The Calder Elementary School serves the Calder area students

Calder, first known as Elk Prairie before it was changed, is located four miles upriver from Hugus Creek or twenty-five miles from St. Maries on the St. Joe River. A homesteader named Holbrook with a family of a wife, and three daughters staked his claim on the meadow. He ran a small store and dining room with several bunkhouses to rent. In 1906 tracks were laid down along the course of the St. Joe River by the Milwaukee Puget Sound Railroad. A construction crew was stationed in Calder the next couple of years and added a small depot and a good-sized section house at the town’s location by the railroad. For a while the railroad stuck to the name “Elk Prairie”, but the confusion with similar names and the dislike of two-word stations led them to change the name to Calder, after a railroad executive. The settlement of Calder grew with the help of many families such as the Buells, Lathams, Taylors, and Prays, who came to call the place home.

In 1912 Frank Buell came to work for the Milwaukee Lumber Company to take care of the horses. He soon realized that there was no school for his children so he asked for an assistant and chose a man with eight children, which then warranted a school. The first school was stationed at what is now Billy Poul’s lot. Mrs. Isabelle was engaged by the residents as the first teacher.

In 1917 the present school was built on the hill above Calder on donated land because of the risk of flooding. The St. Joe area also supported schools at Herrick, Zane, Marble Creek, Mica Creek, so Calder began as a much smaller district. During the 1930’s the other districts consolidated with Calder’s district. The reasons for choosing Calder as the school site is unknown. In the early 1950’s the states school systems’ structure changed. Until then county superintendents ran the districts. Under the new state system, each district hired it’s own superintendents. At this time the state consolidated all the smaller school districts and the Avery, Calder, Clarkia school district was formed.

Students still attend school in the two story, 1917 building. A multipurpose room was added in 1977. Today Calder students have access to a computer lab wired for Internet – still rural but different.