The Gore Center is helping the Campus School celebrate its 75^th Anniversary in its present building.  Campus School is a K-8 public school located on MTSU’s campus. When the General Assembly established Middle Tennessee Normal School (now MTSU) in 1911, it was primarily a teacher training school.  As a result, the General Assembly mandated that a public school be incorporated into the campus as a training facility for teachers. It was originally located in Kirksey Old Main.  Alternately called the “Model School,” the “Demonstration School,” and the “Training School,” it became the Campus School when the current building was completed in 1929.  January of 2004 will thus mark the 75^th Anniversary of the Campus School, which was renamed for longtime MTSU faculty member Homer Pittard in 1985.

In order to assist Campus School with its celebrations, the Gore Center worked with Development Office consultant Susan Grear to prepare a photographic exhibit tracing the school’s history.  The exhibit opened in the lobby of Campus School on Founders’ Day, August 28, and will remain in place through January.

In addition, we have been working with Campus School Librarian Joan Mann to preserve the school’s scrapbooks and photographs, which date back to the 1930s and total about 15 linear feet of material.  Sarah Murphy, a graduate student in the Public History Program, worked with us over the summer to mount the exhibit and to digitize all of the scrapbooks and albums.  The digitized images were burned onto CDs and a set was presented to the Campus School Library.  Meanwhile, student workers at the Gore Center are preserving the original scrapbooks by transferring them to archival paper and bindings.

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