Historic Cambria school house settles into new home — just in time for rain storms
Cambria Historical Society members and supporters are breathing a sigh of relief now that the Old Santa Rosa Schoolhouse is on its new foundation and the roof is back in place.
There’s still more work to be done before those chores are complete, but the heavy lifting is mostly done, and just in time.
All that excitement happened Nov. 20 and 21 complete with crane, crews, a drone and photographers circling around to record the occasion for posterity.
Society board President John Ehlers said Thursday morning that he’s quite “thankful we got the roof reattached … before the rains came this year.”
Rain fell in several San Luis Obispo County locations on the day the building was lowered onto its new foundation, but the precipitation missed Cambria. More is predicted as the rainy season takes aim at the Central Coast.
Lowering the building was crucial and painstakingly slow. But it wasn’t nearly as dramatic for observers as when the crane lifted the roof, which swayed and swung a bit as it was moved back onto the structure.
A crunch here and there indicated that some additional minor fixes would be needed, and the height of some support beams meant the roof couldn’t be fully settled yet.
With the roof nearly in place and the structure mostly reassembled, Ehlers said contractor Carl Brandt will put it “under a tarp, to start tweaking inside. Each rafter has to be put back in place.”
That’s just part of the interior work to be done over the winter. “We won’t be reroofing it until spring,” Ehlers said, with the actual dates dependent on the schedules of Brandt’s other jobs.
Eventually, “We’ll restore the cupola,” which also needs tender loving care, Ehlers said, and then “outfit the schoolhouse as a museum with old school desks, a teacher’s desk” and more.
“We have some of that collected already,” he said, stored in a warehouse unit and Seatrain container.
Schoolhouse move and fundraising
The one-room, circa 1881 structure was moved in pieces in October about a mile down Main Street to its permanent home, a 6-acre site near the intersection of Main Street and Santa Rosa Creek Road, at the foot of the winding eastern entrance to East Village and downtown. A dog park previously occupied the space.
That’s where the small schoolhouse is being reasssembled and lovingly returned to its former glory.
Now the process of putting that jigsaw puzzle back together has begun.
In the meantime, historical society folks continue raising money to pay for the project.
They reached their initial goal of fundraising $100,000, but Ehlers said it will cost “quite a bit more for some jaw-dropping expenses ahead, such as putting in a sewer line up to Main Street, plus an underground electrical line, plus a water line, plus all the restoration of removing 50 years of commercial use of the building and returning it to its original use.”
After decades of housing an art gallery, the charming schoolhouse will once again be in education mode, teaching students of all ages about what it was like to go to school during the Victorian era and early 1900s.
The costly move and restoration is a complex, expensive venture.
Supporters can donate to the cause via a GoFundMe fundraising campaign, “SOS: Save Our Schoolhouse,” at www.gofundme.com/f/sos-save-our-schoolhouse. Make donations by check or credit card.
For details, call the Cambria Historical Society’s museum at 805-927-2891 or go to www.cambriahistoricalsociety.com and www.facebook.com/cambriahistoricalsociety.
