Lehi Central School

In  1891, Lehi boasted three  public schools offering space for 328  students, but 482 students reported for school. Much of the overcrowding  was spurred by those moving to work at the Lehi Sugar Factory. Another  school, the Central School, was built and funded in part by bonding.  Fifty percent of the bond was raised through levies while the other half  was established by the school district. Richard Klettering (who  eventually designed the Utah State Capitol building) drafted up plans  for the school and it was built in 1892. The new six-room school located  on the northeast corner of 600 North and Center Street- across the  street from today’s Wine’s Park, (which was before, the site of one of  Lehi’s earliest molasses mills). The school was renamed the Stanford  School in 1898 -though still referred to as Central School by many  residents.

School  was closed during the ‘beet vacation’ in October so that the youth  could assist in Lehi’s beet harvest. The school almost burned down in  1898 from a spark setting fire to a birds nest in the chimney. A turnout  of 500 people rushed to the school to form a bucket brigade and  successfully put out the fire to save the building. The Central School  Bell rang twice daily from a 40ft Bell Tower  (once at 8:30am and once  at 9:00am) that could be heard throughout Lehi to which many citizens  set their clocks to. The bell was purchased by Blanche Larsen and  donated to the Hutchings Museum before the building was demolished  in  1933. 

Though  the school was originally built as an elementary school, four rooms  where added to the attic of the school in 1898 to accommodate 8th and  9th graders, 10th and 11th grades were added in 1907, and in 1908, 12th  grade was added, making it a full high school. The school became known  as Lehi High School when the Grammar School was completed, and the  younger students moved out in 1910. The building was used as the high  school until 1921 when the new Lehi High School was completed (located  where Lehi Fire Station 81 currently resides). LDS Second ward ,that  prevously met at the Lehi Tabernacle, moved to the building and used it  as a meeting place until 1928. After which the building sat vacant until  its razing in 1933.