Wasco Union High School Auditorium

About this property

Wasco Union High School (WUHS) is a public American senior high school in Wasco, California. The school is part of the Wasco Union High School District and takes in incoming freshmen from the Wasco Union School District, Maple School District, Lost Hills Union School District, Semitropic School District, St. John's Catholic School, and North Kern Christian School. The school's auditorium is the City of Wasco's only listing on the National Register of Historic Places. WUHS was established in 1914 when the voters of the Cleveland, Maple, Poplar, Wildwood, Semitropic and Wasco elementary school districts approved the formation of a high school, to coincide with the new addition of the Wasco Union High School District that year. In the inaugural year, 28 students were enrolled at WUHS, and classes were held in a rented auditorium-like building called Wasco Hall. In August 1916, a new high school building for WUHS was approved; it was completed within six months and cost about $50,000. 69 students were enrolled at the time of the dedication on March 3, 1917. After 1917, as new structures were added to the campus, the original building was referred to simply as the Main Building. In the years following, a host of new buildings were added to the campus: an industrial arts building in 1925, an auditorium in 1929, a gymnasium in 1931, an agricultural addition to the industrial arts building in 1934, the first phase of the science building in 1935, and the second phase in 1939. A cafeteria and a language arts building were added in 1949, a library and a music building in 1953, a new classroom building and a bus garage in 1957, and a new administration building in 1959. In recent years, WUHS has undergone tremendous change. For instance, the enrollment pattern from the 1925-1926 school year through the 2005-2006 school year showed the school's student body expanding every decade (aside from 1975-1976 school year through 1985-1986), which is revealed in the following figures, given in ten year increments: 1925-1926 (143 students); 1935-1936 (299 students); 1945-1946 (385 students); 1955-1956 (546 students); 1965-1966 (879 students); 1975-1976 (869 students); 1985-1986 (854 students); 1995-1996 (960 students) and 2005-2006 (1,551 students). This led to an increase in student enrollment and, should the Wasco Union High School District sustain its present rate of growth, projections indicate that the enrollment at WUHS would reach 2,200 students by 2010. This led the district to begin preliminary planning for a second comprehensive high school to take in the influx of students within the district.

Location

Categories

Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

More in Kern County

Historic places, battles, and census history across Kern County.

More historic places in California

Browse all historic places in California.

Conflict records

Explore 19,000+ military engagements across American history.

California history

Colonial settlement, territorial period, and statehood narrative.