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31 <br />NPs Form 10 -900 -a OMB No. 1024 -0018 <br />() <br />United States Department of the Interior <br />National Park Service <br />NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES <br />CONTINUATION SHEET <br />Section $ Page 15 Murahev School <br />name of property <br />Orange County, NC <br />county and state <br />ignored the rules and continued to ride the school bus to Hillsboro for school By 1947 Murphey <br />School had the lowest student-to-teacher ratio in the county, and an agreement was made to <br />retain the seventh grade at Murphey until higher attendance warranted its transfer to the <br />elementary school in Hillsboro. Nevertheless, with numbers dwindling, Murphey School continued <br />to hire around three teachers almost every year. In 1948 Murphey School enrolled only around <br />seventy pupils and the board decided to transfer the seventh grade to the Hillsboro school. <br />The principal's reports available for Murphey School date from 1946 to1950, towards the latter <br />part of the school's operation. In 1946 Mrs. J. M. Harris served as principal as well as a teacher <br />for the fifth and sixth grades. The other teachers were Mrs. Myrtle Walker, Mrs. Erna Link, Mrs. <br />Chas F. Hudson and Miss Florence Roat. Students at Murphey School engaged in extracurricular <br />activities such as the 4 -H Club and chorale. A parent - teacher association existed at Murphey <br />School as well. Some of the improvements that Principal Harris listed for 1946 included, <br />Improved lunch room by obtaining new chairs, tables, and new curtains, reupholstering state <br />furniture, and purchasing new cooking equipment." During the 1949 -1950 school year a physical <br />education program had been implemented. Additionally, an art teacher from the University of <br />North Carolina at Chapel Hill was employed part -time. <br />Post -World War 11 public schools in North Carolina continued to consolidate and improve their <br />facilities, but they also faced new concerns including desegregation and the large influx of children <br />with the baby boom of the 1950s. Murphey School continued to employ around three teachers <br />each year and attendance dwindled. This can in part be explained by the influx of residents to the <br />cities during the early part of the twentieth century, and later the congregation of middle -class <br />families in the outlying suburbs. The low attendance rate was also due to the prejudices and <br />opinions of local residents regarding the quality of the school. Murphey School closed in 1959, <br />and its students transferred to the elementary schools in Hillsboro. The board agreed to lease the <br />empty school building to the Mt. Herman Baptist Church for one year at the rate of $25 per month. <br />In 1963 the Underwood family purchased the property at a public auction 24 Some time during the <br />early 1970s it was used as a nightclub until the mid- 1 980s; it sat vacant from 1986 until its <br />purchase by Jay Miller in March of 2008. <br />22 Orange County Board of Education Minutes, 248 -250. <br />23 Division of Institutional Services, Elementary and Secondary Education Section., Elementary School <br />Arlhalpals' Annual Reports, 1924 - 1950, Department of Public Instruction (Raleigh: State Archives Research <br />Room). <br />24 Orange County Board of Education Minutes, 1872 -1962, microfilm (Raleigh: State Archives Research Room, <br />c. 073. 94002), p. 402 -487, p. 3. <br />