Division Street at Ward Road

When Lucretia Wood opened the first school on the Island in 1836 with ten pupils, no one could have predicted that in the next century and a half enrollment would peak at over 200 and then diminish to less than twenty. By the same token, until 1901, the year the Estes School was opened, at least four public primary and one high school had operated. In addition, for a time, two parochial schools (Lutheran and Roman Catholic) also existed.

However, since 1901, all of the primary and secondary grades have been consolidated at the Estes School (current enrollment, 1992, is 16). Though the current local school curriculum meets all basic state standards, high school students interested in vocational training fly daily back and forth to the F. Hove school on the mainland and, in recent years, students also have been ferried by air to parochial schools in Sandusky.

   
From Kelleys Island, A Tour Guide