Description
The Nailor High School was initially known as the Cleveland Consolidated School for African American students. It was designed by architect E. L. Malvaney and approved as WPA No. 50,022 in the fall of 1940. The monolithic concrete building contained two wings of classrooms connected by an auditorium seating 400, with a proposed cost of $63,000. WPA approved $25,394 toward the cost of the new school. “Nailor’s poured concrete construction and Art Moderne style is almost unique for black schools of the same period and would have made it one of the finest African American school buildings of its time” (Baughn, 2010, p. 2). The auditorium was damaged by fire in 1950 and during repair, additional classrooms were added to the WPA-constructed building. It served as the Cleveland school for African American students from its opening until the 1960s when a new high school was construction and it became the Elementary school for African American students. It was demolished in 2011.
Source notes
Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Historic Resources Inventory, Cleveland. Retrieved August 19, 2020 from:
https://www.apps.mdah.ms.gov/Public/rpt.aspx?rpt=publicPropSearch&Name=&StreetNo=&StreetName=&City=Cleveland&County=AnyBaughn, J. (June 9, 2010). Nailor Elementary School: Mississippi Landmark Significance Report. Mississippi Department of Archives and History, Historic Resources Inventory.
Projects Involve $138,000 in Two Upstate Cities. (May 5, 1940). Clarion-Ledger, p. 14.
WPA Allotments Total $41,709. (Sep 21, 1940). Clarion-Ledger, p. 1.
$90,000 Fire. (Jan 9, 1950) Hattiesburg American, p. 14.
Plans Underway to Repair Cleveland Negro School Now. (Feb 16, 1950). The Delta Democrat-Times, p. 12.
Project originally submitted by Susan Allen on August 23, 2020.
We welcome contributions of additional information on any New Deal project site.
SUBMIT MORE INFORMATION OR PHOTOGRAPHS FOR THIS SITE