History

Louis C. Saeger

Louis Saeger

Prior to opening, the future students of Saeger Middle School were given the opportunity to write a fifty word or less essay on what they thought the school should be named. After screening all of the submitted essays, our school was named by a sixth grade student in 1997. The following essay was approved by the school board for the new name of our school:

"Louis C. Saeger was important to the Francis Howell School District. He taught there in a one room school house, first through eighth grade. He taught for 53 years, 1877 to 1930. Even when segregation was the law, he taught both blacks and whites. He was also the first county school commissioner."

Louis C. Saeger was a consistent leader in the community. Between 1877 and 1930 he had accomplished many things for the community, not only in education but in other areas as well. He started a move that resulted in the establishment of agricultural extension work in St. Charles County. He served as the first secretary of the extension board. He organized the first boys' and girls' 4-H Club in the state of Missouri.

Farmers in the area were having difficulties with hunters and berry pickers going on their property without permission, then leaving gates open. This was a risk to the farmers for two reasons: cattle and other stock often got out and the fear of someone getting shot by a stray bullet. Eventually, and largely at Saeger's urging, the concerned farmers met one evening at the school house. This meeting resulted in the "Friedens Precinct Protective Association". The local newspaper, one of a half dozen at the time (two of them German), cooperated with publicity.

Even after Louis C. Saeger no longer held the office of county school commissioner, the esteem in which he was held made it almost inevitable that he would continue on the three-member county board of educators and the county textbook commission. His duties with the board normally involved routine meetings; but, by contrast, his duties on the textbook commission was much more complexed. This entailed months of high pressure work, because he scrutinized the sample books submitted by book publishers carefully and conscientiously before he felt prepared to recommend an adoption.

From 1888 until his retirement Louis C. Saeger had been a voluntary weather observer of the
U. S. Weather Bureau. After he had a telephone installed his daily weather reports appeared in the St. Charles newspapers.

This information was gathered from a book written by Louis C. Saeger's son, Armin.

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