The Street Seen: Washington School
2828 4th Street @ Ashland
The first (1890) school in Ocean Park is on the North West Corner of 4th St and Ashland. The present Washington School building, constructed in 1935, is currently used for other school district functions.
The first school in Ocean Park (the South Side School) is a one-room, whitewashed building constructed in 1890. It is surrounded by sand dunes and a few houses on the peak of the hill at Ashland and 4th Streets. In 1895, a tax is passed for the construction of an additional one-room wood-frame school building, complete with a bell tower.
During the 1890s and early 1900s, Ocean Park grows at a rapid pace that overtaxes the capacity of the two small school buildings. Parents insist on the construction of a new schoolhouse, and the necessary funds are approved by voters in May 1902. The existing school buildings are sold to local churches and moved to new sites. A new two-story, eight-room building is ready for occupancy in November 1902 (construction moves faster then !) and renamed Washington School.
The 1902 Washington School burns down on January 2, 1908.1 A new two-story, twelve-room, unreinforced brick (fireproof) building is constructed the same year. Robert Farquhar is the architect.
The streets are still unpaved at that time, but concrete sidewalks are placed around the school.
Following the 1933 Long Beach earthquake, the 1908 Washington School building is demolished (as are Adams, Roosevelt, and Grant) in 1934. Classwork continues in tents erected on the nearby John Adams Intermediate School campus at Los Amigos Park.
The new (and present) Washington School building is constructed in 1935 as a cooperative project of the Works Progress Administration and of the Santa Monica Board of Education. The PWA Moderne-style building by Marsh, Smith, and Powell is mainly one-story construction - the sloping site allows a partial basement.
In 1950, funds are approved by voters for Washington Primary, a new school built adjacent to (and north of) Washington Elementary. Together, Washington Elementary and Washington Primary are known as Washington West.
To accommodate the rapidly increasing population growth during the post-war period, an additional school, known as Washington East, is built across 4th St at the North East Corner of 4th St and Ashland.2
In 1993, the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District decides, that rather than repair and upgrade existing deteriorating school buildings, it would be more efficient to close both John Muir Elementary School (Ocean Park & Lincoln) and the Washington Alternative School / Santa Monica Alternative School House (SMASH) (Ashland & 4th) and relocate them to a new school, which would be built at Los Amigos Park. The Washington West site is to be used for other district, child care, and related community functions.
A defective furnace sets the building on fire at 10 am on Thursday, January 2, 1908, and burns to the ground. A.N. Archer is the janitor. Classes are in session, and the two hundred pupils escape. The 1902 building is valued at $20,000 and carries $12,000 insurance.
The Growing Place has operated facilities on public land at the Washington East site since 1984.