Harrisburg Central High School - Yearbook (Harrisburg, PA)

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DRAXVING ROOM

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Beauty is its own excuse for being -Emwfwn 22

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l l History of Harrisburg High School I I ,DQSHBQ S N looking over the early annals of Harrisburg We cannot hnd the exact date of the founding of our High School, as all records pertaining to its history are lost. Withotit doubt some pupils think that the High School has stood on its present site forever. In the early part of the nineteenth century, when Harrisburg was a borough, it was divided by Market Street into tivo wards-North and South. Before the enactment of the Public School law in 1834 the children of each ward were educated in private schoolsg tuition beingpaid by their parents or by some generous friend, and occasionally the Legislature appropriated small sums for the education of the children. After this law was enforced the citizens began to organize schools and to erect buildings. But their labor only pertained to the education of the younger children. The older pupils still continued to attend the private schools and academies. As the school committee saw the great benefit derived from the education of the children, they began to look after the erection of schools for the older members. Thus it was that the citizens erected two High Schools in each ward, one for the girls and one for the boys of their own ward. 'With these four public High Schools, Harrisburg must have been a thriving little city. These schools were in their infancy and did not have the choice of so many courses of study as the average High School of to-day. As time and experience broadens the mind of man thus the courses were enlarged and improved. It was now no longer necessary for pupils to be sent to private schools to complete their education. History and records tell us that in 1850, tl1e principal of the North W'ard Girls, High School taught chemistry, astronomy, rhetoric, botany, algebra, drawing, and studies pursued in the average college of those days. In 1854, the boys' of the same Ward were studying Latin, algebra, natural philosophy, chemistry, astronomy, etc. The buildings of these High Schools were situated in convenient places. The North Warcl Boys' High School founded in 1836, was situated in the old Lancasterian school building now known as the De'Witt building. The boys of the South Vliard were not so fortunate as their rivals of the' North W'ard, they were compelled to be moved to tivo or three different places. The school was hrst situated on the site of the present Salem Reformed Church 24