Lake Bluff Community Gains One Last Look at East School

The community will receive a final chance to walk through East School before it is demolished this spring.

Superintendent John Asplund announced Tuesday night that the district will hold an informal open house March 20 to give people a chance to go through the 116-year-old school and take pictures.

“There will be no pomp. There will be no circumstance,” Asplund said of the event. The open house hours have not yet been announced.

East School, which opened in 1895, will likely be demolished the week of spring break, which will take place March 28-April 1, said District Spokeswoman Kathleen Reidy.

The school has been closed since Lake Bluff Elementary School opened in September 2009.

Reidy said a task force was formed in May 2009 to try to find the best use for East School. The group looked at potential tenants, but was unable to find a renter for the property. It was ultimately recommended to the school board that East School be demolished, a move the board subsequently approved.

The land where East School sits will be used as green space for Lake Bluff Middle School.

Reidy said district officials are working with the Village of Lake Bluff on setting up a demolition date.

In the meantime, a mural from inside East School has been removed and is now in storage.

“The final place for it is still to be decided,” said Jane Lair, director of business services.

Additionally, the District 65 facilities committee has been charged with the task of trying to decide where the building’s frontispiece, including the archway, will be placed once the building has been demolished.

School Board Member Eric Grenier said that portion of the building needs to be moved and it must be placed in a spot on the East School property where it won’t be in the way should the district need to use the land in the future.

Grenier added that in earlier meetings, “we really did want to save that piece of the school.”