The Mercer Island School District #400 was officially established on Sept. 1, 1941, 62 years after the first students started attending East Seattle School at what is now the old Mercer Island Boys and Girls Club.

Thanks to a special supplement of the Mercer Island Reporter in February 1998, the district’s history is presented in a timeline from 1879 to 1996, the year that work began on the renovation of Mercer Island High School. The supplement includes thoughts from community members and teachers like this one by Island resident Marian Poirier, one of many school children who traveled by ferry boat to get to high school in Seattle in the 1940s, years before Mercer Island built a high school.

“It was fun,” she said. “How many kids get to take a boat to high school?”

A special commemoration of the district’s 70 years of outstanding service to young people will be held on Nov. 10, when former school board members are invited to share in the memories of an Island institution that has become one of the top public schools in the country. The recognition will be held at 7 p.m. in the Board Room at the Administration Center.

In 1891, the average monthly teachers’ salary was $50. Eleven pupils were enrolled, and school was taught only 78 days per year.