How the South Euclid-Lyndhurst School District was Formed

(from the Winter 2012 Alumni Arc-Lite)

In 1917, Euclid Township residents voted down a school bond issue. This lack of funding caused the school board to consider closing schools within the district. Lyndhurst (then Euclidville) residents were forced to send their students to the already overcrowded South Euclid schools. This imposed a distinct hardship on them and they fought back. Euclidville wanted no part of school consolidation.

To regain local control over their schools, Euclidville incorporated as a village on August 7, 1917. The discovery of a loophole in the law allowed that an incorporated village could control its own schools. This interpretation also allowed that a new village acquired jurisdiction over schools in neighboring unincorporated territory.

South Euclid and Claribel (Richmond Heights) residents responded with incorporation later that year. All villages in the surrounding neighborhoods now controlled their destiny.

In 1922, Lyndhurst (Euclidville was renamed Lyndhurst in 1920) opened its new village school at Richmond and Mayfield Roads, with four classrooms, and a small auditorium. Lyndhurst consistently voted funds for expansion and operation, but the site area was limited. South Euclid had financial trouble in the 1920s and struggled to keep its bills paid. South Euclid High was worn out and crowded. Both neighborhoods were in need of a modern high school. What to do?

In 1924, South Euclid School Board Superintendent Otto Korb suggested to Cuyahoga County the combining of the two school systems and the creation of a new high school in the geographic center of both communities. When the County board announced its decision to consolidate the two school systems, Lyndhurst residents objected and took the issue to court. The May 1924 ruling by Common Pleas Judge F. E. Stevens decided that the "broad interests of education should prevail over other considerations" and upheld the County board decision. Lyndhurst had been forced to align with South Euclid, much to their chagrin.

Charles F. Brush High School was built on eighteen acres purchased from Henry Melcher and a small parcel from the Dodsworth family. On this former fruit orchard site rose one of the most beautiful high school structures anyone had seen. With construction finished in 1926 and first classes held in January 1927, Karl Keller was the first principal. It was he who named the school after the famed street light inventor from Euclid Township.

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See the Wikipedia article on the South Euclid-Lyndhurst School District for information that goes beyond the story above. One tidbit -- 1970 was the first recorded decline in school district enrollment.

Here is another link to the past, with a photo of the original South Euclid High School.