Portage Middle School

Fort Wayne Community Schools, 3521 Taylor Street, Fort Wayne; grades six through eight; the Rams; built in 1960 on the Sweet Celery Farm

The Ground: Before Portage was a school it was a celery farm, and a wet one. The Allen County Genealogical Society's school pages record that before the school was built in 1960, the Sweet Celery Farm was located on the swampy land, a detail the society drew from a January 2024 post on the True Fort Wayne Indiana History page. A commenter on that post answered with the Allen County Public Library's photograph, captioned "George Sweet celery farm, Taylor Street, Fort Wayne, IN, 1916," and another noted that the Sweet family home still stands across from the school. Celery was a muck crop, grown in black drained ground, and the west side along Taylor Street was truck farm country before it was school country. The Rams have played on drained celery land ever since, whether they know it or not.

Opening: The genealogical society dates the building to 1960, and the district's own record puts students in it that year. When Anthony Wayne School joined Fort Wayne Community Schools in the consolidation of 1960, the district assigned Anthony Wayne's seventh and eighth graders to Portage Junior High, a Fort Wayne Community Schools history post from March 2020 says. Yearbook albums survive from the school's first decade, a Portage Junior High album of 1965 and a Portage Middle School album of 1971, both preserved on the society's pages. By the 1974 to 1975 school year the state athletic directory listed Fort Wayne Portage Jr. at 3521 Taylor in orange and brown, nickname Rams, enrollment two hundred twenty six, principal Hugh Kariger, in Lester Grile's superintendency. No dedication program for the school has surfaced in the records searched for this page, and the 1960 date stands on the society's statement and the district's consolidation note together.

The Name: No source found documents why the school is called Portage. The word itself is among the oldest in Fort Wayne's geography: the portage, the carrying place between the St. Marys and Maumee waters and the Little River running to the Wabash, is the crossing that made the head of the Maumee a trading post and then a city. A west side school named Portage sits naturally in that story. But no board minute, dedication program or district history found ties this building's name to that crossing by decision, so the connection is printed here as the question the record leaves open, not as a namesake this page can certify.

Enrollment: Portage is the smallest middle school in the district, and the National Center for Education Statistics counts show a long slide. The school enrolled five hundred eighty two students in 1987 and peaked at six hundred fifty one in 2007. In 2024 to 2025 the count was three hundred eighty, with one hundred thirty in sixth grade, one hundred twenty two in seventh and one hundred twenty eight in eighth, taught by thirty six teachers, about eleven students to a teacher, and the total has fallen seventeen percent in five years. The attendance area covers about fifteen and a half square miles of the west side. The student body is seventy one percent minority enrollment. Hispanic students were five percent of the school in 1988 and are thirty three percent in 2025; Black students are twenty five percent.

Feeders: Portage draws its sixth graders from Lindley, South Wayne and Washington elementary schools, and its students go on to Wayne High School, the chain SchoolDigger's feeder records give for the school.

Today: In 2026 Portage is an open, operating middle school of about three hundred eighty students on Taylor Street, led by Principal Michael Christner, running its P.R.I.D.E. program and hosting a free community food pantry outside the building, still the Rams in orange and brown, on ground that grew celery within living memory of the photograph.

Sources:

1. Allen County Genealogical Society, Middle Schools in Allen County, Indiana, Allen INGenWeb, 2026: before the school was built in 1960 the Sweet Celery Farm stood on the swampy land, drawn from a January 19, 2024 post on True Fort Wayne Indiana History; the Allen County Public Library Digital Collections photograph "George Sweet celery farm, Taylor Street, Fort Wayne, IN, 1916"; the Portage yearbook albums of 1965 and 1971.
2. Fort Wayne Community Schools, Facebook post, March 26, 2020, collected in Allen County Genealogical Society, Elementary Schools in Allen County, Indiana: at the 1960 consolidation, Anthony Wayne's seventh and eighth graders were assigned to Portage Junior High.
3. Indiana High School Athletic Association, School Directory 1974-75, page 62: Fort Wayne Portage Jr., 3521 Taylor, colors orange and brown, nickname Rams, enrollment 226, Principal Hugh Kariger.
4. National Center for Education Statistics, Portage Middle School (180363000555), as republished by Public School Review: enrollment 582 in 1987, peak 651 in 2007, 380 students in 2024 to 2025 by grade, thirty six teachers, the fifteen and a half square mile attendance area, minority enrollment and the Hispanic share in 1988 and 2025.
5. SchoolDigger, Portage Middle School, 2026: Lindley, South Wayne and Washington feeders, Wayne High School as the destination, and the smallest middle school student body in the district.
6. Portage Middle School, school site, portage.fortwayneschools.org, 2026: the Rams, Principal Michael Christner, the P.R.I.D.E. program and the community food pantry.