Reunions have been held every five years since the 10th year anniversary in spite of the fact that our class was separated and reassigned to the four LR high schools by order of the LRSD 1971 Desegregation Plan. We are especially looking forward to our 50th YEAR SOLID GOLD REUNION, THE POWER OF THE CLASS OF ‘72 CELEBRATING THE EDWIN L. HAWKINS SCHOLARSHIP. Click here to register.

The Horace Mann Transitional Class of 1972 thanks you for your amazing support and donations of our Edwin L. Hawkins Scholarship Program. Since 2002, our class has provided nearly $50,000 in scholarships to Little Rock area High School graduating Seniors,

The 2019 Scholarship Award Program and “Cooking for College” Buffet was held on Sunday, June 9, 2019, at Horace Mann Middle School. Three Edwin L. Hawkins scholarship recipients were recognized at this program which was followed by the “Cooking for College’ buffet of delicious foods. It was an awesome event, nearly filled to capacity with very satisfied diners! Download the scholarship application.

Paul Laurence Dunbar High School and Junior College From 1907 to 1929, Little Rock’s African American students were educated at M. W. Gibbs High School. When Gibbs was partially destroyed by a fire, the Little Rock School Board chose to retain the building’s undamaged portion as an elementary school and to build a new high school for black students nearby, at Wright Avenue and Ringo Street. Through G. DeMatt Henderson, a Little Rock attorney, the school board obtained partial funding for the new school from the Julius Rosenwald Fund. The school was designed by Little Rock architects George H. Wittenburg and Lawson L. Delony on a plan similar to that of Little Rock High School—though less ornate and on a smaller scale—and cost $400,000 to build. Schools financed through the Rosenwald Fund normally followed an industrial arts curriculum.

The new Little Rock facility was initially named the Negro School of Industrial Arts. The name was soon changed to Paul Laurence Dunbar High School, honoring an African American author. The first class entered Dunbar High School in 1930. Dunbar Junior College was housed within the high school building and operated from 1930 to 1955. As part of the Little Rock School Board’s plan for gradual desegregation, Dunbar students transferred to the new Horace Mann High School in 1956. Dunbar, meanwhile, was converted into a junior high school, and, as of 2017, it continues to operate in that capacity. In 1980, the school building was admitted to the National Register of Historic Places for both its architectural design and its historical significance. National Dunbar Alumni Association The first National Dunbar Alumni Association (NDAA) had been organized by 1949. The current alumni association dates to 1973, when the first national reunion was held; five years later, the National Dunbar Alumni Association was incorporated. As of 2017, the association is known as the National Dunbar and Horace Mann Alumni Association with eight active local chapters in Arkansas, California, Washington D.C., Illinois, Missouri, Texas, and Washington state. The association plays an active role in preserving Dunbar and Horace Mann’s legacy through scholarships, mentoring programs, annual reunions, the Dunbar Community Festival, and other special projects and activities.

National Dunbar Alumni Association History Project At its 1987 reunion, the NDAA began to formulate plans for preserving Dunbar’s history. In 1993, the NDAA was assisted by the University of Arkansas at Little Rock’s Public History program in creating a Dunbar history exhibit for the school’s memorabilia room. The next year, the NDAA hired a UA Little Rock Public History graduate student to organize and preserve an early Dunbar scrapbook. During this project, Dr. Erma Glasco Davis, NDAA president, and Barbara Long Hill, a Dunbar alumna, expressed an interest in creating a permanent, traveling exhibit to highlight the school’s historical significance. The NDAA combined with the UA Little Rock Public History program and Collections and Archives to form the Dunbar History Project in the summer of 1994. A mini-grant from the Arkansas Humanities Council and the National Endowment for the Humanities funded planning sessions to explore the feasibility of creating such an exhibit. During these meetings, a lack of available research materials regarding Dunbar—and segregated education in general—became apparent.

Through a research grant received from the Arkansas Humanities Council in 1994 September, the History Project embarked on three related projects: research primary and secondary resources to produce reports on Dunbar and the history of segregated education; interviews Dunbar High School with alumni; and establish an archival collection with project materials. Upon completion of the project’s research phase in 1995 December, the Dunbar History Project received an additional grant to assist in the funding of a permanent, traveling exhibit, which was first displayed publicly at the Arkansas Territorial Restoration, now known as Historic Arkansas Museum, 1996 November 9.