John Shearer: Baylor’s Barks Hall Rededicated To Also Honor Herb Barks Jr.

Although it was completed roughly 60 years ago, Barks Hall at Baylor School is still the tallest building on campus from bottom to top. It might also offer the most scenic views from its windows and patio due to its location by the Tennessee River.

To alumni and supporters of Baylor, the rededication of the building to also honor Herb Barks Jr. might be appropriate as a result, as he was known for standing tall proverbially and being farsighted in making progressive changes.

All that was remembered during the rededication ceremonies held at the school before the holidays, when several school supporters turned out to honor the now-retired headmaster, who led Baylor in the 1970s and 80s.

“No individual has impacted this magnificent school we love more than Herb Barks,” said longtime trustee Zan Guerry, a member of the class of 1967, in pointing out his direction at a time when Baylor dropped the military, admitted black students and became coed again.

Added recently retired Baylor headmaster Scott Wilson in citing Dr. Barks’ efforts to also enhance the school through the arts, a variety of speakers and travel, “For those of us who spent any time with Dr. Barks, he introduced us to facets of life we would not have known without him.”

Those two and several others turned out to salute the 89-year-old retired school leader during a morning ceremony held in the original part of the Baylor chapel instead of Lupton Circle near Barks Hall due to inclement weather.

As part of the dedication, two large plaques were recently installed at the two main entrances to Barks Hall. They cite the building’s original dedication in June 1961 to Herbert Barks Sr., the headmaster from 1929-64, as well as the current recognition to Herb Barks Jr.

It says in part, “Baylor School rededicates Barks Hall in honor of Dr. Barks Sr. and additionally his son, Dr. Herbert B. Barks Jr. ’51.” It also has the dedication date of 2021 on it.

The five-story building, which was creatively designed by Selmon T. Franklin and Associates and built to fit on the hillside on the bluff above the river and offer views from its patio and windows, was completed and moved into in the fall of 1960. Initially it housed science and other classes on the first three floors, including a basement level, the library on the fourth floor and an open study hall on the top floor.

The upper floor room originally featured table-like desks in the front for older students, and single desks in the back for the younger students, with Sgt. Joe Key overseeing the study hall. The room had also been used for testing and Baylor Camp after-lunch movies.

Prior to that, study hall had been held in Hunter Hall.

Barks Hall also had a small barbershop near a top stairwell early on during the military days, and featured a lounge in memory of Felder Frederick Forbes, who had died following injuries in a shooting accident in 1958 before his senior year.

Such teachers as engaging English and visual arts instructor John “Doc” Miller, Oak Ridge atomic laboratory veteran and chemistry professor Eric “Doc” Swanson, beloved-but-stern wrestling coach and biology teacher Maj. Luke Worsham, and the cerebral football coach E.B. “Red” Etter had classrooms in the building during the first couple of decades. Bruce High and later Jim Hooper also headed the library in the building early on.

Barks Hall was renovated over the years. A door entrance was placed on the side of the hill facing Hunter Hall, and the library was expanded in the late 1970s into the top floor, where an auditorium was also built. A faculty apartment was converted into the school’s first computer lab in the mid-1970s.

One interesting architectural feature of the building – the collection of open porches facing the river -- also served as a not-so-glamorous aspect of the school’s history. In the early years of Barks Hall before the real dangers of smoking were realized, students with parental permission were allowed to smoke there.

The original Hedges Library has also been renovated, and the look of the Forbes lounge has also changed. Today, the building houses the library in the top and classrooms for grades 6-8 in the lower floors.

The building, which was opened for classes by the fall of 1960, originally did not have a name, but in 1961 a decision was made by the board of trustees’ executive committee to name it in honor of Dr. Barks Sr.

The elder Dr. Barks had come to Baylor in 1924 on the recommendation of a Baylor alumnus from Birmingham primarily to be the basketball coach as well as math teacher and baseball coach. He had grown up in Birmingham as the son of a steel mill superintendent, who wanted his son to go farther in school than he had and become a chemical engineer.

Dr. Barks Sr. went to Auburn and was a star basketball player. He also played third base on the Tiger baseball team and was a reserve on the football team. Finding the field of education easier to pursue than engineering, he first coached at Pensacola High School in Florida for three years.

In 1926 after arriving at Baylor, he was attending a party at Cloudland, Ga., when he met a young woman from Rome, Ga., named Elizabeth Vincent Bryan. They were married at First Presbyterian Church of Rome in 1929, and had three children, Herb, Coleman and Betsy.

While remembered more as a classic school headmaster who did not get as close to the students or was perhaps not quite as charismatic as his son, he helped lead the school through such challenging times as the Great Depression, World War II and a 1948 polio outbreak.

At the time Barks Hall was originally dedicated in 1961, Scotty Probasco, a member of the Baylor board of trustees, said that some anticipated a long meeting to come up with a name for the new building. But that did not occur. “I think it took something like 30 seconds for the members to reach unanimous agreement that it should be named for our beloved headmaster, Dr. Herbert B. Barks.,” Mr. Probasco said at the time. 

According to school officials, Baylor in recent years had also been trying to figure out a way to appropriately honor Dr. Barks Jr., who was known for his inspiring speaking gifts, charisma and natural enthusiasm, and for wanting to expose students to a vast variety of topics and people.

Ryan Crimmins, chairman of the Baylor board of trustees, said at the late November gathering that the trustees had recently made the decision to rename the building also in his honor.

Dr. Barks Jr. had grown up on the campus before graduating and attending Vanderbilt and the University of Chattanooga. After receiving his divinity degree from Columbia Seminary, a Presbyterian school near Atlanta, he began serving Presbyterian churches in Shreveport, Los Angeles and Lynchburg, Va. He had also served on the pastoral staff of First Presbyterian in Chattanooga for a period.

After switching into the world of education, he served as headmaster and president at Baylor from 1971-88, although he began helping the school a few months earlier. He went on to build and grow Hammond School in Columbia, S.C., as headmaster from 1989 until retiring in 2006 and moving back to Chattanooga.

He and his now-deceased wife, Carol, had two sons, David, who now works at the University of Maryland, and Daniel, CEO of BlueStar Consortium in Arlington, Va.

During the recent ceremonies, current Baylor headmaster Chris Angel, who also worked under Dr. Barks at Hammond School, praised Dr. Barks Jr. as someone who influenced and encouraged numerous people.

“Today we are celebrating the one person of all of us who represents the spirit and heart of Baylor,” he said.

Good friend and former college head football coach Bill Curry, who also worked at Baylor for a period, sent good wishes that were read.

Dr. Barks did not speak, but a touching moment during the rededication was near the end, when Dr. Barks’ son, Daniel, who graduated in 1981, read his father’s written reflections on the naming. After saying the area around Barks Hall and Lupton Circle is the first place he comes when returning to Baylor and that the Barks balcony draws on inspiration from both the natural setting and the countless people who have influenced others at the school, he expressed appreciation.

“If I could inscribe anything in the masonry above the doorway of this building, Barks Hall, it would be gratitude,” he said.

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A fuller text of Dr. Barks’ comments read by his son states in part:

“It is a great honor to have my name added to this building originally named after my father, Dr. Herbert Barks Sr. It is not proper, however, to think of Barks Hall as my father’s building nor my building, or any of these buildings that bear the names of individuals who came before us as their buildings.

“The unique characteristic of this school is that is it has always belonged to those who inhabit it – mainly its students.

“The area in front of Barks is Lupton Circle, my first home…..This is the first place I always come when I return, as it is for so many alumni…Though, at 89 these stairs have become harder to climb.

“If we are members of this Baylor family for a brief time and forever, they (the buildings) are ours. I hope that for Baylor (these buildings) will continue to embody the spirit of those whose names adorn them, including Barks Hall.

“For those who were here or are here now and will be here in the future, I hope that as you walk toward Barks Hall, you stop and look around and you climb those steps to the balcony and that you never cease to be amazed at the beauty you see on this river and in the spirit that you feel from those who have come before you.

“I hope you both feel simultaneously special and small at the edge of this river and the feet of these mountains. And when you open these doors, I hope you feel the joy in the anticipation and discovery of learning and the keen edge of competitiveness tempered with humility and empathy for those who are less fortunate.

“And if you feel alone and afraid or overwhelmed with school and life, I hope you feel the comfort of the hands of those who loved this school on your shoulder and that you rest on the knowledge that so many before you have come through so much, and so can you.

“I pray you find joy in this place, you find vision, you find peace, you find passion in life that melts your heart, and you find your strength that carries you through your days, as I have.”

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Jcshearer2@comcast.net