The first school in Broadway was a one-room frame building located where the current town office building is now located on Broadway Avenue. This school was constructed in the mid 1870s and was taught by C. E. Barglebaugh, who was eighteen years old at the time. After spending six years at Richmond College, Mr. Barglebaugh came back to Broadway and, in 1882, opened the first high school in Rockingham County outside of Harrisonburg. He taught at the school from 1882-1889. In the 1884 State Superintendent’s Report, the Broadway school is listed as having 3 teachers and 123 pupils with a five-month school term. During his tenure he solicited funds to enlarge the school and four rooms were added.
In 1907, the five-room frame building burned and was replaced by a brick structure, consisting of six rooms, a library, office and an auditorium seating 250 people. The new school cost $12,000. The auditorium was later fitted with folding partitions and was used for classrooms, as the building became crowded. Later, when not needed as an auditorium, it was made into permanent classrooms. In 1913, Broadway became an accredited high school with an enrollment of 18 pupils and one teacher, John C. Myers. In 1914, there were 200 pupils in both the grade and high school and about thirty of these pupils were transported to the school from the surrounding area, resulting in the closing of several small schools. There were four grade teachers and one high school teacher, John C. Myers, and one assistant at the high school.
In 1920 a new high school building was constructed on the south side of the original building and the school was divided into a high school building and a grade school building. In 1926 a dwelling was purchased from Newton Charlton and moved to the front lawn of the high school building. This structure was used to provide for a home economics department and provide housing for women teachers. Also in 1926, a gymnasium was built and the basement was used for the industrial arts and agriculture programs. When the new high school was built in 1952, the basement was converted into the school cafeteria. In 1934 a four-room addition was built to the high school building for a library, a science laboratory and a commercial department. The school continued as a combination grade and high school until 1952 when, as part of the consolidated high school program of the 1950s, a new Broadway High School was built west of town. The old high school buildings housed the elementary school until it was consolidated into Plains Elementary School in 1972. In 1976, the old building was used briefly to house the sixth grade while an addition was being built at John C. Myers Intermediate School. J. Frank Hillyard, who had been principal at Broadway since 1939, was named principal at the new Broadway High School, a position he held until his retirement in 1969. A classroom addition was made to the school in 1959 and an additional gymnasium and music facilities were added to the school in 1988. This school served as the high school until January of 1998 when a new high school building was opened on Springbrook Road.
The old Broadway High School is now J. Frank Hillyard Middle School. This school opened its doors in the fall of 1998.
Our school colors are green and white. Our nickname is “The Gobblers”.
