In lower education they’re still hoping you’ll learn to read, so they never say much about high-end topics like architecture. Which is a shame, as Long Beach Unified schools run the gamut of architectural styles, particularly its elementary campuses—several of which were de-modeled by the 1933 Long Beach Earthquake, then remodeled into Art Deco gems.

But all anyone ever talks about is Long Beach Polytechnic High School—redesigned after the earthquake by architect Hugh Davies into an International style palace of windows and adorned with Works Progress Administration murals.

So here’s to our lower-lower education—repository of much of the city’s best remaining Art Deco and Mid-Century architecture. Because, for some reason, man can rarely bring himself to tear down a school.

PHOTO by SUSAN SABO

JEFFERSON LEADERSHIP ACADEMY 750 EUCLID AVE | LONG BEACH 90804
Built in 1923, Jefferson was all but leveled by the earthquake a decade later. Architect Warren Dedrick redesigned it in 1934 in the Art Deco style—which meant elaborate bas-relief detailing stamped into the concrete, fewer cornices, and un-reinforced bricks, which in an earthquake could fall and kill someone. Also, an elaborate facing on one building looks like symmetrically termite-ridden wood—built, again, from concrete.

PHOTO by SUSAN SABO

INTERNATIONAL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL 700 LOCUST AVE | LONG BEACH 90813
International is almost a new school—built in 1999 from a design by Thomas Blurock of Costa Mesa-based IBI/Blurock, and it looks as if a bunch of skaters did the construction with swag pilfered from a construction site. The playground is on the roof, the walls vary from aluminum to brightly-colored concrete, and nowhere is there a recognizable center or a sense of order. It definitely takes the sting out of pre-pre-algebra.

PHOTO by SUSAN SABO

THEODORE ROOSEVELT ELEMENTARY SCHOOL 1574 LINDEN AVE | LONG BEACH 90813
Built in 1921, then rebuilt in 1935 with the help of architect George W. Kahrs, this campus has more of the streamlined speedlines, the geometric, nature-inspired bas-relief detailing, and the concrete material you’d expect from the era when Streamline Moderne came to power. (Kahrs also gave us the Veterans Memorial building at Broadway and Cedar Avenue—but not being a school, it was demolished.) Don’t miss the school name over the front doors—writ large in recessed letters in a typeface that recalls every bit of 1935 except the breadlines.

PHOTO by SUSAN SABO

CHARLES EVAN HUGHES MIDDLE SCHOOL 3846 CALIFORNIA AVE | LONG BEACH 90807
This campus was built once, in 1948: designed by Harold C. Wildman in an International style method evidenced by the large, horizontal bands of double-hung windows that divide the main buildings on California Avenue into vertical thirds. The school’s dominant front-facing detail is a huge, curved slab of vertical concrete: a pylon that towers over the main building and holds the school name aloft in another vintage typeface—great, except when they added more words to the marquee later, they used a different font. Totally not cool.

PHOTO by SUSAN SABO

BENJAMIN F. TUCKER SCHOOL 2221 ARGONNE AVE | LONG BEACH 90815
More International style here, in 1954 from architect Francis J. Heusel—but just in the windows. (Reading demands light.) Otherwise, this campus is very Mid-Century—using reinforced red brick for the walls of its main building and an awesome porte-cochere; and showing the periodic butterfly (slanted) roof. Very ’50s.

PHOTO by SUSAN SABO

FLORENCE BIXBY ELEMENTARY SCHOOL 5251 STEARNS AVE | LONG BEACH 90815
This school has the same feel as Tucker; it was done two years earlier, in 1952, also by Francis J. Heusel. This time, he used stone for massive square columns that hold the slanty roof of the main building—awe-inspiring, particularly if you’re a second-grader. That same structure also gets an excellent wall of windows, for more natural light.

Tags: architecture, Long Beach, schools