Locals Lament Impending Loss of Historic Hatfield School

A Hatfield landmark will likely face the wrecking ball.

The Biblical Theological Seminary, at 2600 Cowpath Road–straddling Hatfield’s Borough-Township line–has changed its name to Missio Seminary and is moving to Philadelphia. It’s selling the building that has housed it since 1971.

But long before that, when its doors originally opened in 1922, that squared-off, three-story structure was known as the Hatfield Joint Consolidated School. It was built by the Hatfield Borough and Hatfield Township school boards to serve a growing post-WWI population.

Hundreds of area youths graduated from the school in the three-plus decades it was operated as a first- to 12th-grade institution. Numerous more passed through its portals between 1958, when it became E.B. Laudenslager Elementary after North Penn High opened, and 1970, when the new Hatfield Elementary School was built nearby and the Theological Seminary took up residence.

“Supposedly it was a state-of-the-art facility in its day,” said Larry Stevens, president of the Hatfield Museum & Historical Society. “Previous to the 1920s, Hatfield Borough had its own school and Hatfield Township had a number of one-room schoolhouses. They decided to come together to build one school for both borough and township students.”

 ”It was written that it was the finest school building between Philadelphia and Bethlehem,” said Stevens. “Apparently, it was quite impressive.”

Recent posts on the society’s Facebook page about the school’s past and future spurred comments lamenting the loss of yet another site considered critical to the area’s evolution. A New Jersey company, PIRHL Developers, has the site under contract of sale.

Preliminary plans show a 112-unit age-restricted apartment complex on the 4.17-acre tract, with two new structures of 56 units each—one on the borough side of the line, one on the township side—replacing the school building.

“It’s been going on maybe a year and a half that they’ve been talking about selling it,” said Stevens. “I imagine that, barring something very unforeseen, they’ll eventually move forward with the project.”

It is far from Hatfield’s oldest building but, Stevens says, “It still retains the character of the original. It has value in the heritage, what the building has meant to the community for so many years.”

“I’m very sorry to see it go. It’s kind of a landmark. But I guess you can’t stop progress,” said Kulp. In fact, she and Stevens and others are grateful to have had the school as long as they have, thanks to the Theological Seminary, which undertook a number of improvements to keep it habitable.

“I try to focus on the positive, the fact that the building could have been torn down after the school left,” said Stevens. “We are fortunate that the seminary was able to jump right in there, to use the building as it was, and use it almost for the last 50 years.”