What's in a name?

The legacy of an educator endures

Howard Blake, who began teaching as a coach, helped organize the Florida High School Athletic Association.

By MICHAEL CANNING, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 11, 2003

Howard Blake's legacy not only survived federal school desegregation, but endured to grace a state-of-the-art performing and visual arts magnet school.

Blake was born in Tampa and attended elementary schools in Manatee County, where his father was a farmer. He later studied at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical College and attended Claflin University in South Carolina on an athletic scholarship. Blake earned a master's degree in education at Atlanta University.

His first teaching job was coaching at Stevens High School in Quincy. In 1933, he began his 20-year tenure with the Hillsborough County School District as principal of Booker T. Washington school.

Blake helped organize the Florida High School Athletic Association and was a member of Bay City Elks Lodge, Jerusalem Masonic Lodge, Harram Temple Shrine and the Tyer Temple Methodist Church.

In November 1953, he received a citation for 20 years of outstanding service to the school system. He died on March 23, 1954.

Two years later, his namesake high school opened on Spruce Street in West Tampa. Desegregation changed its status to a junior high school in 1971. In 1997, the new $42-million Blake High opened on the banks of the Hillsborough River, a few blocks from the old Blake.

The former Blake Junior High is now Stewart Middle School.

-- Sources: Blake High School, Hillsborough County School District.

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