What Makes A One Room Schoolhouse?

By Jack

Before our schoolhouse, there was another place of learning in the area. A log cabin served as the area's school. It was extremely crude and was valued about six dollars! It stood about three hundred yards North-West of the present schoolhouse. The desks were made out of slabs of wood with sticks stuck in the bottom.

The log cabin was a temporary structure, and may have been abandoned because it was falling apart or burnt down.

Our schoolhouse, built afterwards, was of a better construction. It had a high ceiling and three windows on each side. A blackboard stretched across one whole wall. It was painted white and had a slate roof. It's value in 1835 was thought to be about fifteen dollars.

There were double desks, and they were made according to the age and size of the child.

In one corner there was a bookcase and a sewing machine in another. In the middle of the room, a coal stove gave off warmth. In the basement there was coal for the stove.

The teacher's desk sat on a raised platform behind the stove. Under the teacher's desk there was a little bell (which would be rang in the morning).

There were little shelves for the children to put their lunch pails on, on one wall.

There was a rock in front of the door that acted as a step and to one side there was a flagpole taller than the schoolhouse.

To see how a model of our schoolhouse from the late 1930s to the early 1940s was constructed, go to: http://libertylyceum.org/projects/oneroomschool/