Lincoln High School

Lincoln High School was listed on the Kansas City Register of Historic Places on February 21, 2002. LHS is located at 2111 Woodland Ave and was founded in 1867 as an elementary school for African Americans in at church at 10th & McGee. The school district built the first separate high school in 1890 at 19th & Tracy under the leadership of Principal Gabriel N. Grisham.

In 1931, the school district acquired the site at 22nd & Woodland and the current building was completed in 1936. In the mid-1950s Kansas City began desegregating public schools but LHS didn’t become an inclusive student body and institution until 1978. At that time LHS became a magnet school and was renamed Lincoln Academy for Accelerated study and in 1986 the name changed to Lincoln College Preparatory Academy. Known as ‘The Castle on the Hill,’ Charles A. Smith designed the school in a mixture of the Collegiate Gothic and Art Deco style. In over a century of serving residents of Kansas City and surroundings, Lincoln in all its various locations has a resounding nostalgia.

For those who attended the Woodland building, it still remains “The Castle on the Hill.”Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.

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Civil Rights activists and professional athletes, Lincoln has seen its fair share of some beautiful students to come through the halls. Being one of the oldest high schools in Kansas City, there is so much history that has graced the classrooms in the building.

Lincoln was founded in 1865 at 10th and McGee Street as an elementary school for blacks. Once the high school was formed 1888 they moved to a different building and then eventually to the current campus. During the depression, the current location was built and has been there ever since.

Being a graduate from there, I take pride in knowing how long the school has been there and how nice it is to know that there have been so many people to grace the halls of the school and share similar experiences to myself and my other siblings. Also, going to school down the street from such a huge part of history in Kansas City, 18th and Vine, gave so many of us more of an understanding and appreciation for the history of our school and the area around it.

Lincoln was started as a black college prep high school for students to go to that are dedicated to school and want to succeed. It still follows the same values to this day. However, in 1978, Lincoln had the most drastic change in the school’s history, they became integrated as well as a magnet school.

Lincoln continues to thrive and have been given many award for their academic excellence. In 2015, U.S. News & World Report ranked Lincoln Prep the best high school in Missouri and the 67th best in the nation. The school has also been given multiple Nation Blue Ribbon Awards for academic excellence in its years.

Recently, Lincoln and the school district partnered to build the school a brand new state of the art football facility. It is a huge stepping stone and would not have been possible without community support and an incredibly generous donation to Lincoln from a former alumnus now playing in the NFL, Charles Harris. The school is a beautiful place to grow up as a kid and turn into a young adult. Ever since the doors opened at Lincoln Prep, there has been a humongous community of people built that are all brought together by a shared bond and all share their love for the castle on the hill that overlooks 18th & Vine and downtown Kansas City.

Works Cited

Football, Lincoln. “Lincoln Football (@LCPA_Football).” Twitter, Twitter, 15 Sept. 2019, https://twitter.com/lcpa_football.

“18th & Vine.” Kansas City Jazz History | 18th and Vine, http://kcjazzhistory.kcai-sites.com/18th-and-vine/. “Lincoln College Preparatory Academy.” Show Me KC Schools, https://showmekcschools.org/search/lincoln-college-preparatory-academy/.

“Lincoln College Prep Named Missouri's Top High School.” Northeast News, 12 May 2015, http://northeastnews.net/pages/lincoln-college-prep-named-missouris-top-high-school/.

Holmes, Kevin. “Memorable, Important Lincoln Prep Football Season Ends.” KSHB, 16 Nov. 2019, https://www.kshb.com/news/local-news/memorable-important-lincoln-prep-football-season-comes-to-end.

Randle, Aaron. “Lincoln Prep Soon May No Longer Be Majority Black. Is That a Sign of Loss or Progress?” Kansascity, The Kansas City Star, 12 May 2019, https://www.kansascity.com/news/local/article229600489.html.

Additional Content Provided by

Robert Mansur, graduate of Lincoln College Preparatory Academy and student at the University of Missouri Kansas City as part of Dr. Sandra Enriquez’s Urban History Class.

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