Last September, I took the long way home and wandered though the middle of Hopkins County. One small rural community I passed through was Charleston, where in 1939 and 1940, the Works Progress Administration built a school. I saw no sign of this building as I drove north on Route 109, and my online search of the Goodman-Paxton Collection at the University of Kentucky yielded no results.
(The Living New Deal site doesn’t include it either, but as it only has 130 listings for the entire Commonwealth, that wasn’t much of a surprise.) There were several WPA projects in the county, including a fire station/municipal building, a gymnasium, hospital, and high school in the county seat of Madisonville, but no rural school building.
The Clubhouse for the Madisonville Golf Club was a WPA project, and in materials and form is very similar to the Charleston school. Image from the Goodman-Paxton Photographic Collection at the University of Kentucky.
And although the building was documented, all I have access to are contact prints of the original photos. The concrete block school had the rounded roof of many WPA building projects, and large multi-light steel casement windows. Based on the survey form from 1987, the school had several later additions, including one from 1957. The school was purportedly built to serve elementary school students; the high school in Charleston closed in 1962 in a wave of school consolidations, and high school students from Charleston, Dalton, and Nebo went to a new school christened West Hopkins.
The school was still standing in 1987. Photograph from the Kentucky Heritage Council/SHPO survey files.
I am pretty sure it has been demolished, as Google imagery from 2015 indicates a partially standing building at the corner of Route 109 and what used to be Dawson Road and is now Daylight Road.
Charleston, as seen on a 1954 USGS topographic map.
The community of Charleston has existed since at least 1855, when the first post office opened. The post office closed in 1909. According to oral history, the name of the town stems from the name of a formerly enslaved resident, known as “Free Charles,” who owned and operated a popular tavern in the area.
Coal mining supported the local economy back in the mid-20th century, and at one time, there was a school, church, several stores, and many homes in Charleston. At least one former store still stands – probably from the 1940s or 1950s. The molded concrete block building is shuttered, and I am afraid its frame brethren have vanished.
Former store in Charleston, Kentucky.
If there are any Hopkins County natives who stumble upon this post, I would love to know the fate of this WPA school!
The Charleston school was located where you indicated. The concrete portion of the building is still standing and used as a business, but the round roof section was torn down several years ago. It was the gymnasium.
Most recently the other building was Nash’s grocery.
I was afraid that was the case. Thank you for letting me know! If you ever head out that way and have the time to take a picture of what is left of the school – I would love to have such a photo!
How can I send you a photo?
You can email it to me at: gardens2gables@gmail.com
Thanks for your dedicated research. WPA stuff is always so interesting to me.
I went to school there, James Ramsey was the school principal. I was really sad when I moved back and it was gone. I live now where I grew up on the old hall road. It is now called Fork Springs Road, haw times and things have changed. I still love the area, wish I knew who owns the old store. I would love to get a small business ( smoking meat) in there.
James Ramsey’s sister, Mary Rachel Ramsey, taught there for many years (probably over 40). She still resides in the Charleston area, and would be a gold mine of information for anyone interested in the history of the school, or the community.
I recall a strip mine in very close proximity to the school.