PORT ANGELES — A century ago it housed the future. Now the old Lincoln School shelters the past.
The Clallam County Historical Society, which purchased the building in 1991, will host an open house from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, providing tours of the renovated portions of the school site at Eighth and C streets in Port Angeles.
Tours in honor of the building’s 100th year will be conducted of the the lower level of Lincoln School, the newly renovated research library and the artifact storage facility.
The event is free and open to the public.
In 1890, squatters rushed to claim the government town site reserve in Port Angeles, said Kathy Monds Estes, executive director of the Clallam County Historical Society.
David O’Brien, a laborer, posted signs on all four corners of the Lincoln School site reading, “This site reserved for school purposes.”
O’Brien and a committee of neighbors enforced the sign, and the site was saved for a succession of school houses that started in 1891, Estes said.
The first was a one-room school house, Tumwater Hill, and then it became Lincoln Heights in 1894.
In 1916, the local school board proposed a $23,000 bond issue, which the voters approved, to build Lincoln Elementary School.
The school served generations of Port Angeles students until 1978 when the move to newer, more modern schools forced the abandonment of the old Lincoln School.
Left to deteriorate, the old school remained empty until it was purchased by the Clallam County Historical Society.
Today, the society is restoring the last remaining original school built prior to 1920 in Port Angeles.
When completed, the Lincoln School complex will house a museum, research library, artifact storage and administrative office.
For more information, call the Clallam County Historical Society’s office at 360-452-2662 or email artifact@olypen.com.
