[Granville-Hough] 14 Aug 2009 - Schools 3

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

Date: Fri, 14 Aug 2009 08:05:45 -0700
From: Granville W Hough <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Subject: Schools3 - 1 4 Aug 2009


Smith County Agricultural High School. This boarding and bussing school 
was the pride of SullivanÆs Hollow, of Beat 3, and of Smith County. It 
was organized in 1913 with a plant comprised of an administration 
building and two large student dormitories. Recall at this time that 
transportation in SullivanÆs Hollow was still horse and buggy, and the 
roads were elementary wagon tracks through the forests. It was the only 
(or best) high school in the county, operated for seven months each 
year, and had about 200 students. By 1922, when I was born, it was the 
scene of a basketball disaster in which two persons were killed and 
several others wounded. It rebounded to win the state basketball 
championship in 1928. Under leadership of Superintendent L. N. Davis, it 
reached an enrollment of 400, with about 40 in each graduating class. 
(Mrs. L. N. Davis was Kindergarten teacher for the younger Hough 
children.) The Depression of 1929 devastated the area and the school. 
People from distant areas of the county could not afford to board their 
children at Mize. In 1933, the Smith County AHS was converted into a 
Beat 3 or Mize public school system. Other beats in the county developed 
their own vocational high schools at Raleigh, Taylorsville, Whiteoak, 
and Sylvarena. Pineville, Burns, and Polkville also had schools which 
continued after 1933 for some time. Homewood and Summerland had line 
schools, which must have meant county line schools with shared 
responsibility with the adjacent county.
Mize Public School System was the largest in the county, and it had four 
grade schools and a central high school. The four grade schools were: 
Mize, Morris, New Haven, and Shady Grove. The high school was on the 
southern outskirt of Mize, about one-half mile south (and uphill) from 
the downtown street of stores. The grade school was on the north side of 
town, next to Clear Creek. Taylor Sullivan had been one of the town 
officials who had supervised the building of the school. His picture 
with the school building as a background indicates his pride in the 
project. The busses brought all the children to the grade school, then 
took the high school students up the hill to the high school.
In 1933, when the system was converted from Smith County AHS into the 
Mize Public School System, it served 153 square miles (Beat 3), had 1639 
students, 37 teachers, and 39 school buses. The two Principals of Mize 
Grade School while I attended until 1937 were King Oliver Sullivan and 
Atha Blackwell.