(The "Fall '67" YouTube clips are brief, very grainy videos of Woodbury and Huntington High School activities from the Fall of 1967.  They were recorded on 8MM movie film by the late Emily Belle, 1st grade teacher, and are furnished by her son, Bob Belle, HHS '68).

Woodbury Avenue Elementary School

Woodbury Road at Soundview Road

Huntington, Long Island, New York, USA

1923-1987

(www.woodburyavenue.org)

I am pleased to welcome you to the Jack Abrams Woodbury Page, which is dedicated to the memory of a fine old educational institution, its faculty, staff and alumni. Located on what was originally called Woodbury "Avenue" in Huntington, our elementary school was called Woodbury Avenue School (or, "Woodbury Ave. Grade School", as inscribed on the cornice of the building), although the avenue later came to be known as Woodbury "Road".  The school was constructed in 1923-24, as reflected by the 1923 cornerstone date on the northeast corner of the building. It had classes from kindergarten through 8th grade from the 1924-25 school term until Robert K. Toaz Junior High School opened in 1939; thereafter, it had K through 6. (School photo taken by Laurie Lucey, Class of '71.) 

Woodbury's first principal (1924-1926) was Mrs. Albert Cantrell (née Morris), followed by Donald Smith (1926-1930) and J. Taylor Finley (1930-1943), who later served as principal at Toaz Junior High, Assistant Superintendent of Schools, and Superintendent of Schools. The next to serve was John Black (1943-1951), who was followed in the job by J. Allen Matthews (1951-1962). Jack Abrams, a 6th grade teacher at Woodbury and the district science coordinator, assumed the principal's chair for three years (1962-1965) before teaching for a year in England as a Fulbright-Hays exchange teacher. Jack Whitney was a 6th grade teacher at Woodbury (1957-63), a social studies teacher at Toaz (1963-65), and principal at Woodbury (1965-69).  Walter Turyn then managed Woodbury (1969-70), followed again by Mr. Abrams, who administered the school for its final year as part of Huntington's Union Free School District #3 (1970-71).

Following the 1970-71 school year, the building was leased by Western Suffolk BOCES (Board of Cooperative Educational Services), then known as BOCES III, from 1971 through 1973, as a pre-James E. Allen special education learning center. After BOCES moved the Woodbury Learning Center to the old South Huntington High School building on Walt Whitman Road in Huntington Station, the West Hills Baptist Church bought the building and set up the Huntington Christian School there from 1975 through 1986. After 64 years of service, the facility was finally demolished in 1987, and a townhouse development was built on the site.

The Woodbury Page was born in 1999, when Pete Pearlman (Woodbury '61) and I re-established contact after over 30 years, pooled our class portraits together, and I posted them on a WebTV home page.  It took off from there, with substantial contributions from Laurie Lucey ‘71 and retired teacher & administrator Jack Abrams, as well as from many other alumni, staff, administrators, and next-of-kin.  Their voluminous submissions, credited at the bottom of this page and throughout this site, are greatly appreciated.  The site was renamed in memory of Jack Abrams following his death on June 24, 2020.

Any photos, scannable memorabilia, or movie clips of the school building, playground events, plays, concerts, teachers, students, classroom activities or class portraits can be submitted for addition to the page. Just email them to me as scanned attachments, or as links to existing home pages, YouTube posts, or published articles.  And any help you can provide with respect to misspelled, missing or erroneous name identifications for any of the existing pictures would be most welcome.

(Historical overview courtesy Laurie Lucey '71, Joanne Ahern-Senk '70, Virginia "Ginna" Potter Jacobsen '45, David Jackson '78, Jack Abrams, and Huntington Union Free School District.)

Terry Valentine, Woodbury Class of '61 (Huntington High School '67) 

E-mail:  terryv123@yahoo.com

Acknowledgements:

Many thanks go to Alan, Alex, Alice, Allen, Andy, Anne, Art, Barry, Bill, Bob, Bud, Caryn, Cathy, Charlene, Charles, Charley, Charlotte, Chris, Christine, Chuck, Colleen, Cynthia, Dan, David, Donna, Doug, Ed, Ellen, Emily, Gail, Gale, Georgia, Ginna, Hazel, Helen, Howard, HuntingtonHistory.com, Huntington Union Free School District, Jack, James, Jane, Jeff, Jim, Joan, Joanne, JoAnne, John, Judy, Julia, Kathy, Katie, Ken, Laurie, Leona, Leslie, Linda, Lisa, Liz, Lois, Lorraine, Louise, Lynn, Marcia, Margaret, Margie, Mark, Mary, Meg, Michael, Mike, Nancy, Pam, Pat, Paul, Pete, Randy, Rich, Richard, R.J., Robert, Robin, Ronn, Ruth, Ruth-Ann, Sandy, Shirley, Skip, Steven, Stu, Susan, Sylvia, Ted, Teresa, Theresa, Tommy, Vicki, Virginia, Warren and Winnie for your creative, technical, archival and name identification contributions to this page.

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