Joseph W. Guyton School was named after Joseph VV. Guyton, a Michigan resident who was the first American soldier killed on German soil during the First World War.

The original unit was constructed in 1922 at a cost of $145,265, the equivalent to $2,700,000 in 2024 dollars. It opened on Jan 2, 1923 to serve about 400 students organized into twelve sections under a platoon plan, with twelve non-platoon rooms, a kindergarten, conservatory, and office.

What was intended as the school's main section was completed in 1925 at a cost of $247,855 (~4,6Mio in 2024). It brought the building up to thirty-one rooms, including an auditorium, gymnasium, library, playroom, kitchen, and lunchroom.

It housed nearly 1,200 students in the kindergarten through eighth grade, in twenty-four sections, one non-platoon room, and one kindergarten room. In April 1957, $4,500 was spent on alterations to add an instrumental music room, gym offices, and a new teacher's rest room. By this time, however, enrollment was down to around 900 students.

As colorfully depicted in an account by the Detroit Board of Education in 1937, "The Guyton School is really a beautiful building, of English Tudor design. It has huge playgrounds at the north and south, a beautiful lawn in front, and at the rear the Guyton Garden, which has long been one of the loveliest school gardens in the city. Shrubbery and trees are very well placed. Silvery poplars at the front entrances and at the garden entrance rise to the green slate roof and make the approaches to the school as attractive as school portals should be."

Guyton closed in 2009.