Wallie E. Scott Jr., a CRS partner, was from Port Arthur; this gave the firm the foothold it needed to secure commissions to design all the city's new public schools in the 1950s in succession to Mark Lemmon. Phillis Wheatley, located in the predominantly African American El Vista community west of the Texas Company refinery, was the most publicized of these schools. A long, low, flat roof canopy, supported on widely spaced steel-pipe columns, sheltered the classrooms and created additional covered outdoor space. CRS used freestanding wing walls (built with their trademark dark red paving brick) as baffles to deflect the prevailing southeast breeze into north-facing classrooms. All classrooms featured two walls of glass, into which operable bifold windows were integrated.