George Washington Educational Campus

549 Audubon Avenue | also 535 Audubon Avenue | Washington Heights | built 1925

Open on the map6 entries

The lot about 1940
About 1940. Via 1940s.nyc
The lot about 1985
About 1985. Via 80s.nyc

The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

  1. 1921

    Architect C.B.J. Snyder proposes a palatial high school for the Audubon Avenue hilltop

    Fort George Amusement Park opened on the hilltop in 1905 and suffered fires in 1911 and 1913, after which the high ground stood vacant. In 1921 the school architect C.B.J. Snyder put forward plans for a palatial George Washington High School on the site. The $3.5 million building opened in February 1925, and images of his plans are held by the city's Department of Records.

    Source: Forgotten New York

  2. 1925

    George Washington High School moves to a hilltop on Audubon Avenue

    The school began in 1917 as an annex of Morris High School and became George Washington High School in 1919. In 1925 it moved into this building, on the former site of the Fort George Amusement Park. Graduates include Alan Greenspan, Jacob Javits, Harry Belafonte and baseball Hall of Famer Rod Carew. In 1999 it was split into four smaller schools.

    Source: Wikipedia

  3. 1938

    Refugee Heinz Kissinger enrolls at George Washington High School

    Fifteen-year-old Heinz Kissinger arrived with his family in 1938, fleeing Nazi Germany, and settled in Washington Heights among many other German Jewish refugees. Now called Henry, he attended George Washington High School; after his first year, money troubles sent him to work full time in a shaving-brush factory, and he finished his diploma at night before going on to City College.

    Source: achievement.org

  4. 1938

    WPA artist Lucienne Bloch paints a mural inside the school

    In 1938, Works Progress Administration artist Lucienne Bloch paints the mural "The Evolution of Music" inside George Washington High School. She places it in a room that had originally hosted music classes and later became a dance studio. The mural is one of the federal government's Depression-era art commissions for New York City public schools.

    Source: Wikipedia

  5. 1943

    June

    Alan Greenspan graduates alongside classmate John Kemeny

    Future Federal Reserve chair Alan Greenspan, the son of a New York stockbroker and consultant, attended George Washington High School from 1940 and graduated in June 1943. His classmates included John Kemeny. Greenspan chaired the Federal Reserve from 1987 to 2006.

    “Greenspan attended George Washington High School from 1940 until he graduated in June 1943…”

    Source: Wikipedia

  6. 1999

    The single high school splits into four small schools within one building

    In 1999, George Washington High School reorganizes into four smaller schools that share the same Audubon Avenue building: the High School for Media and Communications, the College Academy, the High School for Health Careers and Sciences, and the High School for Law and Public Service. In 2018, city officials threaten to close the Health Careers and Sciences school over poor performance but later withdraw the proposal.

    Source: Wikipedia

Further reading

Nearby

All 23 buildings with stories in Washington Heights