KATHLEEN, Fla. — Kathleen Middle School is the first school in northwest Polk County to offer classes past eighth grade. It was built nearly 100 years ago and has since survived a fire — and even a tornado.
Bucky Day said it means a lot to be a Kathleen Tiger. He’s Kathleen Middle School's new principal and gets to say he's a third-generation graduate.
“I have deep family ties. My family is all from this area. Kathryn Rogers Prime, whose nickname was Kathleen, so it's where the town name actually came from,” Day said.
This middle school now serves grades sixth through eighth, but it was once called a strawberry school for grades first through twelfth.
“About everybody out there that went to that school farmed either four or five acres, three or three acres, even ten. So, the kids picked strawberries,” Ralph “RJ” Reynolds said.
Reynolds attended Kathleen Middle School all of grade school. He said students picked strawberries from January through March.
“You got to eat all you wanted,” Reynolds said.
Students attended school from April through December. This practice stopped in 1952.
“Looking back, it was really the good old times,” Reynolds said.
But even good old times come with hardships.
In 2019, an EF-2 tornado significantly damaged the town and school. Polk County Public Schools said they made repairs to the roof and several other buildings and classrooms. Students were back in less than two weeks, but it took more than two years and more than $5 million to get this school fully restored.
“One of the really neat things that I didn't realize when we were going through that process, the original roof of the original part of the building, The Strawberry School House, is still underneath the existing one. So, whenever everything was exposed, you could see the old building the old trusses and everything,” Day said.
The tornado caused severe damage, but history can't be erased.
“That entryway when you walk in that's some of the old, restored flooring that they pulled out of one of the rooms,” Day said.
Now, the historic school will live on for more generations.
“My children, one's currently here, one's in high school and hopefully eventually my youngest will come through,” Day said.
Day said for the longest time, Kathleen Middle School was seen as a community school. This school year, he hopes to get back to that by increasing parent engagement.