Elementary School Destroyed By Fire In Cookeville, Tennessee

Jere Whitson Elementary School in Cookeville, Tennessee before the fire that tore through a nearly 55-year-old section of the building early Saturday morning, March 17, 2007.
Photo courtesy of Jere Whitson Elementary School







A firefighter from the Cookeville Fire Department helps to battle the blaze Saturday morning, March 17, 2007 at Jere Whitson Elementary School in north Cookeville, Tennessee. The inferno will leave nearly 400 students without a permanent place to learn for the time-being.
Photo courtesy of WTVF-TV Nashville, Tenn.





The damage is evident at Jere Whitson Elementary School in Cookeville, Tennessee on Saturday, March 17, 2007 after a fire ripped through the building, one of the oldest school buildings in Putnam County.
Photo courtesy of WTVF-TV Nashville, Tenn.
Photo taken by WTVF-TV viewer Rhonda Tomsic of Cookeville





Hooper Eblen Center, the home of Tennessee Tech University basketball and the offices of Tennessee Tech athletics. It will be a temporary home of the nearly 400 students who previously studied at the now-gutted Jere Whitson Elementary school just a few blocks away in north Cookeville, Tennessee. The school was destroyed by an early morning fire on Saturday, March 17, 2007. The students will study here for at least a week, until a better long-
term plan is decided for the students and faculty.
Photo courtesy of Tennessee Tech University




A crisis struck my home city of Cookeville, Tennessee Saturday morning as fire tore through Jere Whitson Elementary School, one of the six elementary schools in this small city of nearly 30,000 people.

No one was in the building at the time of the fire, which shot flames 40-50 feet in the air, according to eyewitnesses.

The fire began around 5 A.M. on Saturday morning and quickly spread through much of the oldest wing of the building. The school is one of the oldest in Putnam County and dates back to the 1920s.

The fire destroyed the wing with administrative offices, the computer lab, and the music room. This section of the building was gutted by the blazing inferno, of which there is no officially-known cause. The fire is being investigated. An expected cause is that of the heating system. Maintenance workers may have entered the building early to turn on the heat during this chilly weekend in the Midsouth region. Schools in Putnam County were on break the last two weeks and are scheduled to return Monday. Heating is probably the frontrunner at this time in considering causes for the fire.

The fire will now displace nearly 400 students who previously studied at Jere Whitson. The most pressing question now regards where to house that number of students, as well as the teachers who will be educating them.

Putnam County school officials met in an emergency meeting Saturday afternoon to discuss the question. It was decided that the students and faculty will meet temporally at the Hooper Eblen Center, an arena on the campus of my university, Tennessee Tech. The Eblen Center is the home for Tennessee Tech men's and women's basketball, as well as the home of offices for Tennessee Tech athletics, various Tech coaches and the Sports Information department. The students and faculty will use the basketball arena, locker rooms, and the Eagle's Nest, a meeting area on the upper floor of the Eblen Center. They are expected to be there for at least a week, until more permanent quarters are found. A likely scenario would have the students going to the five other Cookeville elementary schools, straining the student population the community has been working to solve over the past several years.

It is an honor to see my university ready to serve the community in a time of crisis for them. I myself am patriotic to Cookeville, and I want to see my fellow Cookevillians helped and made more comfortable in a time of need. It will be a test of patience, though, over the next week or so for both those of Jere Whitson, and those of the Tennessee Tech university community. For those of us who like to, or need to, use the Eblen Center on a regular basis, those privileges will be put on hold. The "Hoop" will now only be open to those from Jere Whitson or those with a pass designating that you must work at the arena. I, personally use the "Hoop" regularly to do homework, to meet people from the community walking around the concourse of the arena, and to meet with Sports Information, of whom I do some work with. The "Hoop" will re-open to the general public and students in a week or later, depending on when a more permanent location is found for the students, all in kindergarten to fourth grade.

Tennessee Tech has a strained parking situation, as most universities do. This will have an effect on this condition, as well. The commuter parking lot near the Eblen Center will have less spaces for commuting students during this period. Traffic will dramatically increase around the arena and the entrances to the university nearby. The University has already encouraged us to avoid entering the campus in those areas until further notice.

This will prove to be a good smaller example of how people react to a crisis today in America and how they are able to recover and re-build the infrastructure after a sudden disaster. I believe Americans react well. Just look to 9-11 and Mississippi, as well as parts of Louisiana after Katrina. America stood strong and re-built. This is a smaller disaster, although it is considerable here in our community. We are in the Bible Belt, and I believe the people of Cookeville, particularly in the north part of our great town, are ready to tackle this new challenge.

For more on the "Crisis in Cookeville", please visit the following coverage from media outlets.

Herald-Citizen, Cookeville, Tenn.
MAIN STORY - Cause unkown
Students will go to TTU, Sycamore

WTVF-TV, Nashville, Tenn.

WSMV-TV, Nashville, Tenn.

The Tennessean, Nashville, Tenn.

WBIR-TV, Knoxville, Tenn.