Former P.S. 9 (now North Star Academy Middle School)

The red brick building at 249 Sterling Place, on the northwest corner with Vanderbilt Avenue, opened in 1868 as Public School 9. The early Romanesque style building with its arched entryway was built around the same time as the nearby Grand Army Plaza and Prospect Park. P.S. 9 was established in the 1830s; its former building was incorporated into Prospect Park. Mrs. Jane Dunkley, the first principal in the new school building, was the first woman to become the principal of a large grammar school in Brooklyn. While no longer a grammar school, the former P.S. 9 building was being used as a special high school by the early 2000s, and now houses I.S. 340, North Star Academy Middle School. The building was named a New York City landmark in 1978 and is within the Prospect Heights National Register Historic District.

Purchase of the land and construction of P.S. 9 on the northwest corner of Sterling Pl. and Vanderbilt Ave. cost the City of Brooklyn nearly $100,000, the most that had been spent up to 1868 on a public school. The building was designed by Samuel B. Leonard. The principal of the school, Mrs. Jane Dunkley, wrote to the Brooklyn Board of Education in September 1867 asking for a raise because she had 1,300 children in her department. The board passed a resolution in October 1867 granting Mrs. Dunkley a salary of $1,000 for the year that began on September 1st. Mrs. Dunkley had been hired in 1862 to take the place of a teacher at P.S. 15 who resigned that February. Her husband, Leonard Dunkley, served as Principal of P.S. 16. Mrs. Dunkley was later appointed Principal of the Primary Department at P.S. 15. Ill health caused Mrs. Dunkley to resign as Principal of P.S. 15 in late 1871; she passed away of apoplexy in early 1872 at her home on Dean St. That left only one school in Brooklyn led by a female principal, a Miss Humphrey. The principal of P.S. 9 was A.S. Higgins by July 1877 when 11 students graduated.

The neighborhood population grew rapidly in the late nineteenth century, and an additional 14,000 square feet was built onto the structure in 1887. By that time, the neighboring lot on Sterling Pl. contained the Home for Destitute Children; that institution's building has been replaced with a six-story apartment building. The principal of P.S. 9 in 1896 was Frank L. Greene. An annex building for P.S. 9 was built in 1895 across Vanderbilt Avenue at 279 Sterling Pl., designed by James W. Naughton. The annex became P.S. 111, serving kindergarten and primary grades, relieving some of the overcrowding at P.S. 9. The annex building, made of red brick, sandstone, and terra cotta, is part of the Prospect Heights Historic District and has been converted into 21 co-op residences named "Public School 9 Annex."

P.S. 9 elementary school later relocated from Sterling Place and is now located on Underhill Avenue. The former P.S. 9 building is now known as I.S. 340. It contains North Star Academy Middle School, a New York City Department of Education public school, and has an enrollment of about 200 students in grades six through eight. The two-story building contains 16 classrooms, a basement cafeteria, a second-floor auditorium, and a 2,200-square-foot gymnasium; the school building is not handicapped accessible and has no outdoor playground.

Anonymous. "Board of Education." Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn) February 12th 1862. 2-2.

Anonymous. "Board of Education." Brooklyn Union (Brooklyn) October 2nd 1867. 4-4.

Anonymous. "Personal. Dunkley." Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn) January 23rd 1872. 12-12.

Anonymous. "Obituary. Dunkley." Times Union (Brooklyn) February 16th 1872. 2-2.

Anonymous. "The Schools...Public School No. 9." Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn) July 3rd 1877. 1-1.

Anonymous. "Died. Rudiger-Greene." Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn) November 21st 1896. 7-7.

Anonymous. "The Diphtheria Outbreak." Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn) March 23rd 1898. 16-16.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle Editor. "Questions Answered." Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn) December 20th 1896. Letters to Editor sec, 29-29.

NYC Department of Education. Welcome to North Star Academy Middle School 340! January 1st 2022. Accessed February 5th 2022. http://www.ms340.org/bio/home.

NYC Department of Education. Architectural Inspection I.S. 340...227 Sterling Place, Building Condition Assessment Survey 2020 - 2021. July 4th 2021. Accessed February 5th 2022. https://survey.nycsca.org/bcas/enc_rpts/K874_A.pdf.

NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission. Designation Report LP-0975, Public School 111, 249 Sterling Place, Borough of Brooklyn. NYC Landmarks. New York, NY. New York City Government, 1978.

Sanborn Map Company. Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from Brooklyn, Kings County, New York, Volume 6, Library of Congress Map Collection. January 1st 1888. Accessed February 5th 2022. https://www.loc.gov/item/sanborn05791_006/.

Street Easy. Building: Public School 9 Annex, StreetEasy. January 1st 2022. Accessed February 5th 2022. https://streeteasy.com/building/public-school-9-annex.