Franklin High School (formally Benjamin Franklin High School) is a

public high school State schools (in England, Wales, Australia and New Zealand) or public schools (Scottish English and North American English) are generally primary or secondary schools that educate all students without charge. They are funded in whole or in pa ...

Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous co ...

, United States. It is located in central southeast Portland in the South Tabor neighborhood. Franklin High School (Portland, OR) 1

History

Founded in 1914, Franklin is Portland's fourth high school. The city's high schools were filled to capacity at the time, and the population in southeast Portland was rapidly growing. It was initially founded in part of the Creston elementary school, with nine instructors and 115 student in the spring 1914 semester. The current brick building, designed by

Floyd Naramore Floyd Archibald Naramore (July 21, 1879 in Warren, Illinois – October 29, 1970 in Seattle) was a Seattle architect. He was Seattle Schools Architect from 1919 to 1932, and he was a founding partner, in 1943, of the firm that today is known ...

, opened in September 1917. In 1942, a statue of Benjamin Franklin, after whom the school was named, was installed outside of Franklin High School. Due to the

baby boom A baby boom is a period marked by a significant increase of birth rate. This demographic phenomenon is usually ascribed within certain geographical bounds of defined national and cultural populations. People born during these periods are often ca ...

and the passing of a $25 million building levy by the school district in 1947, a new addition for arts,

industrial arts Industrial arts is an educational program that features the fabrication of objects in wood or metal using a variety of hand, power, or machine tools. Industrial Arts are commonly referred to as Technology Education. It may include small engine rep ...

, and

home economics Home economics, also called domestic science or family and consumer sciences, is a subject concerning human development, personal and family finances, consumer issues, housing and interior design, nutrition and food preparation, as well as texti ...

departments was slated. In October 2010 the school decided to discontinue its competitive robotics team due to the lack of any school official sanctioning the team, allegedly by locking the team out of their workspace without access to their tools, or the more than $7000 the team had raised to sustain the program. The team had been a part of the school for seven years. Between 2015 and 2017, the school was modernized and expanded, with funding from a $482 million bond measure in 2012. The modernization included a new arts center, a new gym, biomedical, and culinary arts building, seismic retrofitting, and a new entrance.

Student profile

In the 2017–2018 school year, Franklin's student population was 48.9% White, 20.5% Hispanic, 16.4% Asian, 5.6% African American, 0.6% Pacific Islander, 0.6% Native American, and 7.4% mixed race. In 2008, 80% of the school's seniors received a

high school diploma A high school diploma or high school degree is a North American academic school leaving qualification awarded upon high school graduation. The high school diploma is typically obtained after a course of study lasting four years, from grade 9 to gra ...

. Of 354 students, 282 graduated, 52 dropped out, five received a modified diploma, and 15 were still in high school the following year. In 2009, 31% of the students were transfers into the school.

Notable alumni

Robin Reed Robin Reed (October 20, 1899 – December 20, 1978) was an American amateur and professional wrestler, and wrestling coach. Throughout his amateur career he never lost a wrestling match, official or unofficial, to anyone at any weight class. ...

, US Olympic Gold Medalist wrestling 1924 *

Bob Amsberry Robert Wayne Amsberry (June 2, 1928 – November 21, 1957) was an American actor, and one of the original cast members on the first two seasons of Walt Disney's ''The Mickey Mouse Club'', working as both a writer and actor. Amsberry also worked a ...

, actor on ''

The Mickey Mouse Club ''The Mickey Mouse Club'' is an American variety television show that aired intermittently from 1955 to 1996 and returned to social media in 2017. Created by Walt Disney and produced by Walt Disney Productions, the program was first televised fo ...

'' *

Douglas Engelbart Douglas Carl Engelbart (January 30, 1925 – July 2, 2013) was an American engineer and inventor, and an early computer and Internet pioneer. He is best known for his work on founding the field of human–computer interaction, particularly ...

, inventor of the

computer mouse A computer mouse (plural mice, sometimes mouses) is a hand-held pointing device that detects two-dimensional motion relative to a surface. This motion is typically translated into the motion of a pointer on a display, which allows a smooth c ...

Tamara Fazzolari Tamara Jean "Tammy" Fazzolari Wallace (born July 27, 1966) is an American beauty pageant titleholder from Portland, Oregon, who was crowned Miss Oregon 1987. She competed for the Miss America 1988 title in September 1987 but was not a Top-10 fin ...

, Miss Oregon 1987 *

Vic Gilliam Victor Stephen Gilliam (July 21, 1953June 17, 2020) was an American politician and actor who served as a member of the Oregon House of Representatives from 2007 to 2017. A member of the Republican Party, Gilliam resigned in 2017 due to health p ...

, Oregon State Representative from the 18th District *

Chris Gorsek Chris Gorsek (born January 28, 1958 in Portland, Oregon) is an American politician and a Democratic member of the Oregon State Senate representing District 25 since January 11, 2021. Background Gorsek earned his Bachelor of Science and Master o ...

, Oregon State Representative from the 49th District *

Howard Hobson Howard Andrew "Hobby" Hobson (July 4, 1903 – June 9, 1991) was an American basketball player and coach of football, basketball, and baseball. He served as the head basketball coach at Southern Oregon Normal School—now Southern Oregon Universi ...

, head men's basketball coach at the

University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc, and its co-founder, billion ...

(1936–47); led the team to the first

NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship The NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, branded as NCAA March Madness and commonly called March Madness, is a single-elimination tournament played each spring in the United States, currently featuring 68 college basketball teams from ...

in 1939 *

Steve "Snapper" Jones Stephen Howard "Snapper" Jones (October 17, 1942 – November 25, 2017) was an American basketball player in the American Basketball Association (ABA) and National Basketball Association (NBA), and later a television analyst. He was a three-time A ...

, former basketball player in the ABA and

NBA The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United St ...

; color analyst for

Portland Trail Blazers The Portland Trail Blazers (colloquially known as the Blazers) are an American professional basketball team based in Portland, Oregon. The Trail Blazers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Western Con ...

broadcasts * Jack Landau, Oregon Supreme Court Justice * Gerald Mahan, physicist and member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

Rod Monroe Rod Monroe (born August 20, 1942) is a Canadian-born American politician who served in the Oregon Senate, representing District 24 in the middle part of Multnomah County, which includes most of eastern Portland and the city of Happy Valley. E ...

, Oregon State Senator from the 24th District * Legedu Naanee, former NFL player *

Claire Phillips Claire Maybelle Snyder (December 2, 1907 – May 22, 1960), also known as Clara Fuentes, Clara Phillips, Dorothy Fuentes as well as High Pockets, was an American spy, entertainer, club owner, and writer most noted for her exploits in the Japanes ...

, spy in the Japanese-occupied Philippines during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

; recipient of the

Medal of Freedom The Presidential Medal of Freedom is the highest civilian award of the United States, along with the Congressional Gold Medal. It is an award bestowed by the president of the United States to recognize people who have made "an especially merit ...

Johnnie Ray John Alvin Ray (January 10, 1927 – February 24, 1990) was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Highly popular for most of the 1950s, Ray has been cited by critics as a major precursor to what became rock and roll, for his jazz and blu ...

, singer *

Shoni Schimmel Shoni Schimmel (born May 4, 1992) is an American professional basketball player. She is a former All-American college player at the University of Louisville and was selected with the eighth overall pick in the first round of the 2014 draft by t ...

, WNBA player with the

Atlanta Dream The Atlanta Dream are an American professional basketball team based in Atlanta, playing in the Eastern Conference in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). The team was founded for the 2008 WNBA season. The team is owned by real ...

* Richard Unis, Oregon Supreme Court Justice

References

External links

* {{authority control 1914 establishments in Oregon Educational institutions established in 1914 High schools in Portland, Oregon Portland Public Schools (Oregon) Public high schools in Oregon South Tabor, Portland, Oregon