When the old Lee High School was torn down, former graduate Richard Wilson, decided he wanted to save a piece of his school’s history.

The scrap metal was sold to a company out of Mobile, but Wilson reached out to the company and asked if he could keep the school’s old flag pole.

They delivered it to his home and erected it in his yard, on the corner of Maysville and Philpot Avenue.

“When I was in school years ago we buried our time capsule around the flag pole. So there are memories of that back from 1981 when I graduated as a Senior from Lee,” said Wilson. “Events have gone on, people met out by the flag pole, or you met your boyfriend or girlfriend out at the flag pole. It’s things like that, little things but yet it’s significant.”

Wilson had the flag pole sanded and repainted before it was placed in his yard. He plans to place lights at the base to illuminate the flags, and erect a plaque that would tell its history.

The flag pole stood in front of Lee High School from 1958 to 2012, when the school was demolished.

“Now the old school is gone and nothing is left, but this is sort of a remembrance of what used to be over there at Lee. People can come by and reflect on what it meant to them when they were at school there,” said Wilson.

The flags flying on the pole are from the old high school. The American flag was the last one to fly on the pole before demolition, and the Alabama state flag hung in the school’s gym.

Wilson says he has 5 other flags that once flew at the school that he will alternate when one gets worn.