Indianola Junior High School


Indianola Junior High School is a historic school building located on 19th Avenue in Columbus, Ohio. It opened in 1929 after the school moved out of a previous building on 16th Avenue. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2010.

Organization and history

In the early 1900s, there was support for marking more of a transition from elementary to secondary education. The Indianola school was the first school to be designed as a separate junior high school. The school was organized in 1909 by the Board of Education of Columbus, Ohio, and Superintendent J.A. Shawan.
The first principal of Indianola Junior High School was C. H. Fullerton, and the school included students from the Medary, Northwood, and Eight Avenue Schools.
The building was designed by Ohio State University architect Howard Dwight Smith who also designed Ohio Stadium. Dr. Erwin Frey, who also sculpted the statue of Dr. William Oxley Thompson which stands outside Ohio State University's Thompson Library, was responsible for the sculpture on the building.
In recognition of Columbus, Ohio,'s role in the early junior high school movement, a tablet was incorporated into the structure of the Indianola Junior High School building which reads:

Primus

Indianola

Junior High School

organized in September 1909 at Six-

teenth and Indianola Avenues

First of its

kind in these United States

was reorganized in this building

September 1929.

In 2018, Ohio State University purchased the property for $2.35 million.