Old Elementary School Building in Kansas City MO - now Apartments

Seven Oaks School, Kansas City Missouri

Date added: May 02, 2024 Categories:

Seven Oaks School at 3711 Jackson Avenue is an excellent example of an Early Twentieth Century/Progressive Era Elementary School. It has many of the interior elements that were designed to improve safety, cleanliness, illumination, and ventilation, issues central to the Progressive Movement. Multi-light wood doors line the wide double-loaded corridor on each floor. The corridor doors access classrooms and adjacent narrow coat rooms at the perimeter of the building. The central core of the school contains the gymnasium, auditorium, and playroom (now cafeteria). Large windows pierce the perimeter walls to provide the classrooms with abundant light and ventilation.

The influence of the Progressive Movement was also evident in the classrooms designated for specific courses of study. Seven Oaks School featured a "Nature Study" room with a glass-walled conservatory. The kindergarten room had a fireplace. The school also housed a library, a series of "Home Rooms," and rooms designed for sewing, cooking, manual training, social science, literature, art, and music. Over time, these specialty rooms were converted into regular classrooms as the school was opened to students through the sixth grade.

Following national trends, schools built during this period adopted one of the popular revival styles for exterior ornament, while the formal massing and heavy masonry exterior of the school communicated the important role it served to the local community. Architect Charles Smith imposed the Spanish Colonial Revival style to Seven Oaks School by applying somewhat whimsical terra cotta ornament to a traditional Colonial Revival form. Door surrounds at the main entrance, details in the pointed pediments at the parapet, and the belt course encircling the building between the ground and first floors have unique designs and patterns, conveying the Spanish Colonial Revival styling.

Seven Oaks School illustrates the rapid growth experienced by the Kansas City School District in the 1920s. It was one of twenty-three new school buildings and two building expansions constructed during that decade alone. To accommodate this volume of work, architect Charles Smith frequently applied a unique exterior theme to a prototype floor plan. Three other schools (Blenheim School at 2411 E 70^th Terrace [1924], Meservey School at 4210 E 45^th Street [1927], and Nichols School at 6903 Oak Street [1926]) have floor plans similar to Seven Oaks School but distinctly different facade treatments.

The Kansas City Board of Education was formed in 1867. As the city expanded and residential neighborhoods spread south and east from the original core, more and larger schools were needed to accommodate the growing school-age population. Paralleling Kansas City's residential building boom of the 1920s, the school district added a significant number of buildings to its inventory during this time, using a $5 million bond issue approved in 1921 to fund the expansion.

Seven Oaks School was constructed to replace an older four-room brick school at East 39^th Street and Cleveland Avenue. The Kansas City Board of Education received a building permit on June 11^th, 1926 to build a three-story school at 4212 East 37^th Street. The 17-room school had a footprint of 208 feet by 108 feet and ornament in the Spanish Colonial Revival style. The cornerstone was laid during a public ceremony on November 6^th, 1926. When the school opened on September 7^th, 1927, just ten months later, some classrooms still needed desks, the auditorium was missing seats and lights, and exterior work was incomplete. But, nearly 400 children from the surrounding neighborhood were enrolled. This included students from the old school as well as some who had previously attended Sanford B. Ladd and Milton Moore schools. The principal, Miss Minnie Dresser, and most of the nine teachers moved with the children to the new building.

Original architectural plans identify locations for future additions to Seven Oaks School. The exposed concrete frame on the east elevation indicates one of these locations. These additions were never constructed.

After World War II, development in Kansas City shifted further south and into the surrounding suburbs, eliminating the need for additional school expansion. Seven Oaks School has been vacant since it closed in 1997. It is currently slated for redevelopment as affordable senior housing.

Building Description

Seven Oaks School at 3711 Jackson, Kansas City, Jackson County, Missouri sits atop a hill at the northwest corner of a city park in an East side neighborhood. A large swath of open park land surrounds the school on the south and east. The building presents its side (west) elevation facing Jackson Street. The primary elevation orients the building south toward the park. The two-story school has a raised basement. A limestone foundation supports the concrete structure and brick walls with terra cotta trim. The building is rectangular in plan with a square block that projects east from the south end of the east elevation. The symmetrical facade exhibits vernacular elements of Spanish Colonial Revival design executed in patterned brick and glazed terra cotta. Many of the original interior features and finishes are extant, including the original configuration of corridors and classrooms, wood trim, and some built-ins.

Seven Oaks School sits at the north end of a four-acre parcel bounded by Jackson Avenue on the west, and the abandoned alignments of Spruce Avenue and 37^th Street on the east and north, respectively. The property sweeps down from the north to the south and from the east to the west to meld with Seven Oaks Park, which extends the open space around the school south to 39^th Street and east to Kensington Avenue.

The neighborhood surrounding the school and park is predominantly residential with small pockets of commercial development along 39" Street. The dense development is interrupted on the west side of Jackson Avenue, across the street from the school. The south end of this block is a large open space, and the few houses on the street occupy exceptionally large lots.

There is an asphalt parking lot behind (north) the building and paved areas directly in front (south) of the building. A grid of concrete footings in the pavement south of the building indicates the location once held by a temporary classroom. The paved area south of the building is terraced at two levels. A limestone retaining wall with a pipe railing forms the barrier for the upper level. The southernmost paved area is larger than the area next to the building.

The three-story mass of Seven Oaks School has a slight L shape. The poured concrete structure is clad with rusticated limestone at the foundation and orange brick on the upper walls. A dressed stone water table encircles the building at the top of the foundation. Cream and orange terra cotta trim and patterned brick work accent the walls. Brick parapets topped with terra cotta coping surround the flat roof. The concrete structure is visible at northeast (rear) corner of the building, suggesting that the school was designed for an expansion that never occurred.

Narrow pilasters divide the primary (south) facade into nine bays. Within each bay is a pair of double-hung wood windows configured with six-over-six or four-over-four sashes. The windows are in poor condition. Bays project slightly beyond the plane of the windows at the east and west ends of the primary elevation. These bays have large blank expanses, but also contain entrances to the building and small windows that indicate the location of stairwells. The walls east and west of these slightly projecting bays are also largely blank, pierced by sparsely-placed windows and accented by a decorative terra cotta grille and panels on the upper stories. A one-story bay projects from the center of the primary elevation. A conservatory-like glazed enclosure with a shed roof rests on top of the bay. Multi-light windows form the walls of the enclosure.

The identical main entrances at the east and west ends of the south elevation are highly ornamented. The paired doors are set within a one-and-a-half story terra cotta surround that features a variety of patterns. Pilasters flanking the doorway are embellished with large geometric shapes. A zig-zag patterned beltcourse separates the ground and first floors and meanders above the window above each doorway. Engaged urns and fluted pilasters flank the window, and a broken arched pediment and shield top the window. "Seven Oaks School" is inscribed in the terra cotta above the door. The gabled pediments at the top of the bays are ornamented with fluted and scrolled brackets (extensions of the beltcourse), a curvilinear medallion, and a simulated coronet, all executed in terra cotta.

Secondary entrances are located on the east and west elevations of the one-story bay on the primary elevation. Secondary entrances are also located at the northwest corner and on the north elevation. Each entrance has a pair of metal doors with upper glass lights.

L-shaped double-loaded corridors organize the functional spaces inside the building. Classrooms line the exterior (south and west) sides of the corridors; the auditorium and gymnasium (both double-height spaces) sit north of the corridor. The corridors have plaster walls with a wood chair rail and a concrete floor with integral cove base. First and second floor ceilings are exposed, painted concrete structure. The third floor has a dropped plaster ceiling with two glazed skylights in the main hall. Corridors on all three floors also have picture rail molding. Metal lockers line the walls.

Recessed classroom entrances open into the corridor at regular intervals. Most openings have a fully-glazed multi-light door. Some doors are solid-core wood slabs. Most appear to be likely dating to a mid-century renovation.

The classrooms have plaster walls and ceilings with picture rail molding and a wood chair rail. Floors have a concrete border and base framing a linoleum tile field. The tile has come loose from the concrete subfloor in a few rooms. One or two rooms have carpet. Most classrooms have modern florescent light fixtures. Typical classroom trim includes varnished wood-framed blackboards as well as door and window casings. Windows sit deep in their masonry openings, adorned only with plaster jamb returns and wide wood mullion covers. Many classrooms also have built-in cabinets. The kindergarten room has a brick fireplace with a heavy wood mantel. The second floor classroom centered on the north side of the building opens into a green house with steel sash windows.

Narrow coat rooms between the classrooms have hooks and shelves lining the walls. Several coat rooms retain historic "school house" pendant lights.

The building has three stair wells. The two on the south side of the building are wide concrete staircases with solid concrete railing walls topped with wood caps and handrails. The northwest stair has a concrete-filled metal structure with metal railing and wood cap at the lower level.

Restrooms are on the first floor and on the upper landings in the south stair wells. They retain some original finishes and fixtures, including ceramic hex tile floors, but materials are generally in fair to poor condition. Original restrooms in the basement have been removed.

Specialized functional spaces include an auditorium, a gymnasium, and a cafeteria. The cafeteria is on the first floor under the auditorium. It has a sloped ceiling that reflects the floor of the space above it. All cafeteria finishes are modern.

The gymnasium is a small space with orange brick and plaster walls. The concrete ceiling structure is exposed and a glazed skylight pierces its center. The raised bleachers were removed and enclosed to create a small corridor and office as well as an HVAC chase. The pipe railing at the front of the bleachers remains intact.

The auditorium on the second floor is an exceptional space. It has a sloped floor with fixed wood seats that face a raised wood stage at the east end. The plaster walls have minimal ornament, but the ceiling is coved and historic pendant lights (globes missing) hang from star-shaped plaster medallions. A small movie projection room on the back (west) wall is accessible from the third floor corridor. Scrolled plaster brackets ornament the underside of the projection room.