Providing excellence in education since 1865, the Kirkwood School District is among the oldest in St. Louis County and one of the oldest school districts west of the Mississippi River. Chartered by an act of the Missouri General Assembly on Feb. 17, 1865, the district’s first school board included several members whose family names are well-known today: A.G. Edwards, William T. Essex, Leonard B. Holland, August S. Mermod, Henry T. Mudd and John W. Sutherland.

In 1866, the first formal classes for white children were held in a one-room frame building at Jefferson and Clay avenues. African American children attended classes in a separate church building. Several years later in 1869, a two-story brick building replaced the frame schoolhouse and was officially named the Jefferson Avenue School. The frame building was moved to a site on Adams Ave. near Geyer Road as a school for African American children and was named the Booker T. Washington School.

The community approved an addition to the Jefferson Avenue School in 1888 to separate the elementary and two-year high school programs. Since the new addition faced Adams, it was named the Adams Avenue School. In 1896-97, Kirkwood expanded its program to offer the first four-year high school curriculum in St. Louis County and one of the first 23 offered in Missouri.

One of the oldest school rivalries in the nation began in 1907 with the first officially recorded football game played on Thanksgiving Day between Kirkwood High School and neighboring Webster Groves. The Turkey Day Game, a proud tradition for both communities continues to unite generations today.

In the early 1900s, the school district added the John Pitman and Henry W. Hough elementary schools and moved the high school into a new building on South Kirkwood Road. Residents of Meacham Park, then an unincorporated community in southeast Kirkwood, petitioned the board of education for a school near their homes. In 1929, the Meacham Park School, later renamed the J. Milton Turner School, was built. In the same year, Keysor and Robinson elementary schools were also built. Nipher Junior High School was constructed adjacent the high school on Kirkwood Road in 1930.

The school district and community continued to grow throughout the 1930s, 40s and 50s. With the annexation of Meramec Highlands School District #5 and the Des Peres School District in 1949, the district’s area increased to the approximately 15 square miles it covers today. New schools were built to accommodate rising school populations, especially the “Baby Boom Generation,” born from 1946 through 1954. These schools included Osage Hills Elementary School in 1931, North Glendale Elementary in 1938, Tillman Elementary in 1956, Westchester Elementary in 1956, North Kirkwood Junior High School in 1957, and Rose Hill School in 1958.

A significant passage for the Kirkwood School District and the nation occurred in 1954 with the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown vs. Board of Education. The Court’s ruling that segregation was a denial of rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution ushered in great changes for American society and its institutions. The landmark decision paved the way for all American children to receive equal education opportunities. The district began the process of integrating its schools, and in 1955, the new Kirkwood High School on West Essex Ave. enrolled both white and African American students.

Student enrollment peaked for the district in 1967 with more than 10,000 students enrolled. In 1971, Pitman Elementary School, located on the now site of Commerce Bank in downtown Kirkwood, became an “optional school” with open classrooms. Students from throughout the district had the option of enrolling in the school that featured no grade levels and team teaching. The district initiated a two-year reorganization plan in 1975 to meet the changing educational needs of students and to address the steady decline in enrollment that began in the early 1970s. Several elementary schools were closed including Des Peres, Osage Hills, Turner and Pitman. Rose Hill Elementary became the district’s “optional school” and was renamed New Pitman School. The reorganization also included changing Nipher and North Kirkwood junior high schools for grades 7-9 into middle schools for grades 6-8 and moving the ninth grade students to Kirkwood High School. The declining enrollment continued and New Pitman School closed in 1977 and Hough Elementary School closed in 1982. The district’s central office, which had moved from several locations throughout its long history, relocated from its Osage Hills site to the campus of North Kirkwood Middle School on Manchester Road in 1983.

Kirkwood School District was among the first in St. Louis County to participate in the voluntary desegregation plan beginning in 1982. Other firsts for the district include offering full-day kindergarten beginning in 1983, offering a Parents as Teachers program in 1985 to serve families with children age birth through three years, establishing the Kirkwood School District Foundation in 1989, and opening the Kirkwood Early Childhood Center (KECC) in 1991 in the former Hough Elementary School building. Nearly a decade later in 2002, district voters approved the creation of the Hough Community Learning Center at the corners of Sappington and Adams (Lockwood). The Hough Community Learning Center campus features a new early childhood education building and a renovated Hough School building with offices for technology and curriculum facilitator staff, a small playing field for the community and a community technology center open to the public during designated times.

The 2007-08 school year brought even more improvements for children and their learning. Thanks to the vision of the Kirkwood School District Board of Education and the confidence and support of the community through Proposition I in April 2005, a new 51,000 square foot science facility opened at Kirkwood High School in August 2007. Using the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) standards for room size and arrangements, the Kirkwood School District developed plans for the new science building with rooms that are designed to reflect current research and best practices in science education. The new science building features 15 combined science classrooms/laboratories, five each for chemistry, biology and physics. Each classroom/laboratory averages about 1,500 square feet and is designed to facilitate the movement of students from discussion to hands-on activities in the same classroom/laboratory. A new physical education facility at Kirkwood High School opened in May 2008. In addition, all district schools received infrastructure improvements through Proposition I including new domestic water and fire mains, new fire alarm systems, roofing, painting, tuck pointing, door replacements and other improvements as listed in the district’s master facilities plan.