Tag: Madison Ave. School

Madison Avenue School – Irvington, NJ

Madison 1960s
The school in the 1960s

buttonMadison Avenue School is at the corner of Orange Ave. and Madison Ave.  It was a K-6 school for many years. This was my elementary school and when I was in kindergarten in 1958-59, we were in the “new” building that was at the corner of Madison and Cummings St. that held the Kindergaten, first and second-grade classes. We had two classes per grade.

The original building was closed in 2013 and in need of many updates and repairs. It was determined that the cost of retrofitting the buildings to the current state requirements was cost-prohibitive. So, students from that area were sent to  Mt. Vernon Ave. School as a “swing” school during demolition and construction.

The Madison Avenue School buildings (original building and K-2 addition) were demolished in 2016. The new building was opened in September 2019 and is now a pre-K through grade 5 school.

If you are a Madison Avenue School graduate from any year, consider joining our Facebook group and join in the conversation and see many more photos of the school, classes and the neighborhood.

1947
In 1947, Joan Gritz is checking out here new school for kindergarten. This was the entrance on Orange Ave. where many of us enter to spend time on the playground before school started.
The Halloween parade

classroom
In a classroom, back in the day
classroom
Classic classroom – remember those desks, the handwriting border, those clocks that we stared at hoping for 3 PM…
cake walk
The cakewalk at the annual fall carnival where you walked around a painted circle on the playground to music and when the music stopped a number determined who won one of the home-baked cakes.
carnival
Parents ran all the concessions and games at the carnival. Here a father is cooking burgers and hot dogs.
madison at mt vernon
Madison at Mt. Vernon
The newer building at Cummings when the school was closed before its demolition.
aerial view
The school in its final years of using the original buildings. (Aerial view via Google Maps 2015)

Demolition begins 2016

Demolition September 2017

Plan for the new building
Construction April 2018
new construction from the Cummings St. corner

The new building – September 2019.

The new Madison
new
The new building as seen from a car driving down Madison and crossing Orange Avenue.
new
The playground side as seen from Madison Ave.
playground
Quite different from the old playground!

playground

Remember Those Elementary Class Photos?

Remember these class photos that were taken each year or assembled from all of our individual photos?

They are a great remembrance of our first 8 years in school?  (Did they do this in kindergarten? If so I can’t find any copies.)  I have unfortunately lost some of mine, but I have gotten a few others from my elementary school (Madison). There is also one here from Grove St. (with little Mike Emanuele, our indefatigable Reunion 50 detective).

If you have yours and would like to make a copy and send it to us, we’ll post them on this site for others.  (Tech Note: I recommend the free Google app called Photo Scan to copy your old photos. Free for Android and Apple phones and much better than just taking a picture of a picture.)

Madison 1960 Grade 1 Ms. Nusbaum
Madison
Madison
Madison
Madison
Madison
Madison
Grove St. 1966-67 Grade 8 Ms. Freda