The windows, recently appraised at $200,000, were commissioned by the Fairview classes of 1938 and 1945. The 1938 window is in the Art Deco style and includes the school motto, while the 1945 window with its depictions of combat honors the 51 Fairview alumni who were killed in World War II.
John Carr, Dayton Public Schools’ chief construction officer, said the windows are to be mounted on a wall and back-lit in the two-story lobby of the new building at Hillcrest and Elsmere avenues. He said he’s surprised the alumni are “continuing to push” to have them displayed elsewhere.
“There has never been any question Dayton Public Schools wants to hang onto them and allow the children to appreciate the heritage or legacy of the district itself,” he said.
But the alumni said the windows should be available to the entire community, not just the students of a single school. And they say the windows would be better maintained by five curators in a new addition at Carillon Park.
“They now should be given to the whole city of Dayton to appreciate them,” said Jeri Jones Bland, of Columbus, a 1966 Fairview grad who is spearheading the effort. About 40 grads attended Sunday’s meeting, including members of the class of ’45, who donated one of the windows. “We’re concerned about the greater good of the community.”
Bland is calling on alumni and others to contact the school board or sign a petition in support of the preservation at www.fairview66.org.
Kress said Carillon officials aren’t trying to snatch the windows from the school district, but noted that the windows could be viewed by the park’s 150,000 annual visitors, about 40,000 of them schoolchildren from 22 counties. They would be placed in a new addition to Carillon’s education building, which is temperature- and humidity-controlled to meet requirements set by the Smithsonian Institution, and protected from excessive ultra-violet light.
The schools wouldn’t have to donate the windows, Kress said, but could put them on long-term loan to Dayton History, which operates Carillon Park.
The old Fairview building at Hillcrest and Philadelphia Drive is to be torn down in early summer.
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