Benton High School, built 1930 by Lumbergh & Hayes (Canton architects/builders), abandoned late 1990s
In 1912 the Yazoo County Agricultural High School was located at Benton, and it is one of the largest and best of its kind in the state. [A] few years later a Consolidated High School was located here, graveled roads were built in every direction from Benton. [W]ith this added educational facilities and good roads people began moving back to Benton, several new stores were opened, a telephone exchange was established and lines built throughout the eastern part of the county, a deep well was put down.
. . . .
The Agricultural High School is just east of Benton on the Canton Highway, they have as well as the school buildings and dormitories for the boarding pupils, a demonstration farm and orchards and gardens, and raise most of the food they use.
WPA Source Material for Yazoo County, “Towns” (c.1938)
A few weeks ago, I showed a few pictures of the elementary building at the Benton school campus, which was included in a list of “America’s Most Outstanding School Buildings (since 1945)” in American School and University, 1951 edition. That building no longer stands, but three buildings remain at the campus, which has been abandoned since the late 1990s: the administration building, a c.1960 gymnasium, and a frame teacher’s apartment building.
At one time, between 1912 and the early 1930s, almost every county had an agricultural high school: a central boarding school for rural students who desired a secondary education. Roads were so bad and automobiles were still so new and unreliable that driving into town every day was not an option. Yazoo’s agricultural high school, like many around the state, dissolved in the 1930s and became just Benton Consolidated School. Others morphed into our first junior colleges. Only a few “original” AHS campuses remain–the junior college campuses in almost every case have grown so dramatically that they don’t have any of their original buildings or they have been drastically altered; the campuses that were abandoned in the 1930s have mostly fallen down on their own over time. One of the Clay County AHS buildings in Pheba up near West Point is being restored using an MDAH Community Heritage Grant. So, this campus as Benton, even in the disrepair it’s in, is a rare treasure I wish we could find a use for.
I first saw the campus back around 2000–at that time it had only recently been abandoned and everything was locked tight. I could see through the door windows though that alot of school equipment had been left in the building. I’ve seen this before in abandoned schools, where desks, cafeteria equipment, trophy cases, textbooks–all has been left to rot or be stolen–very disturbing neglect of public funds. Anyway, the next time I passed by a few years later, many of the doors in every building were wide open and no equipment was left in the administration building. As an architectural historian, of course, my curiosity revels in open doors, but as a preservationist, I know that they bode ill for the buildings.
Recently as I came back to Jackson from the Delta, I decided to swing through Benton again to check on the school. This time, I found boarded and chained doors, but broken out windows and signs of past vandalism.
Benton School teacher's apartments (possibly built as a dorm for AHS students?), c.1930
Gymnasium, Benton School (1960, John L. Turner & Assoc., archts.)--a very cool interior with the clearstory windows going most of the way around
Administration Building, Benton School, main hallway--beautiful space that's still salvageable
Very neat, E.! Thank you!
Do you know the Whitfield School in Jones County “near” Ellisville and Ovette?
Posted by Carunzel | August 20, 2009, 9:14 amI do know and love Whitfield–I’ve stopped many times to check on it. Last time I drove passed though, I looked and looked and didn’t see it. That was around Katrina, maybe 2006. Maybe I missed it because I was going south, which is not the best perspective to see it through the trees, but I know it’s possible it’s been torn down. Have you seen it recently?
Posted by ELMalvaney | August 20, 2009, 11:53 amNope, I was wondering if you had. I haven’t been down that way since 2003.
If you get a chance …
I’ll check if I ever get down that way again.
I guess that means no one has ever made plans to do anything with it?
Posted by Carunzel | August 21, 2009, 9:24 amNo, last time I was there, a guy from across the highway came across to see what I was doing, which was good. He said he and his family keep a watch on the building, but even at that time, the roof was starting to have soft areas, the windows were being smashed out, general deterioration. Very sad for such a grand and dignified place.
Posted by ELMalvaney | August 21, 2009, 10:30 amThe district sold the property to a construction company. It will eventually be demolished.
Posted by jrock | September 16, 2009, 12:48 pmSadly the school at Whitfield in Jones County has been demolished. So has the abandoned school at Moselle, and Calhoun near Laurel.
Earlier in this decade the county floated a bond issue to replace many of the old elementary schools. Now the county has several “state of the art” elementary schools, however, those old school building that were still being used were just abandoned and they became rotting hulks like the former Whitfield school. They are all gone now.
The only exception is the old 1930′s era elementary school in Ellisville. It is now houses the county’s gifted program.
I guess we call it progress, and it is, but It is hard to see those old building disappear.
Posted by dazonblue | February 20, 2010, 2:46 amThanks for the update. That’s really terrible; it was a really neat building.
Posted by Carunzel | February 20, 2010, 9:10 amWe’ll see if it’s progress if the new buildings are still in good shape and useful in the community in another 40 years, or even 30 years. If they’re anything like the “state of the art” buildings I’ve been seeing lately, little more than steel beams covered with a coat of Dryvet, I doubt they will meet either of those criteria.
But as Carunzel said, thanks for the update. I hate to see good sturdy and stylish school buildings abandoned with no thought of the public investment they represent or of their future.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 21, 2010, 8:16 pmThanks for this post. My parents, Clark Johnson and Bettye Vaughan, went to school here. My dad and I drove by recently, and he pointed out the spot where he was standing when he learned that Kennedy had been shot. It’s a beautiful building, and indeed, I wish there were a productive use for this building.
Posted by magnoliamemories | March 31, 2012, 7:53 pmI graduated from Benton High in 1960. It was a Mayberry experience for me and will always be a treasured memory for me. Although the condition of the school brings tears to my eyes, I thank you for this posting.
Posted by RICHARD SPONG | April 2, 2012, 12:47 pm