School History The earliest record found of Holland Landing Public School was dated 1879 when a frame building was located on Peter Street. That building burned to the ground on January 8, 1912. School was held in the town hall until a new building was provided. The new building, was a one room school, was ready for occupancy in 1913 but was not used because the desks had not arrived. The earliest school register is dated 1906. From this register it was discovered that the teacher was C. D. Richardson, a young man with four years experience. He held a second class certificate and received the generous salary of $425 a year. For this sum of money he taught 72 children with an average attendance of 42 and all classes from Primer to Senior Fourth (grade 8). The school building and site was valued at $1,000. In 1930, there were two rooms, two teachers and 70 pupils in attendance at Holland Landing Public School. Text books were not provided for the children and there seemed to be no form of medical or dental inspection. The school by this time had a library, the total value of which was approximately $300. During the year 1949, a new well was drilled and for the first time the school had running water. In the summer of 1950, the school was completely renovated. A small addition to the north of the building was added to make 3 rooms for classes. A hot water system was installed large enough to accommodate further additions to the school. Flush toilets replaced the former equipment. In 1957 one of the basement rooms was fixed up as a classroom. There were six teachers at this time and grew to seven by 1958 when a second room in the basement was transformed into a classroom. The mid sixties saw the closing of Poplar Banks School which added more children to HLPS. The enrolment grew to 232 students. In 1966 the school had grade 7 students from Park Avenue for a year and in 1967-68 grades 7 and 8 from Queensville. As well, by 1967 the Second Street School had been abandoned and was used as an auxiliary kindergarten for Sharon. The Holland Landing kindergarten children went there as well. Since there was overcrowding a portable was provided to the school in 1966 and was used for the grade 6 class. In 1973, one of the downstairs classrooms was renovated and turned into a library. By the end of the seventies, the school was becoming run down. In January 1979, the students of Holland Landing Public School left the old school and moved into the brand new Holland Landing Public School located on Holland River Boulevard. This information was taken from "A History of Holland Landing Public School" by Marjorie Jaques.
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E-mail: hlpsreunion2004@yahoo.ca |