McDonald School construction was completed on its present site on August 21, 1929.

McDonald Elementary School recently observed it's 75th anniversary, observing it's past 175 year span of history as a hub of community life.

During that time, three different buildings have housed a procession of students from families which have come from this area-first, Springwells Township, then Fordson, and finally Dearborn, with high hopes for their future. These buildings have been witness to radical changes in history and lifestyles--including the influences of the automobile, radio,television and airplanes.

McDonald School--first so called after the civil war-has been more durable than some of these, outliving at least two automobiles which were built right in our neighborhood in years past--the Grahm-Paige and the Desoto.

The first school in the area was built in 1851, nine years before Abraham Lincoln was elected President! It was a one room log cabin at Wyoming & Warren Ave. Here, some 30 years earlier, John C McDonald's father had purchased 100 acres, (@ $1.25/acre). It was on this farm homestead that our school's namesake was born in 1834.

John C McDonald was a director of the old school for 25 years. In the years following the civil war, he was active in promoting construction of a new brick schoolhouse at the southeast corner of Wyoming & Warren, a building that came to be known as the "Old McDonald School." (The log house schoolhouse was moved to the McDonald farm to be used as a granary.)

The brick building was this area's school and, along with St. Alphonsus, the community center for more than 50 years. At the dedication of this new building in 1929, Fred J McDonald, John McDonald's son, recalled the dance and midnight supper which marked the dedication of the "old" McDonald School back in 1868---3 years after the civil war.

That old brick schoolhouse had served students until the mid-1920's when Thayer School on Pinehurst, south of Warren, opened. The building then became a gas station, which was finally torn down just before WW II in 1940.

This new school building, OUR McDonald School, was built in 1928-1929 at a cost of $515,264.40--a handsome figure in those days, with depression days just around the corner.

In the cornerstone-laid on December 28,1928-were placed :several pennies, some correspondence from Fordson High about the construction of McDonald School, copies of the lease and land contract for the property, bylaws of the  Board of Education and a student handbook outlining courses offered at Fordson, copies of the Dearborn Independent city newspaper, a city charter, and key and piece of wood from the clock from the old school.

Even before students began attending McDonald School, it was home for the "Sabbath School", later called Littlefield Presbyterian Church. This church began in a storefront on Warren near Wyoming in January of 1929. The congregation held it's first services in McDonald on October 6, 1929. Services were held in the McDonald auditorium until the Littlefield church was dedicated on February 11, 1940.

Even though the neighborhood was growing rapidly during those days in the early 1930's, it retained a decidedly "rural flavor", recalls Charles Theisen, who grew up on Miller Road.

An old red horse barn stood on Manor between Warren and Morrow Circle until about 1936....and there was always a horse tethered in the big field on the west side of Oakman Blvd. between Warren and Morrow Circle, recalls Theisen.

The original Theisen farm extended from Warren to Tireman, between Miller Road and the alley east of Manor. Across Warren, at the corner of Miller, stood the old Thayer farmhouse (although the family had moved years before) until it was demolished to make way for the John Hancock building. The bank of Dearborn at Miller & Warren was built on the site of the Leo Laviolette's service station--a "castle-like" one-roomer with an outdoor grease pit.

Theisen remembers his father planting corn in what was then a field running along Manor all the way to Morrow Circle. The

Theisen family sent youngsters to McDonald for many generations.

Attending the dedication of McDonald School on November 19,1929 along with Fred J. McDonald, were its first principal, Wesley Gilpin; Mayor Clyde M. Ford; board of education president John Makemson; architect H. J. Keough, and Frank Cody, superintendent of Detroit Public Schools.

McDonald was built at its present site because planners believed homes would eventually be built on the undeveloped land in the area. The undeveloped land area was that which lies north of Warren, between Oakman Blvd. and the Detroit City limits...a stretch of some 20 city blocks. Surely, believed those early city planners, from this area would come at least 600 students for the elementary grades.

Their planning was good, their building ideas sound: but they did not for see the growth of the Chrysler Corporation in that area, nor did they count on the most stinging blow of all....the construction of the municipal water works in the corner of the city...one that spread its settling tanks and equipment over more than half of the area that the school was intended to serve.

A unique room layout at McDonald was designed so that classes of lower elementary students could be separated into groups doing either academic or active projects without disturbing each other.

John C. McDonald is an impressive building. Three brick stories rise on Diversey between Normile and Freda, housing 20 classrooms, offices, a gymnasium, a mammoth library and, a unique feature for elementary schools of its day, a separate main auditorium with a seating capacity of 325.

Also found at McDonald are its fine murals in the third floor library, murals which were carefully preserved during the renovations made to the library in 1975. These were WPA  projects commissioned during the Roosevelt administration. The three murals depicting stages of life in King Arthur's days were painted by Leon A. and Bronislau A. Makielski. They were dedicated on October 29, 1935. A mural of  "Little Women"  was done by the same artists at a later time.

By the year 1931, the staff included Principal Gilpin, industrial arts teacher Chalmers Young, art teacher Hannah Johnson, instrumental instructor C. Stanley Meyers, Harriet Britton-music teacher, Lola Miller-piano instructor, Helen Thorpe, Homemaking, Theressa Foster, gym; Ruth Mc George Tate-6th grade, Bertha Horton-5th, Ella Doan-4th, Marion Gatewood-3rd, Mildred Yakona-1st & 2d, August McIntosh-2d, Helen Burns1st -3rd, and Dorothy Coash-Kindergarten.

Since Mr. Gilpin, McDonald has been led by other fine principals including Harold B. Goodall, Simon Babel, Jack Stallard, Merwin Lewis, Harold Odgers, Bernice Knight, Richard Fasing, Eugene Brusco, Paulette Lein, and Dr. Albert Harp.

In addition to providing educational experiences for thousands of young people who have lived and played in this neighborhood during the past 75 years and more, McDonald School has been the place where homeowners' groups met, public officials gatheres......in short, where our community has come together and been together. And it will continue to be the focal point for this neighborhood for years to come...