Karlsruhe ES History
Opened: 1947
Closed: 1995
Karlsruhe American Elementary School was near the city of Karlsruhe, Germany, which is considered the “Gateway to the Black Forest”.
The first school in the Karlsruhe area opened in February 1947 in a private home in the city. The first class had thirty students and one teacher. As the enrollment increased in the 1948-49 school year, an additional private home was used, and a kindergarten was added in February 1949.
The original elementary school was on Rhode Island Street in Paul Revere Village. This school building was opened in June 1952. A new wing containing nine classrooms and an auditorium was added in 1953. Another wing was constructed in 1955. The enrollment for the elementary school for the 1956-57 school year was 848 students in kindergarten through ninth grade.
Later, the elementary school was housed with the high school in a U-shaped building in the Paul Revere Village housing area. There were thirty-eight classrooms in the main building and two annexes for the 1981-82 school year. The kindergarten-through-six complex housed classrooms, a media center, a multi-purpose room, and rooms for music, art, reading improvement, speech therapy, and learning development. Additionally, there were administrative offices, a nurse’s office, and a teachers’ lounge.
In the early eighties there were forty teachers for the 975 students in grades kindergarten through six. By the 1985-86 school year, Karlsruhe Elementary had a staff of over seventy for the 780 students in kindergarten through sixth grade.
The ’86 yearbook was dedicated to Dr. Fred Mossinger who had been the school’s principal from 1974 until his death in 1985.
By the late eighties, the main school also had a computer lab and a compensatory education room. The school also had a new kindergarten complex.
In the 1993-94 school year, the elementary school had grades kindergarten through five when the sixth grade was moved to the Karlsruhe Middle/High School. There were 700 students in the elementary school. The main school had thirty-eight classrooms. There were three portable classrooms and a kindergarten complex. The auditorium/cafeteria at the high school served both schools.
There were only 475 students in grades kindergarten through five for the 1994-95 school year. The school closed at the end of the year.
Information from DoD School Information Guides, school yearbooks and internet resources