While Boulder High was founded in 1875 (as State Preparatory School—our design set even included an SPS shirt), its present art deco building was funded in 1936 by the Public Works Administration. More information about that can be found here. According to Wikipedia, Boulder is the alma mater of Family Ties’ own Brian Bonsall.

See more designs from the Boulder set here.

The main thrust of this project is t-shirts, but when I decide I need a break from that, I like doing some amateur jersey design. This Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp concept features script from the Jacksonville Sheriff Office’s “Bold New City of the South” insignia.

West High was the second high school in Denver’s school district, hence the number 2 on this shirt taken from a design from 1901. As part of Denver’s City Beautiful movement in the 1920s, West, North, East, and South High Schools are located in close proximity to public parks—in West’s case, it’s next to Denver’s Sunken Gardens Park.

West was home to a walkout in 1969 (the West High Blow Out) that led to a larger protest in Denver. Here’s a video on that if you are interested in checking that out:

See more designs from the West set here.

One of Grand Junction’s famous alumni was blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo, who wrote (among many other things) the screenplay for one of my favorites, Roman Holiday. Today Grand Junction features on its Main Street a statue of Trumbo writing in his bathtub, as was his custom.

See more designs from the Grand Junction set here.

In middle school, I knew a guy called Laramie. In the sixth grade, we had band together on the elective wheel, and at the end of the quarter we participated in the class talent show. What did we do, you ask? We sang (a capella, of course), Boyz II Men’s version of “It’s So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday.” Sometimes I wake up in a cold sweat thinking about how bad I must have sounded and how grateful I am that cell phone cameras did not yet exist at that time.

What I didn’t know until much, much later in life was that Boyz II Men’s version was a cover of a song from the movie Cooley High. (Come on, Boyz II Men! Give us some clues! Like maybe name your record cooleyhighharmony or something!)

See more designs from the Laramie set here.

This starts a run of Utah schools that I’m just now posting, but that I did very early on in the project. There are probably some things that I could do better or would change if I took a closer look. I have a lot more experience and much better tools now than when I first started! I always love designs where the shape of the state gets involved, and this one is gorgeous.

See more designs from the Bingham set here.

I bet it was fun to be in the Box Elder Space Shuttle club in 1981. The Box Elder yearbook for that year noted that, “Box Elder has one-third of a ‘garbage can’ which will go up in a later flight of the shuttle.” I looked into it, and (eventually) Box Elder did have experiments go up into space! A Box Elder alum had an experiment go up on Discovery in April 1990 that he was reported to have conceived when he was in high school, and Box Elder students had an experiment go up on Endeavour in December 2001. How exciting!

See more designs from the Box Elder set here.

I always worry when I see that a school has a mascot like “Dinos” that it is a newer school or a school that has changed it’s mascot in the past twenty years or so. I was so happy to see that Carbon has been the Dinos for a long time, and references the nearby Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry. (Dinosaur Quarry!)

I’m never sure if it makes sense to use designs that refer to specific events or dates, but I loved this wartime yearbook cover design from 1942 so much that I went with it. The dino incorporated with the eagle and other patriotic symbols looks pretty great.

See more designs from the Carbon set here.

Denver has the third best city flag in the United States according to The American City Flag Survey of 2004. But did you know that Denver’s flag was designed in 1926 by Margaret Overbeck, a student at Denver’s North High School? She then designed an adaptation of that flag for North. I think it’s pretty cool to have a version of your city’s flag as your school flag, but to have it designed by the original designer of the flag? Amazing!

See more designs from the North set here.

I can’t believe I never heard of German film director Robert Siodmak until I was 42 years old. I’ve really been enjoying diving into his catalog. Most of the ones I’ve seen are a bit noir-ish, but some may be more accurately described as suspense. There’s an early Hitchcock vibe going on, but not exactly. If you want to check him out, maybe start out with Phantom Lady, The Suspect, or The Spiral Staircase. (People seem to like The Killers, but I preferred Don Siegel’s 1964 version.)

Reddy Kilowatt is the famous mascot of…..electricity? He appears in many forms, and is frequently featured in school yearbook ads. Every week I’ll take a look at a Reddy I’ve found in my research. This week’s Reddy came from a 1952 ad for the Iowa Power and Light Company.

See you next week! Tell your friends!