History of Calais Schools, Calais, Maine [ Betty Clark Stuart ] [ Larry Lane ] [ John Adams ] [ Milltown School ] Return to Home Page | Return to History of Calais Area
I attended the Milltown School through 8th grade (1962, I believe they closed it that summer) and graduated from CMHS on June 16, 1966. The school was just across the street from where I lived, and it burned on the Sunday morning of our Baccalaureate Service--June 12, 1966. It had been used for storage for Civil Defense supplies for a few years before that.
The Academy building burned down in February 1945. I [Larry] was in the building at the time (what a day that was!) Therefore, the classes of 1945, 1946 and 1947 did not graduate out of the Academy building. We used the State Theatre instead. (We also had classes in the old gym, and we utilized the old South Street School, now torn down. We had to walk between classes to each building.) The new high school building was built in 1946 and 1947. I attended classes in that building for three months. As I said, our graduation was held in the State Theatre; the gym wasn't built on then. The class of 1948 is the first class to graduate from Calais Memorial High School, and the graduation was held in the new gym. I would say you do NOT include the Class of 1947 in the C.M.H.S. Alumni Page, but I did attend three months of classes in the building. Interestingly enough, the Class of 1948 did attend the old Academy, being Freshmen, from September 1944 to February 1945. They are allowed to attend the Calais Academy reunions although their diplomas came from C.M.H.S.
My father, Percy D. Adams, owned property at 50 Calais Avenue, where I grew up, and he had several loads of the Calais Academy building hauled into our lot as fill. I remember, as a child, working in the garden and digging up pieces of the old decorative iron desks and bricks from the building. All that burned lumber gave the soil a nice black color and, as I recall, we grew very tasty veggies in that garden. Photos
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