[2] The school was named after Paul Laurence Dunbar, one of the first black writers to build a national reputation.

It lost the Dunbar name in 1963, but it was restored when Fairmont residents petitioned the Board of Education in 1970.

[2] The school is built on a slope with two stories and an exposed basement section on the west elevation.

The rectangular building uses buff-colored brick with Flemish Garden Wall bond.

This article about a property in Marion County, West Virginia on the National Register of Historic Places is a stub.