Hillsborough Middle School, Part 3

After Hillsborough voters twice rejected proposals to build a middle school in 1971 - a two-story school at the intersection of Amwell and Pleasantview roads, and then a one-story school at the familiar location on Triangle Road - the school board wisely set the issue aside for nearly two years.

In the meantime, school enrollment continued to increase at a rapid pace.

14 April 1973 Courier News

On April 30, 1973, a new plan was revealed. The $3.9 million proposal actually varied very little from the second rejected 1971 referendum. The 1,259 student capacity school would feature 38 regular classrooms, home economics, industrial arts, music, and art rooms, and three science labs - as well as a gym with locker rooms, a 180 seat library, and a 450 seat combination cafeteria/auditorium.

The one major difference was that while in 1971 the enrollment projections were cautionary, now they were dire. It was estimated that by the start of the 1976 school year the district would grow by 1,135 students - a 30% increase over the 3,622 currently attending.

It was noted that approval by voters would permit the district to finally close the Flagtown School, currently in use by sixth grades, and allow the Hillsborough Consolidated School (HES) to revert to an elementary school when its seventh and 8th graders moved to the middle school. Also, space would become available at the other elementary schools to provide library facilities and proper classrooms for remedial reading.

9 May 1973 Home News

For these and other reasons, the May 8, 1973, referendum gained approval by a vote of 745-580.

Celebrations lasted for about ten months. When construction bids were opened in March 1974, they came in $295,000 over budget. Rather than go out for yet another referendum, which would be the fourth for this school, the board decided to forgo the purchase of some furniture and equipment and instead include these items in future regular budgets.

26 December 1975 Home News

Construction contracts were duly awarded in March 1974, and the school was completed and ready for students in January 1976.

The Hillsborough Middle School has undergone two expansions since its opening. The first, approved in 1988, added classrooms at the front of the building. The second was a major expansion approved by voters in 1992 that added the 500-student annex on the west side of the building. The annex is unique in that it was intended as a self-contained school of its own, with a gymnasium, cafeteria, and 20 classrooms.

Anna Case on Record

In 1981 Tom Petty had a problem with MCA, the distributor for Backstreet Records. They wanted to raise the list price of his soon-to-be-released album Hard Promises from the industry standard $8.98 to the "superstar price" of $9.98. He was having none of it and withheld the master tapes of the album until MCA relented.

October 1912 Edison Phonograph Monthly trade journal

This was a big story that made all of the music rags at the time - I wonder if it was big enough to have caught the attention of 93-year-old Anna Case Mackay, the retired opera and concert soprano and renowned recording artist. 

February 1915 Edison Phonograph Monthly trade journal

She cut her first two sides for Thomas Edison's recording company in 1912 on the format that had only one side, literally - the cylinder. She followed that up in 1913 with two more selections for Edison's new invention, the Diamond Disc. These ten-inch diameter, quarter-inch thick, 80rpm records, with a song on one side, and an"explanatory talk" on the reverse, were such huge hits for Edison that he signed Anna Case to an exclusive contract in 1914.

November 1917 Edison Ad

Here is how the house publication, Edison Phonograph Monthly, described the signing:

"The cost to secure the exclusive services of this eminent artist, precludes the possibility of selling the records at $1.50. It has been decided, therefore, to list all solo selections by her in the $2.00 class. This applies to the two selections now in the disc catalog 80119 and 80120, which have been renumbered 82077 and 82078 respectively."

Anna Case was truly the Tom Petty of her day - the difference being that she didn't fight the price increase, but was probably honored to be elevated. And elevated it was. Just think about it. In 1914 a music lover had to pay $2.00 to own just one song - twice as much as MCA wanted to charge for the ten-track Hard Promises. Not only that, but $2.00 in 1914 was the equivalent of $18 in 1981 and $49 today! If record prices had kept up with inflation, we'd be paying $500 to download an album on iTunes.

1918 full-page ad

Edison didn't keep sales records for his Diamond Discs, so it's not easy to calculate how well the 100 tracks Anna Case recorded for the format sold between 1913 and 1926. But given the massive amount of promotion she received with Edison - with custom window displays for record stores, numerous cover photos on Edison publications, and prominent full-page ads, like the ones above, in popular magazines - we can assume she was one of his top sellers.

December 29, 1928, Music Trade Review

She cut her final two songs for Edison in June 1926 - the same month that her contract expired. She signed with Warner Brothers to make short subject sound movies using the new Vitaphone process - the first successful attempt at "talkies" - but only made two (La Fiesta, and Swanee River). 

September 1929 Columbia Records Ad

At the end of 1928, Anna Case signed with Columbia Records. She released eight 10-inch and two 12-inch double-sided 78s through the end of 1930, recording 20 tracks in all for the label. Unlike the status she enjoyed with Edison, she received little promotion from Columbia. Can you even find a mention of Anna Case in the ad above? With Edison, she would have been pictured prominently in an ad like this. With Columbia, you need to look closely to find the two listed records - I highlighted them for you. In the 1930 record catalog, below, she is relegated to a small photo on page 147.

Page from the 1930 Columbia Records catalog

For all that, the songs Anna Case recorded for Columbia - using the improved "electrical process" - hold up well for sound quality when compared to the Edison "acoustic" discs. And despite the fragility of the Columbia discs, which make them harder to find today than the near-indestructible Diamond Discs, good examples were able to be easily transferred to other formats. Which means that if you pick up one of the two available Anna Case CDs today, it will be comprised of about sixteen Columbia sides and only four Edisons!

Hillsborough Middle School, Part 2

When Hillsborough voters rejected the construction referendum to build the township's first high school in 1964, the school board did not place the matter before the public again for nearly a full two years. After the first middle school plan was turned down in March 1971, the board decided on a completely different approach.

27 April 1971 Courier News

Convinced that the vote failed by a better than two-to-one margin because taxpayers didn't like the fact that the board was paying twice the assessed value for the 30-acre site at Pleasantview and Amwell Roads, the board was back within weeks of the referendum with a brand new plan.

The proposed location of the school was moved to the 32-acre site owned by the school district where the Triangle school was located. Other cost-saving measures, such as removing air conditioning from the plan and making the school slightly smaller would reduce the cost from the original $4.2 million to $3.7 million.

11 May 1971 Courier News

Moving the school and reducing the size drew an immediate negative response from the state Department of Education facility planning office. The state noted that even if an additional ten available acres adjacent to the lot was acquired by the district, the 42-acre site would still be smaller than the bare minimum of 47 acres required for the two schools. As noted by state consultant Dominic Chianese in his letter to the board:

"[T]wo schools on a single site of 42 acres is very restrictive in terms of future educational planning. A desirable site size would be 50-100 percent greater than the proposed minimum for the schools."

Deficiencies were also found in the size of instrumental and vocal music rooms, science rooms, and the gymnasium. In the event, David Noonan, superintendent of Hillsborough schools, was able to convince Chianese that the district was in a dire space situation, had already suffered a defeat at the polls and that no educational compromises would be made in the building.

30 June 1971 Courier News

The June 29, 1971, referendum received support from the Jaycees and three of the five township committeemen, but was opposed by the Hillsborough Taxpayers Association, whose spokesman Joseph Hagarty had this to say after the referendum was defeated - this time by a better than three to one margin:

"The public has decided what they want. They have made it plain that the board should look at alternatives for the school space problems. The next move is up to the board. They are well aware that there are alternatives and where to look for them."

Would the board look for alternatives? Stay tuned for Part 3 next week.

Hillsborough Middle School, Part 1

In the summer of 1969, with the incoming 8th, 9th, and 10 graders who would make up Hillsborough High School's first students yet to set foot in the new building, the school board was already announcing that the district was out of space and would need to build yet another school.

Hillsborough High School under construction, 1969

Coming up with a proposal took another year-and-a-half. In December 1970, the board revealed plans for Hillsborough's first true Middle School, to be built on a 30-acre tract at the intersection of Amwell and Pleasantview Roads. The $120,000 purchase price for the property would be part of a $4.2 million bond referendum set for March 9, 1971.

8 December 1970 Courier News

The school had an expected completion date of September 1973, just in time to save Hillsborough from having to rent classroom space from churches and the rescue squad - although the 1972-73 school year would require using the sub-standard rooms at Bloomingdale, Flagtown, and Liberty Schools.

The two-story school would be able to accommodate 1,200 6th, 7th, and 8th-grade students in 38 regular classrooms, two industrial arts rooms, three science labs, two home economics rooms, two music rooms, and three practice rooms. Also included were three remedial rooms, an art room, a mechanical drafting room, a gymnasium, a library, and a cafeteria.

March 1971 Home News articles

The school budget defeat in February was the first sign that the March referendum might be in trouble.  Taxpayers were not very excited about the price tag - the debt service would cost the owner of an average home $8 per month - and were not happy that the board was paying twice the assessed value for the 30-acre property.

The day before the vote The Courier News published an article laying out what would likely happen if the referendum was defeated:

"The alternatives available to the board, should the middle school be defeated, are double sessions, more rented substandard facilities, additions to present schools and a year-round school system[!]. In regard to the latter, the Board of Education is considering starting such a program in grades 9-12, and if it is successful, possibly expanding it to grades 6-8. However, it warns, since it will take nearly three years to fully evaluate such a program and classrooms are needed now, this cannot postpone school construction."

10 March 1971 Courier News

Despite the dire warnings, the referendum failed by a greater than two to one margin. And so, as it was in the case of the high school seven years earlier, the school board licked their wounds and contemplated Plan B.

To be continued...

Hillsborough High School, Part 3

Hillsborough school board members must have been excited and relieved after voters finally approved a construction referendum on June 28, 1966, to allow the construction of the township's first high school. The Somerville Board of Education had imposed a deadline of June 1968, after which Hillsborough students would no longer be admitted. Indeed, overcrowding in Somerville had already forced  Hillsborough's ninth graders to be retained and attend school with the seventh and eighth grade.

11 July 1967 Courier News

At the school board meeting following the referendum, a construction schedule was laid out: the architect would submit the plans to the state on January 6, 1967, construction bids would be received on April 3rd, and work would commence on April 15th. The deadline for completion was thrust upon the district by Somerville - September 1968.

14 May 1968 Courier News

Although construction bids came in around $200,000 over the $3.56 million amount authorized in the 1966 referendum, work on the school did commence in the spring of 1967, with a groundbreaking ceremony held on July 10. To make up the difference, board members decided to add a second question to the February 1968 school election asking voters to allow the transfer of $168,733 from current expenses to capital outlay. The question failed, as did the entire budget.

17 June 1968 Courier News

As work progressed on the school, it was evident that without additional funds, the cafeteria kitchen could not be furnished, and the gym and outdoor athletic facilities could not be completed. The school board decided to go back to the voters one final time with a three-part bond financing referendum set for June 25, 1968.

6 October 1969 Home News

Here's how The Courier News described the three proposals:

"The first will provide $110,000 for a language laboratory with all necessary facilities and for the purchase and installation of various types of education equipment and shop equipment. The second proposal provides $65,000 for the purchase and installation of kitchen equipment. This will be used in conjunction with the school cafeteria. The third proposal calls for $50,000 for the construction and installation of folding partitions in the auditorium [gym?], curbing at the school site, fencing in the area of the athletic track, bleachers at the football field and additional bleachers and bleacher steps in the gymnasium."

Voters approved all three parts of the referendum by a two-to-one margin 

Image from the first Hillsborough High School Yearbook, 1970

The school board also acknowledged that there was no chance that the building would be ready for students by September 1968. Fortunately, in consideration of the fact that construction was underway, Somerville extended their deadline for one more year and confirmed that Hillsborough students that had already begun their high school careers in Somerville could remain and graduate there. P.S. They also got a new school!

Accordingly, the high school opened in September 1969 with 8th, 9th, and 10th grades, and was formally dedicated the next month.

The school has had three major expansions which have more than doubled capacity, the last one being in 2002.

Hillsborough High School will celebrate its 50th anniversary in September 2019.