Tuggle Elementary School

Original Tuggle Institute as seen in a 1906 book

Carrie A. Tuggle Elementary School is a public K-5 elementary school located at 412 12th Court North in the Enon Ridge neighborhood and part of the Birmingham City Schools system. The principal is Johnnie Finkley.

It was founded as the Tuggle Institute, a privately-run charity by social worker Carrie Tuggle on September 3, 1903. She wanted to provide safe housing and a good education to orphaned African-American children. The school was supported by the Court of Calanthe and Daughters of the Rising Sun secret women's organizations as well as by tuition and with funds from its trustees.

Around 1905 Tuggle hired Sam Foster to start a school band. It was there that he trained trumpeter Fess Whatley and taught him how to read music. Whatley later took over the music program at Tuggle before being hired as a printmaking teacher at Industrial High School in 1917.

In the 1912-13 school year the institute had 146 students, of which 4 were in secondary grades and 120 were boarding at the school. Early industrial programs taught to upper-grade students included printing, woodworking and sewing. At that time the school operated under debt. The school building, judged by inspectors to be overcrowded and in poor repair, were mortgaged to make up the deficit between operating expenses and the approximately $1,800 in income from tuition and donations.

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The school's finances improved with new white sources of support. Hugo Black was enlisted to join the advisory board and Louis Pizitz was a member of the school's building committee. On Lincoln's Birthday in 1920 the institute celebrated the completion of a new building. James Dillard, pastor of South Side Baptist Church spoke, followed by R. A. Blount, grand chancellor of the Colored Pythians and W. W. Green, exalted ruler of the Colored Elks.

The Institute became associated with the Birmingham City Schools in 1926. The Board of Education bought the 15-acre site with its 13 structures in 1934 and renamed it Enon Ridge School. Two years later the Board honored Tuggle by renaming it "Tuggle Elementary School".

The school was rebuilt as a new, modern elementary school in 1952, with a major addition in 1957. In 2007 Tuggle Elementary was placed on a list of schools facing possible closure in light of the system's declining student enrollment and shaky finances. It did not appear on a revised list distributed in January 2008.

Notable alumni

• Angela Davis, activist
• A. G. Gaston, entrepreneur
• Erskine Hawkins, musician
• Jo Jones, musician
• P. H. Polk, photographer
• Bob Range, musician
• Captain Sims, musician
• Fess Whatley, musician

References

• Birmingham Board of Education (c. 1982) “History of Carrie A. Tuggle School.” (mimeograph)
• United States Office of Education (1917) Negro Education: A Study of the Private and Higher Schools. Washington D. C.: Government Printing Office. p. 102
• "Tuggle Institute to Have New Building" (February 14, 1920) Cleveland Advocate. Vol. 6, No. 50, p. 1

External links

• Carrie A. Tuggle Elementary School at birmingham.schoolinsites.com