Former School in NC for African-American Students

Caswell County Training School, Yanceyville North Carolina

Date added: November 13, 2024

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Caswell County Training School (CCTS) comprising a 1949 auditorium/cafeteria wing, a 1951 main block, and a 1960 gymnasium, is the product of a statewide mid-twentieth-century campus improvement and consolidation campaign. At the time of its completion, CCTS, which then served first- through eleventh-grade African American youth, was the county's largest and best-equipped educational facility. The 1949-1951 building replaced the nearby one-story, weatherboarded, 1924 Yanceyville School, which became known as Caswell County Training School in 1934 upon attaining high school accreditation from the State Department of Public Instruction. Funding for the new school complex was insufficient, so the Caswell County Board of Education elected to first construct the 1949 auditorium and basement cafeteria, which would become the school's rear wing upon completion of the main block in 1951. The school's principal at the time, Nicholas Longworth Dillard, advocated this approach, as he feared the auditorium and cafeteria facilities would never be constructed otherwise and this would ensure the complete project's eventual execution. The gymnasium was added to the complex in 1960.

CCTS's imposing facade epitomizes the school's importance to the African American community. The expansive three-story flat-roofed red brick 1951 school designed by Raleigh architects Atwood and Weeks allowed for greatly increased enrollment capacity and manifests the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction's initiative to supply students with spacious, well-ventilated, and amply lit instructional areas. CCTS displays Modernist tenets in its form, massing, and double-loaded corridor plan. The primary entrance bay's cast-stone-panel sheathing and a stepped parapet exhibit an Art Moderne stylistic influence. The 1949 rear wing encompasses an auditorium that provided a much-needed venue to hold academic and civic events as well as a basement cafeteria that supplied separate, sanitary food service facilities for the first time in the school's history. The two-story flat-roofed red brick gymnasium designed by Winston-Salem architects Stinson-Arey-Hall provided amenities including a basketball court, physical education and health classrooms, and locker room not previously available to the county's African American students.

The 1949-1951 Caswell County Training School replaced the 1924 Yanceyville School (known as Caswell County Training School after 1934) that stood on Dillard School Drive's west side. Both schools were erected following many years of advocacy and fundraising by the African American community. In June 1924, the CCBE accepted bids for the construction of a one-story, weatherboarded, side-gable-roofed, four-classroom building. Yanceyville contractor W. E. Reagan was awarded the contract in July and soon erected the school beside the Stephens House on the edge of a ravine. The $4,828 building was the product of public-private partnerships. The Rosenwald Fund supplied $1,100 and state and county boards of education and other donors $2,890 of the project's overall cost. The African American community contributed $838, $800 of which was raised by the school's Parent-Teacher Association, organized in 1924 to facilitate the building's construction. The CCBE allocated $175 to furnish desks for five rooms of the Yanceyville and Beulah schools in April 1925. The Yanceyville building required maintenance by the late 1920s, but repairs were not undertaken until the school was expanded with a three-classroom addition in early 1930. Roll-up partition walls allowed multiple rooms to be collectively used as an auditorium.

Enrollment numbered eighty students in the fall of 1930, when twenty-four-year-old Shaw University alumnus Nicholas Longworth Dillard became Yanceyville School's principal. The faculty comprised Dillard and three female teachers including Danville, Virginia native Gladys Moore Motley, who Dillard married on December 27^th, 1934. His mission to provide a challenging yet nurturing academic environment quickly transformed the school. In addition to executing administrative duties, he taught sixth- through eighth-grade pupils. Dillard began offering eighth-grade instruction his first year and gradually introduced upper-level coursework in order to allow the class to progress from ninth through eleventh grades. Secondary education had not previously been available to Caswell County's African American residents. Dillard's pioneering pedagogical approach enabled the campus to attain high school accreditation from the State Department of Public Instruction in 1934. The institution then became Caswell County Training School.

Principal Dillard and his faculty promoted academic excellence and encouraged participation in extracurricular activities. Enrollment progressively increased. In 1934-1935, Dillard, Chattie L. Price, C. H. Couch, and William Ridley Jr. instructed 143 high school pupils in four classrooms. One of the seven 1935 graduates planned to attend normal school, a significant achievement in a county where few African American students had the opportunity to pursue higher education. Three female educators including Gladys Dillard oversaw 123 elementary school children. Youth published a newspaper called "The Monitor," played baseball and basketball, and participated in glee, drama, literary, and Hi-Y clubs. Student performances drew large audiences. The NCERA facilitated the school's repair and painting, site leveling, and grass planting that year at a cost of approximately $2,000.

Community members also supported the school through donations of money and labor. In November 1930, a delegation requested that the CCBE subsidize excavating a well for the site. However, when T. S. Lea and Peter Graves presented the $140 bill for the well's installation, the CCBE declined to reimburse them, stating that funds were not available and the plan had not been approved prior to execution. During the mid-1930s, Yanceyville School's PTA collaborated with students and faculty to provide approximately $ 530 worth of furnishings, equipment, and books. The ten classrooms were so packed that school patrons leased a "hall" to serve as auxiliary space for $16 a year. Parents also assisted with event preparations and facilitated student transportation. For about two years beginning in 1933, farmer E. C. Jones, whose children attended the school, conveyed youth from Milton to Yanceyville in a "bus" created by enclosing a truck bed. He was unable to recoup the cost, and donated the truck to the state in 1935. The PTA then purchased a bus that covered the Milton route. Similar efforts ensued to provide access to Yanceyville from other rural communities.

Thelma Johnson, who attended the school during the 1930s, remembers that students were assigned to one of two four-hour shifts, 8:00 am to noon or noon to 4:00 pm, in order to reduce overcrowding. This also allowed youth to eat at home, which was important as there was no school lunchroom. Thelma and her eleven siblings walked to campus from their farm. Most of the children attained seventh-grade certificates, but none continued through high school. Rather, they labored on the farm until establishing their own households.

Charles Blackwell took advantage of the secondary instruction offered at CCTS from 1938 until 1940. His family's farm was approximately six miles from Yanceyville. He had previously attended Iowa School, which accommodated first through seventh-grade students closer to his home. As busing was not available for CCTS students during his first two years at the school, he boarded with Jessie Lee Graves in Yanceyville. He also recalled the absence of a lunch room, and remembers purchasing snacks from a store near campus. Blackwell was able to live at home and ride the bus to CCTS during tenth grade, after which he left school and began his career as a truck driver at the age of fourteen.

CCTS was gradually enlarged in response to high enrollment, bringing the classroom total to ten by 1938. However, the facility remained inadequate in size, functionally obsolete, and was a high fire risk due its frame construction. Dillard and CCTS parents continued to advocate for a new building, first petitioning the Caswell County Board of Education and then soliciting assistance from Division of Negro Education Director Nathan Newbold. Following an August 1938 meeting with CCTS representatives, Newbold recommended that the board apply for federal funding to subsidize a new school's construction. The resulting $16,000 PWA loan was not sufficient enough to allow building to commence. However, the CCBE commissioned Raleigh architects Atwood and Weeks to render plans for the county's first brick African American high school. Howard R. Weeks presented drawings and specifications at the January 23^rd, 1940 CCBE meeting and revised them in accordance with the board's comments. The plans were then tabled pending funding availability.

CCTS students continued to excel despite facility limitations. In 1939-1940, Dillard reported that 402 of 440 registered high school pupils regularly attended classes. Students participated in glee, drama, sewing, and debating clubs and published "The Torch" newspaper. Five of the sixty-one youth who graduated in May had enrolled in a college or university and another five planned to attend a normal or industrial school. Dillard facilitated this by encouraging students to take college entrance exams, paying tuition and fees, and arranging for scholarships at institutions including his alma mater, Shaw University.

In May 1941, the Department of Public Instruction's Schoolhouse Planning Director W. F. Credle notified CCBE superintendent Holland McSwain that a $10,000 loan from the State Literary Fund would supplement the $16,000 PWA loan for a new CCTS. The CCBE deemed the frame school, which then accommodated 590 children in ten classrooms, to be a fire hazard in November 1941. The board resolution also requested that the WPA reallocate a portion of its Caswell County labor force to build the school. African American residents contributed lumber toward the effort, but World War II's escalation made additional materials and labor unavailable. Oral tradition holds that after Murphy School, which served white students, burned in March 1943, the lumber was used to construct a new structure on that campus. The CCBE engaged architect Lindsey M. Gudger to render plans for a fire-resistant Murphey School in April 1944. The CCBE authorized building material purchase for Murphey School and CCTS the following month, but work did not transpire. Although the necessity of both projects was well established, construction was postponed until 1948.

Despite the delayed availability of new facilities, Dillard implemented measures to improve CCTS. He recruited faculty with advanced degrees and encouraged them to pursue ongoing education, subsidizing conference and workshop attendance and graduate-level coursework. Dillard set an example by attaining a Master's degree in education from the University of Michigan in 1942 after spending four summers studying in Ann Arbor. He also attended national conferences and was regarded by his white North Carolina colleagues as being extremely well-versed in current educational trends. CCTS faculty joined the Caswell County Education Association, the North Carolina Teachers Association, and the National Education Association and regularly participated in local, regional, and national meetings. Dillard also brought speakers to CCTS.

CCTS accommodated a large number of students in crowded, inadequate quarters in 1945-1946.

Dillard, three male, and seven female teachers headed eleven ninth- through eleventh-grade classrooms comprising 360 youth. Pupils were still without a lunch room, gymnasium, home economics room, or indoor restrooms. CCTS's student body grew significantly after World War II, comprising 421 high school and 415 elementary school students in 1949-1950. Youth had the ability to join junior educators', library, and reading clubs. Students benefited from health care services including physical exams, glasses, dental care, and tonsillectomies provided by registered nurses and physicians.

The CCBE finally began moving toward constructing the desperately needed new school in July 1948 by authorizing the $1,800 purchase of 3.15 acres southeast of the existing building. Since funding remained insufficient, the board elected to first erect what would become the school's rear wing, containing an auditorium and basement cafeteria. Dillard advocated this approach, as he felt that it would ensure the complete project's eventual execution. Otherwise, he feared that the auditorium and cafeteria, amenities that had not previously been available to CCTS students, would never be constructed. On November 1^st, 1948, the CCBE awarded contracts to Burlington general contractor H. F. Mitchell ($46,526), Heating-Alliance Company of Durham ($4,880), and Kimsey Electrical Maintenance of Rutherfordton ($2,441). The site required extensive grading and infrastructure improvements. In order to allow for a baseball field and parking, the CCBE in July 1949 acquired 9.11 acres north and east of the 3.15-acre tract upon which the school was being erected. The wing was finished in December 1949 and immediately placed into service.

Additional school bonds were issued in 1950 to allow for the building's completion. R. H. Pinnix Construction Company executed the project with the assistance of contractors including Arrow Plumbing and Heating and L. R. Wensil Plumbing. Architectural services were a line item in the approximately $245,149 budget, but the scope is unknown and the architect has not been identified. It is likely that Atwood and Weeks' 1940 plans were simply updated as needed. The school was completed in February 1951 at a total cost of about $325,000, with the state subsidizing all but $80,000. Site landscaping valued at $10,000 was also undertaken that year.

CCTS's opening was a landmark event for the county's African American population. The community celebrated the new school at a dedication ceremony on Sunday, March 4^th, 1951, the afternoon before the building was placed into service. North Carolina College at Durham (now North Carolina Central University) Professor James T. Taylor gave the keynote address. Local officials and representatives from the State Department of Public Instruction also spoke and the school band and glee club entertained the audience. In addition to twenty-seven classrooms, the building encompassed a library, music and band rooms, home economics and vocational agriculture departments, offices, a teachers' lounge, and restrooms on all three floors. Each classroom featured coat hangers, blackboards, and built-in cabinets. PTA donations subsidized items including Venetian window blinds valued at $3,000. The auditorium had a 722-person capacity and a stage with floodlights and $1,800 curtain funded by student contributions. Advanced technology included a public address system, movie projector, and other audiovisual equipment.

The greatly improved campus allowed CCTS to achieve new standing and expanded enrollment capacity. The institution was accredited by the Southern Association of Schools and Colleges in 1955, becoming the county's only high school (black or white) with that designation. Nineteen faculty members oversaw 578 high school students in 1955-1956. Fourteen teachers instructed the elementary grades. Due to the time-intensive nature of the school's administration, Dillard relinquished his role in the classroom in the fall of 1957.

Campus improvements during the 1950s were routine, including landscaping, interior painting, and bulletin board, window screen, flagpole, entrance light, and playground equipment installation. The 1924 school briefly served as a gymnasium prior to being demolished in August 1951. Around that time, an area northeast of the school was graded to create a baseball diamond.

The CCTS PTA began petitioning for a new gymnasium in January 1956. The CCBE commissioned architects Stinson-Arey-Hall to render the plans in May 1958, but it was not until June 1959 that contracts were awarded to Greensboro general contractor N. C. Monroe Construction Company, R. A. Suggs Plumbing and Heating of Durham, City Electric of Yanceyville, and plumber Ingram's, Inc., of Durham. A sizable building that included a lobby, regulation-size basketball court, locker rooms, and physical education and health classrooms was completed in July 1960, remedying disparities in facilities available to the county's African American and white students.

Enrollment grew and opportunities for advanced academics and extracurricular activities expanded during the 1960s. In 1959-1960, the faculty comprised eleven elementary school teachers and twenty high school instructors. Eighty-seven of 641 high school students graduated in May. Beginning in September 1961, the campus was called Caswell County High School (CCHS). Elementary and high school enrollment totaled 1,195 students in April 1965. Forty-two African American teachers and a white driver's education instructor-led classes. In 1965-1966, 142 of 762 high school pupils completed their studies. The CCHS curriculum then included a full complement of academic, business, agriculture, home economics, industrial arts, health, physical education, music, and art classes. New courses in building construction and public speaking were offered that year. Youth participated in band, chorus, drill team, student government, and honor society; literary, journalism, drama, science, math, and history clubs; future farmers, homemakers, and teachers associations; and published a newspaper. Cheerleaders encouraged the basketball and baseball teams. Dillard and faculty felt that extracurricular programs provided much more than recreation. Such activities built leadership and teamwork skills and exposed students to opportunities beyond their rural community.

CCHS continued to provide first- through twelfth-grade instruction until September 1967, when the primary grades moved to the newly completed Oakwood Elementary School. Although Dillard and parents would have preferred that the facility be erected on the CCHS lot, the CCBE selected a site 1.5 miles northeast of CCHS for the one-story, flat-roofed, Modernist, red brick building. The campus was the county's first to have an integrated staff, with African American faculty and a white principal, secretary, and cafeteria manager. Several long-time CCHS elementary-grade teachers including Gladys Dillard retired, but most transferred to the new school.

CCHS enrollment comprised 838 ninth through twelfth-grade students in 1967-1968. Approximately eighty-two percent of the student body participated in non-athletic extracurricular activities and about four percent joined basketball and baseball teams. Although Caswell County educators attempted to ameliorate unease regarding impending school integration the following year, the atmosphere was highly charged. Dillard's health had been declining. Perhaps exacerbated by stress, he died on February 21^st, 1969 at the age of 62. His tenure as principal had spanned thirty-nine years. The CCBE recognized his extraordinary service with a resolution adopted at a special session on March 17^th, 1969.

Assistant principal Robert L. Fleming Jr. assumed the school's oversight during its final months. CCHS's last graduating class comprised 146 youth. Upon the Caswell County school system's fall 1969 desegregation, the campus functioned as N. L. Dillard Junior High School, serving eighth and ninth-grade pupils. That term, Yanceyville's white and African American first- through third-grade students received assignments to either Oakwood or Jones Elementary schools. Bartlett Yancey Elementary housed fourth through seventh grades. Tenth through twelfth-grade students attended Bartlett Yancey High School.

N.L. Dillard Junior High School served sixth- through eighth-grade pupils until May 2002. When classes resumed in the fall, students attended the newly completed N. L. Dillard Middle School at 255 Hatchett Road west of downtown Yanceyville. Caswell County Schools conveyed 5.71087 acres of the Dillard School Drive property containing the school and gymnasium to a local organization, Dillard Educational and Economic Development Services, Inc. on July 31^st, 2003.

Building Description

Caswell County Training School is located in an African American neighborhood approximately one-half mile southeast of Yanceyville, North Carolina's central courthouse square. The three-story, flat-roofed, red brick, 1951 school faces west toward Dillard School Drive in the north section of an irregularly shaped 5.03-acre lot. The 1949 rear wing comprises an auditorium and cafeteria. A flat-roofed canopy spans the distance between the school and the one-story, tripartite, flat-roofed, red brick, 1960 gymnasium to the south. The parcel slopes to the south and east, resulting in fully exposed lower-level walls for the school's rear (east) elevation and the gymnasium. The topography is the result of extensive grading. A deep ravine was filled and the site leveled to create a suitable setting for the school.

Deciduous and evergreen shrubs punctuate the facade and flank the concrete sidewalk that leads to the primary entrance. A tall flagpole rises from the yard north of the sidewalk. A grass lawn fills the remainder of the area between the building, the street, and the asphalt-paved access drive that wraps around the complex. The access drive intersects Dillard School Drive northwest and southeast of the school. Unpaved parking lots to the south and east accommodated faculty vehicles and buses.

Large tracts that were historically part of the campus and are still owned by the Caswell County Board of Education abut the parcel's northeast and southwest edges. A grass baseball field and remnants of a chain-link batting cage remain on the two parcels encompassing 7.31314-acres northeast of the school. The four-acre southwest tract is predominantly wooded, although the area adjacent to Dillard School Drive has been cleared. A well and a small front-gable-roofed prefabricated shed once used by vocational classes are on the access drive's south side south of the gymnasium. Two sizable privately-owned lots south and east of the school are also mostly wooded.

Modest one-story dwellings flank Dillard School Drive. The Colonial Revival-style, front-gable-roofed, brick-veneered Yanceyville Missionary Baptist Church stands on the street's west side opposite the school. The site of the demolished 1924 Yanceyville Colored School, which became known as Caswell County Training School in 1934, is in a wooded area north of the church and three houses. Extant features include ruins of the steps that provided access from the road to the schoolyard near 296 Dillard School Drive and the foundation of an auxiliary building that stood east of 170 Julia Street. The 1924 school briefly served as a gymnasium prior to its August 1951 demolition. Fulton Funeral Home is further north on Dillard School Drive's east side. Pearson Chapel AME Church, also a front-gable-roofed, brick-veneered building, fronts NC 62 northeast of Caswell County Training School. Across the road from the church, Bartlett Yancey High School occupies an approximately forty-six-acre campus that extends north to East Main Street.

Classroom, Auditorium, and Cafeteria Building, 1949, 1951

Exterior

The three-story flat-roofed school has a T-shaped footprint with an eight-bay-long, north-south-oriented, 1951 main block and a four-bay-deep 1949 rear wing. Masons veneered the concrete-block walls in five-to-one common bond red brick with cast-stone window sills and coping. At the primary entrance in the slightly projecting fourth bay from the west elevation's south end, cast-stone-panel sheathing and a stepped parapet reflect a restrained Art Moderne stylistic influence. A full-height multi-pane aluminum-frame window, three single-leaf, aluminum-frame, glazed doors, and a three-pane matching transom fill the area within the cast-stone surround. The window comprises fifteen large square sections, all of which were originally clear glass. However, in order to mitigate intense heat and glare in the stairwell, metal panels were added in the outer sections and tinted glass installed in the three central sections during the late-twentieth century. An earlier attempt to address the issue involved painting the inside surface of the perimeter glass panes.

The remainder of the facade comprises four bays of grouped steel-frame windows on each floor north of the entrance and three bays to the south. The bays flanking the primary entrance and stair illuminate offices and other administrative spaces. They thus have a different configuration than the classroom windows. Each bay comprises a narrow twelve-pane central window and two outer sixteen-pane sash, all with hoppers. The classroom windows are each divided into six twelve-pane sections with four-pane hoppers. The facade's first story is slightly below grade, with window sills at ground level. Many first-floor sash throughout the building have been enclosed with particle board to discourage vandalism.

At the main block's north and south ends, three-story brick stair towers with open-air vestibules on each floor are set back from the facade and extend past the building footprint. Concrete steps with metal-pipe railings lead to below-grade first-floor entrances ornamented with fluted cast-stone surrounds. The one-bay-square vestibules that comprise each tower's west third are characterized by cast-stone window sills, unpainted brick walls, and concrete floors. The towers' east sections enclose concrete stairs with metal-pipe railings. The space is not climate-controlled, making the functionality of the two tall, rectangular, steel-frame, ten-pane windows with four-pane hoppers that pierce the east elevation imperative. The metal-frame windows in the upper-level openings were a late-twentieth-century addition and have been partially removed. Double-leaf aluminum-frame doors surmounted by four-pane transoms provide access to the stairs and the main block's north-south corridors. The south tower entrance is sheltered by a flat-roofed canopy that spans the distance between the school and the gymnasium.

The auditorium and cafeteria wing projects from the rear (east) elevation. The four-bay north and south elevations mirror each other. Three pairs of tall, rectangular, steel-frame, fourteen-pane windows, each with two four-pane hoppers, illuminate the auditorium. The east window surmounts a double-leaf aluminum-frame door. Concrete and steel steps with steel railings lead to the auditorium entrances. Beneath the landings, single-leaf aluminum-frame doors provide cafeteria access. On the south elevation, west of the door, two pairs of steel-frame, eight-pane windows with four-pane hoppers light the cafeteria. Two matching single sash and an upper-level four-pane window are stacked in the walls' east bay.

The wing's east elevation is blind with the exception of two pairs of steel-frame, eight-pane cafeteria windows with four-pane hoppers. The one-story, flat-roofed, brick kitchen that projects from the east elevation's north half has blind south and east walls. Two single-leaf wood-panel doors pierce the kitchen's north elevation.

The east bay of the wing's north elevation differs slightly from the south elevation, in that the lower-level window has only four panes. A one-story, flat-roofed, brick storage room extends from the wall's west half. The two small windows on the storage room's east and north elevation have been enclosed. A single-leaf steel door on its north elevation provides interior access.

North and south of the wing, the main block's arrangement is nearly symmetrical, with outer stair towers, intermediary classroom, and restrooms adjacent to the wing. However, the north section contains three classroom bays, while the south section has only two. Also, a roll-up door provides access to the vocational classroom in the north section's north bay. Two steel-frame, twelve-pane windows with four-pane hoppers are north of the door. The classroom windows comprise six twelve-pane sections with four-pane hoppers. A single twelve-pane steel sash with a four-pane hopper originally illuminated each restroom, but the lower half of each sash has been removed and that portion of the window opening enclosed.

Interior

The school has a double-loaded corridor plan. Entrance vestibules at the center of the west, north, and south elevations provide access to the north-south corridors. An open steel-and-concrete double staircase with metal-pipe railings leads to all levels from the central entrance on the west elevation. The small, flat-roofed, concrete-block room at the base of the steps has a single-leaf door and a square single-pane window on its east wall. Steel and concrete staircases with metal-pipe railings fill the stair towers at the building's northeast and southeast corners.

The first floor contains nine classrooms at the north and south ends as well as administrative offices and a cafeteria, infirmary, and teachers' lounge at the building's center. The vocational shop and agriculture classrooms are on the north corridor's east side. The music room on the corridor's west side retains a three-tiered seating platform with a hardwood floor. The second floor encompasses twelve classrooms, restrooms, and the auditorium. The northeast home economics room features cabinets with red linoleum countertops and backsplashes. The third floor comprises a large library with two workrooms at its south end, restrooms, and nine classrooms. Five science laboratories retain full walls of built-in wood cabinets and a few workstations. The auditorium balcony is accessed from the third floor.

Painted concrete-block walls, plaster ceilings, and vinyl-composition-tile floors characterize the: interior. Celotex acoustical tiles sheathe some ceilings. Hollow-core wood veneer doors hang in simple steel frames. Wood-trimmed blackboards and bulletin boards are intact in all but a few rooms. Most classrooms originally featured small pent-roofed corner closets with two-panel doors and attached bookshelves. Plywood cabinets were later installed in a few rooms. Steel lockers line the corridors. Linear fluorescent lighting remains in most areas. Radiators heat the building.

The auditorium retains its original finishes and steel-frame wood seats on the main level and in the balcony. In both areas, seating comprises a wide central section flanked by two wide aisles and two narrower outer sections. Two square posts support the balcony, which has a metal pipe railing. The stage's stepped flat proscenium arch displays a restrained Art Moderne aesthetic. Four wood steps at either end of the stage lead to the hardwood platform. The north stair has a metal pipe railing. Velvet curtains are suspended from the ceiling on steel rods. Two small one-story rooms flank the stage, accessible through single-leaf entrances both from stage level and the auditorium's main level. Double-leaf doors on the north and south walls near the stage allow exterior egress. The corridor entrances are on the west elevation. The pendant lights, opaque globes with metal shields, appear to be original.

The multi-stall restrooms accessed from the corridors have square glazed-tile wainscoting, small square white-and-black floor tiles, painted wood partition walls, and white porcelain sinks and lavatories.

Gymnasium, 1960

Exterior

The Modernist red brick gymnasium is characterized by a tripartite plan and a curved wall that extends from its northwest corner. The walls are laid in common bond with five courses of stretchers followed by a course of alternating headers and stretchers. The parcel slopes to the south and east, allowing for fully exposed lower-level walls. The flat roof extends to deep eaves. The central basketball court is taller than the west lobby and east classroom/locker room wings. On the north and south elevations, clerestory windows with grouped steel-frame three-horizontal-pane sash and slightly projecting concrete sills illuminate the basketball court. The walls are blind beneath the windows. A flat-roofed canopy shelters two single-leaf steel doors at the south elevation's center.

A steel-frame curtain wall comprising three single-leaf steel doors with glazed upper sections, a full-height window, and a four-part transom fills most of the lobby wing's one-story north elevation. A small rectangular ticket window pierces the wall west of the entrance. The wing's west elevation is blind. A central double-leaf steel door with a tall, six-part, steel-frame transom punctuate the two-story south elevation.

The classroom/locker room wing extends from the basketball court's northeast corner. At the west end of the wing's one-story, one-bay-deep south section, a recessed entrance vestibule provides access to the basketball court. Two steel-frame two-horizontal-pane sash pierce the south and east elevations. The windows are hinged at the top, allowing them to swing open. The paired steel-frame horizontal-pane sash on the south elevation of the wing's two-story north section lights the corridor. On the east elevation, six pairs of steel-frame six-horizontal-pane sash illuminate the second-story classrooms while four two-horizontal-pane sash brighten the first-story locker rooms. Two single-leaf steel doors in the east elevation's central bays provide locker room access. Flat-roofed canopies surmount the doors. The north elevation is blind with the exception of a single, central, two-pane locker room window. The double-leaf steel door with glazed upper sections on the west elevation provides access to the classroom corridor. This entrance is sheltered by a flat-roofed canopy that covers the concrete walkway between the school and the gymnasium. Concrete steps with a metal pipe railing lead from the grass rear yard to the walkway.

Interior

The gymnasium's tripartite plan comprises a central regulation-sized basketball court flanked by west lobby and east classroom/locker room wings. Steel trusses carry the roof load over the wide span above the basketball court, which also functioned as a tennis court. Insulated ceiling panels ameliorated the noise during athletic events. The court has vinyl-composition-tile floors and painted concrete-block walls. Collapsible wood stadium seating lines the north wall. Although sections of the ceiling and roof decking failed after sustaining damage during a series of storms, the trusses are intact.

The west wing's north doors open into a lobby with a ticket booth at its northwest corner. The remainder of the upper level was utilized for concession sales. At the lobby's south end, concrete steps with metal-pipe railings lead to the lower-level rear doors, basketball court entrance, and restrooms. The east and west wings both have painted concrete-block walls, vinyl-composition-tile floors, insulated-panel ceilings, and metal-framed steel doors. The east wing encompasses two second-story classrooms, a corridor, a stair, and first-story locker rooms and offices. Each locker room contains a changing area with wood benches and wall-mounted hooks for clothing, a shower room, and a restroom. Square-glazed-tile wainscoting sheathes the lower two-thirds of the shower and restroom walls.

Baseball field, circa 1951

The ten-acre northeast lot includes a grass baseball field with a wooded perimeter. Remnants of a chain-link batting cage remain.

Shed, 1960s

Vocational classes used the one-story, frame, prefabricated storage building with a low front-gable roof and T-111 siding that stands on the access drive's south side south of the gymnasium. A double-leaf door made of siding panels pierces the north elevation's center. The other walls are blind.