Up to a few years ago, anyone who grew up in Presque Isle knew full well who Frank Cunningham was. Mr. Cunningham was arguably the most respected local citizen in our village in the last 70 years or so. But now I fear the memory of his esteem and prestige and the glory of his academic accomplishments are dimming, weakened by Father Time.
In a short time from now, his distinction will dissolve to a faint recollection kept alive for the moment by a school named for him in 1949. The last reminder of Mr. Cunningham (out of respect, no one ever called him by his first name) is scheduled to be demolished by a wrecking ball (now an excavator) here in a few days or weeks. I think ‘demolished’ is maybe the wrong word; perhaps a better term would be, ‘taken away from us.’ Most of us will sense a great loss when Cunningham Middle School is reduced to nothing more than an empty space, perhaps filled in one day by a housing complex of some sort. Frank Cunningham will ‘pass on’ once more, his first passing came upon his death in 1978, and the second will come in the early part of 2007 when the Grim Reaper arrives to level Cunningham the school. Fearfully, it appears that the future holds nothing by which we can be reminded of his name, his influence, his devotion to our academic successes for 43 of his 82 years. Maybe a picture or two hanging on a wall somewhere in the city, maybe not.
Interestingly enough, the original Cunningham school, then called the High School, was designed to last for many generations. It was erected in 1910, the first school in the Presque Isle district to be constructed of any kind of masonry. It was imagined that any building constructed of brick would last many lifetimes, virtually free from the threat of fire. Twelve years later, it burned flat.
For the next 12 years following the 1910 construction of the new high school, student life was full, brimming with new learning experiences. But, like the Titanic, the ‘indestructible’ was destroyed by fire in the last few days of December of 1921. Despite the outer brick shell, the interior frame was constructed of wood including the roof timbers. No one knew just how the fire started, but it did in the wee hours of the morning. Firemen answered the alarm, but nothing they did made any difference. The building was lost and 322 students were out of a warm place to attend school. But not for long. The villagers quickly gathered and appropriated the funds necessary to rebuild. The contract was awarded to a local construction company, Downing and Horsman, and construction began in the early spring. A provision was that the builder must utilize the bricks salvaged from the rubble of the fire. The rest would be purchased from Montreal and brought in by railway.
The new school would handle more students then the one before. A building committee of seven made the decision to double the capacity to 500 students. The old one (322 pupils) had been crowded beyond its intended capacity of 250. Not only would the school accommodate the high schoolers, but would also furnish room for the 7th and 8th graders from Training and Gouldville. The town was growing and this would save it from building a new elementary facility in a few years. The new school would be equipped with a library, a new gym replete with girls’ and boys’ dressing rooms, teachers’ room, janitors’ room, an agriculture department and a physical science lab, along with an adjoining lecture and demonstration chamber. Lastly, there would be a room for developing pictures (photography). The project was finished two months ahead of schedule and was completed right before Thanksgiving.
The next year (1923) brought Frank Cunningham to us after a few years as principal of Mapleton’s high school from fall of 1919 to the spring of 1923. His photo, along with the teaching staff, first appears in the Christmas issue of the 1923 issue of the “SHIP.” The school was practically brand new when he assumed stewardship. Twenty-six years later, the school would be proudly named for its new principal who, by the way, also taught math while serving in that capacity.
