Mechanicsville High School (formerly Lee-Davis High School) is a public high school located in

Mechanicsville, Virginia Mechanicsville is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Hanover County, Virginia, United States. The population was 39,482 during the 2020 census, up from 36,348 in the 2010 census. History The area was settled by ...

, United States. It serves students in grades 9 through 12 and is part of Hanover County Public Schools.

History

Mechanicsville High School opened in 1959 under the name Lee-Davis High School and received students from the consolidation of Battlefield Park and Washington-Henry High Schools. After the new high school opened, both Battlefield Park and Washington-Henry became elementary schools. Lee-Davis opened in the midst of Massive Resistance, as the State of Virginia opposed desegregation of its public schools, despite the 1954 Supreme Court ruling in

Brown v. Board of Education ''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'', 347 U.S. 483 (1954), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court that ruled that U.S. state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools are unconstitutional, even if the ...

. After opening as an all-white school, Lee-Davis admitted a small number of Black students in 1963, but did not fully integrate until the 1969–1970 school year, after all legal avenues resisting full integration were exhausted.

Naming controversy

The Hanover County School Board named the school “in the memory and honor of two prominent members of the Confederacy,

Robert E. Lee Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870) was a general officers in the Confederate States Army, Confederate general during the American Civil War, who was appointed the General in Chief of the Armies of the Confederate ...

and

Jefferson Davis Jefferson F. Davis (June 3, 1808December 6, 1889) was an American politician who served as the only President of the Confederate States of America, president of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865. He represented Mississippi in the Unite ...

.” The two men were featured in the school's logo. The school's name and mascot were contested since the school was fully integrated in 1969–70. That year, the Hanover chapter of the

NAACP The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is an American civil rights organization formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. B. Du&nbs ...

appealed to the school board, on behalf of Black athletes, to remove the Confederate moniker from athletic teams because Black athletes didn't want to play as "Confederates." After a poll was taken of the Lee Davis student body, and it found overwhelming approval of the names, the principal decided to keep the name. In Fall 2018, shortly after the

Unite the Right rally The Unite the Right rally was a White supremacy#United States, white supremacist rally that took place in Charlottesville, Virginia, from August 11 to 12, 2017. Marchers included members of the alt-right, neo-Confederates, neo-fascists, whi ...

Charlottesville Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city in Virginia, United States. It is the seat of government of Albemarle County, which surrounds the city, though the two are separate legal entities. It is named after Quee ...

, a group of alumni, students, and local residents appealed to the School Board to change the name of Lee-Davis and its feeder school, Stonewall Jackson Middle School. Following a survey, the School Board voted in April to keep the names. In August 2019, the Hanover County NAACP sued the Hanover County School Board in Federal Court on constitutional grounds. The suit was dismissed by a federal judge in May 2020. In June 2020, the Hanover County NAACP said that it would appeal the ruling. After the

murder of George Floyd On May 25, 2020, George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black American man, was murdered in Minneapolis by Derek Chauvin, a 44-year-old White police officer. Floyd had been arrested after a store clerk reported that he made a purchase using a c ...

in May 2020, another local movement to change the name of LDHS arose. On July 14, 2020, the Hanover County School Board voted to rename both Lee-Davis and Stonewall Jackson in a 4–3 vote. In mid-October, after considering other names such as Twin Rivers High School, the county and its residents agreed on the badge of Mechanicsville High School.

Athletics

The varsity boys

Baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

Team were the

Virginia High School League The Virginia High School League (VHSL) is the principal sanctioning organization for interscholastic athletic competition among Public school (government funded), public high schools in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The VHSL first sponsored deba ...

group AAA state champions in both 1997 and 2001. The girls

softball Softball is a Variations of baseball, variation of baseball, the difference being that it is played with a larger ball, on a smaller field, and with only underhand pitches (where the ball is released while the hand is primarily below the ball) ...

team won the 2011 state championship. Mechanicsville is a nationally recognized Blue Ribbon School. In 2014 and 2015 the boys track team won back to back outdoor 5A state championships.

Performing arts

Mechanicsville has two competitive show choirs, the mixed-gender Madz and the women's-only New Horizons. Together with Hanover High School, Mechanicsville hosts a choir competition every year.

Notable alumni

* Joe Douglas '94 – General Manager of the

New York Jets The New York Jets are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Jets compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East division. The team p ...

. * Gordy Haab – film, television and video game composer * Ryan McDougle – Virginia state senator *

Jason Mraz Jason Thomas Mraz ( ; born June 23, 1977) is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. He rose to prominence with the release of his debut studio album, ''Waiting for My Rocket to Come'' (2002), which spawned the single "The Remedy (I Won't Wo ...

'95 – singer/songwriterJoan Tupponce
"Jason Mraz,"
''Richmond Magazine'', March 24, 2010. * Latrell Scott – head coach of

Norfolk State University Norfolk State University (NSU) is a Public university, public Historically black colleges and universities, historically black university in Norfolk, Virginia. It is a member of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund and Virginia High-Tech Partnersh ...

's football team; former head coach of

Virginia State University Virginia State University (VSU or Virginia State) is a Public university, public Historically black colleges and universities, historically Black land-grant university, land-grant university in Ettrick, Virginia, United States. Founded on , Vi ...

football; former head coach of the

Richmond Spiders football The Richmond Spiders are a college football team representing the University of Richmond in Richmond, Virginia. Richmond was the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision champion for the 2008 season. Richmond competes in CAA Football, a ...

teamSpiders to name HU graduate Scott as football coach
''Daily Press''. Retrieved on December 15, 2009.

References

External links

*
Hanover County Public Schools website
{{authority control Educational institutions established in 1959 Public high schools in Virginia International Baccalaureate schools in Virginia Schools in Hanover County, Virginia 1959 establishments in Virginia Name changes due to the George Floyd protests