GARDEN GROVE : 1921 School Building Is Being Restored

A 68-year-old bungalow believed to be the first wooden building at Garden Grove High School and the last of its kind in Orange County is getting a new lease on life.

For the last three weeks, more than a dozen young men, many of them high school students, have worked in and around the old wooden structure, restoring it to its original condition.

Before the renovation, the one-story building had peeling paint, chipping plaster and rotting wood and looked like any other bungalow waiting for a demolition crew.

The Garden Grove Historical Society, which is heading the project, hopes to renovate the bungalow, complete with desks, old yearbooks and other school memorabilia, said Alan Trudell, a spokesman for the Garden Grove Unified School District.

“I think it will be an additional attraction to our heritage park, “ said Neil Sprinkle, the curator for the Historical Society.

The bungalow was built in 1921 for $960 by Homer Keel, who was hired by the district as the school’s shop teacher. It was the first and largest of the three wooden buildings on campus, where 63 students were enrolled. One year later, the three buildings were moved from a site now occupied by the Lincoln Education Center to the high school’s present location on Stanford Avenue.

After serving as a classroom for about 10 years, the building was moved to Main Street near City Hall and converted into a house. The city bought the house as part of a redevelopment project just two years ago. When the city decided to demolish it, the Historical Society stepped in to save it.

After learning that it would cost the same to move the building as to demolish it, city officials decided to move the bungalow to the Stanley Ranch Museum for $9,500. The Historical Society is paying the restoration fees, Trudell said.

The 24-by-34-foot structure is now in the middle of a two-acre lot on Euclid Avenue. It is nestled between other old buildings being restored by the Historical Society, such as an old barber shop, firehouse, farmhouse, blacksmith’s shop and a general store.

Sprinkle, 69, a retired postal worker and a 1938 graduate of Garden Grove High School, said: “We have some old yearbooks with class pictures and some other items that we may put in the (bungalow). We also have copies of the Garden Grove News (a weekly paper), now called the Orange County News. The issues go back to the 1920s. The newspapers might be displayed there.

“I think it’s great that they didn’t destroy it (bungalow),” Sprinkle said. “I remember it standing at the Lincoln Elementary School grounds when I was in kindergarten.”

About 15 vocational students studying construction techniques through the Garden Grove Regional Occupational Program are working on the building from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m., four days a week.