Whitney Young Elementary School Part 1

In late August 1971 I went to James Smart Elementary School to meet my first principal.  Remember, even though I had a contract to teach at what would become Whitney Young Elementary, I had never met the person who really should have interviewed me.  The woman in the picture below was that principal.  I never really asked her how she felt about the fact that I was thrust upon her as a teacher.  What I do know is that I was really nervous.  Little did I know that she was probably pretty nervous too.  This was her first year as a principal.  And it really didn't sink in, but I later realized that she was the first African-American principal in Fort Wayne Community Schools.  Believe me,  I have met no one who would have been more suited for that role than Verna Adams.  Some of my former students have said that I have made a positive effect on their lives, if that is true, they can also thank Verna.  She is the primary influence on what I learned in order to be an effective teacher.

 James Smart Elementary School was one of the first schools built in the early days of Fort Wayne Community Schools, but by the time that I arrived there, it was in pretty bad shape.  The picture below shows that the architecture was very similar to South Side, the high school from which I graduated, and North Side, the school where I have taught for many years.  We have saved both of these high schools, but schools like Smart are long gone.  Most of the first year of my teaching career was in this building.  It was old, drafty, and had a distinct smell, but it was stately.  The Young staff shared the facility with the staff that moved to the Bunche school at the end of the year.

In the spring of 1972, the staff and students of the old Smart school loaded their arms with their classroom supplies and walked to the back of the lot where the building below had been built.  It was quite a sight!  While we were going one direction, the staff of Bunche was heading to theirs a few blocks away.  The new Young building was amazing, and we quickly settled in.  As the physical education teacher, I realized that I had one of the best facilities in all of the elementaries in FWCS.  No matter how great it was, we still went by that gorgeous old building, until it was demolished and taken away.  Hard to say that you miss a structure I guess, but I loved that old building.  It was where I began my career.