WILMINGTON — Recognizing New Hanover High School as a potential historical landmark will be assessed after a local commission voted on the measure Thursday.
READ MORE: Lifelong Wilmingtonian aims for New Hanover High School to become historic landmark
Local real estate developer and historic preservationist Gene Merritt put forth the application to the City of Wilmington’s Historic Preservation Commission. They voted unanimously to add the 102-year-old high school to a study list.
The study list is the first step in at least a year-long process that will determine whether the high school can become an historical landmark on the National Registry of Historic Places. Merritt’s intent is to save the high school from potential demolition, which has been floated at commissioner meetings in the last year.
“I’m a historic preservationist and I have a legitimate track record to back that up,” Merritt said Thursday.
Merritt was a pioneer helping revitalize downtown Wilmington as part of the 1970s Downtown Area Revitalization Effort — now Wilmington Downtown Inc. The public-private partnership has transformed downtown into an area of thriving businesses.
“I don’t want to see that building torn down,” Merritt added of NHHS, noting plenty of people in town would agree.
Historic Preservation Commissioner Ashley Wilson echoed the sentiment.
“My grandfather, my father, my mother, my children went there,” she said. “My mother taught there. It’s very significant.”
New Hanover schools Interim Superintendent Chris Barnes spoke during the hearing to ensure the HPC was on the same page about everything underway on the campus currently. A foundation and façade repair is taking place, with the county approving $6.4 million toward it in November.
Scaffolding covers the high school as work is being completed. It has dislocated 16 classrooms, administration and guidance counselor offices for this school year.
Commissioner Stephen Sulkey asked if the building was currently a threat to students and structurally sound.
“It’s structurally sound,” Barnes said.
This was concurred upon by Assistant Superintendent of Operations Eddie Anderson, who has worked with the district since 1997. He was clear with the board the building was safe.
“I personally, nor does anyone else, want to see New Hanover High School torn down,” Anderson said, noting contractors have been stealth as to not cause more structural damage as work continues.
He added there were major cracks on the south-facing walls, but crews have since installed micro pilings to prevent it from settling in the future. They’re currently removing the east and west corners to reconstruct.
School board member Pat Bradford asked the HPC to tour the building and see it from the inside.
“If you look at the pictures from where we came from, it was shockingly bad,” she said. “You could literally see outside through the walls. … We’ve done a lot of work, we’re excited.”
Repairs are supposed to be complete in time for the 2025-2026 school year.
“The concern is whether it will last for another 10, 20, 30, 40 years,” Barnes said.
To assess this, New Hanover County Commissioners approved a $300,000 feasibility study that will wrap by May. Anderson has said before he expects the school may need $90 million in repairs; if approved as a landmark it would qualify for tax credits.
The feasibility study will allow county commissioners and the district a better understanding about long-range implications of the high school and its financial viability.
Historic Preservation Commissioner Joan Keston said she believed the outcome of that study would impact the decision of it becoming a historical landmark.
The NHHS campus is much smaller than others in the district, which operate on 60 or more acres, normally. New Hanover’s is on 15 acres.
“Would you be able to replace this with a high school if you don’t have enough acreage?” Wilson asked, rhetorically posing demolition as an option.
“Welcome to the million-dollar question,” Barnes said, and pressed that the historic building is one he’d like to see continue on in legacy. However, it came with the balance of ensuring it also fits the needs of students and said the feasibility study would provide more data to make those determinations.
Member Joan Keston cited concerns of the two studies — landmark and feasibility — concurring simultaneously. Her colleague and commissioner Christopher Yermal didn’t see them “running parallel” as problematic.
“If it ever comes to us for an actual designation, by then I assume we will have more information about the study you have on the facility and can make a decision at that point,” he said.
“This is not a three-week process,” HPC Chair Kathleen Egan added. “Even if it finally gets landmark status, that means you can’t demolish it without further consideration and that would require jumping through hoops.”
Merritt’s application didn’t include Brogden Hall initially, added 30 years after the school was built in 1922; it’s attached by a skywalk. The commission decided the 71-year-old building was worthy to be included.
The hall also has undergone repairs, with $1.6 million put toward correcting its sinking gymnasium floor in recent years. It was named after football, basketball and baseball coach Leon B. Brogden, who oversaw 55 championships in the gym, which hosts sports games, concerts and housed Lyceum Academy classrooms.
Wilson was concerned that if Brogden Hall wasn’t included and faced demolition, the high school wouldn’t have enough resources to accommodate the student population or keep the school functioning.
“That would have to be replaced somewhere on that site,” Anderson confirmed, if it were razed.
He said the district is going through a master plan process as well and noted it may be more likely to recommend demolition of some buildings — even if not the main structure — in a four-block area of the school. Should that happen, those facilities would need to be replaced with modern resource spaces.
Yemal wanted to make sure that moving forward with both the main building and Brogden Hall would not impact one or the other from consideration of historic designation — that it wouldn’t necessarily be a “single-unit” decision.
City of Wilmington Historic Preservation Manager Benjamin Riggle clarified the two could be separated later before official designation.
“They can only cut things out,” he said, adding Brogden Hall couldn’t necessarily be added in if the application only included the main building.
Riggle said Merritt would have to formally submit the application, to then undergo analysis of historical, cultural and architectural significance and its community impact to determine if designation is viable.
City council would approve it and then the state preservation officer would also have to sign off on it.
Even if the study comes back favorable, the school board has the final say as the landowner and must give permission before any NHHS structures are designated historic.
Egan thought the board should include Brogden Hall, to which her colleagues agreed.
“I know it’s a more modern design, but the son of the original architect designed it, it has a lot of things going for it,” he said. “I think the whole thing should be on the study and let someone else really look at it … I don’t want to just cut it off at the knees right now.”
Wilson read the motion to include both and it passed 6-0.
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