Fire Destroys Plain Dealing High School

February 16, 1963 - Firefighters working to
extinguish the fire at Plain Dealing High School.
Beulah Findley Collection: 1997.054.058.059-2

February 16, 1963 - Plain Dealing High School fire.
Beulah Findley Collection: 1997.054.058.059

 In its 75th year, on February 16, 1963, Plain Dealing High School was destroyed by fire as a result of faulty wiring. The two-story brick building was built in 1928; opening its doors on September 17 to grades 8-11. The building was declared a total loss at an estimated $120,000, which was mostly covered by insurance.

The Plain Dealing fire department was alarmed at 12:40 pm when the fire was spotted burning on the second floor in the middle of the building. The fire spread quickly across the second floor and by 2:15 pm the roof collapsed. It was 4:00 pm before the firemen gained control, but not before the fire caved in part of the second floor and began to consume the first floor.

Altogether about 50 firemen battled the blazing fire as the Plain Dealing firefighters received assistance from firefighters from Bossier City, Springhill, and Benton. The acting Bossier City assistant fire chief, Bobby Roy, stated, “The building wouldn’t have burned up if there had been an adequate water supply. We could have stopped the fire a lot sooner if we had the water.”

Though the fire did not damage some of the classrooms on both sides of the first floor, they did suffer extensive water damage. Fortunately, the school’s records survived; however, they were the only thing saved. The building housed 13 classrooms including a science lab, home economics, a library, and the principal’s office.

According to the Bossier Parish Superintendent, Emmet Cope, “the big handicap will be the loss of the science and home economics departments. We will set up another science department as quickly as possible.” When asked about what the students will do about schoolbooks Cope replied, “We hope a lot of the kids have them at home.”

Nearly 200 students in grades 8-12 were displaced, sending the administration into high gear to set-up temporary classrooms. The students were given a couple of days off while administrators prepared make-shift classrooms in the auditorium, gymnasium, and in empty classrooms in the elementary and junior high school buildings.

Before the fire, voters approved a bond to renovate the old building; instead, these funds allowed the school’s reconstruction. The Bossier Parish School Board approved a $350,00 contract to rebuild the school which opened in time for the 1964-1965 school year.

1964 - The new Plain Dealing High School.
Thomas R. Merideth, architect and McInnis Bros., contractor.
Linda Matlock Collection: 2004.017.013 (1965 Au Roarer)

Bossier City architect, Thomas Merideth, designed the new Plain Dealing High School and McInnis
Bros constructed it. It was designed to provide improved lighting, more drinking fountains, more locker space, as well as airconditioned offices and library.

September 13, 1964 - Raising of the flag at the official opening
ceremony for the new Plain Dealing High School .
Linda Matlock Collection: 2004.017.013 (1965 Au Roarer)

The new Plain Dealing High School opened on August 31, 1964, and the cornerstone laying ceremony took place on September 13 during the open house and reception held from 3 to 5 pm. Friends, former students, and teachers for the past 75 years were honored guests at the formal opening of the school. The ceremony included a brief history of the school, refreshments, and an open house tour of the new school building.

September 13, 1964 - Pledge of allegiance during dedication ceremony of the new Plain
Dealing High School. Linda Matlock Collection: 2004.017.013 (1965 Au Roarer)

September 13, 1964 - Visitors at the official opening ceremony for the new Plain Dealing High School.
Linda Matlock Collection: 2004.017.013 (1965 Au Roarer)

To learn more about the history of schools in Bossier Parish, visit the Bossier Parish Libraries History Center at 2206 Beckett Street, Bossier City.

September 13, 1964 - Mayor Leon Sanders sharing the history of Plain Dealing High School during the dedication ceremony. Linda Matlock Collection: 2004.017.013 (1965 Au Roarer)

September 13, 1964 - Plain Dealing High School opening ceremony program participants: B. H. Hearn, Principal; S. M. Wise, School Board.; Mayor Leon Sanders; James Roberson, School Board.; Emmet Cope, Superintendent.; Dr. W. E. B. Lockridge, Reverend Bob Lawton. Linda Matlock Collection: 2004.017.013 (1965 Au Roarer)

September 13, 1964 - Plain Dealing High School Principal B. H. Hearn and Bossier Parish Schools Superintendent Emmet Cope at cornerstone laying ceremony. Linda Matlock Collection: 2004.017.013 (1965 Au Roarer).

By: Amy Robertson

Airline High School

Airline High School crest printing block. Bossier Press-Tribune Collection: 2012.006.004.

In 1962 the Bossier Parish School Board (BPSB) approved the purchase of 65-acres from Harlan Beene for $85,000. During the time when segregation was law, this land would be home to Bossier City’s second all-white high school. They hired Thomas R. Merideth to draw-up the preliminary plans. A few months later the BPSB agreed to purchase an additional 9.46 acres from Mr. Beene to allow room for a stadium for the high school and for a new elementary school, in the near future. 

In June of that year, the Metropolitan Planning Commission approved the location selected for the new schools. With the necessary approvals, the BPSB officially appointed Thomas R. Merideth as the architect for the new high school. Thomas R. Merideth was a Bossier City architect who designed all the schools in the parish for many years. The Bossier Parish Police Jury (BPPJ) agreed to cut a 1-mile blacktop road to connect Airline Drive with Benton Road. In November of 1964, the BPPJ approved the resolution to name the new road Viking Drive. 

On October 3, 1963, the BPSB voted to name the new school Airline High School. “The name ‘Airline’ was selected because of the school’s proximity to Barksdale Air Rorce [sic] Base as well as its location on Airline Drive.” The school was built on a budget of $2.5 million and paid for by selling bonds in District 13 amounting to $1.5 million, based on an increase in property taxes from 14 mills to 20 mills approved by taxpayers in a 1962 vote. One month later the BPSB accepted the low bid of Howard, Weil, Labouisse, Friedrichs, and Co. of $1.5 million for the bonds. 

Before the school opened, new school district lines were required; dividing, for the first time, the Bossier City high school students. Also, the BPSB approved lengthening the school day by 45 minutes, going from a 45-minute homeroom session and five class sessions to a 30-minute homeroom session and six class sessions. The football team played their first intrasquad game, with the Whites beating the Blues 20-12. And, 28 students were selected by fellow incoming students to serve as the student council. Airline’s first student council held a vote selecting ‘Vikings’ as the nickname and the school colors of Columbia and Navy Blue.  

Airline High School opened to grades 9-12 at the start of the 1964-1965 school year with Robert D. (Bob) Horneman as principal. According to an article in The Times on October 11, 1964, Airline High School is described as “a sprawling complex of nearly-completed ultra-modern units on a site that is still dotted with cotton plants. Airline, which has an enrollment of 781 at present and a capacity of 1,500 pupils, opened its doors last month while construction work was still in progress on part of the facilities. Work continues on the boys’ and girls’ gyms, and the auditorium. The entire plant is expected to be completed by the end of this school year. On a 74-acre site on Airline Drive, the school has 195, 000 feet of floor space and cost $2.3 million. Capacity enrollment is expected by 1966.”  

Aerial photo of Airline High School. Bossier Chamber of Commerce Collection: 1998.047.180a.

Airline High School also boasted a home economics department with “ultra-modern” appliances and an Early American living room.  A commercial department equipped with L-shaped typewriting desks and electric typewriters.  An outdoor book-drop for the secure return of library books even after hours. And a modern island-type science laboratory to allow four students to work on one experiment. Plus, a 1290-capacity auditorium, a baseball stadium, tennis courts, an all-weather track, and various practice fields. In 1969 a 10,000-seat football stadium was added to the campus at the cost of $650,000. 

Valhalla 1965, Airline High School's first yearbook.
Donated by Paul Haynie Collection: 1999.116.025.

On Thursday, May 27, 1965, at 8 pm Airline High School held its first commencement exercise for a class of 101 seniors.    

To learn more about the history of Bossier Parish Schools’, visit the Bossier Parish Libraries (BPL) History Center. We are looking for Airline High School yearbook donations. If you have these years: 1970, 1971, 1979, and 2016, please consider donating them to the BPL History Center. If you’d like to donate your yearbooks, please drop by or call us at 318-746-7717. 

By: Amy Robertson

MENTION OF GEORGIA PEOPLE IN BOSSIER PARISH

Mr. J. T. Manry at Plain Dealing School in 1939 celebrating his 88th birthday.

The November 22, 1928 issue of the Bossier Banner noted that a number of Bossier Parish residents originally came here from Georgia.

“Our attention has been called to a brief article appearing in last week’s issue of the News-Gazette, published in Barnesville, Ga., three paragraphs of which read:

“’Though nearly a thousand miles from Lamar County, there is a former citizen, Mr. L. S. Moore, who is making good at his chosen profession, that of a construction engineer.’”

“Up in the northwest corner of Louisiana, hardly an hour’s drive from Texas or Arkansas, Mr. Moore has been retained by the municipality of Plain Dealing to superintend the construction of a large water supply and sewerage disposal plant. The town got its name from the first settler, who we also understand was from Georgia, and had named his estate by that name, ‘that those about him may know that wealth would never turn his head.’ And when the Cotton Belt railroad, a pet of the late Jay Gould, came through the town took on a progressive spirit. Seven years ago it had built a $112,000 school plant, only to build another this year to care for the overflow of children.”

“Natural gas is produced within nine miles of the town, and close by are oil wells spouting forth their contribution to the resources of the people, many of whom went from Georgia thirty or more years ago. Mr. Moore tells of meeting Mr. J. T. Manry, a brother of the Messrs. John T. and Ben H. Manry, of the Goggans community, this county. Mr. Manry left here sixty years ago, after finishing an apprenticeship under Joel Chandler Harris on the Monroe Advertiser, Forsyth. Other homefolk nearby are Mr. and Mrs. Albright, Mrs. Albright being a descendant of the Potts Family, of this county.”

To discover more about the origins of early families of Bossier Parish visit the Bossier Parish Library Historical Center.

By: Ann Middleton

Letters to Santa

This 1967 photo shows the first-graders at Princeton School ready to write their letters to Santa Claus. Their teacher has written "Dear Santa Claus, I would like some toys and clothing for Christmas" on the chalkboard. This photo (2004.003.009) is from our Walter H. Martin collection. Mr. Martin was the principal at Princeton High School.

Rosenwald Schools

Rosenwald Schools are buildings across 14 South and Southwestern states that represent a cooperative, large-scale effort to educate black children from 1917 to the 1930’s, a time when there was no consistently available education for these students to speak of.

Julius Rosenwald was the son of Jewish immigrants in Chicago. He was a high school dropout who worked as an apprentice in his uncles’ clothing business. In 5 years he had his own business, and then earned enough capital that Richard Sears asked him to be a partner in the legendary Sears, Roebuck mail order company. In 1909 he became president/CEO. He also became one of the new ‘professional givers,’ or philanthropists (think Rockefeller or Carnegie).

Inspired by black educator and leader Booker T. Washington writing to him about schools as bad as stables (some in floorless shacks), he established the Julius Rosenwald fund in 1917 to improve education for black students by improving the physical plant in which it took place. To do so, he introduced the concept of matching funds. Black communities had to raise approximately a third of the money for their new school, local school boards, a third, and the Rosenwald Fund, a third.

Rosenwald Schools were named to the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places list in 2002. Bossier Parish had at least 13 Rosenwald buildings by 1932, according to a map from the Rosenwald Fund. There are a few possible Rosenwald Schools still standing in the Parish, most in very poor shape. One building that is holding
its own houses the North Bossier Civic Club on Highway 2 in Plain Dealing, pictured above. It follows the Rosenwald floor plan and is known locally as “The Rosenwald School”. However, we have not found any documentation to prove that it is one for historic preservation purposes, and the building may have been moved. If you have any information about this building, please contact us at the Historical Center. You could be saving a local treasure!

Pioneer School

This is the Pioneer School in Plain Dealing, Louisiana. According to a 20 April 1944 Bossier Banner article by JT Manry, the school was built in the 1890s by SJ Zeigler. The article contains Miss Aletha Vaughn Montgomery's recollections of the school,

"I thought the building was quite beautiful. And it really was when compared with the other buildings in our section of the country, at a time when even homes were built for use, with little regard for beauty, comfort, or convenience."

We have the original Second Annual Catalogue of the Pioneer High School for the 1903 school year. School didn't start for those Plain Dealing children until September 2. The catalogue gives a brief history of the school. A sixty foot wing was added to the building in 1902, making the Pioneer School

"the finest school building in Bossier Parish and one of the finest buildings for a small town in Louisiana."

In our collections you can also find the Fourth Annual Catalogue, which is from the 1905 school year. Tuition was free to all children in Bossier Parish and enrollment grew to 157 students. The purpose of the school was

"to develop good, honest, intelligent citizens; to thoroughly cultivate those qualities of head and heart that make the true gentleman and the true lady."

To find out more about the Pioneer School, please search our online collections database. This image has an object identification number of 2003.004.012.

Back to School

School is just around the corner for Bossier Parish. We'll be including some images of school days past while our current students get back into their classroom routine.

This photo shows Haughton High School transfers (known today as school buses) loaded with students. About 200 children rode the transfers to school and back home again. The ride was probably a little bumpy!