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Published Monday, February 06, 2012 in Local

Special

This picture — taken at a class reunion — shows many of the first class to finish all 11 grades at Howard Warner High and go on to finish 12th grade and graduate from Central High School. Seated, from left, are: Annie Steagall, Mary Joyce Owens, Shirley Rosser, Annette Rosser, Henri Jean Stewart, Ideal Mullins and Elizabeth Stepps. Standing are: India Steverson, Bennie Jenkins, Johnny Coleman, Ernest Jordan, Alton Taylor, Leola Johnson, Bonnie C. Zackery, Elizabeth Stegall, Williard Melson, Christine Ector, Agnes Hart, Johnny Alexander, Rufus Smith, Yvonne Arnold, Charlie Frank Town, Lillian Bonner, Annette Ferrell and Christine Hardaway.

Stewart finished 11th grade at Warner

By Alex McRae

The Newnan Times-Herald

During Henri Jean Stewart's time at Howard Warner School in Newnan "high-tech" educational aids topped out at a fresh piece of chalk for the chalkboard, but Stewart says the lack of technology didn't dull the desire to learn.

"We learned a lot," says Stewart, who still makes her home in Newnan. "And we loved our teachers. They were hard on us but we knew they cared about us. And they made us work hard."

Stewart grew up in Newnan's Rocky Hill neighborhood and from grades one through four attended nearby Ruth Hill School. Fifth-graders attended Warner Elementary. There was no school transportation, so Stewart had to make the long walk across town to the Savannah Street school every day. But she never walked alone.

Stewart's uncle, Henry Moss, worked at the R. D. Cole Manufacturing shop on East Broad Street in downtown Newnan, where Caldwell Tanks is now located. Every day, he walked his niece to school and even lightened her load.

"He always carried my books," Stewart said. "That was the nicest thing."

Stewart was transferred back to Ruth Hill for the 6th grade but returned to the Warner school in grade 7th and stayed there through the 11th grade.

Stewart spent her 12th grade year as part of the first senior class to graduate from Newnan's brand new Central High School on what is now Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.

"I was in the class of 1956," she says. "We were the first graduates of Central and we were very proud of that."

Stewart says that while Central was equipped with a few more educational bells and whistles, she and other students at Howard Warner High got a good education despite the lack of first-rate facilities and equipment.

"We didn't have computers or calculators," Stewart says of the days before electronics. "We didn't even have our first copy machine until we got to Central. At Warner we didn't even have mimeograph machines. When we took a test, the teacher wrote the questions on the blackboard and we copied them on our paper and took the test."

Stewart says her teachers also didn't tolerate any foolishness.

"Oh, no," she says. "They were in charge. Learning was a must. You had to learn in those days. We didn't have drugs or anything like that when I was in school, but we all knew to respect our teachers and we knew what would happen if we didn't. If you did something wrong, your teacher might just come home with you and nobody wanted that."

Stewart remembers playing basketball games outdoors at the school on Savannah Street in all kinds of weather. The football team played at Pickett Field on Wesley Street, which was the home of Newnan High football until Drake Stadium was built.

Stewart remembers many of her teachers, including Katherine Hill, Marie Reese and Sarah Dodson, whose husband, F. A. Dodson, was the school principal.

Some of her other teachers included Grant Stephens, Henry Seldon, B.J. McClendon, F.R. Harris, Margaree Hines, Ulysses Jackson, Carrie Gordan, W.A. Jones, George Auterberry and Georgia Callaway.

Class offerings included math, algebra, geometry, history, geography, health, music, English, shop and home economics. Extra-curricular activities included Hi-Y, Tri-Hi-Y, Glee Club and New Homemakers of America.

Stewart believes 17 of her fellow members of the Class of 1956 have passed away, but she is proud of what her classmates accomplished. Stewart worked for the Coweta County school system for 30 years before retiring in 1999.

Stewart says since so many of her classmates went all over the county and beyond to work and raise families, she hopes the Howard Warner building "will be used to benefit the county at large. Our class produced educators, nurses, ministers and everything else," she says. "We were prepared when we left school. We learned a lot, and we loved our teachers."

A committee appointed by the Newnan City Council has been taking suggestions for future uses for the now-empty building and is working to make a recommendation for the facilities that were given by the Coweta County School System to the city.

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