Year Minimum Foundation building program completed 1956 and 1957. Cordele city and Crisp County were separate school systems when construction began on their projects. A.S. Clark was built by the city, with a new Crisp County Training elementary built by the county.

Year of total integration 1970. Crisp County High changed its nickname and school colors as a result of total integration, from Rebels to Cougars.

Known high schools A.S. Clark (Cordele) Gillespie-Selden (Cordele) Holsey-Cobb (Cordele) Gillespie-Selden and Holsey-Cobb were private schools. Did Crisp County or Cordele city have an actual public African American high school prior to A.S. Clark's completion in early 1956? The answer is no, at least in the early 1950s. The statistics released by the Georgia Department of Education in its Annual Reports (actually released every two years) with a high school in Cordele city and in Crisp County. Both were private schools, and they served as de facto public high schools. Their status is hazily defined in a July 31, 1952 Cordele Dispatch article about registration for the upcoming school year: "For Colored High School students they will register at their school on the same dates as for the White students. They may elect Gillespie or Holsey." These sentences indicate that neither was particularly tethered to a school system. An Aug. 24 1954 Atlanta Daily World story highlighting Dr. A.S. Clark confirmed there was no public Black high school in Crisp County, though it incorrectly stated that Gillespie-Selden was the only private school. Two years earlier, Marion Jackson's Atlanta Daily World sports column of Jan. 8, 1952, bemoaned the situation. "There are two fine schools in Cordele - Gillespie-Selden Institute and Holsey[-Cobb] Institute - which are doing a tremendous educational job under severe handicaps. Crisp County lacks a single school in its system beyond the eighth grade. There isn't a single high school in the entire county." Cordele was still its own system in 1955-56 and its attendance figures published in the Dispatch on Sept. 8 included Holsey-Cobb and Gillespie-Selden. Crisp County was by far the most populated in Georgia without a public Black high school. Private schools had been a large part of upper African American education in Georgia at one time, but had mostly disappeared by the end of the 1930s. Public education was still not good in the state, but was free, and increasingly available. Not enough research has been done in the Cordele Dispatch to see what the catalyst was for Cordele city to finally build a public high school. Brown v. Board of Education was decided in May 1954 by the Supreme Court, but there had already been similar segregation in education cases in recent years. The Peach State itself had had hints of cases about inequality between white and Black schools around this time, including in Camden, Irwin and Greene counties. The Macon Telegraph said on July 24, 1953, that a plan had been approved for Cordele city schools. It was simply referred to in the Telegraph as "the Negro school improvement program," but has to be the high school. It was announced in the Telegraph on April 1, 1954, that State School Building Authority money had been secured in the amount of $480,000 to "provide ample high school facilities for all Negro children attending school in Cordele and Crisp County." A site had already been purchased. The Macon Telegraph announcement said the building would be opened for the 1954-55 school year, but there was no chance of that happening as state construction projects typically took a year or a bit more. Construction still had not started in late February 1955, according to a roundup of state news on Feb. 26, 1955's Atlanta Constitution. A June 21, 1956 Atlanta Daily World article said the school was completed in the Spring of 1956.

Known schools 1951-52: Arabi Elementary, Gillespie-Selden Institute, Holsey-Cobb, Northside, Southview 1952-53: Gillespie-Selden, Holsey-Cobb, Northside (city), Southview (city) The Georgia Department of Education begins publishing a list of schools in 1956-57. 1956-57: Arabi (grades 1-7) (county); A.S. Clark (grades ?-12), Southview (grades 1-7) (city); Holsey-Cobb (grades ?-12) (private). County list is not complete. 1957-58: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-7), Southview (1-7); Holsey-Cobb (6-12) (private) 1958-59: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-7), Southview (1-7); Holsey-Cobb (8-12) (private) 1959-60: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-7), Southview (1-7); Holsey-Cobb (8-12) (private) 1960-61: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-7), Southview (1-7); Holsey-Cobb (8-12) (private) 1961-62: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-7), Southview (1-7); Holsey-Cobb (8-12) (private) 1962-63: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-7), Southview (1-7); Holsey-Cobb (8-12) (private) 1963-64: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-6), Southview Junior High (7-8) 1964-65: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-6), Southview Junior High (7-8) 1965-66: A.S. Clark (grades 1-12), Crisp County Training (1-6), Southview Junior High (7-8) 1966-67: A.S. Clark (grades 7-12), Crisp County Training (1-6), Southview Junior High (1-5) 1967-68: A.S. Clark (grades 7-12), Crisp County Training (1-6), Southview Junior High (1-5) 1968-69: A.S. Clark (grades 7-12), Crisp County Training (1-6), Southview Junior High (1-5) 1969-70: A.S. Clark (grades 7-12), Crisp County Training (1-6)

Additional notes A.S. Clark was named for Dr. Augustus Simeon Clark, an educator and minister who with his wife built Gillespie-Selden, which was founded as Gillespie Institute. That Clark was to be the new public school's name was announced soon after state funding was approved. Clark died in 1959. Gillespie-Selden received funding from the Presbyterian church. A hospital was for years located on its campus. Black hospitals were considerably rare in rural Georgia. Cordele's hospital began initially providing a few beds for African Americans when opened in the 1950s, but the Aug. 24, 1954 Atlanta World noted it was less space than what the Gillespie hospital had been offering. At one time Gillespie-Selden had dormitories for boarding male and female students. By mid-1954, an Atlanta Daily World ad shows boarding was still available for females, but not males.