The school building that once stood at Galena Boulevard and Blackhawk Street in Aurora is gone, but children once again are roaming the grounds.
To Paul House, former superintendent of Aurora Christian School, which used the building for 25 years, that’s very important.
“The kids are back!” he said, spreading his arms outward to the bevy of children playing. “And they’re having a wonderful time.”
The kids, along with their parents, Aurora residents, public officials and even the West Aurora High School marching band were part of the recent dedication of Blackhawk Park on the block surrounded by Galena, Blackhawk, New York Street and View Street on the near West Side.
It’s the result of the city of Aurora and the Fox Valley Park District working together to reclaim a site that held a school building for more than 100 years. The new park features modern playground equipment, a large grassy area known as the “great lawn,” and a picnic shelter designed to evoke memories of the school building that once stood there.
By next year, it also will have a splash pad.
The park district said in its brochure welcoming people to the dedication event that the park is “where history and the future have come together in the name of community.”
The building that once stood on the grounds was built in 1906 as the new West Aurora High School, and it served that purpose until 1953. When the new high school was built, the building served as the West Aurora Junior High School through 1958, when it became Benjamin Franklin High School through 1977.
At that point, the West Aurora School District sold the building to Aurora Christian School, which occupied it from 1978 to 2004.
Collette House looked at the new park and talked about how during that latter time, the property “was home for so long.”
The daughter of Paul House, she attended third grade through high school in the old building, then turned around and taught there, too. It was during that time, in 2004, she helped move Aurora Christian into its new campus on the far West Side. She now serves as superintendent of Aurora Christian, just as her father once did.
She joked how she still drives down Galena and expects to see the old school building.
“It’s still kind of a shock,” she said. “But it’s exciting to see it used as a park.”
Neal Ormond, who went there when it was West Aurora Junior High School, said in remarks in the program that he remembers the school being the center of the community. On Saturday afternoons, kids would gather in the auditorium to see movies and cartoons.
“This was before the days of TV, so it felt like the whole West Side was gathered there,” he said. “Aurora was a much smaller town then – about 40,000 population – and the school stood as a symbol of community.”
The building was vacant from 2004 through 2015. At one time, a developer planned to redevelop the building into condos, but the recession of the late-2000s intervened. The building began to deteriorate beyond redemption.
The city of Aurora spent more than $1 million to demolish it in 2015. A year later, it deeded the large grassy lot to the park district, which led meetings and online surveys to determine what to do with it. The name Blackhawk Park was chosen by public vote.
Kids’ screams and yelps nearly drowned out official remarks at the dedication, but Jeff Long, park district public affairs and communications manager, closed by saying, “Let’s enjoy this park for 100 more years.”
