The Monticello High School was recently torn down. The building was
completed in 1878 at a total cost of $20,000. Water was piped into the
building in 1881 and in 1882 a furnace was added.
They discovered a bas relief in one
of the upper rooms that was a real work of art. It was a plaster relief
of a panel of the Iowa Soldiers Memorial (Civil War) that was done with
permission from the artist. One of Monticello's Civil War soldiers was
used as a model for one of the soldiers pictured. (Farwell I believe was
his name). The relief was saved, but the building is now gone.
When I was in High School it was the Masonic Temple and we had hot lunch
in the lower portion of the building. The High School that I went to was
built in the late 1920's and now it is the middle school. The good
people of Monticello Community have spent their hard earned money and
built a new high school across from the Monticello cemetery along Hwy.
38.
There is a very impressive alumni association at Monticello,
and they have written a book that details all the teachers, staff,
students from each graduating class and a general history of the changes
in the school itself. They usually sell the book at the annual Alumni
Banquet that honors each class in their ten, twenty, twenty-five,
thirty, forty, fifty and sixty post graduation years.
