1951-1989

1951

Basketball team wins state championship #7 for the third consecutive season. Coach Bob Quiring's team is first Class-A high school team in state history to win three state titles in a row.

1953

Wrestling team begins interscholastic competition.

1955

Kalamazoo Central Alumna, Pauline Byrd Taylor joined faculty at the high school. First black graduate of Kalamazoo College and first black instructor hired by KPS.

1958-59

Kalamazoo Central celebrates its centennial year.

1958

Eleanor Roosevelt returned to speak at the high school auditorium exactly 20 years after her first appearance there.

1960

799 students graduate from Central, the largest graduating class in Central's history.

1961

Loy Norrix High School opens.

1961

Swimming team sets a new world's record in the backstroke relay at the Loy Norrix pool.

1961

First foreign exchange students arrive from West Berlin.

1963-64

Tennis team has undefeated season, Six-A champions.

1964-65

Tennis team has second undefeated season.

1965

Principal Eugene Thomas retires as longest serving principal in Central's history, 20 years.

1965

U.S. Astronaut and Central graduate, James A. McDivitt Jr. is awarded his varsity letter for his successful space flight in Gemini 4, America's first "walk in space."

1967

Outbreak of racial conflict closes Central for one week.

1968

School Board announces it will build a new high school on Drake Road and enlarge existing Loy Norrix building.

1969

L. Henry Goodwyn becomes the 24th principal of Kalamazoo Central. He is also the first black principal of the high school.

1969-70

First year of female varsity sports at Central.

1971

Court ordered busing begins in Kalamazoo Public Schools.

1972

Central moves to the Drake Road site. Dedication of the Eugene S. Thomas stadium.

1972-73

First women's tennis State Championship in Michigan's high school sports history won by Central.

1972-73

Hockey teams debut.

1974-75

Varsity volleyball begins for women at KCHS.

1978-79

Central's women's track team has seventh consecutive unbeaten season.

1981-82

Soccer becomes a varsity sport.

1987-88

Insight, the high school newspaper, won a first place award from the American Scholastic Press Association for the sixth consecutive year.

1989

Women's track team had a 10-0 record and women's cross country team was 10-1. Women's soccer team had a 16-1 record.