Wadleigh Over Time
09/1897 - 07/1902
The Downtown Building
New York City’s first public high school for girls, called Girls High School, opened in 1897. That school occupied a building on East 12th Street in downtown Manhattan which previously had been the site of the 12th Street Advanced School for Girls, a private school founded by Lydia Wadleigh in 1856. In honor of Ms. Wadleigh’s work in girls’ education, the Board of Education of the City of New York renamed what had been called Girls High School to Wadleigh High School for Girls in 1900.
When the 12th Street Advanced School for Girls opened, New York City operated its school on a racially segregated basis. Most likely, only white students attended that school. By 1897, when Girls High School opened, New York had renounced segregation as formal policy. We don’t know if any Black girls attended that school.
09/1902 - 06/1954
Wadleigh High School for Girls
New York City’s separate boroughs - Brooklyn, Manhattan, the Bronx, Queens, and Staten Island - consolidated to form a single city, and a single school system, in 1898. The consolidated city government planned a group of new high school buildings, including a new school for girls. Architect C.B. Snyder designed a new building for Wadleigh High School for Girls, and located it on a part of the block formed by 114th and 115th St, 7th Avenue, and 8th Avenue in Harlem. The neo-gothic building had an imposing tower and new innovations like an elevator and central ventilation.
Wadleigh High School for Girls opened in Harlem in the fall of 1902. Wadleigh moved to Harlem at the same time that many white middle-class New Yorkers were also moving uptown, following new subway lines to more spacious apartments. Many of them were families of recent or second-generation immigrants from Europe. Black New Yorkers, previously restricted by racism to a few downtown neighborhoods, began to move to Harlem when declining demand for its apartments by white people and Black real estate entrepreneurship opened the area to them beginning in 1905.
As Harlem’s Black population grew via migration within New York, from the US South, and the Caribbean, more Black students attended Wadleigh. The school was roughly one-third Black in 1931, but nearly 98% Black as of 1945. Many white residents had moved out of Harlem, and the Board of Education used zoning to make Wadleigh a predominantly Black school.
Wadleigh’s enrollment declined over the 1940s and 1950s, and the Board of Education decided to close it as a girls high school in 1954.
Kimberly Johnson, “Wadleigh High School: The Price of Segregation”
09/1954 - 06/1993
Wadleigh Junior High School
After being closed for two years for a renovation, the Wadleigh building reopened in the fall of 1954 as Wadleigh Junior High School (or JHS 88, later IS 88, in some records). The school served both boys and girls from Harlem.
Wadleigh’s student population reflected the surrounding Harlem community. Most students were Black or Puerto Rican, and many were working class or poor.
New York City did not have a large proportion of Black teachers, but Wadleigh had several Black teachers who chose the school and stayed. After parent protest in the early 1970s, the Board of Education appointed Wadleigh’s first Black principal, Ms. Elfreda Wright. In the 1980s, Wadleigh’s supporters advocated for long-overdue repairs to the well-used building. They were successful in winning a major renovation in 1993, but it came alongside a major reorganization that effectively closed Wadleigh as a junior high school.
Explore yearbooks from Wadleigh Junior High School
Explore oral histories from Wadleigh Junior High School alumni and teachers
07/1994
Landmark Designation
The New York City Landmarks Commission gave Wadleigh historic landmark status in 1994. A network of Black women who had attended Wadleigh High School in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s lobbied local politicians and organized to secure this recognition for their school. This was one part of their advocacy, which had, over the decades after they attended the school, included fundraising for school resources and for scholarship support for Wadleigh students.
09/2000
Wadleigh Secondary School for the Performing and Visual Arts
Continuing the arts focus of one of the small schools within the larger Wadleigh campus, Wadleigh Secondary School for the Performing and Visual Arts opened in 2000.
Frederick Douglass Academy II opened in the Wadleigh building as well. FDAII was designed on a model created by former Wadleigh teacher Lorraine Monroe.
Wadleigh Secondary School for the Performing and Visual Arts
09/2011 - 09/2018
09/2012
Charter School Opens at Wadleigh
Harlem’s first charter school opened in 1999. Charter schools are funded by public dollars but managed by private organizations, including organizations that operate many charter schools in New York City or across cities. One of New York’s largest charter networks, Success Academy Harlem West, opened as a middle school on the 5th floor of the Wadleigh building in 2012.