School Days 50 Years Ago

A school was one of the first things on the agenda when Joseph Naper's group settled here. But by the time of the population boom in the 1960’s, it was obvious that the current schools were not sufficient to educate the children of all these new families.

In 1966, the city served 6,267 students and was quickly running out of space in which to educate them. That year, ground was broken to build Mill Street Elementary School after voters okayed a $1,049,375 referendum. Mill welcomed its first students in the fall of 1967 even though the building wasn’t yet completed.

Mill Street School is of course named after Mill Street which in turn was named after Joseph Naper’s mill on the banks of the DuPage River. It was originally a saw mill to help build the city Naper envisioned, but it was later also a grist mill for grinding flour.

While named Mill Street, the school was dedicated to Edna C. Wunder who was a student in Naperville and later also a teacher and principal. She started teaching in 1896 at $35 per month and went on to have a 45 year career, including terms as principal at Naper Academy and Ellsworth school before retiring in 1941.

Local higher education also got a boost in 1966 with both College of DuPage and Waubonsee Community College launching that year. While neither school held classes until 1967, they were pulling together staff and resources that first year.

The Waubonsee name was chosen from 600 entries in a “name the school” contest. It means “early day” and was the name of a local Pottawatomie chief.

Rodney K. Berg was the first president of COD, overseeing the early years and the establishment of the Glen Ellyn campus. Before then, classes were held in various rented spaces and students had to run all over town to attend class. Which is why the COD mascot is a roadrunner!

North Central College within city limits is a much older institution. It was founded in 1864 and then moved to Naperville from Plainfield in 1870. Don Shannower was a professor at North Central who in 1966 worked with students from the college to start a summer theatre program -- the birth of Summer Place Theatre!