Willson Middle School opened in 1903, with an additional gymnasium and auditorium constructed in 1927. For 100 years, the school operated, providing an average education for students in the area. In 2005, likely due to the age of the structure, the building closed while Willson School was moved a mile or so away into a more modern building. As of 2025, the city has done nothing with the building or property except setting up a fence and boarding windows. This lack of action on the part of the city has made the school perfect for explorers, squatters, and vandals.

Wanting to find out more, I contacted the former principal, current superintendent, and Cleveland Metro School District archives. Unfortunately, I never received an answer from the principal or superintendent.
The CMSD archive provided information like Willson’s construction dates and when Willson moved. Using the Wayback Machine, I found captures of the school’s website from 2001-2004. This site contained basic information on the school, including the address, principal, etc, and school profile documents with information like suspensions and test scores.
The 2002-2003 school profile shows the school had about 50 more students enrolled than the intended 525. Also shown are amounts of incidents and suspensions. These stayed around 100 per year. 6th-grade test proficiency scores were also displayed. These scores were slightly below the district average. On a brighter note, attendance rose through the years until it closed.

A tall fence encloses the property with multiple holes cut all over, on top of being completely gone in some spots.
The school is missing every window, though the ones on the first floor are all boarded except some that got torn off.
Graffiti tags line the building, with a few along the roof ledge.
The building has a bunch of entrances scattered about like broken windows and busted-down doors. Most of these entrances lead into the basement, where you get hit with the smell of two decades of dust and likely mold upon entering. The walls are covered with graffiti of varying skill and intent, and garbage is everywhere on the ground.

The basement has a gym, classrooms, and a few technical rooms. The classrooms are the same throughout the whole building: a standard square/rectangle with room for desks, and graffiti and garbage scattered throughout. The gym is entirely mangled, with most of the ceiling collapsing from weathering, while the court has layers of smashed furniture, ceiling, and garbage covering the whole area. The gym’s walls are defaced, with some tags that make you wonder how they got there. The technical area sports the same garbage-filled rooms as the rest of the school and the bonus of a giant gizmo in a few-foot-deep pool of stillwater and more dust. Most of the water that gets into the school drains into this area, with stalagmites and stalactites everywhere among large pools of water.

The upper floors follow a similar layout with a larger, central hub area with rooms circling it and hallways leading to lockers and classrooms. The first-floor classrooms have warped and torn-up floors with a similar level of graffiti and trash all over. On the first floor resides the auditorium, which is less trashed than the rest of the school and has some pretty impressive graffiti art around the stage. The second floor has access to the projector room and nosebleeds for the auditorium alongside the same classrooms on the previous floors.

The second and third floors are much more treacherous than the others. The wood floors are all creaky and warped with holes, even having collapsed in two stacked classrooms. All the rooms on the third floor suffer the same fate as the previous floors, featuring trash and bad graffiti everywhere, except for increased evidence that people lived there. Access to the roof is the only notable thing on the third floor besides the homeless population.
In the hallway is a skinny doorway into a skinnier stairwell leading to a ventilation room and an open hatch to the roof. The view from the roof is incredible from all sides. Downtown Cleveland, the surrounding neighborhood, and the massive abandoned factory neighboring the school are visible and stand out. The roof is split into two sections by the vent room. To get to the other section, you have to jump into a filthy pool of water on a likely collapsing part of the roof or scale the ledge of the building.
Willson Middle School is a monument that represents both good and bad. The fact the building is still standing today among many other abandoned buildings in the area is an example of the effects of racism and redlining today and the twisted priorities of the city and their catering towards wealthier areas, allowing poorer and redlined neighborhoods to rot and foster crime and poverty. Despite the negative implications of a place like Willson’s existence, its worksheet-lined halls and furniture piles provide positivity for many. The school is a unique place for explorers and a look back into the style of construction and education at the time. Willson also acts as a somewhat safe place to sleep for those who need it and as a canvas for graffiti artists.