Historical Lehi
Over the years, many structures accommodated Lehi students
Lee Anderson | Lehi Historical Society
Educating Lehi’s youth has been a priority for its citizens from its beginning.
In 1851, while the residents of Evansville were building their homes on the banks of Dry Creek, they also erected a one-room log schoolhouse on the north bank of Dry Creek, around 300 North and 400 West. Lehi’s first teacher, Preston Thomas, was challenged to teach 30 to 40 students, each at a different level of education. This school was moved to around 80 West Main when the second fort was built.
For the next 50 years, Lehi had several schools and countless teachers, but none offered more than an eighth-grade education. Those who wanted to pursue higher education had to travel to institutions such as Brigham Young Academy in Provo. The New West School offered some “high school” courses, but it wasn’t until 1902 that an accredited ninth-grade program was offered, with 15 students attending.
George N. Childs was the principal of the ninth grade, and classes were held on the upper floor of the Central School, which was located at 631 North Center Street. The grade school children occupied the lower floors. It took another four years before the 10th grade was offered in 1906.
Things changed that year when the school board hired W. Karl Hopkins as principal of the high school and to teach English, literature, history, and other subjects. Hopkins was committed to growing the high school, but needed more students before he could convince the school board that he needed a school and additional teachers.
Hopkins traveled throughout Lehi, rounding up prospective students. Many of the young men were athletic, so Hopkins became a coach. They put up a pair of baskets at the old pavilion in City Park, where the Lehi Round-Up Rodeo Grounds are now, and coached the young men to two basketball championships. They took state in 1908 and again in 1909. They also won the county in track and field.
With Hopkins’s effort and Alpine School Board Chairman Morgan Evans, another grade was added to the school in 1907 and again in 1908. In 1907, Lehi hired its first female high school teacher, Miss Lodica Seeley. Seeley taught at the high school until the spring of 1909, when she married Hopkins. That same spring, Lehi’s first class from the new four-year high school graduated.
In 1910, the Grammar School, located where the Legacy Center is today, was completed, making the Central School building Lehi’s first high school. In 1913, the student body had grown to 151 students, and the school offered its first yearbook.
In 1916, the Smuin Dance Academy at 57 N. 200 East was used as the high school gymnasium. Over the next few years, the high school student body continued to grow until the Central School was bursting at the seams with 249 students. They needed a new building.
In 1921, a new high school building was built at 154 North Center. The Lehi Tabernacle of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was remodeled and used as the high school auditorium. The new school building had a gymnasium for dances and basketball, but football and track events were still held at the City Park.
In 1930, an athletic field was added across the street from the high school behind the Memorial Building, or today’s Hutchings Museum. In 1931, tennis courts were also added. A few years later, the school was expanded to the south with a new auditorium, a lunchroom and classes for the junior high students. Before this, lunches were served in the Memorial Building. Over the next few years, various additions were made to the building until it had outgrown itself once again.
A new high school was built at 180 N. 500 East in time for the 1959-60 school year, and the old building remained in use as the junior high. That year, there were around 444 high school students. As Lehi continued to grow, so did the high school student body.
In 1983, there were around 725 students. In 1988, the ninth grade began meeting in the new junior high building to keep the high school from being overcrowded. Even without the ninth grade, in 1990, there were still more than 700 students meeting in the high school.
Over the next couple of decades, the student body tripled, and the school struggled to keep up. In 2009, there were 2,124 students in the high school. Trailers had been brought in to help with the overflow, but they didn’t solve the problem. During classes, some students were left sitting on the floor or standing in the back due to the lack of desks.
In the hallways between classes, students struggled to push through the throng to their next class. Even though there were two lunch periods, students in the back of the line sometimes didn’t have enough time to eat before they had to go back to class.
Westlake High School opened in 2009 and took the students who had been attending from Saratoga Springs. Unfortunately, it didn’t solve the problem; it just postponed it for a few years. Another high school was desperately needed.
In 2015, the Lehi High School student body reached 2,363. Fortunately, Skyridge High School opened in 2016 for students living in the northern part of town. After Skyridge opened, Lehi High School was remodeled entirely, leaving no remnants of the original building.
