Little White Schoolhouse Maintenance Fund

The Little White Schoolhouse, a nationally registered historic site built in 1923, is over 100 years old and now houses the Conifer Historical Society and Museum. The property includes a historic barn, pump house and an archives building. Your donation will ensure this building lasts another 100+ years, funding things like painting, staining, roofing, insulation, plumbing, heating, landscaping and snow removal. We also welcome volunteers to do this work as in-kind donations.

Little White Schoolhouse History

Residents of present-day Conifer first filed for a school district in 1860, founding the area's education that expanded to 5 one-room schoolhouses and eventually modern-day schools.

In 1922, Conifer School District No. 9 approved funds to build the first purpose-built school in the area when John J. Mullen (nephew of well-known Denver philanthropist J.K. Mullen) offered a loan of his land adjacent to his yellow barn. Previously all others had served as gathering places and churches outside of school hours.

With the funds and the land, the Junction Schoolhouse was built in 1923 and replaced the prior school located near today's Hwy 285 and Kitty Drive (formerly a Reformed Latter Day Saints church).

A barn was built in the 1930s to house the animals that the teacher and students rode to school, including the horse that the teacher would previously bring into the basement while teaching upstairs.

The school functioned as a one-room schoolhouse until 1955 when West Jefferson Elementary opened nearby. It then served as an overflow classroom as the area's population grew. In 1965 the Jefferson County School District converted the Junction Schoolhouse to a preschool and library and it operated as a preschool until 2012. At this time it was deeded to the Conifer Historical Society which has invested thousands of volunteer hours and significant sums of money towards maintenance and historic preservation.