One-room school days

Soon we will gather at the one-room schoolhouse for a reunion. And there will be flurries of “Remember when …”

The school began 100 years ago in the Williams Valley farming community west of Deer Park. By the time I, at age 5, arrived at its door, the floor was already sanded smooth by country dirt, the desks anointed with ink and a few carvings.

Unused to new frightening experiences, I stood at the blackboard with tears in my eyes, unsure of how to write my name. No printing for us. We started right out with cursive, although it would be years before I heard the term.

My first-grade teacher was a pillowy grandmother type who stood me on one of those brightly painted little chairs to search my hair for woodticks. We were rural folks. Some of us even lived in the hills. The only running water was in the creek, which we pronounced “crick.”

Since I was the smallest I was chosen to play the part of Tiny Tim in the Christmas play. My one momentous line was, “God bless us, every one.” I suppose in these politically correct times I would say, “Happy Winter Solstice.” How inspiring!

We didn’t have a music teacher. And as I grew to be an important fourth-grader with a bent toward music, I pumped out the jaunty strains of “Country Gardens” on the old organ used for both school, then church on Sundays, while the other children danced around the room.

We small ones sat by the big black stove to keep warm while the teacher explained long division on the blackboard. Fascinating! When it was time to learn the various enterprises in our many states, we pasted tiny cows on the state of Wisconsin to represent the dairy industry and a sheaf of wheat on the outline of Washington. Geography, now abandoned in more enlightened times, was fun.

Since my family had a big house, it was my misfortune and embarrassment to have the new teacher board with us one year. She even sat at the breakfast table and walked to school with us! But, she didn’t last long and the next year we had a better one who had some place else to live.

When the first warmer days of spring came, we girls rolled our long stockings down to our ankles when we arrived at school and rolled them back up on the way home. (Except the year the teacher boarded at our house.)

Once I had to sit with my leg propped on a chair as a punishment for kicking a classmate. As far as I know, in the long history of the school, it was a one-of-a-kind incident.

I remember the Christmas tree cut and carried in by the eighth-grade boys for us to decorate with paper chains. There were spelling bees and ball games with other country schools. And yes, George Washington’s picture hung on the wall.

Were we deprived? Every one of us could have qualified for free hot lunch. Although there was no such thing those days. We ate our sandwiches of homemade bread and were content. My sister and I shared one of those black lunch buckets that men carried to their work at the mill. It even had a strap around it to keep it from flying open. Many of the parents could have stood in line for welfare. Instead, they stood for principles and self-reliance.

Now, the old school building, reroofed, repainted, reporched, stands proudly, welcoming us back Saturday for potluck lunch and an afternoon of “Remember when…”