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| Serving Callaway County communities since 1875. | www.fultonsun.com | Wednesday, November 19, 2008 |
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One-room school houses brought communities together BY KATHERINE CUMMINS The Fulton Sun
“Outside of church, it was the center of your community,” said Mildred (Jones) Palmer Wilson, who attended Guthrie School and also taught in rural one-room schools for 16 years. “It was the center of interest, and the only contact you had (with your neighbors).” “It was like you were one big family because you became close,” Fulton resident Juanita Butler - who attended Grant Colored School - agreed, a sentiment that was echoed by Dorothy Maune, also of Fulton. “With all the kids and everyone helping one another it was kind of like a family situation as well as a school,” said Maune, who taught at a number of rural schools in the 1930s. Even area residents without young children were a part of the schoolhouse family - attending programs and picnics, and even boarding teachers when necessary. “(When I was in Peno) I boarded with a family in the country,” Maune said. “They had two older sons that kidded me that I was their little sister.” Telling stories Butler could hardly stop laughing as she recalled one particular incident involving classmate Donald Lee Harris. “Don Lee was always being bad, and one day the teacher said ‘I'm giving you one more time to get your act up,' so he started singing ‘Hey good lookin' watcha' got cookin'? How's about cookin' somethin' up with me?'” Butler giggled. “She jumped up from her desk and gave him a switching and then asked, ‘Now what do you have to say?' and he just started in again with ‘Hey good lookin'.' “Every time she would switch him and ask he'd start singing again, he would not let us see him cry.” Fulton resident Mabel (Vaughn) Fischer, who attended Sunrise School, recalled another prank involving her future husband that did not have such a happy ending. “Marvin Fischer and his brother Wallace rode Old Dan, a big spotted pony, from the east two miles to Sunrise School,” she wrote. “One day, at noon, the boys were up under the tree with Dan the pony. Marvin was setting on the pony. “Marvin Creacy came up behind and slapped Dan real hard on the rump. Dan jumped and Marvin fell off and broke his collar bone,” Fischer continued, noting that Creacy had to run the two miles to get “Pop Fischer to come get Marvin and take him to Fulton eight miles to the doctor” because there were no telephones. “I remember crying because Marvin got hurt so bad.” Fun and games To help students work out some of those trouble-making urges, the teachers at one-room schoolhouses did the same thing modern educators do; go outside and let them run it out. “Mother and I had a lot of discussions, and she said ‘We didn't have a lot of fighting in class, probably because I was just as eager to get out to recess as they were,'” said Maune's daughter, Marilyn Dunham, who read “The Whistling Season” with her mother and used it as an opportunity to learn more about Maune's teaching days. “We got out and played baseball a lot,” Maune said. “I was always out right there with them.” “We played a lot of baseball in the fall and spring,” Wilson agreed. “Sometimes if there was another school near us, we would take the day off and play them.” Fischer also recalled playing other games at recess. “We would choose up sides (and draw) a center line in the dirt with kids on each side of the line,” she wrote. “We would try to get all ten sticks from the back tree behind each center line and back to your side without getting touched.” Fischer went on to describe playing various forms of tag as well as marbles, swings and red rover. Butler said her favorite game at Grant was hide-and-seek. “We would hide in the woods,” she said. “One time I went too far back and found a spot that had never been touched (by people) before - it was the prettiest green I had ever seen, and it was so still.” Fulton resident Vivian Dutton, who graduated from Whiteside School between New Florence and Big Spring, said she and her classmates also had to be creative about their recess entertainment. “We didn't have toys or swings or anything, we just made up our own games, and I was always spraining my ankle,” Dutton said. “I remember one time I sprained it pretty bad, and the teacher - he wasn't much bigger or much older than I was - carried me all the way to the nearest house to wait for my father to come get me.” Pulling together One-room schoolhouses often were the only public structures in the area - in some cases serving as both school and church - which meant that events held there often drew in the whole community. “(The school) was pretty important,” Dutton said. “We always used to have a big basket dinner at the end of the year. “I remember one year the teacher asked if we wanted to do a wiener roast or a basket dinner, and we all wanted a wiener roast, but none of us knew how to spell wiener, so we had the basket dinner.” Butler had similar memories from Grant. “We would have plays and programs, and all the parents would come and bring food, and after the children did programs we would all have dinner,” she said. On occasion, the school family was able to lend a helping hand to some of its less-fortunate members. “Sometimes our teacher would cook a meal (on the stove) for the school kids to eat lunch,” recalled Howard Beard of Grant Colored School. Wilson had a story that was perhaps the best illustration of the one-room schoolhouse pulling together as a family. “I had a doctor who had a farm in one district, and he would put foreigners on as renters, and they would come to school in the winter time with no gloves or hats, and only bread and butter (for lunch),” she said, describing one of her proudest moments as a teacher. “So my kids at school decided they wanted to give them something special for Christmas - they brought in scarves and gloves and baskets of food.” Asked why her students were so eager to help their classmates, Wilson's answer was simple: “They were very concerned because they saw that (the immigrant children) didn't have what they had,” Wilson said. (Editor's note: We'd like to thank the members of the community for sharing their stories and photos with us.) |
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