Thanks to our partners at the Hendersonville High School Alumni Association, DigitalNC is proud to announce that a collection of student life records are now available online for the first time! High school archetypes of all kinds are represented within this collection, which has something for Buellers and Ringwalds alike. Three new scrapbooks and seventy-six issues of the student newspaper are now available online!
Two of the scrapbooks featured in this collection were created to record the epic highs and lows of the drama club from 1969 to 1978. The scrapbooks feature all aspects of the drama club’s operations, from color photographs of rehearsals to annotated play festival programs. Each year encapsulates a journey, from auditions in August to the performance in the North Carolina Theater Conference festival. A personal highlight of these books are the handmade felted harlequins and jesters, which often point out key moments or important documents.
A different high school experience is represented in the third scrapbook, composed by a member of the Hendersonville High School Student Council in 1990. The scrapbook records the high school’s event planners, meeting organizers, and sock-hop decorators at the advent of the decade. A corresponding hope and vigor runs through the scrapbook, and the slogan “Bearcats are Putting It Together in the 90’s!” can be seen throughout the pages. The scrapbook contains an excellent series of photographs of the school’s clubs, which have some truly spectacular 90s fashion.
You can find these new scrapbooks online now at NC Digital here, and the new issues of the student newspaper online here. Interested in more content from Hendersonville High School? You can find their associated page at DigitalNC here, or visit the Hendersonville High School Alumni Association online at their website here.
Though this batch of yearbooks covers so many different eras of high school throughout the 20th century, one consistent element among several editions is a focus on uniforms. The 1970 edition of The Falcon, for example, shows a representative from the school’s various teams showing off their athletic uniforms. This 1970 cheerleading uniform is a bit of a departure from the cheerleading uniforms of the 1950s, as evidenced by this squad from Mills River High (though the dance teams’ preference for shiny uniforms seems to be evergreen).
More Henderson county high school yearbooks are now available on our site thanks to one of our newest partners, the Hendersonville High School Alumni Association. Included in this batch are 12 yearbooks from the Bearcats spanning from 1954-1972.
One of the main characters of this stretch of yearbooks is longtime teacher and alumnus Tom Orr, who graduated in 1957 and came back to teach at his alma mater after attending UNC Chapel Hill and Western Carolina. The HHSAA recently posted a scholarship announcement honoring his contributions to the school as well.
Tom Orr in 1955
Since these yearbooks span a few decades, you can see Mr. Orr back when he was still a student in 1955. Back then, he was on the business staff of The Red and White as one of the ad men. Perhaps this is what later inspired him to pursue teaching English as a career.
His obituary notes that he taught at the school for 32 years, and in that time, he received several teaching awards, both for English and Drama.
This blog is maintained by the staff of the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center and features the latest news and highlights from the collections at DigitalNC, an online library of primary sources from organizations across North Carolina.
