Archive of: Schools -- High School

At the end of the 1964 school year, Leroy High School students selected biology teacher and basketball coach Ron Crosby (left) as “Teacher of the Year.” Crosby is seen here looking over diplomas with William Lewis, LeRoy’s principal.

The Bloomington High School marching band passes through the gates of Evergreen Memorial Cemetery on Bloomington’s south side for a Memorial Day program. “Our nation, our young men of necessity, play a role in the tragic drama now a part of current world events on this Memorial Day,” Edward B. Akin of the Illinois Veterans’ Commission told those gathered for a ceremony at the cemetery.

Danvers High School seniors are seen here pouring though The Daily Pantagraph’s 56-page graduation edition of May 18, 1949. The Pantagraph distributed complimentary copies to some 2,370 senior from 77 Central Illinois high schools.

These seniors delayed their “skip day” to Starved Rock State Park to get a look at the class photographs.

Bloomington High School students Wanda Rust (right) and Margaret Schlemmer work on murals in the newly opened student lounge, a repurposed second floor classroom. At this time the high school was located on the 500 block of East Washington Street. The current high school opened in 1959.

Several weeks ago we ran a photograph from a set of 1954 negatives showing the staff of Aegis, the BHS student newspaper. Here’s another one.

Gathered around the desk of Aegis editor Su Selders (that’s Sue without the “e”) are Pat Jones, assistant editor; Don Owen, business manager; and Ann Alcott, reporter.

Timothy P. Irvin (left, kneeling in front of the guitar) formed The Shattertons in 1960 as a high school freshman. Six years later the band was performing local gigs.

“New” Bloomington High School, which opened four years earlier, is seen here in a June 1963 aerial. The view is looking southwest. Note the beginnings of Towanda Plaza in the lower right.

What else can you see of interest?

The Aegis is Bloomington High School’s longtime student newspaper. Here’s chief photographer Bob Stoner in late October 1954 snapping BHS students Mary Ellen Ponsford and Courtney Read, both holding fund drive posters.

Who has fond memories working for their school newspaper?

Five BHS swimmers prepare for the Big 12 Conference meet in Peoria in this mid-February 1953 scene. Left to right: Peter Whitmer, Hal Johnstone, Ray Baxter, Chuck Dunbar, and Adlai Rust, Jr.

Here’s Gridley High School Coach readying his varsity squad for the 1953 McLean County Basketball Tournament.

The Pontiac Holiday Tournament is the nation’s oldest such Christmastime classic. Seen here are University High School’s Jim Barnes (#12) and Ted Smith (#8).

Richard Young is seen here showing an enlarged reproduction of his 1937 Christmas Seal design. More than 10,000 letters with Christmas Seals were sent in the hopes of raising money to fight Tuberculosis.

Led by Bruce Taylor Donald Biefeldt, the Anchor High Aces finished the 1945-1946 season as the Colfax District champions before losing to Gridley.

Nearly 2,000 teachers from a four-county area gathered at the new BHS for an Illinois Education Association meeting in October 1959.

Seen here are 1909 graduates from Cooksville, a small community some fifteen miles northeast of Normal. Left to right, beginning with the top row, are Grace Fossett, Ethel Wright, Eddie Manning, Merle Douglass, and Clarence Crumbaker.

The June 3, 1898, Bloomington High School commencement exercises were held at the Grand Opera House on East Market Street. At this time the high school was located on the north side of Monroe Street between Prairie and Gridley streets

This aerial shows the “new” Bloomington High School, corner of Towanda Avenue and Locust Street on the city’s eastside, roughly one year before opening. A local firm headed by Edgar E. Lundeen and Dean F. Hilfinger served as architects for this underappreciated modernist beauty.

This wonderful aerial photograph of Heyworth High School dates to January 23, 1933. The view is looking east-northeast into town.
In many ways, the Village of Heyworth hasn’t changed all that much, though most of the high school shown here is gone.

This late April 1958 scene shows Octavia High School student Marcella Brucker at a sewing machine working on a dress she planned to model for the May 1 Future Homemakers of America (FHA) fashion show.

Long before successive waves of school consolidation beginning apace in the late 1940s, every small town had their own high school. The Village of Stanford in Allin Township, located west of Bloomington, was no exception. Seen here is the 1920 Stanford High School. The view is looking to the northwest. In 1972, Stanford became part of the consolidated Olympia School District.