WATSONVILLE—The historic 1903 Roache schoolhouse is on the move, once again.
In order to make way for heavy equipment and ground moving, the building at 221 Airport Blvd. was recently hoisted across the property and now sits perched on cribbing at the edge of Airport Boulevard as work gets underway on a new housing project.
The project includes 48 townhomes plus the rehabilitation and conversion of the Roache School to a residential unit, said Suzi Merriam, the city’s Community Development Department director. The project was approved by the Watsonville City Council in July 2016.
The project calls for the new homes to be situated over nine buildings. The school will be transformed into a 4-bedroom, single-family home.
Raeid Farhat Real Estate is the owner and developer of the project and the architect is Lattanzio, Inc. of Aptos.
Merriam said the current location of the schoolhouse is temporary and that it will be moved a few more times before being placed on its permanent foundation closer to the center of the site.
According to the city’s historical records, the Roache School was the first school in Freedom, then known as Whiskey Hill. It started in the parlor of the Roache family home. As the population in Whiskey Hill grew, the need for a dedicated school building became apparent and in 1867, the Moehr family donated land for the construction of a school building.
In 1903 famed architect William H. Weeks was contracted to design a new schoolhouse at the corner of Ross Road and Holly Drive—the current site of Freedom Elementary School. The schoolhouse was reconstructed in 1929 and expanded in 1936. It was eventually relocated to the Airport Boulevard location where it then became home to a church.
