Wakefield High School opened in September, 1953 with 1,529 students in grades seven through tenth. The building continued to be under construction, opening in stages as it was completed. The Auditorium and Gym were completed in 1955. Wakefield's first graduation took place on June 12, 1956. When the enrollment grew to over 2,600 in the sixties, a new wing was added to house the English Department. Also in the sixties, a swimming pool was added and the library expanded. In 1975 the library was expanded into the courtyard and further expanded in the nineties.

Wakefield has had eight principals in its history. Doris Jackson is currently serving in this position. She joins a list of educational leaders. They are:

Dr. Harold Wilson, 1953-64
Mr. Jacob Johnson, 1965
Mr. Henry A. Renz, 1966-68
Mr. Thomas J. Cabelus, 1969-71
Mr. Victor Blue, 1972-82
Mr. Dennis Hill, 1983-88
Dr. Marie Shiels-Djouadi, 1988 - 2002
Ms. Doris Jackson, 2002 - present

Student activities have always been a cornerstone of Wakefield. It's interesting to see how organizations and activities changed through time. In the beginning, extracurricular activities were a part of the school day. If you didn't join some group, you went to study hall. Later these became optional after-school activities.

Clubs can be grouped into basically four groups: honorary clubs for which you had to qualify for membership, service groups, sports and "pep" clubs and special interests. As early as 1953 there was a National Honor Society and societies for French, Spanish, German, Latin Math, Art and the Quill & Scroll. Wakefield Guides, as early as 1953, were selected on citizenship and grades. Hall Monitors in 1956 were by invitation only and the Monogram Club in the '60s was restricted to boys who had earned athletic letters. In 1964 the Monogram Club included cheerleaders and in 1971 they changed their name to the Varsity Club to reflect that varsity athletic letters were criteria for joining.

Service organizations began with "Y" clubs affiliated with the YWCA. HiYs were for boys and Tri-Hi-Ys for girls, each chapter distinguished by a Greek letter. In 1957 they formed a council to coordinate their activities. The 1964 Supreme Court ruling on not allowing religious activities in schools disassociated the "Ys" from the WMCA and they where ended. In 1967, the ICC replaced the Service club Council to coordinate all clubs, including honorary societies, interest groups, and service clubs. One year later this group reorganized as the Service Club Council, deciding that other groups didn't want the same organizational oversight. Key Clubs for boys (1956) and Keyeets for girls (1957) were affiliated with the Kiwanis Clubs. By 1983 they were a coed Key Club. Through the years service was also rendered through the Junior Red Cross, Red Cross and Rescue Clubs, as well.

The first Wakefield yearbook (1953-55) listed the sports of football, cross country basketball, wrestling, baseball, track, tennis and golf. It would be ten years before girls track became a school sport. And in 1973 a young woman made the football team. In the early years Wakefield had the Girls' Athletic Club, Girls' Official club or Girls Physical Education Club. There was a Tumbling Club ('53-'55 for boys only) followed by Gymnastics (which later became coed), a Rod and Reel Club ('56), Rifle Club ('58-'65), Track and Field, Modern Dance was all female, Swim Club which used Anacostia Naval Station and Alexandria YMCA in the pre-pool days, and the Ski Club ('66) which formed several years before they ever actually got together on snow. Where there are sports, there are fans. Wakefield has had Cheerleaders, Pep Clubs, Majorettes, Cheer Block, Drill Team, Glove Girls, Flag Girls and the Soul Squad.

Special interest groups run the gamut. Square Dance ('53 -'55) and Ballroom Dance ('56) had short lives, as did Fashion and Modeling, the Flying Warriors model airplane club, the Bridge Society, Shakespeare Society and the Small Engine Repair Club. The Rocket Club first appeared in 1957 and by 1967 divided into three subgroups to cover all the interest. Other groups with staying power were the Audio-Visual Club, Chess Club, Photography Club, Debate or Forensics Club, Psychology Club, language clubs for Spanish, French, German and Latin (which really reached a peak in the early '80s). The Art Club would come and go as did the Radio and TV Club, Ham Radio Club and Radio Club of America. The Math Club became the Math-Computer Club in '83. There were Chemistry Club and Biology Club for the science students.

In the beginning there was the Bible Club ('53-'57), then the Interfaith Council ('62) and the Alpha-Omega ('68) group that discussed world religion and philosophy. Diversity spawned the Black Culture, Korean, Vietnamese, Latin American Clubs and many more. The career mined could join a gamut of clubs like the Future Teachers of America, Distributive Education of America or Diversified Occupational Club Industrial Cooperative. There were always extracurricular music programs: orchestra, band, marching band, chorus, and singers. The Twilighters formed as a dance band in 1953 and were a fixture for many years. Gospel Choir appeared in '72.

Wakefield students have always been creative in mischief. Here is a partial list of how seniors showed their creative nature.

 • released 800 live crickets in an opening of school assembly

 • had all of the seniors check out five books from the library and returned them the same hour

 • took control of the PA system and played the little rascals theme song everyday for a week

 • placed over fifty real estate for sale signs in the point at school

 • got a cow on the second floor

 • made a 20 foot circular aquarium on the Senior Lobby floor out of plastic wrap and boards

 • brought alarm clocks, put them in your lockers and set them to go off at the same time

 • elected Jake the Wonder Goat as homecoming king

 • some how, put tires over the flag pole

 • "borrowed" a life-size gorilla, from a home in the area and put it on the roof at school

 • borrowed the Big Boy from the restaurant on Columbia Pike and placed him on the roof

 • put rabbits in Miss Baylor's office where they left droppings on her new carpet

 • filled Vic Blue's office with newspapers, fish, and many other items

 • slowly stole all the silverware out of the cafeteria and then planted them in the senior court with the tines pointed upward

 • had a streaker run down the hall

 • filled one whole hall with pictures of Victoria Secret models with the face of the principal

 • put a VW on the 2nd floor