The original Veritas School closed in 1957 when the then new Nile Garden School campus opened.

Veritas— named after the Latin word for truth — opened on Sept. 16, 1916 as a two-room school costing $5,000 to construct.

It was located on Veritas Road that runs east-west intersecting Manteca Road (South Main Street within the city limits) south of Sedan Avenue and north of West Ripon Road.

A third classroom was added in 1925 and a fourth classroom was constructed in 1931.

In March of 1917, trustees planted 170 eucalyptus trees around the school yard.

The original trustees appointed by the county consisted of Guss Schmiedt, A.C. Jensen, and A.C. Finch.

Finch, who served for five years, is the reason the original Veritas School is more than a passing footnote in Manteca area history.

Finch kept the minutes of each meeting, adding observations — actually more like complaints — about the local events of the day.

One of his first complaints was recorded in the minutes of a 1916 meeting. He was upset that no one in attendance during the course of the meeting bothered to reference the World War.

A memo to a teacher penned by Finch suggested she teach the school children the workings of the sewer system.

Homework, he said, was not to be discarded again in the toilets adding the sewer “would not be unplugged again that year.”

Finch, based on his minute entries, pressed hard to have the school yard fenced “to keep the little hyenas in” and to protect the surrounding neighbors.

The school was closed for five weeks during September and October of 1918 due to the Great Flu Epidemic.

That fact was recorded for posterity by Finch with an entry it was “much to the enjoyment of the students who were not afflicted.”

Among his entries was this gem from September 1920: “School opened with two teachers on deck, but with poor attendance, as most kids were picking grapes, which are quite valuable this year in spite of prohibition.”

One school year, he made note in a minute book entry that they made it through the final board meeting of the term without the teacher “our dear Miss Bell” making her usual long list of complaints.

He ended the entry with the notation, “will miracles never cease.”

Other entries include two boys being caught for breaking into the school and their patents being held liable for the damages, how Hogan Road (South Manteca Road) was paved for the first time ever in 1918 while noting he doubted it would get him anywhere faster, and that the winter of 1921 was the driest on record until it March and April it rained steadily bringing more rainfall than normal.

His last entry in the minute book when leaving the school board in 1921 noted he “didn’t hear any regrets upon my departure.

After its closure in 1957, the school was sold and converted into a home. A fire in the 1960s destroyed the building.

The last new school built by Manteca Unified in Pagola Avenue south of The Promenade Shops at Orchard Valley was named after the original Veritas School. It opened in 2005.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com