Public School 190, ca. 1930. Puerto Rican-American poet Martin Espada wrote a poem about this particular school. Public School 190, Brooklyn 1963 The inkwells had no ink. The flag had 48 stars, four years after Alaska and Hawaii. There were vandalized blackboards and chairs with three legs, taped windows, retarded boys penned in the basement. Some of us stared in Spanish. We windmilled punches or hid in the closet to steal from coats as the teacher drowsed, head bobbing. We had the Dick and Jane books, but someone filled in their faces with a brown crayon. When Kennedy was shot, they hurried us onto buses, not saying why, saying only that something bad had happened. But we knew something bad had happened, knew that before November 22, 1963.

(Probably Charles B. J. Snyder, New York City Board of Education, 1922-24) In 1921, plans to build a high school in East New York were made public. Prior to that, students had to travel significant distances to schools outside of the neighborhood, so the announcement was extremely well received. In May 1922, Mayor John Francis Hylan, local leaders and six live bands led the parade and celebrations surrounding the school’s groundbreaking ceremony. Dedicated to the third President of the United States, Thomas Jefferson High School opened with roughly 4,000 school seats in September 1924. Some of the school’s notable attendees include Howard Zinn, Danny Kaye, Shelley Winters, Jimmy Smits and Al Lewis, who played Grandpa Munster in the 1960s TV show The Munsters.

Thomas Jefferson High School, early 1930s. The 1922 groundbreaking for this East New York high school (then considered part of Brownsville) was attended by Mayor John Hylan, who headlined a ceremony featuring six bands and “a parade of civic and religious bodies and school children which marched through Brownsville.” For decades, Thomas Jefferson was known for its outstanding athletics, with graduates regularly going on to play in college or in professional leagues. Other notable graduates have included the historian Howard Zinn (‘40), former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein (‘51), and the soul singer Sharon Jones (‘75). After years of decline, Thomas Jefferson closed in 2007 due to low graduation rates. Four separate high schools now operate out of the original building.

Construction of the IRT New Lots Line elevated trestle at New Jersey Avenue (foreground at left, with buildings under construction), June 10, 1920. The eastward extension to New Lots Avenue would be completed in October, 1922. The steeple of the New Lots Reformed Church is visible in the distance, at center-right.