Demolition began Monday on the former Ontario Elementary School building. Built in 1937, the structure served as Ontario High School until 1961, when Norwalk and Ontario formed the consolidated Brookwood High School. It then was the site of Ontario Elementary School until 1994, when the Norwalk-Ontario School District closed the Norwalk and Ontario elementary schools and consolidated them at the Brookwood site.
Money from the federal Works Progress Administration, a New Deal agency, was used to build the structure.
The building has had various owners in the years since, though it mostly has remained vacant. The Village of Ontario purchased the building in April 2019 and decided to raze it in February 2022.
The village will continue to use the school’s 1983–84 building addition as a community hall. That section contains several multipurpose rooms and a half-size gymnasium.
