Abandoned school in Louisiana

Clinton High School 1938 building, Clinton Louisiana

Date added: June 16, 2023 Categories: Louisiana School

Although Clinton traces its establishment to 1824, settlement in the region occurred as early as the 1790s when the area which would become East and West Feliciana parishes was ruled by Spain. During that decade, Lewis Yarbrough and a group of Anglo-Americans from Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia cleared land and built homes along Pretty Creek, a tributary of the Comite River.

Clinton's founding can be traced to the division of Feliciana Parish into East and West Feliciana by act of the Louisiana Legislature in 1824. Commissioners appointed to select a location for East Feliciana's parish seat chose a site on high land owned by Lewis Yarbrough slightly east of Pretty Creek. Citizens Susan Bostwick and James Holmes purchased land from Yarbrough, then commissioned a surveyor to lay out the town of Clinton. The entrepreneurs also donated a square to be the site of the courthouse and jail.

Early milestones in the community's history included the destruction of the first courthouse by fire in 1839: the construction of the still-used, majestic Greek Revival courthouse with a domed cupola in 1840; the arrival of banking in the 1840s; and the completion of the Clinton and Port Hudson Railroad (also in 1840).

Like many Louisiana towns, Clinton's early economy centered upon the products grown on surrounding plantations. The railroad carried cotton, East Feliciana's main product, to the Mississippi River where it was loaded on steamboats bound for New Orleans. In 1858 the total shipped ranged between twenty and twenty-five thousand bales. By the end of the antebellum period, Clinton was a town to be reckoned with. According to DeBow's Southern and Western Review of September 1851, it did more business than any other Southern town of equal size. By 1858 the community supported two weekly newspapers, two buggy and carriage manufacturers, a livery stable, several private schools, a large hotel, and the governmental and judicial functions of the parish.

This prosperity ended with the war of 1861-1865. During the battle for Port Hudson, the Marston House and Silliman Institute (see below) in Clinton served as Confederate hospitals. Once Baton Rouge was occupied in 1862, Clinton suffered foraging raids by Union soldiers. By the end of the war fire had destroyed the town's depot and the majority of its business district. After the war prosperity returned slowly to Clinton, but not as slowly as in some places in the South. By 1870 newspapers were again available and private schools (see below) had reopened. Using hired freedmen as laborers, East Feliciana planters revived the cotton growing industry. By the 1890s the town had several large mercantiles, as well as a brick and tile company, a cotton thread mill, and a large cotton seed oil mill. During the early years of the twentieth century coffee roasting and soft drink bottling plants contributed to the economy. The 1940s saw the arrival of the lumber industry, which stimulated the opening of several new businesses. However, Clinton followed the pattern seen in many small towns in the 1950s and 1960s as the commercial focus shifted to highway shopping strips and the local economy suffered.

Although its first several schools were private, Clinton's residents recognized the importance of education early. A girls' school opened in 1832; by 1858 the community hosted three private schools for girls and two for boys. Best known of the girls' schools was Silliman Female Collegiate Institute, a private school that operated from 1852 until 1931. A large (for its time) public school offering all grades opened in 1903 in a two-story frame structure. By the 1930s the frame school was far too small. Its auditorium had been subdivided as classroom space, additional classes had expanded into several small nearby structures, and all of the buildings were bursting with students. Education officials recognized that a larger school was needed. A new brick and concrete facility (the candidate) opened in 1938. The architect was Herman J. Duncan; the builder, was W. M. Bozeman.

Clinton's residents considered their public school the heart of their small community (population of 998 in 1940). According to several older residents interviewed for this nomination, three factors contributed to this attitude. First, Clinton's adults were sincerely interested in the town's young people, and the youths' activities centered upon the school. Second, the building was the place for any community activity of any size. (The only other possible space was the courtroom in Clinton's antebellum courthouse, but part of its area was taken up with facilities for judicial officials and juries.) Finally, as more than one person explained, "There wasn't anything else." Therefore, once the 1938 school opened, it became the focus of the community. And when school consolidation began in the early 1940s, people from throughout East Feliciana Parish came to feel the same way. Children targeted the school for their Halloween pranks. All residents supported the institution's activities, including turning out for graduation ceremonies whether one had a child graduating or not. Of course, sports were a special focus. When Clinton High School's football team competed for the state championship around 1950, the whole parish "emptied" because the game was being played in North Louisiana. Interest was so intense that a telephone operator relayed the score to those few people forced to remain behind.

Presentations that were not school-related drew large audiences to the school's auditorium. The interviewees remembered dance recitals, musicals, plays, minstrel shows, talent shows, style shows and weightlifting meets as being presented in the auditorium. However, the memory which generated the most smiles during the interviews was that of several "womanless weddings." These were hilarious spoofs of weddings in which young men and boys played all the roles. Some of these entertainments were used as fund-raisers as well as social events. Although students often took part, adults from the broader community also participated in the entertainment. Again, these were community-wide events, not school events. The school also served as the center of more serious activities. For example, the interviewees remember that a large Masonic convention held in Clinton used the auditorium as its meeting space. And during World War II, for example, it was to the school that people delivered scrap rubber and metal they collected for war materiel drives.

The high school's role as the social focus of the community lasted into the 1950s. However, as television and other types of entertainment became available, people began to look elsewhere for social activity and entertainment. The school continued in operation until the 1980s, when a new facility on the outskirts of town replaced it. However, the new institution does not inspire the affection and loyalty its predecessor generated in the community. In the days before television and the Internet, school activities and public entertainment were eagerly awaited diversions in rural and small-town America, and Clinton and East Feliciana Parish were no exception. Thus, the 1938 school is greatly cherished by those who remember it as more than an educational institution; for they remember it as the very center of the town's (and later the parish's) community life.

The 1938 Clinton High School has been vacant since the 1980s. Clinton officials are currently studying the possibility of restoring the building as a community center.

Building Description

The 1938 Clinton High School, a restrained example of the Classical Revival style, faces a heavily traveled road a few blocks southeast of downtown Clinton. A large lawn or playground separates it from the highway. Because the brick and concrete building is sited at the edge of a low hill, the lowest of its three stories is an above-ground basement. The building has received some additions at the rear and is deteriorated on the interior.

A word of explanation is necessary regarding the reference to the building as the 1938 school. Three public high schools, two of which are historic, survive in Clinton. The oldest is a two-story frame structure constructed in 1903. This building is the town's second public school; it opened in 1938 after the original building and its satellite structures became too small to hold the student body. The current Clinton High School dates to the 1980s. Construction dates are used as part of the names in order to distinguish the institutions from each other.

The simply styled building is rectangular in shape and has a hipped roof with overhanging eaves. Its Classical ornament includes: 1) rustication elaborated in concrete on the previously mentioned above-ground basement story, 2) a belt course surmounting the rustication, 3) a second belt course that encircles the original building at the level of the second-story window sills, and 4) a central portico. The latter is composed of two pairs of colossal Tuscan columns that support a molded entablature and a pediment with a raking cornice. The entrance behind the portico is reached by a grand flight of concrete stairs. These ascend to a mid-level landing from three directions, then turn and rise in a single flight to the portico's floor. Bands of large windows with multiple panes pierce the school's middle and upper stories. The windows piercing the above-ground basement are much smaller than those above.

The school's floor plan is different on each level. The main (second) floor contains a range of classrooms paralleling the facade. A narrow central hall leads from the main entrance to a wide, two-story auditorium filling the central portion of the building's rear. Two very large skylights pierce the roof above the auditorium. Vestibules flank the auditorium's rear stage and link the auditorium to the rear exits. Additional classrooms are grouped off the sides of the auditorium. Staircases leading to the upper floor and the basement are found at each end of the building. The upper story is similar to the main floor, in that classrooms parallel the facade on this level. The upper hallway overlooks the auditorium and stage and, despite its narrow depth, was used as a balcony as well as a hall. Interior decorative treatments include plaster walls above beaded board wainscots and a leaf motif decorating the molding surrounding the stage. Otherwise, the interior is unadorned. The basement story contains boys' and girls' restrooms, two classrooms, a mechanical room, several storage areas, and a large (roughly finished) area where movies were shown to the student body.

When the student body outgrew the 1938 building, the school board added frame classrooms to the rear of the upper level. Other alterations include the installation of acoustical ceiling tiles, the attachment of a runway (similar to those used in beauty pageants) to the stage, the subdivision of some of the classrooms, and a general state of deterioration caused by lack of maintenance.