NORTH ADAMS — Sisters Shirley Valotta and Nancy Howland remembered their early days at Greylock Elementary School in the 1950s, before the building add-ons and when they could walk home for lunch.

On Tuesday, the women, who still live in the neighborhood, were among a group of about 50 people celebrating a new beginning as the North Adams Public Schools  broke ground on a $55 million, 73,000-square-foot elementary school.

Bearing their own tiny shovels, a handful of local preschoolers — future Greylock students — joined in the celebration at the site of the former school building, which has been largely razed in recent days.

“We know the building is old and needed repairs and couldn't be saved,” Valotta said. “We have to think of the kids and the future.”

The city invited the community to the ceremonial groundbreaking, including the future students from nearby Connie’s Family Child Care, though demolition and site work began a few weeks ago. In its April newsletter published Monday, North Adams Public Schools announced that the school project has moved into active demolition and will soon begin pouring the foundation.

Mayor Jennifer Macksey speaks during Tuesday's groundbreaking ceremony for the new Greylock Elementary School in North Adams. Keeping cool in the shade Herbie, the unofficial construction site mascot.

“We’re marking more than the start of a construction project,” Mayor Jennifer Macksey said at the site. “We're marking the moment when years of planning, collaboration and community commitment become something real … and something that lasts long beyond any of us.”

Site preparation is underway for the new Greylock Elementary School in North Adams. Greylock Works can be seen in the background.

Constance “Connie” Tatro, who has operated Connie’s Family Child Care for over 30 years, wheeled six of her students over in a colorful wagon to be part of the ceremony.

“This is literally their future,” she said of the kids, who will be old enough to attend when Greylock is expected to reopen in the fall of 2027.

Recently, crews from general contractor Fontaine Bros. have completed the interior and exterior material abatements and started demolitions of the existing building.

“For me, it's a bittersweet time,” Valotta said. “It’s sad to see it go but like the mayor said, we have to look to the future. ... But when they started tearing it down we had tears in our eyes.”

Macksey thanked the Massachusetts School Building Association, which is covering most of the project’s cost.

“Your support and $42 million investment in little old North Adams makes this possible,” she said.

Greylock was built in 1951 and closed in 2024 after years of issues, including a faulty boiler and flooding. It hadn’t been renovated since 1955, and in 2019 Greylock was accepted on the state repair list after years of attempts by the city.

City Councilor Alexa MacDonald, center, joins her great-aunt, Shirley Valotta, left, and grandmother, Nancy Howland, right, during Tuesday's ceremony. All three women attended the Greylock Elementary School as children and reminisced about their experiences.

Howland started at Greylock in 1954 and sent her six children there, followed by many of her 15 grandchildren, including City Councilor Alexa MacDonald.

“We were still always in and out of the building even when we left,” Howland said. “It’s a great neighborhood around here and the school was the center of everything.”

Voters narrowly passed a 2024 vote to close Greylock, rebuild the school — mostly with money from the state — and reconfigure all grades into the remaining Colegrove and Brayton elementary schools. Falling enrollment drove much of the divide over the school vote: Some argued it made sense to build now with state funding, while others said a new school wasn’t needed and would burden taxpayers.

As soon as the new Greylock building is ready for students, Brayton will become a multipurpose city building of yet-to-be-determined use.

A locker from the old Greylock school has a new home in the apartment of North Adams City Councilor Alexa MacDonald, who was a student at the school beginning in 2009. MacDonald got the locker when the school closed in 2024.

MacDonald, who started at Greylock in 2009, was excited for the school’s future but took home an old blue locker and library sign during a 2024 clear-out sale.

“I think it's really sentimental,” she said. “I know people who grabbed little art supplies and knickknacks and it's just taking a piece of it with you. I grew up here, this is my entire childhood.”

And like MacDonald, Patti Lentine has lived across from Greylock her entire life and wanted to bring a part of the old school to the future.

“I had mixed feelings,” she said. “It's hard to see it go, but it will be beautiful, the new one.”

With her dog Swisher finding shade underneath, Patti Lentine sits on a newly painted ladybug, a piece of playground equipment she rescued from the grounds of the Greylock Elementary School.

When Lentine heard the equipment was being pulled up and likely destroyed, she inquired about the insect playground structures, and the district promised her one if it came out in good shape.

“I didn't really care which insect, I just wanted one,” said Lentine, who was born in 1958 and could see her house through the kindergarten classroom windows. She how has a ladybug structure from the playground that sits in her yard, overlooking Greylock’s southwest corner.

When asked why she wanted it, Lentine thought for a moment before answering, “Because it's part of the neighborhood.”

For MacDonald, the loss of her old school was bittersweet, but she said showing up for its future generations of students was important.

“A lot of people want to be involved and see potential and that's what this school is," she said. "It’s about new beginnings and pushing North Adams forward.”