HISTORY The area known today as Riverside, Ohio was settled in the late 1700’s as Mad River Township. The Mad River, which flows through the township, was a fine millstream for sawmills, gristmills, and copper stills. The lush land and abundant stream of southwest Ohio attracted many pioneer families to settle in Mad River. Among them were Judge Isaac Spinning, Jonathon Harshman, Lewis and Elizabeth Kemp, and Phillip Wagner. Current residents recognize these names for the roads commemorating these early pioneers. Recognizing the importance of education the founders of the area took to the task of providing schools for the education of the settler’s children. Although the first schools were somewhat meager, one room log structures with slab floors, rough wooden seats and desks, and greased paper windows, it was a start. “Robinson School House” was the first school building, boasting one room and one teacher. The Kemp School was next, a log structure, built in 1815. As years passed, other schools such as Wagner, Harshman, and Franklin schools were added. This district was eventually known as the Mad River Township School District. During the early 1900’s, the following buildings housed the school children of Mad River Township: a temporary building at the northwest corner of Troy and Leo streets, known as the Keiser School, a one room school on the Old Troy Pike, known as the Heinz School. In 1923 Valley High School, was established in the old Kemp Grade School. The school enrolled about 50 students. Students also attended the new and old Wagner School, and the old Harshman School Building. The Mad River area gave up taxable property when the federal government acquired the land to establish Wright Field in 1927. As Wright Patterson grew, more and more dwellings for military families were established and the enrollment of Mad River Township Schools grew at a rapid pace. In 1939, Mad River Township schools had 836 pupils enrolled. By 1947, over 25 hundred were enrolled. Providing an education for these students was almost impossible. At that time, the Township maintained three elementary schools: Wagner and Harshman each had four classrooms and two sub-standard basement rooms; Mad River Elementary, built in 1940, had twelve classrooms, a cafeteria and auditorium. In 1941, the old two-room Wagner building was reopened with its two rooms welcoming more than 80 students. Restrooms and cafeteria facilities were across the street. Overlook school was built with funding from the Federal Government and leased to the district at no cost. This building was opened in 1943 with fourteen classrooms, but was already too small. Classrooms were also set up in leased buildings—many people recall going to Base School located at Wright-Patterson. Over 200 students attended classes in old barracks. During the 1948-49 school year, school enrollment had doubled. Students were on half-day sessions and it was necessary to transport high school students to an adjoining school district. Walter E. Stebbins, the Superintendent at this time, contacted other school districts that faced similar problems with overcrowding. This group went to Washington where they argued, lobbied and demanded Federal help for their school systems. They were successful and the government helped to build 4 new schools. Brantwood Elementary, the “oldest” current school, was built on Schwinn Drive in 1952 (additional space was added in 1968). Although the physical facilities at all four elementary schools offer similar opportunities for all students, the land on which Brantwood is located allows for a land lab that can be accessed for science and environmental studies as well as recreational activities. That same year, a six-room addition was added to Overlook. Page Manor One, was built in 1954 on Spinning Road and modeled after Brantwood. It housed grades 4 from 8 until 1964, after that, it housed grades 4 through 6. In 1968, the school district added 4 new classrooms and a library onto the south wing. In 1981, the school was closed and later sold to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. It now houses the Base’s Youth Recreation Center. Page Manor Two, the current Beverly Gardens Elementary School, was built in 1955. In 1961, the district added an east addition onto the building and also changed the name of the building to Beverly Gardens--to reflect the growth of the subdivision of homes that was developing in the area around the school. By 1954, with the growth of Wright Patterson and industrial development in Dayton, Mad River Township had 600 high school students but no high school. These students where farmed out to adjoining school systems. This was an expensive arrangement and lacked the unifying effect for the township that a high school brings. In September 1954, the school board proposed a Bond issue to raise $810,000 to build a high school Mad River High School was dedicated in 1957 after being built at a cost of $2.6 million, and is situated on a 45 acres of land. ( super: The new Stebbins High School currently under construction will cost more that $23 million.) The High School was rededicated as Walter E. Stebbins High School in 1960 to honor the former Mad River Superintendent who served the district from 1943 to 1960. For dedication of the new high school Walter Stebbins wrote that for many years the citizens had dreamed of a high school, and, knowing that progress does not just happen, had pooled the strength and resources of the community to build a school that now stands as a symbol of opportunity in a land of freedom. In 1963, construction was started on a new 84 thousand square foot junior high school. The school, to be called Mad River Junior High, was built on Harshman Road behind Mad River Elementary and housed 8th and 9th graders when it opened in March of 1964. In 1982, 9th graders went to Stebbins High School and 6th, 7th and 8th graders took classes at Mad River and Spinning Hills---both schools became “middle schools”. In 1992, Mad River Middle School became a 5th-6th-grade building. Spinning Hills would house 7th and 8th graders. The student population for Mad River Schools continued to boom in the early 60’s. In 1965, the district submitted an application to the State Board of Education for assistance to build much needed classroom space and asked voters to approve a $934,000 bond issue. Thanks to those monies, in 1968, the Old Harshman School that held six classrooms was converted into administrative offices. That February, construction was completed at Saville Elementary on Burkhardt Road, adjacent to a new development of homes called Saville Estates. And in the fall, a vocational area and eighteen additional classrooms were opened at Stebbins. On the south end of the school district --- located on a corner lot on Woodman and Eastman Avenue, construction on Spinning Hills Middle School was beginning. In September 1969, it opened its doors to students of grades 7, 8 and 9. Construction was also started on a new Harshman school. This school was built directly behind the old Harshman School and opened its doors in February of 1969. The building was originally named Harshman Elementary and was rededicated as Virginia Stevenson Elementary in 1987, to honor a community activist and friend of Mad River Schools. During the 1970’s, there were over 2,500 students attending Stebbins each year. At the time of the largest student population, the school was greatly overcrowded. Students were attending classes in the cafeteria and auditorium. Teachers traveled from one classroom to another with their books and supplies on carts because there just weren’t enough rooms to accommodate everyone. District enrollment ranged between 82 hundred students to over 5 thousand during that decade. In 1977, Overlook School was closed and later sold. By the 1980’s enrollment was on the decline ---in 1983 enrollment was over 4000---nearly half of what it was 10 years prior. Mad River Elementary and Page Manor One were closed and Wagner School was sold. To accommodate the enrollment decline, the district organizational structure also changed at Brantwood, Beverly Gardens, the junior highs and Stebbins. The population decline continued into the 90’s with school administration changing boundary lines and again, reorganizing the structure at several schools (show Spinning Hills & Mad River). Today, the Mad River Local School District primarily serves the children of the residents of Riverside, Ohio. Riverside became one of the largest cities in Montgomery County when Mad River Township merged with the Village of Riverside in 1994. The school district’s boundaries also incorporate small portions of Dayton, Fairborn, Huber Heights and even a few homes in Beavercreek. Enrollment in the late 1990’s and early 2000 has been at around 1,000 students for the high school and a district total close to 3500. In November of 2003, the groundbreaking at Stebbins High School was the last in a series of groundbreakings to celebrate the beginning of an $87 million dollar project to construct and renovate all seven of the district’s schools, after the community approved a 5.22 mill bond issue to raise $17.3 million. The Ohio School Facilities Commission assumed 80% of the cost and the local community 20% for construction costs. Distinguished guests at the groundbreaking were teachers that were teaching in 1957, representatives of the class of 1959, other Stebbins Alumni and the daughter of Orville Edmundson, the school’s first principal, and the daughter of Walter E. Stebbins.