Eldorado High School - Golden E Yearbook (Eldorado, IL)

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the schools of the township and examine the pupils to determine who was qualified to enter the high school. It was determined that the number of pupils ready to enter high school would be rather small. Acordingly, an arrangement was Physics class scene in 1910-1911. made with the Eldorado Public School Board of Education to provide classes for the 8th grade, since the school facilities in Eldorado were inadequate to provide room and teachers for the rapidly increasing school population. 1. Marshall Peer and Bess Pemberton were employed as teachers and on Monday, Sep- tember 29, 1908 the school opened in the Methodist Church of Eldorado, since the new building was not ready for occupancy, There The graduating class of 1912 was the first class to attend all four years at E.T.H.S. Standing: Ralph Adams, Clyde Kane, Pearl Roberts, George Shaw, T. Leo Dodd. Seated: Neil Martin, Mary Shafer, Effie- Beare, Angeline Baugh, Freda Farmer. were 80 pupils enrolled in the 9th, 10th, and 11th grades, none in the 12th, and 47 in the 8th grade. For a few days classes were conducted in the Methodist and Baptist churches and then in the high school barn which had been con- structed to shelter the horses driven by the pupils from the rural area. The janitor's dwell- ing, which was fitted for temporary school quarters, was used for that purpose until De- cember 6, 1908, when the new building was completed. By this time the enrollment had reached 129 pupils, and Zola Green was em- ployed as a fourth member of the teaching staff. Basketball Squad of 1913. Standing: Coach Putnam, John David Upchurch, Leslie Stinson, Henry Kirkland, Hubert Bramlet, Seated: George Wilson, Cecil Simp- son, Louis Beasley. The new high school was soon fully accredited by the University of Illinois which enabled graduates from the school to be ad- mitted to the University without examination. Courses of study offered in the first year of the new school included: English, History, Draw- ing, Manual Training, Geometry, Zoology, Bo- tany, Modern and Medieval History, German, Bookkeeping, Agriculture, Physics, American History, Civics, and Arithmetic, all in addi- tion to the courses offered for the 8th grade. The close of the first year was marked, not by graduation from high school since there were no pupils in the twelfth grade that year, but by graduation of the eighth grade pupils, and their promotion to high school. The en- rollment in high school increased constantly until it reached its highest point in 1933 with 650 pupils enrolled. The first class to graduate with the full four-year course from the Eldorado Township High School was the class of 1910, with seven members, two boys and five girls. The class of 1911 had only two members, both girls, The 5

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Through 50 Years of E. T. H. S. by T. Leo Dodd The Eldorado Township High School is more than a high school-it is the expression of a community idea. The people of Eldorado did not have a high school forced upon them. The law of the State of Illinois did not require the people to provide secondary education for their children in the first decade of the 20th Century. The privilege of providing such educational advantage was made available and it was up to the expressed choice of the people as to whether or not a high school should be. Thus it is that the Eldorado Town- ship High School is a monument to the abiding ambition of the people of this community to provide the best within their means for their children. Prior to 1908 the only opportunity avail- able for those in the community who sought formal education beyond the 8th grade was in the Eldorado Public School system which provided only two years of high school train- ing or in one of the very few four year high First Board of Education. Standing: D. L. Wood, L. J. Wise, R. F. Jones. Seated: J. A. Watson, J. C. Dodd. schools in Southern Illinois. The need for a high school to accommodate the rapidly in- creasing population of the Eldorado commun- 4 ity was sensed by many local citizens. ln the spring of 1907, a vote was taken in Eldorado Township to establish a high school district, and was carried by a large majority. A high school board of education was elec- ted, consisting of five members: I. A. Watson, President, I. C. Dodd, Secretary, D. L. Wood, R. F, lones, and L. F. Wise. An election to issue bonds, December 14, 1907, and to select a site, April 1908, re- sulted in the issue of bonds and the selec- tion of the present site which was donated by Henry David Westbrook. This area near the High School came to be called College Heights because many people referred to the new school as a college. M. T. Van Cleve First Principal, 1908-1914 Van Cleve Building erected 1908, This is the way it appeared before the addition of the Dodd Building. On May 30, 1908 the Board of Education employed lvl. T. Van Cleve as principal, and authorized him to confer with them in the selecting of teachers and the selecting and purchasing of equipment. He was also to visit

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U1 r, . M ,2 al w 1. : m-vc. ' W n TY fn..-7. 4: M., 1 ' ! mn if 5 1... X U' rf Football Squad of 1912, Back Row: Coach Put- nam Cecil Murphy Henry Kirkland, Ray Wiggins, Homer Bramlet, Frank Sutton, ,'Vlidd'e Row: Hubert Bramlet, Cecil Simpson, McKinley Hicks Hal Burnett. Front Row: George Wilson, Louis Beasley Earl Simp, son, Simon Sutton, John Cox first'class to graduate, having had all its training in the new school was the class ot 1912, with e1e'ven members, three boys and eight girls From that time the size of gradua- ting classes increased untzl 1942, when the Baseball Team of 1912. Baseball was resumed at E.T,H S. in 1958 number of graduates reached 147 The en- rcllment of the school has usually reflected the economic candit1ons, not only in the com- munity, but in the country in general When unemployrnent has been great, greater num- bers have attended the school, due in part to pasrtions being filled by adults, and in ig The first gymnasium erected 1914. part by the fact that young families employed away from Eldorado returned to live here during periods oi unemployment. As rapidly as they could be provided, considering room, revenue, and demands for the new courses, the curriculum was expanded to include a well-rounded course of instruc- tion. Vocational Agriculture was added in 1919. Manual Training, or Industrial Arts, has been enlarged. Home Economics, Band, Or- chestra7 Chorus, a lull commercial course, Lan- guages, including at times, Latin, French, Ger- man, and Spanish, have been offered. Instruc- tion in Health, including Drivers Training, has been offered for several years, The first picture of the entire student body taken in 1910-1911.