History

Our History

The Schoolhouse Children’s Museum is housed in one of the first schools in Boynton Beach. With the many South Florida neighborhood schools of today, it’s hard to imagine all the town’s children attending the same school.      
                
But that is how our history began…

1913   
The Boynton School is constructed to replace the wooden one-room schoolhouse. The “new” Boynton School contained two floors, six rooms, indoor plumbing and served as Boynton’s only school for the next fourteen years, during which attendance increased steadily. The school principal and three teachers divided the classes by grade level to handle the increasing attendance.  The teachers were assigned to grades 1 through 8 and the principal taught grades 9 through 12.

1926   
A High School was built next door, opening in 1927, and the name of the Boynton School was changed to the Boynton Elementary School.

1990
The Boynton Elementary School closed, though the building continued to be used for community programs.

1994
The Boynton Beach Elementary School was added to the National Register of Historic Places thanks to the efforts of the Boynton Beach Historical Society and local supporters. That same year, the Palm Beach County School Board transferred the title to the property to the City of Boynton Beach, which sparked a movement to raise funds and create plans for the building to be restored and converted to a children’s museum. Through the commitment and effort of a dedicated group of supporters, funds were raised to establish a South Florida history-based Children’s Museum located in the original Boynton School building.

2001
The Schoolhouse Children’s Museum opened.  Since then, hundreds of thousands of children and families have visited the museum, where Learning is an Adventure, enjoying the wide range of programs and exhibits housed in the old Boynton School.