Workers uncovered a big red splash of Huntsville history last week while demolishing an old school building on Randolph Street in the Twickenham Historic District.

The latest memory to emerge from the rubble was a bright red lunchroom painting of the Huntsville Junior High School panther mascot.

The building is being redeveloped into condominiums and home lots, and owner-developer Wesley Crunkleton of Crunkleton and Associates said Monday that all the planned condominiums and residential lots on the site are sold. All available homesites are also sold on the parking lot across the street.

The original building dated to 1927 and was sold along the property to Crunkleton’s company for $3.2 million in 2022.

The cafeteria and most of the structure are coming down, but the building’s oldest front center core facing Randolph Street is being redeveloped from school system offices to condominiums. Outside, surrounding campus on two sides and the back will become a new parking lot for condo residents and small-lot home sites.

The redevelopment was originally controversial with some residents. The neighborhood was Huntsville’s first designated historic neighborhood and homes there are some of the most expensive and sought after in Madison County. Residents came to meetings with questions and objections.

But a warmup began after experts said any legitimate offer to save and repurpose any part of an old building like the Annie Mertz Center could be the best possible result. Too often, they said, the challenges of meeting modern building codes and modern tastes render plans to renovate old structures like this one unprofitable.

Neighbors listened, city leaders were supportive and, while current feelings likely run a gamut, one prominent Twickenham resident pointed through the construction fence last week to show a reporter the lot he and his wife have bought for their future.

As for the schools that had the panther mascot, Huntsville Junior High School is now on Adams Street west of California Street and Huntsville High School is on Bob Wallace Drive east of Memorial Parkway. The high school has since changed its mascot to the Bumblebee, but the junior high school retains the panther.