Bradford High School was named after Mary D. Bradford, who was Superintendent of Schools for the Kenosha school system from 1878 to 1894, and again from 1910 to 1921. Bradford was the first woman to serve as superintendent of a major city school system in Wisconsin. The former Mary Davison was born in Kenosha County in 1856 and graduated from Oshkosh Normal School in 1876, after which she taught at Kenosha High School from 1876 to 1878. She became a member of the Board of Visitors of the Milwaukee Normal School in 1892, joined the new faculty of Stevens Point Normal in 1894, the Stout Institute in 1906, and Whitewater State Normal in 1909, where she served one year before returning to Kenosha. She retired in 1921 after 45 years in education. Bradford died in Kenosha in 1943 at the age of 87. The original Kenosha Central High School was built in 1924 and is located at Sheridan Road and 57th Street. The building took three years to complete, opening in 1927. Mary D. Bradford High School also occupied the site of the previous Kenosha High School, later called the Mary D. Bradford High School Annex. This building was razed in 1980. In 1975, the Kenosha Unified School Board purchased the former University of Wisconsin-Extension Center located at 39th Avenue and Washington Road, which had been built in 1961, with an addition in 1965. A major addition was constructed to the building in 1979 which included all of the components of a contemporary high school. In 1979–80, the Bradford building located on Sheridan Road was vacated and the building on 39th Avenue and Washington Road became the new Mary D. Bradford High School. The Bradford building on Sheridan Road then became Reuther Central High School and remains a school in the Kenosha Unified School District. Since Bradford High School relocated to the Washington Road location, two soccer fields have been added north of the school, a varsity baseball stadium has been created to the northeast, and three practice football fields have been created north of the ravine. A successful referendum in 2005 gave the school a new weight room and renovations and expansions to the locker rooms and further renovations to the indoor athletic facilities. A renovation of the Bradford library was completed in Fall 2013. A 2015 referendum gave the school its first home football stadium, with the tennis courts and soccer fields moving to the Bullen Middle School site to make room for the stadium.
Athletics
Bradford competes in WIAA in Division 1. The school has been a member of the WIAA Southeast Conference and has been in a cross-town rivalry with Tremper High School since 1958. In 2005, the girls' golf team won its first state title. The school won a combined championship in gymnastics with Tremper High School in 2005. In 2008, the boys' baseball team won its first title in over 40 years over Kimberly High School. The football team qualified for the state tournament in 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011. In 2011, the Red Devils won their first state championship in football, besting Wisconsin RapidsLincoln High School 7-0.
