Encyclopedia Dubuque
"Encyclopedia Dubuque is the online authority for all things Dubuque, written by the people who know the city best.”
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Affiliated with the Local History Network of the State Historical Society of Iowa, and the Iowa Museum Association.
SAGEVILLE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
SAGEVILLE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL. Part of the DUBUQUE COMMUNITY SCHOOL DISTRICT. The former West Sageville one-room school was located off Highway 52 on the Sherrill Road on the location of the present school. In 1956 twenty-eight students in eight grades were housed in the building that had concrete wedges along one side to keep the wall from collapsing. An article in the Des Moines Register from 1957 described the former school as “a drafty, one-room building. Wood for the pot-bellied stove had to be carried in everyday. The first job of the teachers in the morning was to rekindle the fire. There was a small blackboard with one eraser, no maps, and few other teaching aids.”
On March 12, 1956, voters in the Sageville Independent School District approved a $75,000 bond issue for a new two-room brick school. Construction began in April and students began using the new school in October 1956. From September 1956 until the new school was completed, classes were held across the road in a quonset hut building owned by Walter Eichman.
On April 6, 1959, voters in the Sageville School District approved a $250,000 bond issue to finance a six-room addition and gymnasium. The addition accommodated more than 110 students who were attending several schools in the Sageville area. Schools that merged were the seven schools in Jefferson Township, and the Bloody Run, Riverside, Knollville, East Sageville and West Sageville Schools in Peru Township. Grades one through six were to be taught at the school. The Sageville School dedication ceremony for the addition was held on December 11, 1960.
In 1967 a $6.5 million bond issue for HOOVER ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, EISENHOWER ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, STEPHEN HEMPSTEAD HIGH SCHOOL, and Sageville schools included the addition of seven classrooms for the Sageville school. A new wing was built onto the rear of the existing school. In October 1999, a 1,760 square foot double wide portable classroom was added to the Sageville School. The double-wide portable provided two additional classrooms.