A fire early Friday destroyed a historic building that was formerly used as a high school for black students before desegregation in Morrilton and most recently housed part of a Head Start program.
No one was in the one-story, primarily stone building at 906 W. Rock St. on the Conway County town's west side when the blaze broke out, Morrilton Fire Chief Earle Eichenberger said.
One of the town's volunteer firefighters who battled the blaze, however, later went to a hospital after suffering from heat exhaustion. The firefighter remained at the hospital Friday afternoon, the chief said.
Just last year, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places. The fire, reported about 12:20 a.m., had already engulfed the building when firefighters arrived, Mayor Allen Lipsmeyer said.
At the time of the fire, the building was one of two facilities in that area being used by the Morrilton Early Learning Center, the chief said. Firefighters prevented the blaze from spreading to the other building.
The learning center building, constructed in about 1934, was originally the Morrilton Colored School, according to a nomination form on the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program's website. It later became known as the L.W. Sullivan High School and eventually housed the learning center.
Construction of the building was "a community-wide effort" with "teams and wagons" hauling rock to the site and with assistance from the Works Progress Administration, a New Deal program started during Franklin Roosevelt's presidency, the nomination form says.
The school, which served "a large area" beyond Morrilton, originally housed all grades until the late 1940s, when an elementary school was built in Morrilton. School-bus drivers in other towns kept the vehicles at their homes in towns as far away as Russellville, Blackwell and Bigelow to help get students to school on time, according to the form.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a turning point for Arkansas and the school -- which, the form says, was renamed in honor of its first principal, L.W. Sullivan, after his death in 1939.
In May 1965, the form says, Morrilton's hometown newspaper, The Petit Jean Country Headlight, "reported that, 'Of 168 Negro students who normally would attend Sullivan High School next fall, 164 have chosen to enter presently all-white Morrilton High School when it begins classes in September in the new building.' Furthermore, it was reported that 'no students chose to switch from Morrilton High to Sullivan.'"
Desegregation in other towns that had bused students to Sullivan High School also apparently contributed to the school's demise.
The nomination form notes that The Arizona Republic, reporting on school desegregation in Arkansas, wrote that the Danville School District decided to admit black children to its all-white school system because it "'had become economically prohibitive to haul the Negro students 50 miles to Sullivan High School at Morrilton and back every day.'"
The school closed in 1965. After no one bought the building, the city took possession of it, the form notes.
On Friday, firefighters worked about 21/2 hours before containing the blaze, which wasn't extinguished until mid-day, Eichenberger said.
"The building is a total loss," he said.
Eichenberger said the fire appears to have started on the building's west side. "That's about all we can ascertain at this point," he said.
"The Police Department and my department will be investigating [the cause]," he added. "We feel it was accidental. But you don't rule out anything until you get something definitive."
Eichenberger said he doesn't think the learning center, which works with children up to the age of pre-kindergarten, has chosen a new location yet. Phone numbers for the learning center were not working Friday afternoon.
State Desk on 04/11/2015