Wayne Haver, longtime Southside High School principal, receives an Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve Patriot Award in Fort Smith in 2015. U.S. Air National Guard photo by Staff Sgt. Hannah Dickerson / DVIDS.
Hey Fort Smith — we lost somebody this weekend whose name became almost inseparable from Southside High School.
Wayne Haver, the longtime former principal of Southside High School, has died, his family announced Sunday.
Southside also publicly remembered Haver and the impact he had on generations of students, teachers and staff.
If you didn't grow up around Fort Smith schools, the numbers explain why this one means so much to people around here.
Haver spent 48 years with Fort Smith Public Schools.
He started at Southside in 1970 as a business teacher.
Four years later, in 1974, he became an assistant principal.
Then in 1982, Haver was promoted to principal.
He stayed in that job for the next 36 years before retiring in 2018.
Think about that for a second.
Thirty-six years as principal of the same high school.
There are Fort Smith families where parents remember Haver from their Southside years, their children remember him too, and another generation wasn't far behind by the time he finally retired.
Teachers changed.
Buildings changed.
Fort Smith changed.
Thousands of students walked through Southside's doors, graduated and moved on.
Wayne Haver was still there.
That's why calling him simply a former principal doesn't really explain his connection to the school.
After that many years, he became part of Southside itself.
And since news of his death began spreading, one particular memory has kept coming up from former students and colleagues.
“Make it a good day or not... the choice is yours.”
That was Haver's line.
If you went to Southside during his years there, there's a decent chance you've heard it before.
After retiring from education, Haver didn't completely disappear from Fort Smith public life either.
He remained active in the community and ran for mayor of Fort Smith following his retirement.
His connection to the military community was recognized years earlier as well.
In 2015, Haver received an Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve Patriot Award during a faculty luncheon in Fort Smith.
The award recognizes supervisors who support members of the National Guard and Reserve through things like flexible schedules, military training and deployments.
The photograph above comes directly from that presentation and was taken by Staff Sgt. Hannah Dickerson of the 188th Wing.
At this point, we're going to keep the personal details where they belong.
Reliable local reporting confirms that Haver's family announced his death Sunday and that Southside publicly honored him afterward.
We're not going to guess at a cause of death or repeat rumors about circumstances that haven't been publicly confirmed.
If official visitation, funeral or memorial information is released, we'll share it separately so former students and staff who want to pay their respects can find it.
For now, this one's really about remembering just how much of Fort Smith's history one person got to see from the same school.
Forty-eight years in one district.
Thirty-six years as one school's principal.
Generation after generation of Southside students.
That's a footprint that doesn't disappear when somebody retires.
Community takeaway: Wayne Haver, longtime former principal of Southside High School, has died. Haver began teaching at Southside in 1970, became an assistant principal in 1974 and took over as principal in 1982. He served in that role for 36 years before retiring in 2018 after a total of 48 years with Fort Smith Public Schools. For generations of Southside students, Wayne Haver wasn't simply an administrator — he was part of what they remember about growing up and going to school in Fort Smith.
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Sources: KNWA/FOX24 — Wayne Haver death announcement and Southside tribute · DVIDS / U.S. Air National Guard — Wayne Haver Patriot Award photograph · 40/29 News — Haver's 2018 retirement after 48 years
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