The 1929 THS football team on the back steps of the new high school

Get a brick and a book

Contributed

“When the decision was made to build a new Tallassee High School,” music teacher Michael Bird said, “our superintendent, Dr. Brock Nolin, sent Mrs. (Traci) Evans and me an outline of what he’d like to see. He suggested that we save some of the bricks and have a book about the school to be sold along with them.  That’s where the idea of the ‘brick and a book’ came from,” Bird continued. 

Mrs. Evans has titled the book MOMENTS OF GOLD, and it will be the same shape and size as a traditional yearbook published by Herff Jones, which longtime observers may remember went by the name Paragon Press in the 1960s and early 1970s. The nationally-known publishing plant is located on Highway 80 in Montgomery, across from Dannelly Field. 

Over the past few months, Mrs. Evans and Mr. Bird have spent hours interviewing locals and contacting longtime faculty members and asked for their input.

From left: Goss, Evans, Bird

“Obviously, we wanted to try and reach out to people who worked the longest in the building we’ve known,” Bird said, “so I started with people like Coach (Ronnie) Baynes, Mr. Bush, Coach (Carl) Stewart, and Coach (Glen) Baggett and then have been working on trying to get material from others like Mrs. (Susan) Davidson and Mrs. (Monice) Keahey, who worked here for several decades.” 

Evans and Bird have also received documentation and essays from local citizens Suzy Wilson, Bill Goss, and W.C. Bryant, all of whom have collected a lot of data over the years about Tallassee High School and its role in the life of the community. 

The Tallassee-Mount Vernon Mills Briefs, which were published for most of the first half of the twentieth century, have proved to be a treasure trove of information about the early years of Tallassee City Schools.

School Board President Mr. Don Bryant has compiled a list of every graduate of THS, with the years 1938-2021 completed.  He is currently researching the years 1916-1938.

Local historian and author Mr. Bill Goss has also been hard at work finding the oldest living graduates of THS, and is in contact with some of them who reside locally.

Some of the archival material has proved to be illuminating.

Band uniform from the "Long Blue Line"

“When we were closing down the main building the last couple of weeks of school, they were going through all of these old books in our Library and deciding what to keep and what to donate.  One of the books was a 1961 Palladium annual from Troy University,” Bird continued.  

“The yearbook was dedicated to Dr. Charles Bunyan Smith of Tallassee, the founder of our school system, who left here to become President of Troy State Teachers College, and there was an article with pictures of him right at the beginning of the book,” said Bird.  “It was one of those lucky finds that proved to Mrs. Evans and me that we are on the right track and will be learning a lot about the school we all love.  We hope to pass that along in this once-in-a-lifetime document of history passing before our eyes.”

MOMENTS OF GOLD will be edited in August and September, then sent to the publisher with the expectation of a Christmas delivery date.  A website where customers may place their order for the brick and the book will be established in the coming months.  For more information, please contact Traci Evans at Tallassee High School at traci.evans@tcschools.com.