McKinley Elementary

McKinley Elementary School, nestled just off of Overland Rd. was opened in 1952. It used to be farm land owned by S.E. Brookover and it was surrounded by the farming community, people started coming in the 1940s and ’50s and the population expanded. When the school was in its youth nothing was in front except a huge field and on the road were a grocery store and a couple of other little business. It has many improvements and revisions since then to keep up with the fast changing society. The now faculty room used to be the cafeteria and the kitchen. The now Library used to be the auditorium with a stage. It is still possible to see the outline of where the stage used to be in the Library. The gym was built in the ’70s and that is when the library replaced the gym/auditorium and stage. A blueprint from 1976 indicates that in 1955 a wing was added on and in 1972 improvements were installed on the new wing. The wing added in ’55 is easy to tell because the floor is different from the original building, it is cement. McKinley was tile for a long time then went to carpet. Then, there was the addition of the now Kindergarten and pre-school wings. In the boiler room there is still the coal furnace that used to heat the school and rooms with coal chutes. Now technology has much improved and McKinley no longer operates on coal. McKinley has made many modifications in its time to provide a better educational environment for the students and is indeed a senior citizen in the Boise educational system. It is sad to see such school with as much history as McKinley to disappear but it will never disappear in the hearts of many prideful alumni and current students and staff. McKinley closed permanently in 2009.