Benton Community Celebrates 50th Anniversary

As we prepare for the start of the 2015-16 school year it is also important to note that Benton Community is celebrating its 50th Anniversary as a school district in 2015.   We plan on celebrating the history of the school district throughout this school year and the District certainly had an interesting start.  Below are a few of the historical highlights from the beginning of the school district.

• On March 10, 1964 the vote on the reorganization proposal of the Keystone, Van Horne, Newhall, and Blairstown School Districts carried.
• The Benton Community School District became effective on July 1, 1964.  Dale Grabinski was selected as the first superintendent of the newly formed district.
• During the 1964-65 school year each of the four former Districts operated as separate K-12 attendance centers and each had their own graduation in 1965. 
• On October 7, 1964, the Board approved the centralization of grades 10,11, 12 in Van Horne. The Board also decided to maintain three K-9 centers in Blairstown, Keystone, and Newhall.  The Board selected Phillip England as the first principal for the newly centralized high school.
• These changes went into effect for the start of the 1965-66 school year.  The first joint Benton Community graduating class was in 1966.  That summer the Benton Community Girls Softball team won the district's first state championship.