Local PTA Seeks Stories, Photos of Bickel Elementary

TWIN FALLS, Idaho (KLIX) – Twin Falls is experiencing today what it did more than 100 years ago – population growth.

At that time, the home where early students of the area met began flexing at the seams shortly after classes started and an actual school building was needed. Now, history is repeating itself. The Twin Falls School District is planning to open three additional schools in the area over the next year and a half because of expanding student population.

This spring it also will be celebrating a bit of the past.

To celebrate the 110-year anniversary of Twin Falls’ first school – Bickel Elementary, named after Paul Bickel, Twin Falls’ first mayor – the PTA is collecting memories from former students, teachers and administrators. Anyone, in fact, who has a story or photo to share of Bickel is welcome to do so.

“The goal is to compile the memories into a booklet and sell them to raise money for the PTA,” said Donna Simonson, PTA co-president. A questionnaire can be found at Bickel’s website.

The PTA came up with the idea to solicit memories after Simonson saw an old photograph of the school at a local branch of First Federal Bank. It shows students and teachers in front of the school.

“It’s a fun picture,” she said. “It was taken in 1906, the year the school opened.”

The PTA recreated the picture with current students and staff last October, and collecting memories for the school’s anniversary was a simple offshoot of that idea.

Early students in Twin Falls first met in a local home, but six months later the young people needed a larger space. Construction of Bickel School began in 1905 and it opened a year later with 395 students. Elementary grades met on the first floor, higher grades on the second floor.

“Within a few years it had 1,200 students, so that’s when they built Lincoln School,” she said. In 1911, Twin Falls High School opened on Shoshone Street, and Bickel became an elementary school.

As with people, buildings age, and after 31 years of use Bickel was determined to be unsafe and a new building was started around the old facility in 1937. Soon after construction began, a fire broke out and damaged the roof of the old school. Once the new school was finished, the remainder of the building was taken down “brick-by-brick,” Simonson said. “I’m not quite sure where it all went.”

The new building opened in 1938, using the desks and books of the original school, but the district today still celebrates the anniversary of the first school’s opening. The current building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

On May 19, the school will host a party and open house, when members of the community can visit classrooms and see creative displays. Simonson would like to have the memory booklet compiled before then. Completed questionnaires and photos should be emailed to schroederke@tfsd.org with “110 year project” in the subject line or sent by post office to:

Bickel School 110 Year Project
607 2nd Ave. East
Twin Falls, ID 83301

Deadline for submissions is March 11.