Original Site of Uvalde High School

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Four years after Uvalde became a railroad shipping point, the people of that city decided their children deserved a real school. And so they built one.

Completed in 1885, it served every grade level under one roof, a picketed structure of cedar logs standing right here on this very site. Now the land itself didn't cost the town a thing. It was donated by Uvalde's own founder, Reading W.

Black. A generous start to what would turn out to be a long and eventful educational history. But cedar logs and good intentions only go so far.

Demand for space grew fast, and before long a new four-room two-story structure went up in its place. Then, in 1891, four more rooms were added. That same year, 1891, the first class ever graduated from Uvalde's school.

Graduation after completion of the tenth grade, and sometimes those ceremonies were held not in any schoolhouse, but in the Uvalde Opera House. Now that is a detail worth savoring. Then came 1898.

The school building burned to the ground. All of it. Gone.

Another town might have faltered right there. Uvalde did not. Determined to continue meeting the educational needs of their children, the citizens came back to this same site and erected a new building in 1900.

Two stories tall, ten thousand dollars to build, and not without some controversy over just how big it ought to be. People have opinions about schoolhouses, always have. By 1907, Uvalde had become an independent school district, and even that modern 1900 structure was no longer adequate for the rapidly growing area.

So in 1908, plans for a larger Uvalde High School on West Main Street were carried out. Cedar logs to opera house ceremonies to a ten-thousand-dollar building to a whole new campus on West Main. The marker puts it plainly: the educational investments of the early citizens of Uvalde have been multiplied in the graduates of Uvalde High School.

For more than a century, Uvalde students have become valuable community members. That's not a small thing. That's the whole thing.

What the marker says

Four years after Uvalde became a railroad shipping point, the people of the city built their first school building. Completed in 1885, the facility served all grade levels. The picketed structure was constructed of cedar logs and erected on this site, which was donated by the town's founder, Reading W. Black. The demand for space quickly required a new four-room two-story structure. Four more rooms were added in 1891, the year of the first graduating class. Graduation ceremonies, which took place after completion of the tenth grade, were sometimes held in the Uvalde Opera House. The school building burned to the ground in 1898. Determined to continue to meet the educational needs of their children, Uvalde citizens erected a new building on this site in 1900. The two-story edifice cost $10,000 to build, and there was some controversy over its size. By 1907, Uvalde had become an independent school district, and even the modern 1900 structure was no longer adequate for the rapidly growing area. Plans for a larger Uvalde High School on West Main Street were carried out in 1908. The educational investments of the early citizens of Uvalde have been multiplied in the graduates of Uvalde High School. For more than a century, Uvalde students have become valuable community members. (1998) Incise on base: Gretchen Catron, Jane Knapik, Donna McDonough