Vernon school board mark VTHS' 40th anniversary

VERNON — The Vernon Township Board of Education celebrated the 40th anniversary of the opening of the high school building at its last meeting.

The building officially opened on Sept. 9, 1975, after 2 years of construction, at a cost of $6.5 million. The new high school was desperately needed, as the town's increase in population was overwhelming Franklin High School, where the students had been going, along with students from Hardyston, Franklin, Hamburg and Ogdensburg.

It had gone so far that Franklin had to start having students attend high school in split sessions, so by 1970, Vernon Township was ordered by the New Jersey Board of Education to find another resource for its high school students.

The district bought what was formerly known as The Hollywood Farm in 1971 and came up with seven plans for a 142,000-square-foot building. The board of education at the time pared it down to one, a bi-level plan created by Frederic Weidersum Associates.

“I had just been elected and I received a call from Carl Olson, who was the board president the time. He asked what I was doing at that moment, and I said nothing. He invited me down to a building and grounds meeting to discuss the new high school, which became the first meeting I attended as a board member over 15 years,” said Patrick Rizzuto, the current Township Council president and a former school board member.

The district also was looking for a superintendent while the construction was going on and Rizzuto told how they were down to two candidates, one of which was former Superintendent George Iannacone. They went into his office, and saw that there was no desk.

When asked about it, Iannacone said “I don't have a desk, desks are anchors.”

According to Rizzuto, they were so impressed at that attitude, that he would prefer to be out in the district and not behind a desk, they hired him, making him the first superintendent in Vernon as a K-12 district.

Iannacone, who also was onsite for the ceremony, said no one ever does anything alone, and he praised George Ziegler, the interim superintendent who envisioned the school and got the referendum to have it built.

“The school building contains tomorrow," he said. "It contains what might be. What we have here is the future. You have two important charges. The children they trust you with. They send you the best they've got. The second thing is their money."

“Every year, Vernon has graduated about 250 people. In 10 years, that's 2,500 people and in 40 years, that's 10,000 people. That's a huge amount of people when you think about it.”