Watching what was Russellville Middle School being torn down recently has been met with mixed emotions. Reactions have varied from reliving
memories to resistance to reluctance to resignation.
The Russellville Band Boosters have devised a plan to save a memorable part of the building complex. The project will help preserve a portion of
the past while raising funds for present and future learning experiences.
Band boosters spent Saturday, Jan. 24 pulling up pieces of the gym floor. The shiny, familiar wood is resting in a storage unit donated by RHS
alumnus Jim Riley of A-1 Self Storage.
"It is our goal by this fall to be able to sell 'Memories of RMS' as a fund raiser for our organization," says Vanessa Priddy, secretary of the
Russellville Band Boosters. "I could not just watch the gym be torn down and hauled off without the opportunity to save a piece of history. It is our
goal to disassemble the floor and try to reassemble much of the center section."
Priddy, who is a former member of the school board, says the reassembled
section will be donated back to the school system to be put on display for future generations. The rest of the floor will be used to make plaques or
similar items that will be offered for sale to alumni and friends
Russellville no longer has a middle school as such. The fifth and sixth grades have been in remodeled/expanded sections of Stevenson Elementary
School for a couple of school years. Seventh and eighth graders moved to a beautiful new expansion on the east side of Russellville High School when
this semester began in early January. Razing RMS began immediately afterwards.
For years community members and alumni have consulted with the school administration about what would happen to the old RMS building. A school has
been located on that site in some form for many generations, dating back to Logan Female College. A free-standing building between the gym and the east
wing-Landers Hall-was part of the college, and the gymnasium included a swimming pool beneath the stage.
Because of the terms of the school board's financing of construction projects, it became clear that the school system could not sell, lease or
donate any of the buildings, according to Board Member David Corbin, a former teacher at RMS. Meanwhile the state department of education would not
allow any more funds to be spent on rehabilitating the buildings.
"Over the years I have seen and even been involved in taking old school buildings and adapting them to other uses. We never encountered a
situation where the school board was denied the opportunity to transfer ownership of property and rights especially when it meant generating revenue,"
says Jim Humphrey, a Russellville architect who has been involved in many school construction projects, including the design of Logan County High
School.
“That part I don't understand but, in all fairness, I do not doubt that the school board found themselves in an untenable situation with the
bureaucrats in Frankfort."
Russellville historian Mary Lucy Franklin was one who wanted to preserve parts of the building, but she also accepted that its being razed was
inevitable. "I have been keeping up with all this for the past several years; all the local folks have been wonderful," she says. "There is just
nothing that could have been done short of coming up with huge sums of money."
Potential customers for the Band Boosters' plaques won't just be alumni of the city
school system. Until the current Russellville High School was built in the mid-60s, RHS
was part of the downtown academic complex. What has been known as the middle
school gym for 40 years was the high school gymnasium during the previous decades.
The county and district basketball tournaments were played in the gym, so many
champions from county schools also have wonderful recollections of what happened in
that facility.
"We want to be good stewards of this piece of history, so this will not be a quick
decision," Priddy says. "We want the many people who have memories of this fine gym
to have the option of making a purchase."
The band boosters also have been granted the gold curtains hanging above the proscenium of the stage. How they will be used or distributed has not
yet been decided.
Priddy's husband Brad is the RHS Band Boosters president. Other officers are Theresa Shutt, Cindi Anderson and Pam Pate.