See Eerily Beautiful Pictures from Inside Indiana’s Largest Abandoned High School

Why do we find abandoned buildings so fascinating? I think that requires a multi-tiered answer. My fascination with old and/or abandoned buildings can be attributed to a combination of factors, including a sense of mystery and intrigue, the combination of beauty and decay, and the nostalgic and historical component. A perfect example of all these things can be found at a former high school in Northern Indiana.

A Brief History of Horace Mann High School

Massachusetts educator Horace Mann has often been called the "Father of the Common School" because of his belief that every child should receive a basic education funded by local taxes. Nearly 70 years after his death, Horace Mann High School opened its doors in Gary, Indiana. where it continued to prosper for the next several decades. AbandonedOnline.net shares these details about the school...

Unfortunately, those numbers continually dropped over the next 47 years, and by 2003, only 546 students were attending Horace Mann. By the summer of 2004, the Gary School Board decided it was time to close the historic school.

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Horace Mann High School These Days

Here we are two decades later and the years - and more importantly the uninvited guests - have not been kind to the school. The son of a former Horace Mann student, Kevin Richards, was given access to the school where he captured some hauntingly beautiful and sad pictures. Kevin was kind enough to allow me to share some of those pictures with you.

The Two-Tiered Gymnasium

The Auditorium

Just imagine how beautiful this auditorium was back in the day. Just stunning.

This once gorgeous auditorium sustained even more damage from a fire set by an arsonist in 2017.

The School's Entrance

Think about the thousands and thousands of students who walked through these doors over the decades. Think about this - the final graduating class consisted of only 72 students.

One of Many Long Hallways

If you're like me and you want to know what Horace Mann looked like in its glory days, you are in luck (kinda). The following video takes you through the halls of Horace Mann after it had closed, but before it started to fall apart. It's pretty neat to see if you can handle the extremely low-quality video and the equally low-quality music.