Post date: Feb 18, 2010 5:3:43 AM
412 Ann St. Wilmington, NC
(Approx. 34.231767, -77.94358)
Like many of the locations in this project, this one was not easy to find. With absolutely no knowledge of where it could be, besides that I had a hunch that many of the Princeton scenes were likely filmed in historic Wilmington since it was close to Screen Gems Studio (where the bookends were filmed). My hunch led to scouring over Google Maps in the aerial view, looking for buildings of a similar structure. What I quickly found was that Wilmington has many such large school/government/courthouse-looking buildings with columns in front. So it was a matter of double-checking each in Street View to see if they match up with the screenshot from the show.
For whatever reason, I didn't immediately find the Tileston school - probably because Street View doesn't happen to work on Ann Street. However, after stumbling upon a photo of the school in a Google image search for "historic Wilmington buildings," I knew I'd found it at last. Then it was just a matter of finding what the name of the school was (or even if it was an actual school), which wasn't hard once I knew the address. The school was built in 1871 and is now a Catholic school.
This location was used in the first episode of the show - Curse of the Jackal or My First Adventure. While no exterior shots were shown, the interior served as young Indy's classroom, where he hears Indiana bark & sneaks out the window. If you look out the window, you can see the roof of St. Mary's Catholic Church across the street & one of the columns, indicating that this is the 2nd story classroom immediately to the right of the columns (as seen from the front). Which means that poor Henry is about to drop out the 2nd story window.
The school is most prominently seen in the Princeton 1916/Spring Break Adventure episode - both in the opening sequence (on DVD) and for an establishing shot later on (they used the same shot for both). Later, we see some of the interior, which I can't confirm is the actual inside of the school, though I suspect it is:
At the end of the episode, Indy & Nancy arrive to the prom on the west side entrance to the building.