Placer High School is a public high school located in Auburn, California, United States, and is part of the Placer Union High School District. Auburn is located northeast of Sacramento, California, in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
History
History, 1882 to 1906
Placer High School’s origins can be traced back to 1882 when three young men from the East Coast arrived in Auburn with a dream of creating a college for Northern California. The trio met with influential members of the community in the Placer County Courthouse and began a campaign to solicit donations to the building fund of the Sierra Normal College and Business Institute. When the contributions reached $6,000, the three young teachers, M.L. Fries, A.W. Sutphen, and M.W. Ward contributed $1500 each and began to search for a building site.
General Jo Hamilton, a former Attorney General for the State of California during the 1870s, had retired to Auburn by this time and built a home on an estate at the corner of what is now High Street and College Way. He donated a parcel of his land to the newly formed school. By 1883 Sierra Normal College was advertised in the Placer Argus newspaper as “the only independent normal college on the Pacific Coast.” Normal in this instance meant preliminary, professional education of teachers.
1897 marks the beginning of Placer High School. In that year a Professor DeBell and the City of Auburn leased the Sierra Normal College building and property and ran the school under the name of Auburn High School. In September of that year the school began operations with 17 students present, all of whom paid tuition. Auburn High School graduated its first class in June 1900 at the opera house, the result of a three-year study. There were 10 students, six boys and four girls—five of them attended the University of California. At the time half of the students came from towns other than Auburn. In the first four years student population grew and more pupils were coming from outside of Auburn. This growth required more teachers and money and in 1901 the electors of Placer County voted for a high school and the name was changed to Placer County High School. Two years later, in 1903, the county purchased the building and grounds from Dr. Ward, the president and sole owner of the former Sierra Normal College.
History, 1906 to 1936
Dr. John F. Engle became principal of Placer High School in 1906 and began a 30-year career in which the school expanded from five teachers in one rickety wooden building to an 800-student facility boasting five buildings and the creation of a junior college.
Several landmark buildings were added during Engle’s stay as principal. During the 1906–07 school years the original Sierra College wooden building was torn down and replaced by a $40,000 building. The new building was a brick structure consisting of 22 rooms on four levels, including a basement, and a large tin dome.
In 1909 shower baths and lockers for athletes were installed downstairs in the new building. In the next few years tennis courts were finished on the site of the old wooden building and a football field and track were installed. By 1918 the school showcased a large wooden gymnasium with sideline seating and a stage. 1926 marked the beginning of a new era for Placer when the music/auditorium and science wings were added and the brick building was plastered over to match the architectural style of the two new wings. The auto shop and bus shed building along Agard Street were constructed at this time. Ten years later, building began on Placer Junior College buildings, gym and athletic field during the final year of Engle's administration, 1936.
Athletics began to affect the school during Engle’s tenure. The addition of a young coach from the University of California, Earl Crabbe, enabled the girls’ and boys’ basketball teams to achieve great success. Between 1916 and 1920 the girls' basketball team went 41–1, winning 37 games in succession at one point, compiling four straight undefeated seasons. Beginning in 1923 the boys’ basketball teams won 16 out of 17 league championships, including 12 in a row. Crabbe also coached his men to eight Central California titles in 13 appearances.
Engle was at the helm through World War I, when a junior Red Cross Club was organized on campus with girls learning to make surgical dressings and the school donating over $500 to a war drive. The Engle years also saw the formation of the first high school cadet corps in the State of California under the direction of Captain Fred S. Roumage, a National Guard officer and later captain in France in World War I.