The building to your left was originally built as a schoolhouse in 1880 in nearby Silver Reef. It also served in the mining boomtown as a place for community dances and other gatherings.
Soon after the schoolhouse was built, Silver Reef began to decline in population, and by the early 1900s the building was no longer in use. At that time, the building was divided into two parts and moved on logs pulled by horses along the road, 2 miles from Silver Reef to its present site in Leeds. For more than five decades, until 1956, it served as the Leeds Schoolhouse. During most of that time, its two classrooms housed students in eight different grades.
After the school closed, the building was leased to and used by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as a recreation center. Eventually it was remodeled and turned into a town hall and community gathering place for Leeds. The old school was reroofed and the small porch on the original building was expanded across the full length of the new town hall’s front.
LEEDS PEACHES: DID YOU KNOW? In the 30s, 40s, and 50s when the peach farming was booming in Leeds, peaches from the community were shipped throughout the West via rail from Cedar City. The local people working in the orchards and packing the bushel baskets with ripening peaches became curious about the cost consumer’s were paying for their peaches. So they began writing notes in the bottom of the baskets asking for people to write them back and let them know what they were paying. It was common to receive replies from as far away as Texas and Michigan. Compliments about how good the peaches tasted were often included with the replies.
There are two historic markers out front:
Located at 218 North Main Street in Leeds, Utah.
