duPont Manual High School | |
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The north side of duPont Manual's main building
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Address | |
120 West Lee St Louisville, Kentucky 40208 United States |
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Coordinates | 38°13′19″N 85°45′29″W / 38.22194°N 85.75806°WCoordinates: 38°13′19″N 85°45′29″W / 38.22194°N 85.75806°W |
Information | |
School type | Public Secondary Magnet |
Established | 1892 |
School district | Jefferson County Public Schools |
Principal | Jerry Mayes |
Grades | 9–12 |
Enrollment | 1,875 (2013–14) |
Campus size | 17 acres (6.9 ha) |
Campus type | Urban |
Color(s) | Crimson and white |
Team name | Crimsons/Rams |
Rival | Louisville Male High School |
Newspaper | The Crimson Record |
Website | www |
duPont Manual High School is a public magnet high school located in the Old Louisville neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky, USA and serving students in grades 9–12. It is a part of the Jefferson County Public School District. DuPont Manual is recognized by the United States Department of Education as a Blue Ribbon School.
Manual opened in 1892 as an all-male manual training school. It was the second public high school in Louisville. Manual merged with its rival, Male High School, into a consolidated school from 1915 to 1919. Manual permanently merged with the Louisville Girls High School in 1950 and moved into their Gothic-style three-story building, built in 1934. In 2004, after conducting a poll, Louisville's Courier-Journal newspaper listed Manual as one of Louisville residents' ten favorite buildings. As a coeducational school, Manual experienced a decline in discipline and test scores in the 1970s. In 1984, Manual became a magnet school, allowing students from throughout the district to apply to five specialized programs of study, or magnets.
Manual and Male High School have the oldest football rivalry in the state, dating back to 1893. Manual's football team has won five state titles and claims two national championships. In the 1980s and 1990s Manual became a prominent academic school and has been included several times in lists of America's top high schools in Redbook and Newsweek magazines.
In 1892, Louisville factory owner Alfred Victor du Pont donated $150,000 to the board of Louisville Public Schools to establish a training school to teach young men industrial arts ("manual") skills that would fit them for their duties in life. The Victorian building was built on the corner of Brook and Oak Streets by the firm of Clark and Loomis, which also designed the Speed Art Museum and Waverly Hills Sanatorium. After Manual moved out of the building it was used as a Middle School until 1974 when it was converted to apartments. Manual's first principal, Henry Kleinschmid, was a favorite of du Pont but was unpopular with the school board, which conspired to replace him in 1895. Despite a summer of controversy and protest from the du Pont family, Manual's first two graduating classes and the four major local newspapers, the board replaced him with Harry Brownell on July 2.