The legacy of Austin-East Magnet High School
Free public education for Black children began in 1876, five years after Knoxville's citizens voted in 1871 for free public schools. Austin East, the successor of the Colored School and the once all-white East High school, has stood the test of time.
Before schools were built for Black children, some passionate students learned by spying on schools, according to records at the Knox County Museum of Education. The Rev. Thomas Hures, St. John's Episcopal Church's rector, taught Black kids before the Civil War. One of his students, Laura Cansler, went on to start Knoxville's first school for Black children, called Burnside School, in 1864 at 1503 Detroit Ave. It closed in the early 1900s.
Then came the the Colored School and Austin School.
In January 1876, the Knoxville Board of Education authorized funding to create a Black school. A June 1876 article in the Knoxville Chronicle referenced the Colored School, which was reportedly "recently purchased or leased" by city officials.
Separately, Austin School was established by Emily Austin, a white woman from Philadelphia who came to Knoxville in 1870 to teach Black children. The city assumed responsibility for the school in 1879.
Austin approached the Board of Aldermen and Board of Education members in May 1879 to say she had raised $6,500 in the North to expand her school for Black children to the high school level. Officials voted unanimously to proceed with the project and merged the two schools. The expanded school graduated its first 10th-grade class in 1888. It added 11th grade in 1920, and 12th grade in the mid-1930s.
By 1916, the student population had outgrown the facility on Central Street. The city approved a $40,000 wing to the 1909-established Green Elementary School on Payne Avenue, and moved the school there.
In 1928, a new Austin High School was built at Vine Avenue and Preston Street. The school continued to grow over the years.
Segregation in schools was struck down by the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision, but even years later, schools around the country continued to be segregated.
In 1968, in a bid to fully integrate high schools in the city, Knoxville's Board of Education combined Austin High and the then-all-white East High, and thus Austin-East High School was formed. The school remains a majority Black school with an 84% Black enrollment, according to the latest available data from the Tennessee Department of Education.
Areena Arora, data and investigative reporter for Knox News, can be reached by email at areena.arora@knoxnews.com. Follow her on X, formerly known as Twitter, @AreenaArora.
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This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: A look at the legacy of Austin-East Magnet High School
