After our group picture event on our 35th Anniversary, a small group of us took a tour of
Main Building and we were amazed of the transformation that had taken place after the renovations
over the years. The building has been modernized to conform with current building codes and I'm
quite confident that Dr. Goodwin would be proud of the upgrades made to this building:
fire alarm systems, security cameras, air conditioning, video relay service, a new elevator,
broadband internet service and even a back up electrical generator to service
these critical systems during power failures.

I purposely did not take pictures at every turn during this tour so if you return to NCSD for the
Homecomings, I would highly recommend that you make time to take the Main Building Tour.

However, I wanted to take pictures of the renovated Dining Room of Main Building as this
area was the most memorable to both girls and boys of the Class of 1970. During the tour, I was
advised not to take pictures with any students in the room due to school policy. So when I
returned on June 7, 2006 and with the permission of the school staff, I was able to take
these pictures for this portion of the Buildings Then and Now section of this website.

This was taken with my back towards Upper School. No that's not a TV in the background, it's a ice
 machine with a lighted cover. The entrance to the kitchen where the students received their
food, cafeteria style, is behind the brown doors partly obscured by the column on the right.
 

This was taken with my back towards the Chapel. Notice the angled walls halfway up the windows.
 Jimmy Autrey mentioned that these were added during one of the renovations that occurred in recent
years. Actually, they were "beefing" up the lower half of these walls due to moisture seeping in from
the outside of the original walls.
 

With my back towards the water tower, you can now see the main entrance to the dining room
which is partly obscured by the column at the right. Yes, that's a TV you see hanging from the
wall in the center of this picture.
 

With my back towards the Old Gym, you will notice that there is a 2nd TV set in this room. Boy,
how lucky can these kids get?

In our school years, Main Building was the girls dormitory and their Dinning Room was smaller than
the Dinning Room of Hoffmeyer Hall, so if my memory serves me correct, the younger girls had their
meals earlier than the older girls.

The only time the boys of the Class of 1970 ever ate in this Dinning Room were the football players
and the team managers who had to eat earlier than the 5:30pm normal eating time before the
football contests that were held at the Morganton HS football field. According to Randy, their early
"protein" dinner menu consisted of rectangular shaped ground chuck steak, (although some players
would swear it was hamburger steak), then we had baked potatoes drowned in butter, peas, toast
with honey, and milk or tea.

Now that he mentioned the dinner menu, I remembered a meal or two as a football manager and I
thought at the time, "Wow! These guys are lucky because we never had hamburger steak or baked
potatoes for dinner at Hoffmeyer Hall".

The Auditorium

As with any school, the Auditorium was used for a variety of functions: Student Plays, Fashion
Shows, Halloween Costume Contests, Pep Rallies, Chapel Services, a variety of student
organizational meetings, and of course Graduation Ceremonies.

The one most memorable function of this revered room the students always looked forward to
was the "Saturday Night at the Movies". The movie screen was at the stage, boys of Hoffmeyer
Hall was on the right, the girls on the left and the "Lovebirds" on the last 3, 4, 5 rows behind the girls.

The movies that were shown whatever they were, short newsreels, cartoons, funny shorts, before
the big feature films either they were in black or white or in color, it didn't matter! They were all
opened captioned. The students thoroughly enjoyed themselves because this was the only time
of the week where we could really enjoyed MOVIES!

I remember one of these Saturday Nights near the end of a really engrossing movie when the screen
 went dark! Loud groans could be heard from just about everyone. The ceiling lights came on and
 everyone's heads turned to the back and that was when we were told that the bulb in the movie
projector had burned out. More groans! "When will we see the rest of the movie?" someone asked.
An informed staff member said that the movie had to be mailed back to Washington, DC on Monday
morning. Again, more frustrated groans.

By the way, the movie that we did not finished seeing was "The Miracle of the Bells", staring
Fred MacMurray, Alida Valli, and Frank Sinatra. The scene that held us to edge of our seats when
the projector quit is where a Church is loaded with people who witness angelic sculptures in the pulpit turning.

<<< Return to Previous Page
If any one can send me any more interior pictures of Main Building
I'll create a new page.
 

                                 Google Site Search

                                This website is proudly designed and maintained by:
                                 
                                                          Copyrighted © 2002-2011 NCSD Class of 1970 All rights reserved.