brick schoolhouse in the city of Providence. In 1828, the schoolhouse became the first public school to be open to African American children. Since the 1960s, the Providence Preservation Society has leased the structure from the city for use as a meeting hall.
The Simsbury Center Historic District is a 75-acre (30 ha) historic district located in the town center area of Simsbury, Connecticut. It encompasses seven blocks of Hopmeadow Street, as well as the cluster of commercial, civic, and residential buildings along Railroad, Station, and Wilcox Streets, and Phelps Lane. Although its oldest element is the cemetery, most of its buildings were built in the late 19th and early 20th century. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996.
The Anchorage Memorial Park, also known as Anchorage Cemetery, is a 22-acre (89,000 m2) cemetery located in Anchorage, Alaska, United States. Covering nine city blocks, the cemetery separates the city's downtown and Fairview neighborhoods.
The Jesse Lee Home for Children was a former home for displaced children on Swetmann Avenue in Seward, Alaska, United States. It was operated by the United Methodist Church from its opening in 1926 until the building suffered damage from a 1964 earthquake and operations were relocated to a new building in Anchorage.
The Alaskan Engineering Commission (AEC) was a U.S. Federal agency, sometimes known by its initials or by alternate spelling Alaska Engineering Commission. It was created by the Alaska Railroad Act in 1914 by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson in order to arrange for the construction of a railway system in Alaska. William C. Edes was named chairman, chief engineer Colonel Frederick Mears. In 1915, the AEC became part of the U.S. Department of the Interior. In 1923, after the railroad began operation and construction was complete, it became the Alaska Railroad Commission, later renamed to The Alaska Railroad.
The Anchorage Hotel is a hotel located at 330 E Street in Anchorage, Alaska, United States. The original Anchorage Hotel building was built in 1916; the current hotel building, which was constructed as an annex to the hotel, opened in 1936. C.B. Wark built the first hotel building; while the building was originally a wood frame structure, Frank Reed upgraded the building to a luxury hotel in 1917. The hotel outgrew its original building due to Anchorage's growth in the 1930s, so the Anchorage Hotel Annex was built in 1936 to house additional guests. The annex, designed by E. Ellsworth Sedille, had a Gothic design and was one of the tallest buildings in Anchorage at the time. Guests at the hotel included Warren Harding, Harold L. Ickes, Walt Disney, Wiley Post, and Will Rogers; the latter two stayed at the hotel only two days prior to their deaths in a plane crash. In addition, artist Sidney Laurence lived in the hotel for parts of the 1920s and 1930s; Laurence once exchanged a painting of Mount McKinley for a year's rent at the hotel.
Orah Dee Clark (1875–1965) was an American educator. She was the first superintendent for the first school in Anchorage, Alaska. In 2009, she was named into the Alaska Women's Hall of Fame.
The Star is a historic commercial building at 5 Creek Street in Ketchikan, Alaska, United States. It is the only one of a once-numerous collection of brothels that famously lined Creek Street to retain its historical integrity, and was one of the largest in the city.
The Oscar Gill House is a historic house at 1344 West Tenth Avenue in the South Addition neighborhood of Anchorage, Alaska. It is one of Anchorage's oldest buildings. It is a two-story wood frame structure, three bays wide, with a side gable roof. The bays are asymmetrically arranged, with a single-window bay on the right and a double-window bay on the left. The center bay is taken up by a projecting gable-roofed vestibule, in which the door is slightly off-center. The house's modest Craftsman style includes extended eaves with exposed rafter ends, and it has retained original interior flooring and woodwork. The house was built in 1913 by Oscar Gill in the town of Knik at the head of Knik Arm. When Anchorage was established in 1916, Gill had the house barged across the inlet, and it stood at 918 West Tenth Avenue for many decades. The house was removed from that site in 1982 to accommodate expansion of the Anchorage Pioneer Home, one of many historic houses throughout downtown Anchorage which fell victim to a real estate and building boom that intensified in 1982 and 1983. Unlike other similar structures, most of which spent years in storage on municipally-owned land but were eventually demolished, this house was spared. It sat on a vacant lot on P Street, across from the western end of the Delaney Park Strip, for approximately a decade and a half before being moved to its present location. The house has been operated as a bed and breakfast establishment since that time.
The Talkeetna Historic District encompasses several blocks of the historic village center of Talkeetna, Alaska. It includes buildings on Main Street, roughly between C and D Streets, along with a few buildings on C and D Streets between Front and East First Streets. The village was established in 1916 as a regional construction headquarters of the Alaska Railroad, and became a home to area miners after the railroad's completion. The district includes three buildings that date to the time of the railroad construction, and another ten that were built before 1940. Most of the buildings in the district are one or two stories in height, and are either of wood frame or log construction. Notable among them are the Fairview Inn, the town's first schoolhouse, now the Talkeetna Museum, and the Talkeetna Roadhouse, which was built as a residential log house in 1917 and expanded in the 1940s to serve as a roadhouse.
The Spring Creek Lodge is a historic former restaurant at 18389 Old Glenn Highway in the Chugiak area of Anchorage, Alaska. Vernon and Alma Haik built the Spring Creek Lodge in 1949. It served as an essential eatery and community center in southcentral Alaska from 1949 to 1974. The lodge was famous for its homemade bread and banana cream pies, and it was the place to go for a hearty Sunday dinner. For 25 years, the lodge served homesteaders, hunters from the Matanuska Valley, and military personnel from the Elmendorf Air Force Base and Fort Richardson in Anchorage. The lodge stands at Mile 20 on the two-lane Palmer Highway halfway between Palmer and Anchorage. It also served as the first community center for the early settlers of Chugiak. On September 9, 2001, the Spring Creek Lodge was inducted to the National Register of Historic Places "in recognition of its contributions to the cultural heritage of Alaska." The restaurant was a local landmark until its location was bypassed by the new Glenn Highway in 1969, after which it closed.
The Wendler Building is a historic commercial building at 400 D Street in Anchorage, Alaska. Built in 1915 by Tony and Florence Wendler, it is the oldest commercial building in the city. Originally located at 4th and I Streets, it was moved to its present location in 1985. It was used by the Wendlers as a store until 1920, after which Florence Wendler converted it to a boarding house. In 1948 she and her daughters opened Club 25, an exclusive private club for women. It was eventually opened to general membership, and was for many years a landmark of the city's social scene. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.
Colonel Frederick Mears was an American military officer in the US Army and railroad engineer and executive. He was the son of a career army officer and his brother Major Edward C. Mears was also in the US army. Mears was principal engineer of the Alaska Railroad. Mears took advanced engineering courses at the Infantry and Cavalry School, located at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas and became a cavalry officer in the US Army.
Manley & Mayer was an American architectural firm in Alaska, and was the leading firm in Anchorage for several decades.
The Anchorage Woman’s Club (AWC) is a woman's club founded in 1915. It was instrumental in organizing the construction of the first schoolhouse in Anchorage.
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There are no sites listed on the National Register of Historic Places in Kusilvak Census Area. | |||
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