Upper Arlington Schools in 1923

Our schooling had had humble beginnings, starting in the basement of King Thompson’s home in 1917 with one teacher (Mary Boyer) instructing a dozen children in the first three grades.

By 1923, students were attending Waltham Road School (nicknamed the Barracks School presumedly for the logs used from Camp Willis), a temporary structure located near today’s Devon Road Pool. Ten classrooms and a gymnasium with lockers and showers was becoming too small to house the growing number of children.

A bond issue and levy passed in fall of 1922, along with the donation of land to the north of the Waltham Road School by The Upper Arlington Company, allowed for the construction of UA’s first permanent school building. Designed by UA resident, Howard Dwight Smith (also the architect of Ohio Stadium), 1923 began with the acceptance of bids as shown in this March 2nd article on page 1 of The Community News:

The building was NOT ready by the fall; seems as if construction experienced similar delays as we have today! It would be March of 1924 before students entered the building we know today as Jones Middle School. Only the center section was completed at that time.

The name “Jones” comes from the first principal to work in that building. See his photo here. His promotion is detailed here in this front page May 13, 1923 article from The Community News:

1923 was also a “first” for a printed yearbook in Upper Arlington. The Community News, April 20, 1923, p. 2:

Our community only taught through the 11th grade in 1923; seniors went to other area high schools like Grandview. See the 1923 yearbook here. The first year UA graduated seniors was 1925.