In February 1928, construction work began on Lethbridge Collegiate Institute at the corner of 4 Avenue and 15 Street South. The institution would become the city's first combined junior high and high school. The site had previously been used for aviation activities in the city, until the opening of Kenyon Field (now Lethbridge County Airport) south of Six-Mile Coulee in the summer of 1939. Construction of the school at the site finished in October 1928, but a fire in the spring of 1929 ravaged the new building. Classes had to be moved to other local schools until later that year.