Comments on: Name That School

By: Alison

Alison — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 00:19:49 +0000

I teach at Turkey Foot Middle School. It’s got to be the only one in the world. It was named Turkey Foot because it was farmland where farmers would walk their turkeys across a trail.

By: Elaine

Elaine — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 21:16:29 +0000

I haven’t seen anything like this so far: The town near where I grew up, Salem, Ohio, and Salem High School has the mascot the Quaker (a.k.a. Quaker Sam). The Salem Quakers (a.k.a. The Fighting Quakers!).

I never thought much about it until after I moved away and saw the outside world. And thought about it in terms of there are no school mascots like the Marietta Protestants, the Lakeville Hindus or the Plattville Raging Christians.

From their website, it looks like they’ve laid off actually mentioning the Quaker, but his pic is still alive and well. They’re logo is also now an Ohio State “O” that has been bastardized into a “Q.”

By: FourthRow

FourthRow — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 21:54:13 +0000

In Lawrence, Kansas, the second of our two high schools was named Lawrence Free State High School in honor of and reference to Kansas’ history in the abolition movement.
Particularly cool given that our town survived Quantrill’s Raid and all that noise.

By: Jennifer

Jennifer — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 14:57:25 +0000

There’s an elementary school in western Maryland called “Conococheague Elementary.” It’s pronounced CON-a-ca-chig. Try saying that as an adult, much less a child. It’s named, I believe, after a creek located nearby with the same name that originates in Pennsylvania and empties into the Potomac River.

By: bob

bob — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 19:45:56 +0000

I would add another category – people who donated money. I went to two separate private schools that changed from geography names to people names, in one case the name of the father of the donor. Both schools were in the middle of building new campuses and needed money badly.

By: Keis

Keis — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 16:58:15 +0000

About the NYC numerical system, they have second names. And they’re usually after important historical figures. My elementary was P.S. 151 aka The Lyndon B. Johnson School. So it’s not all incompassing the numerical idea.

By: Jennifer

Jennifer — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 14:39:30 +0000

I teach in NYC at a school called the Baccalaureate School for Global Education. Not only is the name impossible to say (try it 5 times fast) but the kids (grades 7-12) have a heck of a time spelling it. I think one of the them spelled it wrong on facebook…

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 03:46:44 +0000

In Sioux Falls we have an elementary school that’s also named after a living person; Terry Redlin, a South Dakota artist of some renown. Before Jim’s mention of Neil Armstrong’s namesake, I thought Terry’s was the only one.

I think it’s a bad idea. What happens if the guy goes off the deep end and does something terribly embarrassing? Will they still want the school to be known by his name?

By: Blu

Blu — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 01:05:37 +0000

My highschool was named Signos (Signs in Spanish)and everybody thought it was a night club. Does that count?

By: Charlie

Charlie — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 22:51:37 +0000

It’s a shame this one has changed, but I remember as a kid the Hanford, Washington high school mascot was the Hanford Bombers, with the logo being a mushroom cloud. A great reference to Hanford’s role in helping win WWII.

I just checked, and they have changed it to the Falcons. What a shame.