Abandoned Appalachia Series
A school in the bend of Beaver Creek
Wayland sits in the hills of Floyd County, Kentucky, a coal town whose footprint shows up neatly on the U.S. Geological Survey’s 7.5-minute Wayland quadrangle. The quadrangle places the school site and gym in the narrow valley bottom, with the town hemmed in by steep ridges that channeled community life toward the schoolhouse and its court. Recent USGS products and the older geologic quadrangle confirm the setting and long use of the site.
A century later the old school building still appears in reference photos and captions as “the former Wayland High School,” a reminder that the campus served as the town’s public square as much as a place for classes.
“Wildcats” and “Wasps”
In statewide lists kept by the Kentucky High School Athletic Association, Wayland appears under two nicknames, Wildcats and Wasps. The KHSAA’s all-time school list records both monikers along with the school’s colors, a small but telling sign of how traditions evolve in mountain schools.
From small gym to statewide stage
Newspaper files show that the Floyd County Times covered Wayland constantly, especially during basketball season. Digitized issues preserved by the Floyd County Public Library include holiday-week write-ups in 1954, state-tournament week in March 1956, and late-1957 season coverage, along with items from the consolidation era in January 1972. Those runs give a contemporaneous paper trail for lineups, box scores, senior lists, and school news.
The Wasps broke through to the Sweet Sixteen as early as 1951. The official KHSAA results show Wayland beating Lyon County 82–47 in the first round before falling to Louisville’s DuPont Manual in the quarterfinals. That first win set a pattern for the decade to come, with mountain schools regularly punching above their enrollment.
The Kelly Coleman years
From 1953 to 1956 Wayland’s star was Kelly “King” Coleman, a scorer whose numbers still read like fiction. KHSAA’s record book and tournament histories document his 1956 run: Wayland beat Shelbyville, then Earlington, lost a one-point semifinal heartbreaker to Carr Creek, and won the third-place game 122–89 over Bell County. Kelly Coleman’s individual 68 points in that game remain the state-tournament record. Coleman’s name fills KHSAA single-game and single-half field-goal lists from that tournament.
The association’s own feature profile centers his legacy in Wayland and in Kentucky basketball lore, describing how crowds from across the Commonwealth came to honor him near the end of his life, and how his career remained the state’s measuring stick for decades.
A gym that became a museum
Wayland’s old fieldhouse opened in 1937, and its proportions tell you it was built for a coal camp town and not for television. Press accounts and institutional releases that accompany recent “throwback” games describe the building’s 48-foot floor and balcony ringed with fans, and they place the gym’s construction in the late 1930s with restoration in the 2010s and 2020s.
Public media have tracked that revival. A Kentucky Life segment visited the building as it was being restored as the Mountain Sports Hall of Fame, and WUKY’s long-form radio profile interviewed Wayland mayor Jerry Fultz and others about turning the gym into a regional museum of mountain sports.
In February and December 2023, the refurbished gym hosted “throwback” high-school doubleheaders, including a much-noted game that brought Lyon County and Travis Perry to the same floor where Coleman once played. Coverage framed the event as living history in a 1937 building, packed with old letter sweaters, banners, and new memories.
Consolidation and after
Like many eastern Kentucky schools, Wayland closed in 1972 during countywide consolidation. Students moved into the new Allen Central High School alongside former rivals from Garrett, Martin, and Maytown, a merger still remembered for its cultural impact as much as its logistics. Later consolidations folded Allen Central into Floyd Central in 2017.
Yearbooks, photographs, and what survives
For names and faces, the best primary sources are the school annuals and local photograph sets. Yearbooks from 1950 through 1972 are available in major databases, and LDS Genealogy provides a finder that lists the Wayland volumes across Ancestry, Classmates, and MyHeritage.
On the ground in Floyd County, the Wayland Historical Society’s photo collections are hosted by the Floyd County Public Library, which also maintains a digitized run of the Floyd County Times with issues that document games, graduations, and campus life. Those files provide the richest set of contemporaneous images and captions for researchers.
And if you want to place all of this in the landscape, USGS topographic series for the Wayland quadrangle show the school site and town through time, while the geologic quadrangle maps and current US Topo sheets help verify the footprint and approach roads to the campus and gym.
Sources and further reading
Kentucky High School Athletic Association, Boys’ Sweet Sixteen History & Results. Entries for 1951 and 1956 include Wayland’s scores and opponents. KHSAA
KHSAA, Boys’ Basketball Record Book and Sweet Sixteen Records. Coleman entries and single-game marks. KHSAA+1
KHSAA, “Kelly Coleman still the ‘King’ of Kentucky high school basketball.” KHSAA
Floyd County Times digital runs, Floyd County Public Library. Examples include Dec. 23, 1954, Mar. 22, 1956, Nov. 21, 1957, and Jan. 20, 1972. Fayette County Public Library+2Virginia Chronicle+2
U.S. Geological Survey, Wayland 7.5-minute quadrangle materials and geologic quadrangle. USGS Store+1
Wayland Historical Society collections and digitized local holdings, Floyd County Public Library. Fayette County Public Library
Wayland High School image reference in town overview. Wikipedia
Yearbook finder for WHS volumes 1950–1972. LDS Genealogy
KET, Kentucky Life segment on the Mountain Sports Hall of Fame at the Wayland gym. KET
WUKY, “Behind the scenes at the Mountain Sports Hall of Fame.” WUKY
WYMT, reporting on Glory Road recognition and the 2023 throwback games. https://www.wymt.com+1
Lexington Herald-Leader, context on the 2023 Wayland throwback featuring Lyon County and Travis Perry. Kentucky
Allen Central High School overview, including list of consolidated schools. Wikipedia
https://doi.org/10.59350/tfvxk-3y166
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