page_title: Montgomery Blair High School
section_title: Wayne Avenue Campus Era (1935–1998)
hierarchical_section_title: Montgomery Blair High School / History / Wayne Avenue Campus Era (1935–1998)
caption_attribution_description: English: It is the cupola at the front of Montgomery Blair High School.
context_page_description: Montgomery Blair High School is a public high school located in Silver Spring, Maryland, United States, operated by Montgomery County Public Schools. The school's total enrollment of 3,200 makes it the largest public high school in Montgomery County and Maryland as a whole.
  The school was named after Montgomery Blair, a lawyer who represented Dred Scott in his Supreme Court case, and later served as Postmaster General under President Abraham Lincoln. After opening in 1925 as Takoma Park-Silver Spring High School, the Blair name was adopted in 1935 when the school moved to a location overlooking Sligo Creek at 313 Wayne Avenue. In 1998, the campus moved again two miles north to the Kay Tract, a long-vacant site adjacent to the Capital Beltway, and the old building was repurposed to house Silver Spring International Middle School and Sligo Creek Elementary School.
  About 15% of the student body is part of one of two magnet programs: the Science, Math, and Computer Science Magnet, and the Communication Arts Program, which draw students from both the Silver Spring area and across Montgomery County, and make up approximately 20% of Blair's student population.
context_section_description: When Montgomery Blair High School's 23.5-acre (95,000 m²) Wayne Avenue campus opened in March 1935, it was the sixth high school in Montgomery County, and the first in the lower county.  One of several Montgomery County schools designed during that period by Howard Wright Cutler, the facility then consisted only of the C building, overlooking Sligo Creek. In 1936, the Auxiliary Gymnasium was added, followed by the B building in 1940, and the D building in 1942. MBHS's first football team was founded in 1944, and the War Memorial Stadium opened in 1947. In 1950, the A building was constructed, containing the Blair Library/Media Center. With the addition of the Main Gymnasium/Fieldhouse in 1954, MBHS possessed one of the finest basketball and football facilities in the county. The E building was added in 1959 as an administrative section, followed by the 1969 opening of the 1200-seat auditorium, named for long-time teacher and librarian, Elizabeth Stickley. The most recent addition was the automotive shop building in 1973.
  During World War II, students from the University of Maryland taught several classes, and in some cases, able senior students taught sophomore classes. The Blair Library created the "Senior Corner" to honor those who had not returned from war. Life Magazine featured the school's Victory Corps close order drill team. Prior to the Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, Blair was an all-white school. In 1955, the school began to integrate along with the rest of Montgomery County.
  With Silver Spring's growth, Blair's enrollment jumped from 600 students in 1946, to 1900 by 1956, peaking at 2900 in 1965 before being reduced from 1700 to 1400 after re-zoning in 1982. Enrollment was around 1800 when the Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science Magnet program brought 80 new students in the fall of 1985. The Communication Arts Program (CAP) followed in 1987, bringing 75 new students. Overcrowding became an issue for Montgomery Blair High School, as portable buildings covered what was once open land and enrollment exceeded the building's capacity of 2,000. In 1994, it was decided that the school should relocate to an empty tract of land 1.5 miles (2.4 km) to the north. Construction began on the Kay Tract in the mid-nineties and the Four Corners Campus opened in the fall of 1998. After the move, Blair's Wayne Avenue campus converted into a combination Elementary/Middle School; currently Sligo Creek Elementary School and Silver Spring International Middle School each take up half the campus. The Elizabeth Stickley Auditorium, however, was not included in the conversion plans, and has remained closed since 1997. Nevertheless, the auditorium has received a significant amount of attention throughout the region as it has fallen into disrepair. Several local politicians and leaders, including former Maryland state senator Ida Ruben, current U.S. representative Jamie Raskin and former U.S. Senator Barbara Mikulski, have endorsed projects to restore the auditorium to its former condition.
caption: The Blair Cupola and Steeple at the Four Corners Campus
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