Effort underway to designate New Hanover HS as historic landmark

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — Real estate developer and Wilmington resident Gene Merritt has submitted an application to the City of Wilmington’s Historic Preservation Commission to designate New Hanover High School as a historic landmark.

The school was built in 1922 and it’s one of the oldest buildings in use in the county.

The school is currently undergoing a major construction project to fix cracks along the southern wall of the building facing Market Street.

Merritt graduated from New Hanover in 1962 and said the building is extremely sentimental for many others in the Cape Fear.

“You’re talking about a lot of hell being raised in this community if this building was torn down,” Merritt said. “You’ve got a tremendous amount of people that graduated from this high school that live in this town that are dedicated to it and love it.”

Last August, New Hanover County Commissioners approved a $300,000 study to look at the state of the school.

The study will look at how much additional repairs would cost, including the ongoing project.

Commissioner Dane Scalise supports doing whatever needs to be done to keep the school standing and remaining an integral part of the Wilmington area.

“That we have got to save, preserve, and invest in restoring New Hanover High School to magnificence,” Scalise said. “Not only do the students and teachers that are there now deserve it, but the students and teachers of past years and students and teachers of future years deserve nothing less than this.”

The Historic Preservation Commission’s February meeting was held on February 13th, where Merritt’s application was unanimously approved.

Merritt said he will now begin work on another, more in-depth application that will be submitted to the Commission to determine whether the school should be declared a landmark.