The Abandoned Thomastown School of Mound, Louisiana

Thomastown School (Panatomic-X film, Leica IIIC, 50mm ƒ/2 Jupiter-8 lens)

Thomastown School (Kodak Tri-X film, Tachihara 4×5" camera, 135mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar S-II lens)

A forlorn school sits on an overgrown lot near the junction of US 80 (the former Dixie Overland Highway) and Mound Road (also shown on Google Maps and Thomastown Road). I first saw this abandoned school when I biked on Mound Road as a way to bypass some of the traffic on US 80. Well, maybe it is not technically abandoned. A farmer must own the buildings, because he stores hay rolls on the former parking lot and parks tractors and machinery in the former gymnasium. But the classrooms are a mess and totally neglected.

According to one website, the Thomastown High School was an all-black establishment that closed in 2001.

The 1-storey section on the north was mid-1960s mass production with a brick exterior. The bricks are in good condition, but the roof is leaking. The large windows show that this building did not have air conditioning when built.

The south section was 2-storey, and when I first saw the building from the road, I thought this might be an abandoned mid-century motel. The wide overhangs on both floors were designed to provide some shade to the windows (an architectural feature that more homes should use). The panels on the overhangs were asbestos sheets; many have fallen they crunch underfoot when you walk next to the building.

Classroom on west side (Kodak Gold 100 film, Hasselblad 501 CM, 50mm ƒ/4 Distagon lens, minor fill flash on ceiling)

Central hallway with cheap but intact cinderblock walls

Needless to say, the interior is a mess of debris, with dripping roof panels, standing water, and chipping paint.

This has been our short tour of a semi-abandoned school. I have no information about its fate. If it is privately-owned now, it may sit here moldering for decades.

The color photographs are from 120-size Kodak Gold 100 film. The film was long expired but had been stored in a freezer. I exposed it at EI=64 in my Hasselblad 501CM camera, all frames tripod-mounted.

Schools in rural Gorkha (Nepal 2017-15)

The Gorkha District of Nepal was the epicenter of the 2015 earthquake. The earthquake knocked down thousands of homes, shops, schools, and other structures. They were especially vulnerable because many were built of un-mortared brick or stone with no reinforcing. The walls simply crumbled in the shaking.

One of our projects in the area around the town of Bhachchek was to visit rebuilt schools. Some of the reconstruction was funded by the Gorkha Foundation, which developed innovative school buildings with translucent fiberglass walls. We also visited some schools to donate dental supplies to the children and teachers.

At the elementary school in Bhachchek, the children line up and do some exercises before class starts. The children we saw were well-behaved and cheerful.

We tried to instruct the children about dental hygiene. They were familiar with the concept of tooth brushing, but flossing was a bit too complicated for the little kids. But they were thrilled with their packets of tooth supplies.

While hiking uphill to the village of Siran Danda, we saw children in gray uniforms and neckties. These children go to a private school, not the elementary school in the previous pictures. These students were also fascinated by the odd lumpy Westerners.

The second day, we walked to a construction site in the town of Birauta, where the Gorkha Foundation had built one of their buildings. The village elders fed us a hearty mid-morning snack. Our host was a former UK army officer, Sub. Gobinda Gurung. He had been very organized and effective in 2015 when the earthquake struck, and lobbied the government effectively for relief supplies and other assistance for his townspeople. The children thought we were very odd (well, we are).

Courtesy of the Gorkha Foundation, April 2018

This is a construction photograph from Birauta. The bottom part of each wall is made of stone held together with concrete. A steel framework supports the fiberglas roof panels and translucent walls. In an earthquake, the upper portion of the building has some flex. One problem: we were told that at lower altitude, the buildings are hot in the midday sun.

Telling the students in Nepani about tooth hygiene. The guys responded to a hint that girls like fellows with good clean teeth. 

Talking to the teachers about kits that let young ladies continue to attend school when they have their periods. This is a Gorkha Foundation building with translucent sides.

From Birauta,we descended steeply through the forest/jungle to the Shree Nepane Secondary School in Siranchok.

I was impressed by the range of ages. It is a secondary school, but the teachers bring their little ones to work with them. The older students learn English and high school-level material. Mixing all ages reminds me of some Montessori schools, where older students help instruct the younger ones.

The last photograph, of the young laughing ladies, is my favorite frame from the 2017 Nepal trip. I took it with a Leica IIIC rangefinder camera and 5cm ƒ/2.0 Summitar lens on Ilford Delta 100 film, exposed at E.I of 80. The Leica is small and unobtrusive, and the shutter release makes a subtle "click." I think it is much less intimidating than a modern DSLR, which looks like the photographer is pointing a cannon at its victims.

Into the Woods: the Kiln Colored School, Kiln, Mississippi

Before a recent trip to the Mississippi Gulf coast, I checked the Mississippi Heritage Trust's list of most endangered sites. The Jourdan River School, formerly Kiln Colored School, was on the 2015 list and was easy to reach by driving north from Waveland.

The building is in the woods just east of Mississippi 603, north of the junction of 603 and the Kiln-Delisle Road. At first, I did not know where to look, but the town's dispatcher pointed out where to stop the car and look through the trees. According to the Heritage Trust, loggers uncovered the school when they were cutting timber. Although the site was cleared, brambles and weeds are growing rampant. I predict that after one more growing season, you will be unable to reach the school unless someone clears a path with a bush hog.

The building's roof is reasonably intact, but some of the floor has rotted and boards are missing. In the photograph above, the chimney shows flues where a wood or coal stove likely stood.

I hope someone can raise funds to preserve this piece of Mississippi history. The following is from the Heritage Trust:

Mississippi Landmark Information Designated: 07-18-2014  Recorded: 08-13-2014  Book/Vol. No.: 2014/8152

Context/Comments From Mississippi Landmark Significance Report, June 10, 2014: The Jourdan River School is locally significant for association with Education as the only remaining rural African American school in Hancock County. The only other surviving African American school, Valena C. Jones School in Bay St. Louis is a much larger Equalization-period building and represents a more urban consolidated school than Jourdan River School. Although the 1927 deed to this property refers to the “Trustees of Rosenwald School of Kiln, Mississippi” there is no evidence that this building was ever a Rosenwald school. Only one school in Hancock County (Logtown, 1921--demolished) received Rosenwald funding. Photographs taken with a Fuji X-E1 digital camera using Fuji 27mm and 14mm lenses. RAW files processed in PhotoNinja software.

Deserted Culkin Academy, Vicksburg, Mississippi

(Note: click any photograph to enlarge it.)

Generations of Warren County students who lived east of Vicksburg went to school at the Culkin Academy, later the Culkin Elementary School. When I first moved to the area in the mid-1980s, Culkin was still open, and I recall a PTA fund drive to buy air conditioners. The last year of operation was around 1999. A coworker's children attended elementary school there before the new Sherman Avenue Elementary School opened.

The old "Culkin Academy" sign is still engraved in the architectural concrete. On the front wall, each window was topped with the symbol of an academic discipline (in this case, mechanics). According to a friend at Mississippi Department of Archives and History, the building can be considered Art Moderne style, designed by a Modernist master, E.L. Malvaney of Jackson. It was completed in 1942. This was during World War II, but construction obviously started before the war began, likely funded by the Works Progress Administration. The county was lucky on the timing because most civilian construction was terminated or put on hold during the war years.

The classrooms are a mess. Many of the windows no longer have plywood covers, so I was able to place my camera on the window ledges and use time exposures. For a few years, a fellow rented the building and raised worms (yes, a worm farm). But I can't tell in what part of the building this animal husbandry occurred.

Not much is happening out back on a sultry summer day. 

Suzassippi wrote about how the high school in Eupora, Mississippi (now the Webster County school district), may be an architectural match to the Culkin Academy

There may be a use for the Culkin school yet. On July 7, 2015, the Vicksburg Post reported:

The sheriff’s department uses a building on the school’s campus for self-contained breathing apparatus training and tactical training like searching through smoke filled rooms, Warren County Sheriff Martin Pace said. The department also practices intruder simulations besides using the site for other law enforcement training purposes. Pace said it gives the department’s employees real world experience so they can be prepared for any emergency that might arise in the schools, offices or other locations.

Photographs taken with a Panasonic G3 digital camera with the Panasonic Lumix 12-32mm lens. I processed the raw files and converted to black and white with PhotoNinja software.

Abandoned Wood Schoolhouse: Crosby, Mississippi

While driving on Highway 33 through the Homochitto National Forest in southwestern Mississippi, you pass through the small town of Crosby. It is pretty quiet. The photograph above shows the view towards Oak Street.

Just east of 33, a driveway leads up an incline to a parking lot. This is the site of the Old Crosby School House. It was closed and unoccupied as of January 2014, and a commercial real estate company had it listed for sale.

This was a long, low wood-frame building with cheerful windows facing the north to let in plenty of light (compare and contrast with modern super schools, which look like windowless penitentiaries to me).

This was the door on the east side, facing Oak Street.

The south side was a mirror image of the north, with tall windows. I wonder if the building originally had girls' and boys' sides, separated by an interior wall?

I did not go in but took this photograph through a window. I can't tell if this shows original tongue-and-groove walls or if someone put paneling up over the original walls. I emailed the Realtor about the site. She wrote back that the school was built in 1945-50 and had recently been used as residential. It was rented to a family for about 12 years, but had been vacant for a year after they moved. Current status: unknown. If any reader has information, please add to the comments.

A few minutes to the south is Coles, Mississippi, a town that appears to be drying up entirely. I wrote about Coles earlier this year (click the link).

Photographs taken with a Fujifilm X-E1 digital camera. Black and white processed in-camera or using PhotoNinja.

Abandoned Hinds County School, Utica, Mississippi

Just south of the Morning Star Baptist Church at the junction of Old Port Gibson and Adams Station Roads is a one-floor, two-room cinder block school building. It has been unused for at least a decade, and part of the roof is collapsing.

This was a basic cinderblock building with steel push-out windows.

Windows facing the south let in plenty of sunshine.

My friend from Utica told me that many of these simple, two-room schools were built in the late-1960s - early 1970s for the Head Start program. They were funded by Lyndon Johnson's Great Society program in the late 1960s. According to Wikipedia,

The most important educational component of the Great Society was the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, designed by Commissioner of Education Francis Keppel. It was signed into law on April 11, 1965, less than three months after it was introduced. It ended a long-standing political taboo by providing significant federal aid to public education, initially allotting more than $1 billion to help schools purchase materials and start special education programs to schools with a high concentration of low-income children. During its first year of operation, the Act authorized a $1.1 billion program of grants to states, for allocations to school districts with large numbers of children of low income families, funds to use community facilities for education within the entire community, funds to improve educational research and to strengthen state departments of education, and grants for purchase of books and library materials. The Act also established Head Start, which had originally been started by the Office of Economic Opportunity as an eight-week summer program, as a permanent program.

The inside is a mess, with stacked up old furniture and piles of papers.

There are even two pianos waiting for restoration. Much of this furniture may be from the Morning Star church, using this as a convenient storage shed.

 

As a photographer, I love the patterns of shadow and light around furniture.

 

The roof is collapsing over the small side rooms that contained the toilets.

Schools tell us a lot about our society, our respect for learning, and about our optimism for the future. I am glad some one built this modest little facility but am sad it was abandoned. Hopefully, the contemporary Head Start children have a better facility. If any readers have more information about this and other schools, please let me know.

If you are interested in some other abandoned schools:

Utica High School
The Speed Street school in Vicksburg
Two-room schoolhouse in Carpenter
Yazoo County Ag. High School, Benton

The Bonner Campbell Institute, Edwards

I took these digital frames with a tripod-mounted Fuji X-E1 digital camera and the 27 mm ƒ/2.8 lens.  The little Fuji does a nice job with color balance inside. 

Update December 2020: Mississippi Department of Archives and History sponsored a renovation of the school. It has been re-roofed and repainted. Some windows are covered with plywood panels. Ultimate use: unknown.

Demolished: the Speed Street School, Vicksburg, Mississippi

For many years, a handsome brick school stood at the corner of Speed and Marshall Streets, in Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Location of former Speed Street School, Vicksburg, Mississippi

This is a historic neighborhood east of Washington Street with late 1800s and early 20th century houses.

The school, located at the crest of the hill, was a handsome, traditional brick structure with large, airy windows to allow plenty of light.  Contrast with today's typical, prison-like box, optimistically labeled a super school. According to the Vicksburg Post, the Speed Street School was designed by Vicksburg builder/architect, Mr. William Stanton, and was built in 1894.

"The three-story, brick building at 901 Speed St. was built in 1894 and housed Speed Street School until 1940, making it the last remaining 19th century public school building in Vicksburg. Its fall into disrepair can be traced only to recent decades, with its conversion in the late 1960s to rent-assisted living spaces under a number of different owners. It has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1985."

According to the Nomination Form for the National Register of Historic Places,

"On January 14, 1895, the Speed Street School opened as South Vicksburg Public School No. 200. As late as the mid-nineteen-thirties it was one of only two white elementary schools in the Vicksburg public school system. The district also included a white high school and two schools for black students of all grade levels (Cooper, Sect. 3). Upon its closing in 1940, the Speed Street School was sold to the Allein Post #3 of the American Legion. It was again sold in 1968 at which time it was divided into low-rent apartments." 

The historical background in the nomination is interesting reading.

The entry foyer once had separate doors for boys and girls

It was a stately building, with tall, elegant windows.  The original double hung sashes were still in place,  They were probably in poor condition, but still, they were 120 years old.  The lower photograph was taken from the second floor of an apartment complex across the street.

After the tenants were removed, I explored the property.  The children abandoned some toys.

This hallway was on the north side.  An identical hall was on the other side of the wall on the right.

The door in the back led to the auditorium

The interior was grim.  There were two main halls inside on each floor with adjoining classrooms. Originally, one side of the building would have been for boys; the other side for girls. My mother went to elementary school in Nazi Germany, and she said the boys were separated from the girls with barbed wire and strictly prohibited from interacting.

This was one of the basement apartments.

The 2-story auditorium was added to the rear of the building in 1930.  The steel truss beams look newer, but possibly the roof was replaced more recently. Originally, it was a decent venue for gatherings and school events. I think the auditorium had been closed off from the apartment residents in recent years. Once the building was in demolition, the workmen stored plumbing fittings and junk there.

The building was condemned in 2008 after sewage backed up in the plumbing. Two former City employees told me that shootings, drugs, and rapes plagued the building when it was used for low-cost housing. A friend of my daughter lived there.  She reported that her apartment was one of the few with a permanent telephone.  The other tenants would come to use the phone and then steal things from the family.

The neighborhood has deteriorated, and no one was interested in restoring the building because the revenue stream would never cover the costs. A Bogalusa, Louisiana-based company, Will Branch Antique Lumber, recycled the bricks, wood floors and support beams.  It was hard, dirty, dusty work to deconstruct. Some of the roof joists were huge, made from old growth timber of the type we no longer can get.

I hate to see a building like this torn down, but at least the materials will be reused rather than discarded, as is typical now. Will today's commercial buildings and McMansions have anything worth recycling in 100 years? I doubt most will even be standing in 50 years.

For more information, Preservation in Mississippi had an article on the Speed Street School in 2009 (click the link).

Photographs 1,2, and 4 (the black and whites) were taken on Kodak Panatomic-X film with a Fuji GW690II camera, film developed in Rodinol 1:50.  The rest were taken with an Olympus E-330 digital camera with the 14-54 mm lens, or a FujiFilm F31fd compact camera, all tripod-mounted.