By Bob Holeman

As Diane and I made our 3-mile downtown walk on Monday, we arrived at our traditional stop at the Winn Parish Enterprise for a little rest and water.  While in the back, I spotted the bound edition of the 1974 Enterprise, open to May 15.  The headline caught my attention:

“Schools to Graduate 319”

I found the number a little unsettling.  Minnie Young at the front desk told me that Winnfield Senior High School would have just 74 graduating seniors while Dodson High School would add 24 and Calvin 20 for a parish total of 118.  I knew the parish has been losing population over the 40+ years that we’ve been here, so the school numbers would naturally fall as well.  But this seemed to be an alarming drop over this reported half century.

Good news of sorts came after we walked home.  I got into my car and drove back to the Enterprise to read more.  Lo and behold, when the Enterprise wrote about 319 graduates in 1974 (it had been just 271 the year before, the paper stated), they were talking about nine high schools, including neighboring Georgetown’s 20 graduates, Goldonna’s 22 and Montgomery’s 54.

Winn’s high school count at the time was six.  Atlanta had 28 graduates, Calvin has 32, Sikes had 7, Dodson had 18, Winn Academy had 7 and Winnfield Senior High School had 131.  So over those 50 years, the parish is showing three fewer schools.  The remaining schools are graduating 105 fewer seniors this month than they did back in 1974.  That’s better than the drop of 200 I’d initially suspected.

Note that school enrollment will trend with parish population.  According to internet figures,  Winn’s population in 1974 was around 16,200.  Although the numbers edged up for a time, since 2000 the census has shown a steady decrease and by 2022, stood around 13,200.

For interest, principals at the time of the 1974 story were Russell Sullivan at Atlanta High School, W.E. Carpenter at Calvin High School, Bill Willis at Sikes High School, Mrs. Virgie Williams at Winn Academy and Tommy Bankston at Winnfield Senior High School.

Congratulations to our 118 seniors who are moving on to the next important stage of their lives.