Description
Highland High School (HHS) is an accredited comprehensive public high school located in the town of Highland, Arkansas, United States, located south of Hardy.
The Highland High School mascot and athletic emblem is the Rebel with red and gray serving as the school colors.
Football games are played at the school's Rebel Memorial Stadium.
EXCERPT FROM
Highland High’s first student body president explains ‘Rebel’ name
- KAIT8 - June 23, 2020 - See in links below
Eddie Wiles was part of the opening of Highland High School when Hardy and Ash Flat consolidated in 1964.
He was the student body president and a part of the group chosen to come up with the naming of the new school’s mascot.
“[The committee was] given the task - one of the first things by our superintendent - to come up with a mascot,” Wiles said.
Wiles says the school at the time was considering nominations for other mascots. Ash Flat’s ‘Eagles’ and Hardy’s ‘Bulldogs’ were quickly put off the table because of the division they thought it would create between those coming in from the two schools.
Eventually, the name ‘Rebel’ was chosen.
Wiles said that he didn’t have a big part in the mascot’s naming, but one of his close friends, Baxter Cone, did.
He says Baxter was a civil war buff.
“[Baxter] loved the Rebels. He loved the confederacy,” Wiles said. “We had little soldiers, plastic soldiers we would play with, I recall, and he always would get mad because the Rebels lost in the end always, and he always wanted to remake the Civil War.”
Wiles wasn’t sure about naming the mascot Rebels, but after facing some pressure from Baxter, he ultimately said yes to the name.
After conversations with student body members, the Rebel name was passed.
Wiles tells me he believes Cone’s goal was accomplished.
“When he got this name, Rebels, given to the school, I think he finally got his goal of fighting the Civil War over with,” Wiles said. “He was just kind of a little bit of a Rebel.”