Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (1841-1935) was an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court originally appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1902. Holmes was born in Boston and served with the Massachusetts Twentieth Volunteers during the Civil War. He received his law degree from Harvard in 1866 and both practiced law and taught at Harvard for the next 15 years. In 1882, he was appointed to the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, where he served until being nominated and confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court in December 1902. He retired in 1932 at the age of 90.

Throughout his 29 years on the Supreme Court, Holmes ruled on a number of highly influential cases protecting American civil liberties and helped build the legal framework for the New Deal.

I.S. 204 is a public middle school (grades 6-8) that offers a dual-language program for students. It serves a largely immigrant and first-generation American student population, including the local Bangladeshi community, as well as children from the Ravenswood and Queensbridge NYCHA communities. Across the street is a large public recreation area called Dutch Kills playground that the school shares with P.S. 112.