Celebrating 125 years of Lawrence education

Intertwining history with faculty, student and alumni collaborations and state-of the-art technology, the Lawrence School District will continue its 125th anniversary celebration next month with a dinner and a philharmonic concert.

Lawrence schools, founded on Jan. 24, 1891, is paying homage to its past with an exhibit of memorabilia that includes photographs, the clock from the Number One School, a vintage classroom desk replica and a 45-minute video documenting the district’s history with remembrances from graduates, including Mille Magnuson, 93, one of Lawrence High School’s oldest living alumni.

There will be a dinner at the high school on Jan. 7 at what Superintendent Gary Schall called the “beautiful new cafeteria,” where a video made by students with guidance from social studies teacher Frank Zangari (LHS class of 1998) and 2012 graduate Nicole Gardner, who does social media for ESPN, will be shown.

“People can travel down the halls and … say, ‘I can’t believe it looked like that,’ or ‘I remember that event,’” Schall said about the exhibit. The history of the district will be documented from its first public school (known as the Cedarhurst Public School, which later became the Number Three School and now is the home of the Hebrew Academy of the Five Towns and Rockaway High School) to now.    

Using digital technology, students are creating a quilt of photos under the watchful eye of art teacher Ilanit Oknin and digital graphic posters with the assistance of high school art teachers Janet Gaines, Joanne DelGuidice and Miriam Vainblat (LHS 2011). “The quilt is made by scanning images onto the material,” said Oknin, who along with fellow art teacher Rob Verone and Zangari, conducted much of the research.

One of the less-known tidbits they learned is that in the late 1800s, Margaret Sage, who was the second wife of robber baron Russell Sage, inherited $63 million (more than $1.33 billion in 2016 dollars) after his death in 1906. A former teacher, Margaret used the money to found the Russell Sage College, a women’s college in upstate Troy, and for other educational institutions. She also established the Margaret Sage Industrial School, which was built in 1907, and later called the Nassau Industrial School. It stood on what is now the Five Towns Community Center’s soccer fields, at 270 Lawrence Ave. The building, renamed the Five Towns Community House in 1942, was a settlement house that provided an array of community-oriented services.

Using a part of that history, Verone is repurposing the wood from the recently replaced high school gymnasium’s bleachers and the students in his stagecraft class are making the exhibit cases. On the new bleachers is the 1998 Tornado mascot drawing designed by student Mike Lee, and the newer Tornado designs are on the recently installed billboards on the side of the school parking lot. “We are combining yesterday with today’s type of look,” Verone said.

On Jan. 8, a concert will be performed by an orchestra under the baton of high school music coordinator Terry Batts, which will comprise students, graduates and other professional and amateur musicians. The pieces range from Aaron Copeland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man” to excerpts from the opera “Carmen.” “I’m very excited about what we will see from our students,” Batts said. “To see the younger students interact with the older community is very inspiring.”

To attend the dinner at 6 p.m. on Saturday and the Sunday concert at 4 p.m., call (516) 295-7084 or go to www.lawrence.org. The dinner is $15 per person and $25 per couple. Concert tickets are $10 for adults and $5 for students and seniors. Gallery doors open at 3 p.m. for a stroll down memory lane.

 To support the events, send a tax deductible check (memo: 125th Anniversary) to Lawrence 125th Anniversary, PO Box 477, Lawrence, NY 11588 or call the number above.