The Little Red Schoolhouse

Built in 1909 and dedicated on the founder's seventy-third birthday, the Little Red Schoolhouse was Scottsdale's first real school, a brick building with classrooms for grades one through eight. For a young farm town it was far more than a schoolhouse. Over the years it doubled as community center, city hall, justice court, and library, the closest thing the settlement had to a civic heart. It served as the grammar school until 1928 and now houses the chamber of commerce, the oldest surviving public building in a city that grew up fast around it.

What the plaque says

Scottsdale Grammar School, also known as The Little Red Schoolhouse, was dedicated February 26, 1910 on the 73rd birthday of Scottsdale's founder Chaplain Winfield Scott. Built in 1909 with classrooms for grades one through eight, the building served the people of Scottsdale over the years as school, community center, city hall and justice court, and library. It operated as the grammar school from 1909 to 1928 and today houses the Scottsdale Chamber of Commerce. It was placed on the State Register of Historic Places in 1976.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Heard Museum — 8.7 mi
  The Native Southwest, told in the first person
• Taliesin West — 9.1 mi
  Frank Lloyd Wright's desert masterwork, grown from the ground it stands on
• Phoenix — 9.2 mi
  The fifth-largest US city, built on the canals of a thousand-year-old one

More markers nearby

• Winfield Scott Memorial — steps away
• Sterling Drug Store — steps away
• Our Lady of Perpetual Help — steps away
• Herb Drinkwater — steps away