Durham High School (North Carolina)

History

Central High School, located on Morris Street, opened in 1906 and served Durham city's white high school students until 1922. This building then was converted to Durham's City Hall and is now the home of the Durham Arts Council. Durham High School replaced Central High School in 1922 on property that once belonged to Brodie L. Duke.

During racial segregation Durham High School was a high school for whites in the city of Durham. The high school for African Americans was Hillside High School. In 1959, Durham High School began integration under then Superintendent of Schools, Lew W. Hannen. In 1959-60 African Americans Joycelyn McKissick, a senior, and Claudette Brame, a junior, enrolled.

Located next to Durham High School was also the then new Central Junior High School, which opened in 1926. The building was later renamed Julian S. Carr Junior High School in 1945. The junior high became part of the Durham High School campus in the fall of 1975, when the school district expanded high schools to include grade 9. (Prior to that year, Durham junior highs included grades 7-9 and high schools served grades 10-12.)

By the 1980s Durham High School was no longer a majority white school.

In 1992 the Durham City and County School Districts merged to become Durham Public Schools. Durham High School closed as a traditional high school in 1995. Durham School of the Arts opened in 1995 as the Durham Magnet Center for Visual and Performing Arts and later was renamed Durham School of the Arts. The former Durham High School campus now makes up part of the Durham School of the Arts campus, along with the site of the former Carr Middle School. The former Durham High School auto shop is now Durham School of the Art's Black Box Theatre.

Athletics

Durham High School's football team won five state championships between 1938 and 1945, under Coach Cary Brewbaker. By the 1970s the Bulldog football program built another power house under the ("Great") Coach Hal Stewart, and later the tough, Coach James "Bump" Elliott, during the late 70s along with the 1981 football season. The sports writer with the" Durham Harald Sun" back then was Al Carson. The Bulldogs were the preseason 4A conference favorite, and favorites to win the state in football. ESPN did a special on the Bulldogs very talented class with Roy Firestone, along with the Bulldogs 4A conference pack 6 player of the year (Harris Williams)"Fact. The class of 1982 football team that should have won it all. Durham High School, was also well known for its basketball program as well, in fact Durham High School lead North Carolina in most Men's Basketball State Championships with 13. Before that, during a three-year period, from 1937 through 1940, under Coach Paul Sykes, Durham High's basketball team compiled a phenomenal record of seventy-three straight wins. Included in those wins were championships in the Duke-Durham Invitational Tournament and the Eastern Interscholastic Tournament at Glen Falls, NY. Horace "Bones" McKinney, was the premier player during this three year, undefeated span. McKinney later became a standout collegiate and professional basketball player, ultimately ending up as Head Coach, for many years, at Wake Forest College. The gymnasium at Durham High was later named for Coach Sykes. In 1969, Dave Odom became Durham High's basketball coach. He was voted the league's coach of the year five times in his seven years there, before becoming a coaching assistant at Wake Forest University.

Notable people