Gymnasia Herzliya

December 25, 2009 - 4:08 PM by

gym herzHad to head to Tel Aviv’s Gymnasia Herzliya this week for work — writing up a teachers’ seminar from the twinning program of the Los Angeles Federation’s Los Angeles-Tel Aviv Partnership — and was transported back in time to the place in history that this well-known high school occupies.

True, the bell signifying the end of a period plays the theme tune of the TV show “Friends,” and the front of the school’s sidewalk is crowded with bicycles and motor scooters. But the school’s facade is the same as the one built in 1909 — although it is a replica of the original — and it is still considered one of the country’s best high schools.

What I liked best was the school’s basement room, which was lined with photos and information about the school’s establishment. Originally known as Gymnasia HaIvrit, the Hebrew High School, the school was founded in 1905 in Ottoman-controlled Jaffa, before there was a Tel Aviv or Tel Aviv’s first Jewish neighborhood, Ahuzat Bayit. Once Ahuzat Bayit was established, the school had its first building on Herzl Street, with the cornerstone laid in 1909. Hence the name Herzliya. That lasted until 1962, when the historic building was razed for the Shalom Tower, and the school now sits on Jabotinsky Street in north Tel Aviv. The gate that I saw is a replica of the original, and now, probably as they did back then, students gathered around the entrance between classes, discussing whether to walk down to the nearby makolet to grab a sandwich or to make do with the offerings from the school cafeteria.

I doubt today’s students have calling cards like the students in the early 1900s (those were displayed in the school museum), but hey, who needs ‘em when you have iPods and cellphones?

Tags: , , • Category: General, History and Culture 

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