ATHENS HIGH AND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL

The Athens High and Industrial School, previously known as the Reese Street School, is located at 496 Reese Street (Tax Parcel No. 17-1-A3-A-010A).

The two-story frame building is typical of the turn-of-the-century urban black school. The Athens High and Industrial School presents a strong horizontal orientation and a low-pitch hipped roof with wide projecting eaves. Two Doric columns support the classical pedimented doorway, which features a set of paneled doors flanked by sidelights. A broad central hallway containing two double-flight, open-well stairways separates the four rooms on each of the two levels. The Athens High and Industrial School standing atop its brick foundation commands a position of prominence in the Reese Street neighborhood.

This institution was built in 1913 and opened early the following year as the Reese Street School, a privately supported black school. When the Athens High and Industrial School opened in this building in 1916, it established the state's first three-year black high school. During the next fifteen years, the expanding school occupied eight neighboring buildings. The most prominent of these was Carnegie Hall, part of the first private school for blacks in Athens, and Knox Institute, which closed in the late 1920s. Athens High and Industrial School moved in 1955 to a new building on Dearing Street later named Burney-Harris High School to honor black educators Annie H. Burney and Samuel F. Harris. Separate black and white schools became part of the past in 1970, when Burney-Harris and Athens High were combined to form Clarke Central High School. The original Reese Street School building is all that remains of Athens High and Industrial School, the Knox Institute properties having been demolished and replaced by a park and vacant lot. The facility currently serves the New Joy Church of God in Christ and the Prince Hall Affiliation of the Athens Masonic Association.

The Athens High and Industrial School has been locally designated as a Historic Landmark (February 2, 1988)