Niles East Reflections High School Yearbooks, 1938-1980

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Student notes and signatures, 1956

This collection includes the digitized Reflections yearbooks of Niles East High School, a public 4–year school in Skokie, Illinois. Operated by Niles Township High Schools District 219, Niles East was first opened in 1938 and closed after the 1979–1980 school year. 

Niles East's sister schools Niles West High School and Niles North High School remain open. The school was known as Niles Township High School or NileHi until Niles West High School opened in 1959. Only a portion of the original building still stands - it was mostly demolished during the construction of Oakton Community College. The school newspaper, the NileHiLite, is also available in the library's digital collections.

Related material can be found in the Skokie Newspaper Index.

Fun Facts

  • It ranks high among schools around the world on the list of Nobel Prize laureates by secondary school affiliation.
  • Exterior and interior shots of the school were used in scenes from the films Risky Business (1983), Sixteen Candles (1984), and Weird Science (1985).
  • Six athletic teams finished in the top four of their respective IHSA state championship tournaments.

Notable Alumni 

  • Martin Chalfie, co-recipient of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
  • Robert Horvitz, co-recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
  • William Nack, author of Secretariat
  • Jill Wine-Banks, lawyer, legal analyst, author of The Watergate Girl: My Fight for Truth and Justice Against a Criminal President
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Robert Horvitz, 1964
Martin Chalfie, Class of 1965
Martin Chalfie, 1965
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William Nack, 1959