Williams High School celebrates 50 year anniversary

Plano was a very different community when Loretta Hickey taught home economics at Williams High School in the early 1960s.

A member of the school's original planning committee, the 40-year Plano ISD veteran educator remembers disbelief among residents when it was announced that a high school would be built "out in the country," just beyond the last paved road in the city.

On Sunday, the school celebrated its 50th anniversary at a campus that has seen incredible change, yet has remained the same in many key ways over the past five decades.

"It is just tremendous, all they've done to it," Hickey said, "but it's still Williams ... It still felt like Williams when I walked in the door."

When Williams opened in January 1962, it was known as Plano High School, housing some 390 students in grades eight through 12. Today, more than 1,000 ninth- and 10th-graders call the school home.

The rededication included a proclamation by Mayor Phil Dyer, as well as keynote speeches by Justice of the Peace John Payton, who attended Williams, and Tom Kimbrough, who served as head coach at the school between 1976 and 1989.

After the speeches, the school's halls were packed with former students, socializing while admiring the expanded and renovated campus and looking at pictures from all 50 yearbooks, which were pasted to the walls.

Laurel Chaddick, now Laurel Dow, graduated from the school the first year it was open. She remembers transferring from the old Plano High School, now the Cox administration building, to Williams after winter break in 1962.

"When we moved over here, it was like the Taj Mahal," she said. "There were two wings, a cafeteria, a gym [and a band hall], and we thought it was huge."

Jackie Mayfield, class of 1963, described Planoites of the early 1960s as a "giant family," never locking their doors at night and knowing no strangers in the community.

At that time, Mayfield said, the city's town motto was "Where everybody is somebody," a "charm" that he said has held true for more than 50 years.

But the school's glory days are far from over. Williams will be one of two homes for the Plano ISD Health Sciences Academy, set to open in August 2013. Construction will be underway this year to turn the area just beyond the front office into a mock hospital lobby and treatment area.

The rededication marked the opening of another new feature at the school, Plaza Marquez. A Mexican-themed center courtyard named for longtime Plano ISD administrator Emiliano Marquez, the central common area includes a fountain brought over from Ciudad Acuna, Mexico by Marquez and his wife.

"We have a diverse population in Plano, and our school is equally diverse," said Principal Lynn Ojeda. "... I think we've created a space that shows respect for the diversity of our students."

Current Rating: 0 of 0 votes!

Rate File: Select Rating: * ** *** ****

 Plano Apartments
 Plano Attorneys
 Plano Auto Dealers
 Plano Auto Parts
 Plano Auto Repair
 Plano Beauty Salons
 Plano Car Rental
 Plano Dentists
 Plano Doctors
 Plano Flowers
 Plano Hotels
 Plano Insurance
 Plano Loans
 Plano Mortgages
 Plano Movers
 Plano Pizza
 Plano Realtors
 Plano Restaurants
 Plano Storage
 Plano Tax Preparation
 Plano Travel
 Featured
 More...