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McClung School stood in West St. Paul for 45 years on E. Hurley Street in what is now a residential neighborhood.
1927: McClung School
Below is the only known picture of McClung School, located at 248 E. Hurley Street.
- Built in 1885, the school is named for John W. McClung, an 1870s author who created promotional materials that attracted settlers to Minnesota.
- The school closed in 1928 and was demolished in 1930. The students pictured were the last group of children to attend the school.
- The school served as the meeting place for the South St. Paul City Council in 1887 until they moved to Gladstone School in 1888, before West St. Paul broke away as its own city.
- Originally one of the early township schools, McClung School came under the jurisdiction of the new City of West St. Paul in 1889, along with Sibley, Gladstone, and McGrath schools.
- McClung School hosted West St. Paul’s first church in 1887, Oakdale Chapel, a mission of St. Paul’s Hebron Baptist Church. A year later land was donated at Hurley and Oakdale for a new chapel building. The church would later become Oakdale Community Church.
2023: Neighborhood
Here’s the site of McClung School in 2023:
There’s no evidence the school building was ever there. Demolished in 1930, the lot supposedly remained vacant until 2000 when these two houses were built. According to the West St. Paul Centennial, remnants of an old stone wall that surrounded the site were still visible in 1988. (At least presumably—a house exists at 248 Hurley, the address of the former school, though according to property records the house was built in 1938. Based on the West St. Paul Centennial information, it seems likely these two newer houses are where McClung School was located.)
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