In 1943, the first public school was built in Bellevue. This was Walter B. Patterson Elementary School, built on a site at Chesapeake Street SW and Nicholls Avenue SW (now Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue SW). Due to critical resource shortages caused by World War II, the structure was meant to be temporary. Despite its small size, more than 900 students crowded into it. Even the site was a poor one: Planes taking off from Bolling Field roared over the school, and school and military officials warned about damage to children's hearing and the potential for a plane crash. City officials wanted to build a much larger elementary school on the east side of Bellevue, on a site bounded by South Capitol Street, South Capitol Terrace, Danbury Street, and Elmira Street, but had no funds to do so. But local anger over the site was so great that just six months after the school opened, D.C. officials asked the federal government for $430,000 to build a new, permanent structure at the South Capitol Street site. The request was granted, and the school was open by fall 1946.