Category: Sunnyside School

Sunnyside School: the first real schoolhouse, 1909 to 1927

Sunnyside History6 Comments
OpenSFHistory.org

Part of a series of articles about Sunnyside School.

The first dedicated schoolhouse to be built for the neighborhood was neither big enough nor safe enough to serve the needs of families in Sunnyside in the long term, but for 18 years it was a busy and productive place. During this time, Sunnyside emerged as a vital neighborhood, no longer ignored by City government and able to garner its share of public monies. Community and parental involvement was effective and intense, centered on a newly founded PTA. Then a group of mothers helped bring to the City’s attention the schoolhouse’s dangers and inadequacies. When it came time to build a replacement, rather than drag the process out for a decade, as the City had with the first provisional school in a cottage, that new building went up in just a few years.

1910s-Sunnyside-School-
The east face of the first Sunnyside School. Taken in the 1910s. From outsidelands.org, courtesy of longtime Sunnyside resident Ron Davis. There is a link to the photograph at this end of this post.

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Sunnyside School: the cottage-house years, 1896 to 1911

Sunnyside History4 Comments
Sunnyside School, SF Chronicle, 23 Jul 1899.

Part of a series of articles about Sunnyside School.

Despite the profiteers who sold lots in Sunnyside in the early 1890s primarily as investments, families did move here, and they had children–often lots of them. But there was no school. Then they were given only a rented cottage for a one-class school. The story of how long it took before the district finally built a real schoolhouse here is a lesson in both City government corruption and the perseverance of the early residents.

Promises, promises. SF Board of Education declared its intention to build Sunnyside a school over and over, and just as often broke those promises. First purpose-built schoolhouse not built until 1909, sixteen years after neighborhood residents first asked for one. Details on news items at end of post.
Promises, promises. SF Board of Education declared its intention to build Sunnyside a school over and over, and just as often broke those promises. The first purpose-built schoolhouse was not constructed until 1909. [Details at end of post.]
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