A Look at The School Through The Years

(A.K.A. Old Blurry Photos of How the Outside of the School Has Changed!)

Hello Alumni!! (And anyone else surfing through!) Here you will find some old photos of Mendham High School, through just about 40 years! These show the outside of the school, and how it changed through the decades. Depending on what year you were there, some photos you may recognize and some you won't! Sad to say, some of these photos are far past their prime, but oh well. I'll post better ones when I find them!

The Very Beginning: Mendham High begins it's story in early 1969, as construction started then. The original architects were intrigued with the idea of the flat box, so the whole school was designed around this wonderful concept.

When the school opened, there was no Auxiliary (Small) Gym, no Music Wing, no grand Clock Tower, no upstairs Library, a back hallway wasn't there, none of that stuff! Well, here are some photos through the years .........!

		Photo #1: Overhead View of Construction - August 1969!

		Put your mouse pointer over the photo to get your bearings!

		Starting things off here is a photo from August 1969. Believe it or not, this mess of construction will be your future school! At the time of this photo, construction on the school was about five months along. This photo was taken from an airplane, and was in the Observer Tribune on August 28, 1969. If any of you lived on or near Drake Road, you may see your house! If you put your mouse pointer over the photo, you can see more detail of what you are looking at. See your future classrooms? How about where your locker will be?

		Photo #2: More Construction - 1970


		This photo of the front of the school during construction is really awful, but here it is anyways. As you can tell, the original architectural design was pretty plain and boxy, I must say! I believe this photo was taken in early or mid 1970. See the nice mounds of dirt around The Circle! The school has not looked anything like this in a long time, as construction completely changed the front in 1991. I really like that cool car there - after much extensive photo analysis, I am pretty sure that car is a 1970 Pontiac GTO and inside is Coach & Vice Principal Mr. Sutterley, and he is sitting in there anxiously waiting for the school to open! (Yup - I'm pretty sure!)

		Photo #3: School's Open! Summer/Fall of 1970


		This dark side-view photo is from I guess summer/fall of 1970, about when the school was done being built. This photo nicely shows how "factory" the original school looked, and no wonder with that giant smoke stack sticking up! The school looked like this for 12 years up until 1982, when the Auxiliary (Small) Gym and another hallway was built on the back of the school.

		Photo #4: Circle Circa 1974


		This photo is really bad and crinkled in one spot, sorry! This is a picture of The Circle area, looking towards Main Street, from 1974. If you are familiar with the current building, there is certainly no Music Wing, and that front paved parking lot is still a long ways from being created! I mainly posted this photo because I like that cute little 2-seater car parked on The Circle - I think it's a late 1960's English-made Triumph TR3! Who drove that to school? (Well, must be a student or parent, since no teacher could afford that back then!)

		Photo #5: Out The Back Window 1974


		Took me a minute to figure out where this was! This photo was taken from the from the back side of the school, looking down the fields towards the football field. That path there is the one we old folks walked down many a day in gym class, like these poor students! That path later became the covered green stairs, which was removed in 2006. That whole field is where today's Field House is. On the left, that little structure sticking up is that little hut on top of the bleachers on the football field/track. But in 2006, this entire view started completely changing once again, as a new wing is being built smack right in front there!

		Photo #6: Photo Of School Around 1976

		Put your mouse pointer over the photo!
		This grainy side-view photo is of Mendham High from around 1976. You sure can't miss the Sheep Farm right in front of the building! This photo was taken from the back of Hilltop Church. Once again, no Auxiliary Gym or "hall above the Social Studies hall", as they were built later. Since this photo is really drab, I decided to spice it up - if you put your mouse pointer over the photo, it turns into the current view of MHS from the EXACT same location. Cool! Watch the big red sheep barn, as it remains the same in both pictures. The School is sure quite a bit taller nowadays, and the trees really have grown over the years! UPDATE: The new construction has really changed this view! Got to update this photo when it's all completed!

		Photo #7: Overhead from 1976


		This photo is an overhead shot of the entire school, plus the Sheep Farm next door. The Circle is clearly visable there. Must have been taken by balloon or low flying airplane, or maybe a blimp, I assume! Wow, the school looks so dull! You can see how the school really looks like two big boxes with a medium sized box connecting them, with little retangles on each end. Though now that I look at the completed school, I can see the school actually has an almost perfect symmetry to it! Whoa! Who knew!

Photos #8: 1985 Front and Back

This photo made it to the wmmhs.org alumni page - I'm so proud of it!

In 2006, this area is better known for mud

Ah! Finally color photography was invented! Skipping ahead a decade, here is the school I am most familiar with. This is the front and the back, from around 1985. The front looks basically the same as in the 1970's, but the back is different. A new hall was built over the existing lower "Social Studies Hall" (with the Aux/Small Gym, too) around 1982. The back of the school looked like this for about 23 years, as only in 2006 did a construction project start to change all this.

		Photo #9: 1988 - The Mendham High Sign! (Built in 1980)


		Here is a very familiar sight to many an alumni! This is the Mendham High Sign, donated by the Class of 1980. It sat on the mound in the middle of the Circle for many, many years. How many of you were in a yearbook photo where you posed on the mound near the sign? In the later years, The sign had pretty flowers planted around it. But around 2005, The sign was removed - keep reading on down to see why!

		Photo #10: Clock Tower Built in 1991/1992


		In around 1991/1992, a HUGE construction project changed the whole front of the school, to what it is currently. The original front of the school (with the famous orange doors!) lasted 21 years. But with this new addition, there is no mistaking the school for a factory any longer! The new construction's most prominent feature is a grand Clock Tower, with a clock that tells the correct time twice a day. Also built was a new 2nd story wing for a library, plus new classrooms, and many other interior renovations! In the center of The Circle, you can still find the mound and the Mendham High Sign, too. The front of the school looked very similiar to this for about 13 years, until 2005ish.

Photos #11: The Mound Gets Flattened

Definition of mound (noun): structure consisting of an artificial heap or bank usually of earth or stones

I heard next they are building a monument of the mathematical symbol Pi and dedicating it to Mr. Domas!!

The Mound was in the center of The Circle since the school opened in 1970, but it is there no longer! In 2005, The Mound was flattened and instead they built two memorials. One is a pretty fountain honoring math teacher Mr. Wargacki, who served as principal, and the other memorial is for veterans from the local area. And the famous Mendham High Sign that stood for about 25 years was removed from The Circle in 2005 - not sure where it is now! It may be in storage! They better put it back somewhere!

And so the trip down Memory Lane ends with a splash in the fountain. I am looking for better photos, so maybe someday I will find some! And with all the new construction going on, all my "new" photos on the main page will become "old" quite soon .... So back to your merry lives now you go ...!

This page is part of oldmendhamhigh.com (A Mendham History/Alumni Site)
The absolute address of this page is http://home.att.net/~suelighthouse/mendhamhighschool.html

Updated: February 2008

These are two different Fisher Prince Little People Mail Trucks. They are suppose to represent the concept of email. Did you play with Fisher Price toys as a kid?

Sue Willis (Class of '88) - local librarian & member of the Mendham Borough Historical Society Send email at: suelighthouse@att.net

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