Landsberg ES History
Opened: 1947
Closed: 1958
In 1947, the United States Air Force established an Air Base Group at Landsberg as a detached unit for Erding Air Base. In 1949, the base was designated as Landsberg Air Base. The American base became a German Training Center in 1955. The school was located on Saarburg Kaserne on the western bank of the Lech River in Landsberg. The school occupied a former two-story office building that had a basement where the cafeteria and a few classrooms were located and a huge, open attic. The Kaserne had housed displaced persons in the years immediately following WWII.
The school had grades one through eight, and high school students were dorm students who attended Munich High School.
The students were bused from Landsberg Air Base (about five miles away and on the other side of the Lech River) and from requisitioned apartment buildings in neighboring towns. Also, there were several Saarburg Kaserne apartment buildings which housed military families.
The principal for the 1954-55 school year was Fred Z. Harris, and there were 233 students enrolled. From 1955 to 1957 there were enough students to have two classes at each grade level. However, as the base mission was turned over to the Germans, American officers and enlisted were reassigned elsewhere in Europe or returned stateside. During the 1957-58 school year the twenty-four sixth through eighth grade students were combined into one classroom. Raymond Schlieben was the principal from 1955–1958.
According to Michael P. Hoffman, Lt Col USAF-Retired, a student at the school from 1955–1958:
We had a nice playground in front of the school with the standard swings, slides, and seesaws. We had two elephant-shaped monkey bars that had slides coming out of them like elephants' trunks. There was plenty of grass for games, an asphalt basketball court, and a Little League baseball diamond. There was a gym about a block away, but the school didn't use it much. When the weather was bad, the teachers would let us play in the huge attic of the building. We used [to] have regular snowball wars in front of the school, because this was southern Bavaria and it snowed a lot.
The teachers lived in special apartments on the air base, right across from the Officers' Club.
The dependent school was closed in 1958.
Information from online resources and student Michael P. Hoffman, Lt Col USAF-Retired