Lee County High School

Lee County High School

Education; Lee County, AL; Auburn, AL; Lee County High School; Hudson, Belas; Quinn, I.T.; Parrish, J.A.; Northside Grammar School

In 1914, the city of Auburn successfully petitioned the Lee County Board of Education to strip Opelika’s high school of the title “Lee County High School” and bequeath that distinction to a new high school in Auburn. Auburn provided seven acres for the new two-story brick edifice school, which was built by contractor Belas Hudson for $10,400. Lee County High School opened its doors in August 1914 with an enrollment of seventy eighth- through eleventh-grade students. Lee County High School’s first principal, I.T. Quinn, was quickly succeeded by the legendary J.A. “Fessor” Parrish, one of Auburn historian George Petrie’s students. He served as principal of the institution from 1915 until 1946. In 1931, a schoolhouse accommodating all twelve primary and secondary grades opened on Samford Avenue, and the old Lee County High School was used as a recreation center. In 1948, the city began using the old building as a grammar school. Northside Grammar School closed in the early 1950s in the wake of the founding of several other public elementary schools in Auburn. The building functioned as a recreational center until 1973, when the city finally demolished it.

Taylor McGaughy

Image Source: http://www.auburnschools.org/ahs_band/photos/biga.html

Text Source: Ralph Draughon, Jr., Delos Hughes, and Ann Pearson, Lost Auburn: A Village Remembered in Period Photographs (Montgomery: NewSouth Books, 2012), 53-54.

Alabama Cultural Resource Survey

2014-11-26

Taylor McGaughy

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English

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