104 Comments for Arlington School

This still seems like an afterthought "space for a gymnasium" doesn't sound like gym was high on the prioity, although, a semi-buried gym in Alabama sounds like it might have some cooling benefits. Still seems awful narrow for basketball, especially with the doors opening into the gym.
Well huh, this opened in 1908, Basketball was still just starting to get rolling in colleges. This is a late model - pre-basketball gymnasium then? With idioting spraypaint.

Hmm, no windows in the doors themselves. That must have become standard later. I can't think of another school with solid doors.

I take it that's all lead paint chips on the floor?

I have to say I'm laughing instead of mad. The once-mighty sheetheads reduced to graffiti in an abandoned school. How powerless can you get? If it wasn't for random chance of you being here literally nobody would even see it...didn't even have the courage to spraypaint a wall in public.

I remember these. They were BIG STUFF when I was a kid, administered every year at my elementary school. Past middle school I never heard of 'em again.

Amazingly intact!

Motts you find the most amazing stuff. That tree and empty swing is a perfect forlorn symbol of an abandoned school.

Made me miss my old elementary school, ya did.

Thanks for the extra details. I didn't get that the windows were at street level. Looks like the last door on the right goes to the outside as well. Even then they were hopefully smart enough to put good exits in case of a fire.
Really is amazing that the lamp shades hadn't been crushed by this time. I guess the final demo took care of that...
Thanks as always for the galleries and great info.

Thank you for the link. Indeed a fine lovely well planned school-building.
Uncanny little shiny pistachio-green enamel lamp-shade still there, untrampled, after the visit of lowlife scribblers.

...think i will pass......

Yeah - that tree! And Google Earth Has Excellent Street View "click to go" around the block (thanks!)...and there IS a Swing-tree!!
Handsome stately building; You HAVE made it look pretty, and caught beauty; it IS derelict, decrepit, delipidated and forlorn, indeed.

The gymnasium appears to be original to the building, as it was noted in a May 23, 1908 issue of the Bessemer Weekly newspaper:

"In the basement are toilets for both sexes… and space for gymnasium, boiler and blowing engine, electric motor, etc."
http://greetingsfrombe...om/arlington-school/

I don't see evidence of ceiling tiles, the debris seems to be mostly glass from the smashed-out skylights and leaves blown in from the open windows, which are at street level.

Of course, now I see the 2 green light fixtures laying on the ground. The obvious one is close up and then one towards the back. Even with a dozen of those this would have been very dark at night.

LPN makes a good point. This really does look to have been the result of enclosing space between 2 exterior walls. I see what looks like a single light on the far wall left of the goal. The lack of other lighting is odd.
Did there used to be an acoustic ceiling glued to the ceiling? Seems like a lot of debris for a room in such good condition. No obvious source unless an entire layer of ceiling has come down.