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Published Monday Sioux City will redevelop school where Ann, Abby studied BY CHRIS CLAYTON |
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WORLD-HERALD
STAFF WRITER |
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SIOUX CITY, Iowa - The high school where Ann and Abby honed their counseling skills will find new life as apartments, rather than face a wrecking ball, through the latest renovation efforts of an Omaha firm.
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Sioux City Central High School has been closed since 1972, and residents have looked for ways to redevelop it ever since.
The stone building on a hilltop overlooking downtown has towers that suggest its nickname, Castle on the Hill. A group of local residents took it over in 1976, and the Castle on the Hill Association has maintained a strong interest in protecting the school.
The school's main floor was built in 1892, with a four-story addition built in 1913. Don Jensen, president of the association and a 1946 Central graduate, said the two main goals of the original planners were to develop a school that looked unique and would last.
"I think they did both," Jensen said. "It's a pretty impressive building when you come up the street here."
Attention to detail was always important with the school. When the addition was built, the school's sandstone didn't match because the original stone had been stained with soot over the years. So workers put a tarp over the entire north addition and smoked the building to blacken the pink sandstone.
"They put smoke pots around the whole thing to make it look black to match the original," Jensen said.
Before it closed, Central High School produced more than 40,000 graduates, including its most famous alumnae, Esther Pauline "Eppie" and Pauline Esther "Popo" Friedman, better known as advice columnists Ann Landers and Abigail Van Buren. The twins graduated in 1936.
The school was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 and appears frequently on the Iowa Historic Preservation Alliance's annual ranking of the state's most endangered historic buildings.
From time to time, Sioux City residents have talked about converting the school into a cultural center or museum, but a lack of funds stalled such efforts.
Advocates have taken on a variety of projects, such as creating a virtual archive of photos from the building's past and working to document the renovation step-by-step.
Last year, the association contacted NuStyle Development Corp. in Omaha. Jensen said he and others were pleased when they overheard a NuStyle representative say the building should be saved at all costs.
"That was when we knew we had the right people," Jensen said. "They've been trying to find something for the building for all those years, but finally NuStyle came in and saved it."
NuStyle has a successful track record of such conversions, including the Old Market Lofts, the Bull Durham Apartments, the Farnam Building and Immaculate Conception School, all in Omaha. The company is converting Lincoln's old federal building into apartments.
Like Omaha, Sioux City has been active in redeveloping old buildings, said Charlie Kuester, a city planner. The old Carnegie Library was recently converted into a housing area. The Plymouth Block Building on historic Fourth Street has new retail stores and restaurants on its bottom floor, offices on the second floor and apartments on the higher floors.
"That's kind of what we are looking at here," Kuester said.
The plan is to convert Central High into 75 apartments with up to three bedrooms. The castle association will keep the gymnasium and auditorium for alumni functions and other gatherings. Known as "the dungeon," the 960-seat auditorium isn't used often because it lacks heating and air conditioning.
Julie Stavneak, development project manager for NuStyle, said the renovations will cost more than $9 million. The project will receive more than $4 million in tax credits from the Iowa Finance Authority, as well as funds from the City of Sioux City. The state tax credits were a key incentive.
"It was after that we knew we would be moving forward on it," Stavneak said.
NuStyle will reshape the classrooms without a lot of modifications. The association will maintain an office and a gift shop, as well.
NuStyle's involvement has drawn both praise and criticism, Jensen said. Some people prefer to turn the school into a cultural center.
"There's a feeling they don't want apartments there," Jensen said. "The cultural center idea has been one of those blue sky deals."
Renovation is expected to begin in March, with tenants moving in a year later. The affordable housing tax credits come with a requirement to reserve some apartments for low-income residents. Most apartments will go for market value.
"There may be some commercial property there, as well, but that's still up in the air," Jensen said.
Jensen has his own place picked out: an upper-floor room with a freestanding wooden spiral staircase that leads to the school roof. He envisions spending evenings on the roof, looking at the city lights and the stars.
"You can look out over the whole city," he said. "When I give tours up there, I tell people this is going to be my place."