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Naming of Carter High School
This story comes from Vivian
(Yates) Skinner.
Vivian - Please accept my
apologies for the delay in getting this posted. Great story! cw
"David W. Carter was a physician, and he was instrumental in the passing of a
law that required a school nurse in every school five days a week.
Until that time, nurses rotated through schools, and you were lucky to have the
nurse there one day out of five.
When an additional high school was needed in far south Oak Cliff, the Dallas
School Board voted to name it in Dr. Carter's honor. But by the time
construction was underway, Carter was in extremely poor health.
Superintendent W. T. White was concerned that he might not live to see the
dedication, and he made regular calls to the project manager to check on
progress of the building, then would call to see how Dr. Carter was holding up.
Things weren't looking good, so he put the construction crews on double shifts
in a race against the Grim Reaper.
Finally the building was completed, but by then Dr. Carter was virtually on his
deathbed.
Nevertheless family members brought him to the
ceremony in a wheelchair.
He was absolutely thrilled with the beautiful new school, rallied, and to
everyone's amazement lived another seventeen years!"
"I was, strangely enough, at a meeting of the
Adamson Alumni Association, where I heard Rosemary Rumbley speak. She is the
one who told this story. She, of course, wrote "A Century of Class," about the
DISD.
I assume she came across this story in her book research. I have tried to find
more info online but have not succeeded (also haven't spent just a whole lot of
time at it so far.)
I was asked to present a continuing ed class on
the history of Oak Cliff at Mountain View; got a friend to agree to be my
co-presenter. That's how we wound up at the Adamson Alumni Association (youngest
people there by 15 years, at least.) The research has been fascinating. and
more fun than I anticipated."
Thanks for the story Vivian!
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