Atholton High School

Atholton High School is a high school in Columbia, Maryland and is a part of the Howard County public school system. The school hosts an Army JROTC program. The school mascot is the Raider.The campus features extensive sports facilities, including a large open-air astro-turf football field and a baseball diamond with conventional "dug in" dugouts instead of open air dugouts that you would find at other Howard County high schools. Atholton also has a large drama program, with its own dedicated stage, auditorium and related rooms. Over the years it has hosted many programs and talent shows, held outside of school hours and attended by students and parents alike.The second floor of the main building hosts multiple science labs.HistoryAtholton takes its name from a land grant named "Athole" granted from King Charles to James McGill 17 August 1732. He built a nearby manor house named "Athol" built between 1732 and 1740. In 1845, Nicolas Worthington freed seventeen of his slaves, and gave them of the "Athol enlarged" land which was then called "Freetown". The community was briefly a postal town named Atholton, Maryland. The school sites were later considered part of Simpsonville, Maryland, and later Columbia, Maryland.The Howard County school system was segregated since the building of the Ellicott City Colored School in 1888. The first Atholton school was a one room colored school house next to Locust Church given by John R. and Susie Clark in 1885. Students transferred to Guilford in 1939. School property was bought for $200 by the Locust Church. In 1941, an additional acre was not accounted for, then sold on a separate bid for $701 to Herbert M Brown.