The new Tyler Independent School District (TISD) campus for Robert E. Lee High School is seen on Wednesday, June 24, 2020 in Tyler, Texas. The new campus was part of a 198 million dollar bond package passed in 2017 to renovate both the Lee campus and John Tyler High School. An estimated 123 million dollars went into new 400,000 square foot Robert E. Lee High School.

Robert E. Lee High School will now be called Tyler Legacy by a 6-1 vote by the Tyler ISD board in a meeting late Thursday morning.

The other name submitted by the focus group was Tyler Liberty. The board settled on Tyler Legacy after debating the pros and cons of each name.

Robert E. Lee High School was opened in 1958 as an all white school during a period of intense resistance to desegregation in many southern states. The Black segregated school was Emmett J. Scott High school, which was shut down. Students in that district were primarily moved to newly renamed John Tyler High School, now reclaiming its original name of Tyler High.

The name Robert E Lee came from students, who were allowed to suggest what they wanted the school to be called. The most popular name choices were Robert E. Lee and Benjamin Franklin. Elvis Presley High School also was suggested and the Tyler Morning Telegraph ran an editorial in November 1957 suggesting Alamo High School as a name. After months of debate and input from students, Robert E. Lee was selected during the December 1957 Board of Trustees meeting.

Now, those names are a distant memory, as the name Robert E. Lee will be as well. The high school will be known as Tyler Legacy.