Celebrating Austin High's 125 Years (published 2007) 125 Years (pp 1-24) | Page 9

Seven Campuses
A Brief History of Austin High
We are the "oldest, continuing, tax-supported, locally controlled, public high school in Texas".
AHS #1
1881 -- The first day of school at "Austin High" was September 14,
1881, in two classrooms on the third floor of the "old West Austin
School" at 1100 Rio Grande. Today we know that building as
Pease Elementary. There were thirty-three girls and eighteen boys
in separate classes. There were only ten grades in the high school
until 1899, when the 11th grade was added.
AHS#2
1884 -- We ran out of space at the Pease School and moved to four Sunday
school rooms at the First Baptist Church, then located across the street from the
Governor's Mansion on Lavaca Street. The Mansion is still there, but the church
is gone. By 1894, we were using all eight of the Sunday school classrooms.
AHS#3
1894 -- The school district leased the temporary Capitol Building of
Texas at 11th and Congress as the third Austin High campus. By
1899, AHS occupied fifteen classroom spaces including the old Sen-
ate Hall where Professor Pearce taught government. The building
burned in a spectacular fire on September 30, 1899.
AHS#4
1899 -- For six weeks there was no school. Then, in mid-
November, the school district rented a second story space in the
100 block of West Sixth Street. It had been a theater, but the
"Smith Opera House", as it was called, was more of a dance hall
than an "opera" house. They ran wires along the ceiling and
strung curtains to divide the 40' wide by 130' long room (with a
stage at one end), into twelve classrooms (two on the stage).
7