Alachua Schools

Alachua Grade School

With many of the settlers moving from Newnansville into Alachua a decision was made to close both the Methodist Church and the school at the Newnansville community. A school house was built in Alachua in 1895 on South Main Street on the site where. Alltel Telephone building was located. That building met the needs of the community for only a short time. In 1899 construction began on a new schoolhouse to be located on a four acre site on the hill where the Alachua Elementary School is now located. This three classroom building with an auditorium on the second floor was the first brick school building in Alachua County. It was dedicated on February 22, 1901 by state and county officials. Later a two story wing was added to accommodate more students when Newnansville School closed May 3, 1904. Alachua then became an eight teacher school. In the years that followed schools from the communities of Haynsworth, Greenleaf, Hague, Gracy, Perseverance, Spring Hill, Santa Fe, Bland and LaCrosse were sequentially consolidated into the Alachua School. The old two story school buildmg built in 1889 - 1901 was torn down in 1933 and in its place was a long one story building that housed all grades one through six, with an auditorium large enough to seat all the students one through twelve. Who had Roger Wood, Ms. Ellis or Mrs. O’Dea as your teacher, K-4th grade.

Alachua Elementary School 1956

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Alachua High School - now Santa Fe High

Alachua High School 1917

On July 28, 1916, the Alachua County School Board voted to build a new two story building just west of the existing building at a cost of $12,600.00. This new building was completed in 1917 and served as a high school for thirty years. This is the one we all remember as Alachua High School, per H J Waters. In 1955 the high schools of Alachua and High Springs were consolidated into Santa Fe High. The school mascot was originally the Rebels, but was later changed to the Raiders in 1970 when integrated. In 1955 the high schools of Alachua and High Springs were consolidated into Santa Fe High School and the site became the Alachua Elementary School.

Alachua High School Memories  

Charles Beverly (Beb) Waters Class of 1930: The Alachua Indians played football on a field that was right next to the school rather than down the hill from the grammar school. The offense was the Notre Dame Box, The quarterback lined up about four feet behind the center and had a fullback lined up a few feet behind him. The other two halfbacks were lined up on their left (or right), stacked one behind the other to form a square box. The QB would take a direct snap and then hand off to one of the backs or drop back to pass. It was mainly a running offense. Pete Sfrlngfellow was the quarterback. Hal Rivers was the fullback. Troy Fowler and Jesse Shaw were halfbacks. I played left end. Other players included Marion Pearson and Charles Boston. If you left the game, you couldn't return to the field in the same quarter. And yes, we wore leather helmets and had drab brown canvas pants; and the jerseys were whatever you could find and had no numbers. The coach was named Rockwell. Alachua didn't have a good punter, so Marion Pearson would try to throw a long Interception rather than try a weak punt. The Big Rival was the High Springs Sandspurs, at least until around 1929 when we had "the Big Fight" playing in High Springs, The referee that night was a prominent High Springs doctor (Whitlock?), maybe even the mayor. Emotions were running high, and an intense argument between players, coaches and the referee ended in a Big Fight when Jessie Shaw knocked the referee out cold and the townspeople charged the field. I prudently ran for the car. As a result of the fight, the teams didn't play each other again for a number of years (20?). The trip to a game in Cedar key was hard to forget. The field was covered In sandspurs, and after the game, the shower was salt water. School buses couldn't be used for game trips, so townspeople would drive the players, Barney Cato was a rural mail carrier and had a son on the squad. He would drive players to games, and Bill Ennis' dad a carload of players. The school buses back then were Model A trucks with a row of seats down each side and a bench down the middle. The back was open, and that was where you would enter the 'bus.' The back end of the bench down the middle wasn't bolted down, and ft rode like a bucking horse.

Alachua High School Memories  

1944 Henry Jackson Waters, aka: H. J. or Jack: My school career began in 1932 in an old, old two story building in Alachua. It was just east of the beloved two story, beige, bell tower. High School building. My first grade teacher was Mrs. Morrow, wife of the Principal. She was a lovely, caring, thoughtful person. We brought our lunch to school in a bag in the good ole days. One day my lunch was lost, stolen, or eaten by a dog or a hog. Yes, in 1932 Florida had an open range law. Animals could wander where ever they pleased. You had to fence your yard and fields. Mrs. Morrow shared her or her son's lunch with me. I don't remember much about the academics of that first year but reading. Baby Rae and I took to reading hke a duck to water. I had no problems with reading or any other subjects. The next two years, second and third grades, were spent in Brooker, Fl. Bradford, County. I returned to Alachua in the fall of 1934. The old two story building had been demolished. A long one story building was in its' place containing eight classrooms and a big auditorium. The auditorium was big enough to hold community events. My fourth grade teacher was Mrs. Caswell. Nothing eventful happened that year. My fifth grade teacher was Miss Lucile Ellis. She was single and never married. She was a very creative and innovative instructor. The class was always involved in some kind of activity. One big event of that year was a class play about the Pilgrims Thanksgiving and with the Indians. The play was essentially written by Bobby HitchcoSc. We performed the play as a chapel program for the entire school. One of our favorite class activities was story time. Miss Ellis would read a chapter from a novel. She, at times, would balance the chair she was sitting in, on its' front legs. One day a student walked behind her, on the way to the restroom, and kicked the chair out from under Miss. Ellis. She fell and there was a deathly silence in the room. Fortunately she was not hurt. The next two years, sixth and seventh grades, were uneventful. My teacher in the sixth grade was Mrs. Caroline Butler. My seventh grade homeroom teacher was Mrs. Aiiiiie Baldwin. Upon entering the eight grade, boys and girls were segregated. The boys took Agriculture and shop. The girls took Home Ec. classes. Some of our other teachers were: Ivlr. George (Uncle George) Dansby, Miss. Dorothy Herlong, Miss Bemice Dew, Mrs. Jessie Johnson, Mr. C.H.J Johnston, Coach C. Aubrey Smith, Mr. John Davis, Mr. Sidney Padgett and Miss. Rita Garris. I had to wear glasses beginning in the seventh gi'ade, so did not participate in sports much. I also had a newspaper route and couldn't stay after school for practices.

Perhaps the biggest event in our High School lives was the Junior and Senior theatrical productions. Mrs. Johinson wa-s usually the Junior class play sponsor and Miss. Dew was the Senior class sponsor. The Junior class play was usually produced in the fall and the Senior class play in the spring. The next biggest activities were football and basket ball. I don't remember AHS being involved with baseball. Being a small high school we seldom came out with the winning score. High Springs was the perennial rival. I have no idea v/ho won the most games. We didn't have too m-uch coaching due to the war years 41-44.

In 1942, we had a scrape iron drive for the war effort. The entire school grounds, from the Home Ec. building to Rivere's fence (east- west) and from the H.S. building to the tennis court (north-south), was piled high with scrape h'on. Wq were excused from classes to climb into a ton and a half truck to go load scrape iron from some garage or farm. This continued for about two weeks. I don't remember whose truck we used or who drove the truck. A. big time was had by all I'm sure there were a lot of funny incidents that happened in class but the memories have faded. I do recall the time Miss. Devis, a very prim, elegant and popular English teacher, had called the roll one moraing. She was the senior class homeroom teacher. Som.eone asked her a question and she answered, "just a minute, I have the answer right here in my drawers". She blushed and the class snickered. Of course she meant her desk drawers. No one said a word. Any story about AHS would not be complete without mentioning the bell tower. I have heard that it was a beg deal to ring the bell on Halloween. However, it took a look of careful planning to do this trick. The store room below the tower v/as the school's science supply store room. Therefore the key to that room was hard to get. So, if you could manage to leave the Supply room unlocked, you then had to find a classroom window unlocked. Then you could get access to the bell tower. In my years at A H S, I never heard the bell ring after school hours. In closing I have always told anyone who asked, my years at A H S was comparable to the Tom Sawyer story. A wonderful life and an experience that not everybody is fortunate enough to have lived.

 

 

 1938 Alachua High School: Back Row Mary Alice Thomas, Estelle Witt, Trumie Shaw, Ellen Emers, Front Row Ann Lewis, Nell Dole and Audrey Hardee 

 1948 Cheerleaders 

Go back' Go back! Go back to the woods'  You haven't, You haven't got the goods! You haven't got the rhythm, you haven't got the jazz, you haven't got the team that Alachua has!

Class of 1958 ~ 50 Year Reunion 2008Vida Waters front & center

Class of 1963 - 2023 60th Reunion

Katherine Travers Barnes, Ellen Erwin, Bronease Dampier, Kay West, Tom Beaty, Tommy Collar, Robert Sutton, Sue Ann Enneis, Ray Woodruff, Nolan Smith. There were 3 former teachers Don McCormick, Ken Lee, and Tommy Harris.