Taft Union High School
| Taft Union High School | |
|---|---|
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| Address | |
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1 Wildcat Way Taft, California, Kern 93268 United States |
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| Coordinates | 35°08′47″N 119°27′38″W / 35.146508°N 119.460462°WCoordinates: 35°08′47″N 119°27′38″W / 35.146508°N 119.460462°W |
| Information | |
| School type | Public School |
| Founded | 1912 |
| Colour(s) |
Blue Gold |
| Website | School website |
Taft Union High School is located in Taft in Kern County, California, in the United States. Taft High was founded in 1912. Taft is a small city of fewer than 10,000, and the school also serves the surrounding rural area, which in the early 21st century has a total population of about 20,000.
The school was featured in the movie The Best of Times (1986) starring Robin Williams and Kurt Russell. Taft was also seen in For My Daughter's Honor (1996). Parts of the movie Frog-g-g! (2004) were filmed at TUHS as well.
In February 1909 Thomas Conley and Wilson St. Clair Lierly circulated petitions to establish the first school district in the town. Classes started September 1909 in a small frame shack near the Moron Boiler Works at Crystal Street and Leirly Avenue near what was then Boust City. The district was formed in 1915 and named after Conley, who had donated property for the school.
By 1917 a new campus was completed on property purchased from Southern Pacific Railroad on the northwest corner of Seventh and San Emidio Streets; this is the present-day location. The Conley High School District was expanded in July 1920 by including Elk Hills, Midway, Mckittrick and Olig elementary school districts. It was then renamed as the Taft Union High School District.
TUHS has been developed over the decades, with the additions of an athletic field for football and track, a gymnasium, auditorium, science building, cafeteria and domestic science buildings. The stadium was renamed as the Marion Martin Memorial Stadium in honor of a popular student and captain of the football team who was killed in 1927 in a bus accident returning from a game.
TUHS' first football team was formed under coach Andrew Hardin, although the school did not have a football field. The team was known as the Gaugers, after the oilfield workers who read the gauges on oil storage tanks. These were boom years for oil in Texas and Oklahoma. In 1928 the team was renamed the Wildcats, alluding to oil prospectors ("wildcatters"), and the wildcat was adopted as the school mascot. Practices and games were played in the baseball field.
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