From 1962 to 1969, E.E. Butler High School was the home of the mighty, mighty Tigers.

The school was closed shortly after integration, despite being "the most modern school in the system," said Jerry Castleberry, a former student now serving as the transportation director for Gainesville City Schools.

Emory Turner, a 1966 graduate and member of the Fair Street-Butler High Alumni Association, said the alumni were heartbroken when the school shut its doors for a final time.

"When the county took back their student population and you look at the figures, you really didn't have enough students that would attend the school. It would have gone from 600 or 700 to 300 ... They took their share so that just left a little of really city students. And that was just not enough to keep it open," Turner said.

The building now houses Hall County's Head Start pre-kindergarten program.

Built as a brand-new high school for Gainesville's black students, Butler High became home to rich traditions, best friends and a strong sense of community still evident today.

It was the community pride that made the school stand out from the rest.

"All of our teachers lived in the community. Most of them roomed with families. Some would even rent a house and have a group of teachers live there," Castleberry said.

The school's first principal, Ulysses Byas, joined two others to create Byrome Teacher's College on the corner of Fair and High streets, where teachers could stay as well.

The community feeling stemmed from much of the student body being together at Fair Street School and Fair Street High School, both in the same building, before the new school was built on Old Athens Highway. The Fair Street Tigers football team won the 1957 championship, led by Gene Carrithers, a point of pride that Butler alumni still talk about.

"Even the white community rallied around Butler's band and football team," Castleberry said. "On Thursday nights when we had a home game, that was just an awful lot of white people at the game. Most of them came to see Gene Carrithers and the Fair Street band."

Construction began on E.E. Butler High in 1961, when high school students were still housed within Fair Street School. When it opened in August 1962, the school had 515 students and 18 teachers, plus administration, according to the 1969 "Aurora" yearbook.

The school was officially dedicated to Emmett E. Butler in 1963. Butler was born in Macon but after years of medical school, he opened a practice in Gainesville, where he worked until his death in 1955. Butler's widow, children and grandchildren attended the ceremony.

"One of the many ways in which Dr. Butler served his community and his country was that of promoting good citizenship," the yearbook states. "He was instrumental in getting Negroes in Gainesville to vote. He strove for better jobs, better schools and better recreational facilities for the people of this community."

The legacy of E.E. Butler stood out in the high school named for him. Students participated in clubs — Vogues and Debs for the girls and the Esquires for the boys — athletics of the maroon and white Tigers, and homecoming king and queen voting.

Alumni of the school became historians, businessmen and women, doctors and lawyers. Some went on to become educators themselves and work for the Gainesville City school system.

Castleberry began school at E.E. Butler in 1962 and graduated in 1965. His brother was a member of the class of '63, the first graduating seniors.

"My fondest memory was my graduation because of the person who spoke at our graduation, Dr. Benjamin Mays, who was president emeritus of Morehouse College. That was the highlight of my tenure at Butler High," Castleberry said.

Students walked to school from Newtown and the Fair Street neighborhoods. There was a local bus service for a few years run by Grady Cheek that cost a dime per ride, Castleberry said, but most of the bus riders came from other counties.

"We were fortunate to have an educational system that made sure that everyone from other counties that didn't have a chance to go to high school went to Fair Street and Butler High," Thomas Hailey, president of the Fair Street-Butler High Alumni Association, said in a May interview.

Athletic teams got hand-me-down uniforms and equipment. Students didn't have the latest textbooks or technology.

There was only one field trip a year to the ice show in Atlanta.

But that didn't phase the student body.

"We thought we had it all. We didn't know because we hadn't experienced anything else," Castleberry said. "We thought we were doing well at Butler and Fair Street."

E.E. Butler High was renovated in 1965, with additional air-conditioned classrooms, a study room for juniors and seniors and a new library.

And just four years later, the school's final senior class was saying goodbye.

"We realize an important phase of our life is coming to an end," the yearbook states.

"Ahead the trail has led us from stony hill to hill. We've scaled the hardest summits and kept going still. Then loomed a castle high, its towers to the sky, and we gave a shout of gladness, for we knew the end was nigh."