Donald M. Cleland A History of the Santa Monica Schools 1876-1951, Santa Monica Unified School District, February 1952 (Copied for the Santa Monica Library, July 22, 1963). 140 pp., 1932
Chapter V School Development in Adversity
When Percy R. Davis became Superintendent of Schools in 1932 Santa Monica, like the rest of the nation, was already in the throes of the financial depression which characterized most of the decade between 1930 and 1940. Future prospects for the schools were unpredictable, for lack of funds, ordinarily accruing for school purposes from various tax sources, in addition to heavy indebtedness, harassed the Board of Education and the school administration. General conditions were by no means auspicious; yet to Superintendent Davis, adversity presented a challenge that a less able man might well have found it impossible to meet. With characteristic foresight and efficiency, he began immediately to examine the issues to which he had fallen heir. Then, less than a year after his assumption of office, disaster struck. The earthquake of 1933 overnight rendered most of the schools unsafe for occupancy and added immeasurably to the new superintendent's already numerous problems. How these problems were met and in what ways the schools were further developed during these trying years, is the subject of the present chapter.