Unique in its kind, the school building dedicated to the illustrious Ligurian writer Edmondo De Amicis dates back to the early twentieth century – completed at the beginning of 1913 and inaugurated in May of the same year – and is built according to the Art Nouveau style. In this sense, the central parapet in stone, with stylized floral motifs, the handrails of the double stairway, which end with elegant scrolls, and the classical architectural friezes, are particularly noteworthy. Currently the structure houses the Comprehensive Institute of the country, with elementary and middle classes; in the basement rooms a small school gym and the rehearsal room for the local band “Gastone Greganti”, founded in 1846, have been created.
In 1905, the Municipality began to reason concretely on the urgent need to acquire a new school complex for elementary education; shortly after, in 1908, the City Council decided to establish it in the area usually reserved for the cattle market. Finally, in November 1909 funding from the Cassa depositi e prestiti arrives and the project can be put in hand, entrusted to the engineer, as well as politician, Guido Albertelli of Parma (the task for the execution of the work is given to the local firm Ignazio Bucari). Behind the new elementary schools, the sports field is also created – called Campo Boario or Campo della Fiera – for the athletic training of young students.
Once the work was completed (May 1913), it was decided to inaugurate the building with great public celebrations that lasted all day, in conjunction with the traditional tree festival, established in 1903. After the official celebrations and speeches in the morning, the In the afternoon, citizenship was also able to attend a cycling race, organized for the occasion, and participate in a tombola in support of the school patronage, and then move all to the Alfieri Theater, where a dramatic show is staged in the evening.
Once again, the merit of this operation with great civil and cultural value is to be attributed to Giovanni Battista Marotti (1834-1908) – who in 1890 had already promoted the construction of the nursery school, a few meters away from the elementary school E. De Amicis and that, after his death, he had left to the Commune a grant of fifty thousand lire for school education in the country – and to his administration, since they had provided in time (already in 1902) to also guarantee the service of school canteen for the poorest students of Montemarciano, in addition to the supply of clothing for the poor students of the villages. The school menu provides in those years the free distribution (guaranteed until April) of 190 grams of bread, a “modest 20-gram salty” for the first three days of the week and cheese in the remaining two days of Thursday and Friday; the possibility of serving soup is also taken into consideration.
This is in principle the scholastic situation of the small town of the Marches who, in the context of general backwardness that characterizes Italy at the beginning of the twentieth century, has sought as best as possible to promote literacy and offer some more redemption possibilities. to the very young students who still depended heavily on work in the fields, alongside their fathers and relatives.
With the outbreak of the First World War, the new primary school is temporarily converted into a military reserve hospital for Ancona, with a capacity of 200 beds, a function that maintains from 1916 to 1918.