Will Rogers Junior High students share wall with namesake

Pictures of Claremore Will Rogers Junior High “Students of the Month” will hang around a portrait of the school’s namesake. Steve Gragert, Will Rogers Memorial Museums executive director, presented the framed Charles Banks Wilson portrait; signed by the artist, to Wes Coleman, school representative.

 

 

Will Rogers Junior High students selected each month, as “Students of the Month” will share “The Wall of Fame” with Will Rogers.

Steve Gragert, Will Rogers Memorial director, presented a print of the Will Rogers’ portrait that appeared on the 1979 Oklahoma telephone book cover to school officials. The portrait is signed by the artist Charles Banks Wilson.

Southwestern Bell commissioned Wilson to do the telephone book cover on the 100th anniversary of Will Rogers' birth Nov. 4, 1879 on an Indian Territory ranch near Oologah. It was first unveiled during Will Rogers Days in 1979.

Wes Coleman, WRJH teacher, said the “Wall’ will highlight students who show success in and out of the classroom. It will be covered with “character words we want students to focus on centered around the painting," Coleman said. Pictures of each grades’ “Students of the Month” will surround the Will Rogers print.

Will Rogers was the name given Claremore’s first junior high when it opened in 1956 between 10th and 11th Streets on Weenonah. The name went with the school when it was moved to 4th Street and again when the newer facility opened on North Florence.

Another memento of Will Rogers’ place in history is in the foyer of the school. A model of the USS Will Rogers Nuclear Submarine, the last of the “41 for Freedom” Polaris submarines was placed in the school soon after it opened on the north campus. Launched in July 1966 by Muriel Humphrey, wife of then Vice President Hubert Humphrey, it was commanded by Capt. R.Y. Kaufman (blue crew) and W.J. Cowhill (gold crew). It was decommissioned and stricken from the Naval Vessel Registry in 1992, destined for recycling.

Kaufman visited Will Rogers Memorial when the replica was on display in the museum.