A special ceremony marking the completion of the Clover Creek Elementary will be held on Thursday, Nov. 8 at 6 p.m. Refreshments will be served.

The district spent about $19 million dollars to build the replacement school. Renovations include a new, two-story design, courtyard, technology lab, high-tech equipment, enhanced playfields and additional parking space. The Clover Creek project was made possible thanks to taxpayer support of the 2006 bond.

Clover Creek Elementary was formerly its own school district. Started around 1855 by

Christopher Mahon, the school has had several locations and new buildings. According to historians, the current building is the 8th iteration. One location was Old Military and Radermacher Road (22nd Ave.) near the northeast corner. The remnants of that building were removed by the property owner in the 1990’s, not realizing it had been the former school. It appeared to be just an old barn covered in blackberries. Another iteration of the school was moved from a little farther west on Old Military to a farm in Frederickson owned by O.J. Anderson. The building was a two room school and became a chicken house and is currently a tool shed. A former church, Clover Creek Baptist was also a former Clover Creek School building. That building was moved from the school site to a place across the street where the current church has a marked footprint.

The most memorable of Clover Creek’s building was the white Colonial Revival building built in 1938. The wooden structure had large windows and a library upstairs. Students on Facebook fondly remembered

climbing up into the cupola, sometimes for surreptitious purposes such as smoking. That cupola was spared and is now part of the new building’s central rain garden courtyard. The location of the bell from that cupola remains a mystery. An article by Kathleen Merryman of the News Tribune brought some leads, but no bell.

Some of the land the new Clover Creek Elementary sits upon was purchased recently by the school district. Much of it was donated in the late 1800’s by Frederic Meyer, a former millwright for Thomas Chambers. The Meyer Donation Land Claim included all the land east of the school to Canyon Road and south to 176th.

Old Military Road that runs along the north end of the school grounds was the main road from Walla Walla to Fort Steilacoom. Along the creek at the bottom of the hill was the Naches Trail route that settlers took over the mountain. That trail ran through the current park, crossed the creek and ran along the bottom of the cliff below the school and church, ending at the Brookdale Golf Course where the Mahon family lived. There is an Oregon Trail marker in front of the golf course if you look closely as you pass by.

Just to the west of Clover Creek Elementary is another stone historical marker (cairn). It sits on the Donation land Claim of John Montgomery who was a farmer for the Hudson’s Bay Company’s subsidiary to Fort Nisqually, the Puget Sound Agricultural Company. Montgomery worked at HBC’s Spanueh station. Spanueh is a Lushootseed word meaning prairie where roots are dug.

The cairn denotes Camp Montgomery, a blockhouse built during the Indian War of 1855-56. That war followed the Medicine Creek Treaty when the local tribes expressed their dissatisfaction with the reservations that they were located to. In particular, this blockhouse was used to hold 5 Hudson Bay employees who were married to Indian women and Territorial Governor Issac Stevens suspected of treason. These men from Muck Creek were held in April and May 1956 while Pierce County was declared under martial law. There is a lesson in the use of habeas corpus in this event; these men were held without being told their charges. When the first trial was finally held for Sandy Smith, the court found him not guilty. No other trials were held and all the men were set free. The story of Chief Leschi is tied up in these events as well. He was one of the visitors to their farms for which to Governor was concerned. The Indian war ended soon after. A hearing on the events surrounding that declarations of Martial Law was held at Congress in Washington D.C. and Governor Stevens was given a letter of

reprimand from President Franklin Pierce.

Clover Creek Elementary sits in a location with a great deal of history, settlers by wagon train, old military road, Indian war blockhouse, treason trials, martial law, and Hudson Bay Company farms. It became part of the Bethel School District in 1956, several years after the merger of the other districts (Spanaway, Elk Plain, Rocky Ridge, Kapowsin & Roy) into Bethel. It is a beautiful new school, join in the dedication and the history.