Donna Public Schools

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm gonna pass it along to you. The story of Donna's public schools goes back further than the town itself, which is the kind of detail that ought to make you slow down a little and think. Six miles south of Donna, in a community called Runn, there was a school as far back as 1904.

And when those first students sat down to learn, they weren't in any schoolhouse. They were in somebody's home. Specifically, the home of A.

F. Hester, a man the marker calls a founder of Donna. Classes held in a founder's living room.

Not the worst way to start a school system, but not exactly the permanent arrangement anybody had in mind either. When the town of Donna itself came along, the earliest school for the new town opened in 1908. Teachers made do with a one-room structure and a store building.

A store building. Imagine trying to conjugate verbs with the smell of dry goods in the air. They kept at it, though, and by 1911 the first proper schoolhouse was complete.

Then in 1919, the Donna School District was officially set up, and from that point things started pulling together. The smaller schools scattered across the area began merging in, one by one. Runn itself, that original 1904 school where the whole thing started in A.

F. Hester's home, merged with Donna in 1972. The place that started it all eventually came home to it.

Today, Donna's system stands as one of Hidalgo County's leading educational systems. Started in a living room. Ended up leading the county.

That's a pretty good run.

What the marker says

The present school system for the town of Donna can be traced to a 1904 school in the Runn community (6 mi. S). Classes were first held in the home of A. F. Hester, a founder of Donna. The earliest school for the new town opened in 1908. Teachers held classes in a one-room structure and a store building until completion of the first schoolhouse in 1911. The Donna School District was set up in 1919. Since then, several early area schools, including Runn in 1972, have merged with Donna. It is now one of Hidalgo County's leading educational systems.