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Lots Of Name Dropping

File Photo/Jay Nolan 2003

HELEN DAVIS (seated) gets flowers and a hug from LINDA HARDING, President of the Children's Home Board, during a program to honor Davis at a ground breaking of a new school named after Davis.

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By COURTNEY CAIRNS PASTOR, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 17, 2007

CITRUS PARK - The call for names goes out while schools are being built.

Teachers, students, community members and retired district administrators flood the Hillsborough County school board with suggestions of celebrities, local standouts, place descriptions and, occasionally, concepts.

They send letters arguing for their idea. They speak at board meetings. When 6-year-old Adam Johnson pitched his idea for Deer Park Elementary in 2006, he stood in front of the school board in a T-shirt with the proposed name but had a bout of stage fright.

"I'm scared," he said, turning to his mother.

The most recent naming took a cue from Veterans Day. Less than a week before the holiday, the board met to figure out what to call a middle school being built behind Citrus Park Elementary. The list the board consulted had variations on Citrus Park (Citrus Grove, Citrus Pointe, Orange Park), animals, presidents and athletes.

Residents spoke in favor of former district administrators and a group of brothers who had served in the military, but the board selected Army Sgt. 1st Class Paul R. Smith, who was killed in Iraq in 2003 and posthumously received the Medal of Honor for bravery. Smith was a Tampa Bay Technical High School alumnus.

Chairman Jack Lamb said it would be appropriate to name the new school on his behalf at a time when the nation was preparing to honor its veterans.

The naming procedure differs from other votes the board takes. Members vote on paper in silence, sometimes a couple of times to break a tie. When a majority of members agree, the chairman announces the name that will appear on buildings, letterhead and uniforms.

Some of the choices honor community members who have died or superintendents, board members and other educators who have retired. Some reflect the development or neighborhood: Westchase, Carrollwood, Forest Hills and Town and Country, among others.

After Sept. 11, 2001, the board chose patriotic themes for Liberty Middle and Freedom High in Tampa Palms.

The board had put out a call for names in 2001, less than a month after the terrorist attacks. About 1,000 people had signed a petition pushing for a high school named for former Hillsborough Superintendent J. Crockett Farnell, but the day of the meeting an 11-year-old boy suggested to his mother that the schools' names honor firefighters or the country.

The mother brought Freedom and Liberty before the board, which agreed. Farnell would get recognized two weeks later, when his supporters successfully pitched his name for the middle school being built in Nine Eagles.

A list the district keeps of submitted names that have not yet been chosen reflects politics, history, pop culture and literature. If the board picks one of these names, future students may attend King Arthur Elementary, Sherlock Holmes Middle or Wayne Gretzky High.

Reporter Courtney Cairns Pastor can be reached at (813) 865-1503 or cpastor@tampatrib.com.

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