Former Site of Longview High School
Longview, Gregg County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The first public school offering high school classes in Longview was built in 1880. A larger school building was erected in 1884 to accommodate an expanded student enrollment. The Longview Senior High School Complex, constructed at this location in 1929, was converted to a junior high school in 1932 after an area-wide oil boom contributed to a doubling of the student enrollment and the decision to build a new high school structure on East Whaley Street. successful bond elections in 1972 and 1986 led to the construction of the Longview High School Complex at Airline Road and Loop 281.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Longview's first public high school classes began in a building erected in 1880, replaced by a larger structure in 1884 as enrollment grew. A senior high complex rose on this site in 1929 but was converted to a junior high just three years later, after the area's oil boom doubled the student body and prompted a new high school on East Whaley Street. Later bond elections in 1972 and 1986 funded the modern Longview High School Complex on Airline Road.
Why it matters
The school's shifting sites track how the East Texas oil boom swelled a town's population so fast that its classrooms could barely keep pace.
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Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
First Methodist Church of Longview
Longview, TX
This congregation dates to 1845, when a one-room log building served the community as church, school, and town hall, tended by circuit-riding ministers until 1850. Following the paths of trade and travel, the congregation moved to Earpville on the stagecoach road in 1860 and then relocated its building to Longview in 1874 after the railroad arrived. It has served the area for more than a century and a half.
Longview Womack High School
Longview, TX
Opened in 1930 on Gum Street as the Longview Negro High School, this campus gave African American students a secondary education in the era of legal segregation. Rebuilt after a 1946 fire and later renamed for beloved teacher Mary C. Womack, it produced graduates guided by principals honored in the East Texas Black Educators Hall of Fame. A federal desegregation order finally closed and razed the school.
Early Teague Home
Longview, TX
This house is one of the few surviving structures of Earpville, the early settlement that grew into Longview, standing along William T. Brooks's stagecoach line running from Monroe, Louisiana, to Tyler, Texas. Built before 1882 and bought that year by Alabama natives Latimus and Mary Teague, it became a schoolhouse in 1890 when their daughters Molly and Sarah taught classes and music here until the school moved in 1905.
Red Oak Missionary Baptist Church
Longview, TX
In 1875, a decade after emancipation, freed African Americans south of Longview organized Red Oak Grove Baptist Church on land donated by Sallie Rollins, with Rev. Rube Wright as their first pastor. The congregation later moved to its present site and dropped 'grove' from its name, all the while investing in education through ties to Butler College in Tyler and student scholarships. Its mission work has shaped the surrounding community for nearly a century and a half.