The Nathan L. Bachman School is a former

elementary school A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary ed ...

located near

Signal Mountain, Tennessee Signal Mountain is a town in Hamilton County, Tennessee, United States. The town is a suburb of Chattanooga and is located on Walden Ridge. "Signal Mountain" is used as a colloquial name for the part of Walden Ridge close to the town. The town ...

. The building was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 2001. In 2017, it is used as the Bachman Community Center.

History

The Nathan L. Bachman School was built in 1937, and designed by the firm of R. H. Hunt and Company. It was built under the

Public Works Administration The Public Works Administration (PWA), part of the New Deal of 1933, was a large-scale public works construction agency in the United States headed by Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes. It was created by the National Industrial Recove ...

with funding from the Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works, at a cost of about $57,000. The school was named for

Nathan L. Bachman Nathan Lynn Bachman (August 2, 1878April 23, 1937) was a United States Senate, United States Senator from Tennessee from 1933 until his death. He was a member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party. Biography Bachman was born ...

, a prominent local lawyer and politician. It was built to replace older and obsolete schools in the area. In 1955, two additions were added to the original structure. It functioned as a school until 2000, when its students were transferred to Nolan Elementary School. It now functions as a community center under the name, Bachman Community Center. With .

Architecture

The Nathan L. Bachman School building is an example of

Colonial Revival The Colonial Revival architectural style seeks to revive elements of American colonial architecture. The beginnings of the Colonial Revival style are often attributed to the Centennial Exhibition of 1876, which reawakened Americans to the archi ...

architecture. Prominent features reflective of this style include the front brick

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cult ...

fanlight A fanlight is a form of lunette window, often semicircular or semi-elliptical in shape, with glazing bars or tracery sets radiating out like an open fan. It is placed over another window or a doorway, and is sometimes hinged to a transom. Th ...

s over the main entrance and auditorium windows, red brick facade, multi-light window sashes, panel doors, and an overall symmetrical design, with the main entrance in the center flanked by equally-spaced windows.

References

External links

Bachman Community Center
official site National Register of Historic Places in Tennessee Colonial Revival architecture in Tennessee School buildings completed in 1937 Hamilton County, Tennessee {{HamiltonCountyTN-NRHP-stub