Lincoln School – Wagoner

Address:	Harrison and 8th Streets, Wagoner, Oklahoma	County:	Wagoner
Started:		Completed:	1940
Agencies:	WPA	NRHP:	No

Current Usage:

School Property

Description:

A four room, single story and rectangular (80′ x 54′) structure, Lincoln School is constructed of unrusticated native sandstone laid with a cobweb design. Mortar is beaded. The roof, now covered with composition shingles, is gabled; an intersecting gable on the front extends over a recessed entryway. With pre-formed concrete sills, window openings that rise to the eaves have been reduced in size with decorative inserts and energy efficient, metal sash windows installed. A hall connecting the structure with a new brick building has been enclosed with concrete blocks. These minor alterations do not affect the architectural integrity of the building.
Lincoln School is significant as a WPA project because it was the only segregated school for African-Americans in Wagoner. As such, it brought modern educational opportunities to the African-American minority of Wagoner for the first time, and it continued to provide those opportunities for the school community long passed the desegregation in 1965. Had it not been for this building some youngsters in Wagoner would have had few educational opportunities. Moreover, construction of Lincoln school provided jobs for need relief roll laborers of African-American descent who had been long without gainful employment–longer than most whites–and benefitted local main street businesses with the wages from more than 22,000 man hours of labor. Architecturally, the building is unique in terms of type and workmanship within the community. The school now houses the Lincoln Enrichment Center which provides the literacy, fitness, recreation programs in a safe and caring environment for all children of the community.

VERBAL BOUNDARY DESCRIPTION: Go 80 feet west, 150 feet south, 80 feet east and 150 feet north in Block 544, Wagoner original plat

Visited: 10/13/2023

Although the current usage of the building is hard to determine it is believed to still be in use by the school system. According to typed history the construction of the building in 1940 greatly improved the educational opportunities of African-Americans within the Wagoner Community as well as many white students who attended the school as an elementary after desegregation of Wagoner schools in 1965.