East Coweta High School

History:

Education in eastern Coweta County probably began for the children of frontiers venturing into Indian territory in the early 1800's. At that time, what would become Coweta County, was a lush wilderness inhabited by "squatters" seeking to establish themselves in rapidly expanding Georgia (Tranquil Cemetery near Turin has headstones indicating interment as early as 1807). Children were often sent to learn reading and writing from any nearby neighbor who had those skills. [Crane: The Southern Frontier]


After the county was established (June 9, 1825), following the controversial Treaty of Indian Springs (March 1825), settlers entered and settled from east to west. Thus eastern Coweta was the first-settled part of the county with Kedron, Preston, White Oak, and Haralson as the leading early communities.

The wealthy established privately funded white academies almost immediately. It is believed that Preston Academy was existent in 1827. The poor of that day had to swear a pauper's oath to receive "poor school" funds for their education--few would do so. Even so, in 1833, five school districts were laid out in the county, and trustees were authorized to apportion the "Poor School Fund." It is unknown exactly which districts were formed. They probably included Kedron, White Oak, and Haralson.

In 1836, a "common school" fund was established by the state to combine academies and poor schools resulting in free education for all. However, the funding stopped in 1839. Once again, private academies and poor schools characterized the years 1840-1958. The major academy established in this part of the state in that era was eastern Coweta's own Longstreet Institute (1849), attracting the brightest scholars and professors from throughout the area.

Few white schools continued consistently through the war years of 1861-1865 and the reconstruction years through 1870. An exception was the Methodist-sponsored Senoia Institute, which flourished from the time of the founding of that city in 1865. Also, the Freedman's Bureau established free black schools in 1865 but funded them only through 1870 (we have no record of the names of any of those black schools). Nevertheless, the Coweta County Public School System was optimistically established in 1871 with Radford E. Pitman of Sharpsburg as commissioner (superintendent.) Common schools free to all the children of Georgia were resurrected in that year. However, in the three months of school offered then by Coweta schools, only 671 whites of 2055 eligible were enrolled.

Those early, shaky years gave way to an era of unbroken progress beginning in 1873. By 1879, Coweta County Schools employed forty-five white and twenty-six black teachers, and by 1893 there were forty-eight white and forty-four black schools. In 1898 the school year was increased to 100 days, and by 1927, Coweta was one of only fifteen counties statewide to have a full nine-month term and ranked third in the percentage of rural pupils in high school. Hoke Smith donated the first library (circulating among the various schools of the county), in 1901.

Consolidation efforts began earnestly in 1918 when J. Marvin Starr became superintendent. The first major consolidation took place around Sharpsburg and Turin. Ultimately, when Starr High School opened in 1921, it was hailed statewide as the most modern and innovative of rural high schools.

In 1922 there were thirty-two white public schools in the Coweta County School System. At that time Senoia area schools had an independent public system. By 1926, that number had been reduced to five, and by 1937 to twelve. Yet there were still forty black schools throughout the county.

After World War II, consolidation efforts intensified. East Coweta High School was founded on April 17, 1946 when the Coweta County School Board "ordered that the Haralson, Raymond, Starr, and Senoia school operate East Coweta High School at Starr School for the ensuing year." This ended a series of ever more inclusive consolidations which had begun years earlier. By 1955, the black schools had been combined into four schools.

Total integration began in Coweta County Schools, along with the merger with the Newnan School System, in 1970. With extensive metropolitan Atlanta's growth during the 1970's and 1980's, especially in eastern Coweta County, additional construction was required.

In the fall of 1988, the high school students of Moreland, East Newnan, White Oak, Major, the traditional East Coweta area, and all parts in between merged to culminate the consolidation efforts begun so long ago.