The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883
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Then and Now: McKinley School

1903: The McKinley School, named after assassinated President William McKinley Jr., opened in 1903 and was quickly expanded to more than twice its original size, anticipating the growing neighborhoods of east Spokane. The school at 117 N. Napa St. served elementary and junior high students and for a short time was an alternative school offering vocational training to junior high boys. (Libby Collection/Eastern Washington State Historical Society Archives)
1903: The McKinley School, named after assassinated President William McKinley Jr., opened in 1903 and was quickly expanded to more than twice its original size, anticipating the growing neighborhoods of east Spokane. The school at 117 N. Napa St. served elementary and junior high students and for a short time was an alternative school offering vocational training to junior high boys. (Libby Collection/Eastern Washington State Historical Society Archives)

McKinley School was built in 1902 at the height of Spokane’s early boom. It was only a block from the busy Northern Pacific rail corridor. The building had eight classrooms and cost $26,000.

Within a year, the school district doubled the size of the building, at a cost of $38,000, to accommodate the growing school-age population in the East Central neighborhood. In 1909, the school served 585 elementary and junior high kids. The name of the school honored President William McKinley Jr., assassinated in 1901.

In 1917, junior high girls were moved to other schools and a vocational program was started for boys in seventh, eighth and ninth grades. The one-gender environment and extensive manual arts education were seen as a way to reach boys with behavioral problems. Teacher Louis Livingston described the population as boys whom other schools found difficult to manage.

It was the era in which civic organizations took seriously a societal responsibility to train young men who were fatherless, incorrigible or without career prospects. The Rotary Club sponsored Boys Week with activities in civics, public service, sports and church life. The Kiwanis Club partnered with the McKinley boys in a program to build garages and other structures. Along with carpentry and mechanics came military training.

“The boys must pass in the military training just the same as they pass in spelling, arithmetic or anything else,” Principal R.K. Edmunds said in 1917. “Of course, the boys do not drill with guns but are given all the marching and saluting exercises.”

The Feb. 4, 1922, edition of The Spokesman-Review profiled a street kid named Willie Shaw, 13. “Yeah, there’s just Ma and me at home now,” he told a reporter. “Dad’s gone up to Canada to try and get a job. We ain’t heard nothing from him lately. I used to be a messenger and I carried papers in the summer, but I’m going to McKinley School now and so I quit those jobs.”

In 1928, all the junior high students were moved to the new Libby and Havermale schools, leaving only kindergarten through sixth grades at McKinley. Enrollment in the mostly industrial neighborhood continued to slide for the next 30 years, and the district closed the school in 1962. The school district sold the property in 1965 to the five Ross brothers, who operated Spokane Transfer, a trucking company. Since then, the building and adjacent warehouse have served as storage, and trucks have been repaired in the school’s shop. The Ross family still owns the building, which has served as a set for the TV show “Z Nation.”

Several times over the years, the Ross family has offered neighborhood groups a chance to remodel and use the building for a community center, a recreation center, a public marketplace or a social services center, but no one with the means has come forward to refurbish the deteriorating structure. In 1970, the Ross brothers estimated that $35,000 would cover the restoration and suggested that the center be named the Emmett M. Ross Memorial Building after their father.

– Jesse Tinsley