| Address: | Draper and Whittaker Streets, Shawnee, Oklahoma | County: | Pottawatomie |
| Started: | Completed: | 1940 | |
| Agencies: | WPA | NRHP: | No |
Current Usage:
School
Description:
The addition to Horace Mann School is two stories, rectangular (39′ x 86′) and constructed of brick. It runs perpendicular to the original building. The roof of the addition is flat with concrete capped parapets. Jambs and lintel of the front entryway are of cut limestone, as is the flat pediment above the door. The two door side entry is slightly subsurface and has transom lights. Window openings have cut limestone sills and continuous lintels of the same material, the latter having the effect of a frieze. Three different bas reliefs decorate the front. Other than different windows and the filling in of one-half of a small window, the building has not been altered.
The addition to Horace Mann school is primarily significant because of its two stories, a feature that is rather rare on WPA buildings. The fact that the addition also symbolizes the social significance of the WPA program–putting destitute people to work–is also significant, as is its importance to the advancement of elementary education in Shawnee.
VERBAL BOUNDARY DESCRIPTION: Lots 45-50, Block 14, Whittaker Addition to Shawnee original plat.
Coordinates: 35.33188 -96.90549
In 1940 the Federal Works Progress Administration (WPA) helped finance the expansion of Horace Mann Elementary School. The WPA-additions included a classroom and an auditorium. A report that ran in The Oklahoman on October 13, 1940 notes that in the process of constructing the additions, laborers first demolished the 1907 foundation that had been left when newer Horace Mann Elementary was built in 1927.
Hamquilter’s Waymarking web page for Horace Mann Elementary describes the additions as follows:
“As was common under the WPA, an addition (in this case, a classroom/auditorium addition), was constructed in 1940, perpendicular to the original school.
As is the school, this addition is two stories and red brick. The entrance has double doors and faces east. Above the entrance is a flat stone lintel. The transom area is covered with concrete and reads “Auditorium”. There are two one-over-one windows above the entrance on the second level. Three stone panel reliefs are on the upper wall for decoration. A bronze WPA shield is also located high on the east wall.
The south wall has one-over-one ribbon windows in threes, with single windows at each end. (The west single window has been bricked in, as are all windows on the west end). The sills beneath the sets of three are continuous, and all windows have sandstone transoms. On the upper wall is a two-row stone belt course beneath a flat roof with stone coping. The single door on this south side has boarded-in sidelights, and is slightly below ground level…
The school is in good condition and currently being used as a school [2]
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