|
Centennial History Book
Since education was important to these people
there were SCHOOLS
RURAL SCHOOLS
During the depression years of the thirties, a number of families left the farms to go West. This left the country schools either without pupils or too few to merit having school. Several of the students were sent to the town school. During the fifties all of the surrounding schools were consolidated into the Farnam district. These included the three schools of District #35 in the Walker precinct of Lincoln County in the southeastern corner of the county. The Earl school north of these schools was added as was the former Ingham town school, District #67, and the north Ingham school, North District #67. The last Lincoln County school to be added to the Farnam district was the Speck school in West Deer Creek.
Frontier County schools that consolidated with Farnam Schools were Mulberry Ridge that was about twelve miles southwest of Farnam, and the Heath school on Deer Creek south of Ingham District #86; the Mount Hope School District #85 located nine miles southwest of Farnam; Bailey School District #20 about four miles south of Mount Hope School; Sunflower College District #3 four miles south of town; the Hazen school that is located south of District #3; and Lone Star School, District #66, south of the Hazen School; Happy Hollow southeast of town that was known as the Crampton School District #55; and District #48 about 10 miles southeast of Farnam.
The north school of the Farnam School District #51; another school about six or seven miles northeast of town Mercer School; and a school four miles east of town District #98 were the three Dawson County schools which were added to the district.
A total of twenty two country schools were consolidated with the Farnam District. The size of our school enrollment tells the true story of the loss of the population in the town and community. In earlier days these country schools had twenty to thirty pupils in each school.
Mount Hope School
The two boys in the door way are Will Erwin and Charles Hurschman. The boy standing with arm round the post is Lynn Calvert. Back row, left to right: Arthur Hicks [teacher], Margaret Dryden, Eliza Dryden, Sarah Erwin, Rose Dryden, Mable Hathaway, Maggie Dodson, Grace Erwin, Grace Hathaway, Fred Rowland, Frank Campbell, Harry Dryden and, Lathe Calvert. Front row, left to right: Ida Campbell, Maude Campbell, Eva Hathaway, Jennie Dodson, Cora Calvert, Alvin Hathaway, John Rowland, Roy Campbell, last one not identified.
REMINISCENSE OF MT. HOPE SCHOOL and COMMUNITY
by J. L. Hicks
I have been asked to write something about the country schools of this vicinity fifty years ago and when I submitted the picture for publication of what is known as the Mt. Hope School, Dist. 85 of Frontier Country, located eight miles south west of Farnam, it was suggested that I describe the first days of that school as typical of the other schools of that time. The irst school that my brother and I ever attended was the first term ever taught in that district. However, the photo was taken some twelve years later, but it was the original school house.
My father, H. G. Hicks, mother, and we two boys, aged one and three, landed in that neighborhood in the spring of 1884. My two sisters were born on the homestead as also were my own children, I think the only homesteader in that vicinity at that time was Harry Jones who lived on the place now occupied by John Adkisson. During the next two or three years the homesteaders became very numerous and soon the neighborhood was much more thickly settled than it is now, as many of the quarter and half section farms then occupied by separate families have since been combined into larger farms.
Soon the need for a school became evident and District 85 was organized with Marshall Colebank, Sam Colebank and H. G. Hicks as school board.
I well remember my first day of school. It may interest some of the youngsters of today if I describe it from a kid’s standpoint. My father took us to school the first day in a lumber wagon which was the only kind of automobiles anyone here had at that time. The school house was of sod with the walls unplastered, the cracks around the door and windows filled with yellow clay mud. The floor was made of rough one foot boards with numerous knot holes. The furniture consisted of a chair for the teacher which she brought from home and three long wooden benches without backs. We needed no desks for we wrote on slates which we held on our knees. The blackboard looked like the throw board from someone’s corn husking wagon, painted black or nearly so and fastened to the sod wall with stakes. Outside was a pile of large ears of corn for fuel, valued at 10 to 15 cents per bushel.
Another picture of Mount Hope School located about nine miles southwest of Farnam
This picture was taken in 1891. The teacher was George Hicks, a brother of Horatio Hicks and father of Horace Hicks, grandfather of Gilbert Hicks and Lila Stebbins. The pile of ear corn was for fuel for heating. Corn was 10 cents a bushel so was the cheapest fuel available. Joe Hicks is seated [with the hat]. Standing behind him are Will Colebank and Arthur Hicks. Catherine Hicks is standing in the front row at the right end.
The teacher was Mrs. Knight, wife of the man on whose homestead the school house stood. Her time was quite well occupied during school hours teaching us the three R’s, doing her family sewing and disciplining her incorrigible son, who was too young to study. Before we started out the first day, my mother had expressed doubt as to my ability to sit still even until school was started, so I thought it had to be done and sat still and copied figures on my slate while the men who were "shingling" the roof, that is, laying sod over the rough boards, rattled dirt down my neck. I also sat still and said nothing when a few days later I saw a snake crawl into the school room through a hole in the wall, crawl across the room, pass under the teacher’s chair and go into a hole in the floor. I expected a chastisement if I interrupted the school for a little thing like that.
The first school year consisted of a three month term, as also did the second which was taught by Geo. S. Hicks, whom many Farnam folks will remember. He was a Methodist minister of the "circuit rider" days and had been ship’s carpenter on a whaling vessel and sailed all around the world, including the south sea islands, so his talks were very instructive. Seats and desks were installed that year and the teacher built a teacher’s desk which served until a few years ago.
The third year, 1890, we had a four month term, taught by D. W. Brooks, who still lives in the community west of there. He also added a piece of equipment which consisted of a cottonwood switch about four feet long, which he took care to let us see him stick it up behind the blackboard. I cannot recall that he ever had the occasion to take it down. I think he originated the policy of preparedness. By that time we could read Harper’s Third Reader, win an occasional "head mark" in spelling and sing the multiplication table.
Other important lessons were how to divide into squads to hold the windows, frames and all from blowing in or out when a sudden wind storm came and how to pick ants out of our dinner pails. The playground equipment consisted of plenty of room to play "dare base" and "black men", etc.
Much has been said about the wonderful pioneers, but I wonder if we realize how many things they and incidentally the teachers, had to worry them even in as safe a country as this was. At the time my oldest sister was born there were no doctors within forty miles and no way to get word to them except by horse power. Among my earliest memories was the warning to look out for public enemy No. 1, the rattlesnake and it became sort of an instinct for us kids to jump when we heard the familiar "buzz". Probably to us the cactus should be listed as enemy No. 2, as we never wore shoes in summer, and several kinds of cactus hid in the thick buffalo grass, which grew everywhere. As an example I will tell on Arthur, when he was about three or four years old, he stepped on some cactus which did not bother much as he was used to it, but when he sat down to pick them out of his feet, he sat on a bunch which did bother, so he rolled over into a still larger cactus patch and lay there broadcasting the S.O.S. signal.
As for myself from the time I could walk I was troubled with "wander lust" and would start out to see the world whenever I could make my get away. I remember my parents telling of finding me once in a canyon where I had crawled partly into a coyote hole and gone to sleep with a big rattlesnake nearby. Another time after a hunt which lasted most of the day they found me in a cornfield where I had become exhausted and lay asleep with my face streaked with tears and dust. When my sister started following my example, they used to stake her out on a lariat, this did not prevent her from getting hold of some poison and taking it one day, and I remember the frantic and successful application of home remedies. This happened while my father was away from home. He hauled all his building material for a frame house from Lexington and Cambridge with a team. It was while he was away on one of these trips that we had our first experience with a Nebraska cyclone, which fortunately was a small one. My mother, when the boards which were nailed over the places where the windows were to be, began flying across the room, got us two kids into a corner with her sewing machine drawn over us for protection. The house was picked up and turned around but not moved far, and about the only damage it did was to land on the tail of our dog. My cousin, Wm. Hicks, who had gone to hunt the cattle and got in a hole during the storm, came and when he saw that we were all safe he tried to lift the house from the dog’s tail and failing in this task, took the hatchet and cut the tail off.
Then there were the prairie fires with no roads and few patches of plowing to stop them. But all these things were but common experiences in those days and detailed descriptions may become tiresome.
Your editor also asked me to tell something about the people who homesteaded in that neighborhood. Space will permit me to do no more than name them. I think I can remember most of them. Those who had children in school during three "terms" were Sol Davison, Marshall Colebank, Sam Colebank, James Harry, Mr. Marrifield, Lewis Gilman, H. G. Hicks and Wm. Barns. Others who had no school children of school age were John Thomalla, Mr. Mariman, Herm Dyer, Frank Dyer, David Brooks, Agnes Whitaker, Lish Colebank, W. L. Hicks, Chas. Hicks. X. White, Sam Hathaway and Ben Lapp.
The children of Sol Davison, H. G. Hicks and Sam Hathaway still retain the land taken up by these men. All the other farms have changed hands, some of them have died or moved out of the country with the exception of D. W. Brooks and James Harry, who live south of Moorefield and John Thomalla of near Farnam.
The above are the names only of those who lived in Dist. 85 and do not include the names of many well known pioneers of the surrounding territory. I have written this account entirely from memory and if I have made errors or omitted any names, it was unintentional.
Early school in Farnam.
Sunflower College, Dist. #3, 1912
Back row, left to right: Ed Davidson, unknown, Bill Davidson, Francis Johnson, Genevieve Fitch, Lucy Davidson, Mable Davidson, Mrs. Whitney [teacher], unknown. Front row, left to right: Seaton Smith, unknown, John Knoedler, unknown, Marion Johnson, Ronald Fitch, Doris Fitch, Glenrose Fitch and Theron Smith.
District 86, Frontier County
Five miles west and one mile south.
Back row: Ruth Lewis (teacher], Marvin Babcock. Middle row. LeRoy Gaudreault, Vivian Gaudreault, Gerald Whitney. Front row: Billy Miller, Bobby Miller and Helen Miller.
South School #51, 1935-1937
Left to right: Gary Kerry, LeRoy Tillotson, Jeanette Ihfe, Claude Ihfe, Junior Beermafl, Mary Tillotson, Raymond Tillotson.
District #98 in 1916
Front row, left to right: Martin Schurr, John Franzen, Clarence Mercer, Bert Farmer, Harold [Pat] Miller, Glen Farmer, behind is Bill Schurr, Kenneth Burton, Ina Austin, Eldred Burton. Back row, left to right: Orville Miller, John Schurr, Harry Mercer, Margaret Baldwin, Elsie Rieker, Emma Rieker, Mable Mercer, Alma Schurr, Alvin Burton.
Little Souvenir Booklets given out at the end of the year by the teachers, giving the following information.
Crampton School--Happy Hollow--Frontier Co. District #55
Back row, left to right: Louise Crampton, Doris Williams, Joyce Crampton, Lucile Hall, Cecil Williams, Wayne Williams, Buster Hall, Laverne Hall, Donald Williams. Front row, left to right: unknown, Kenneth Hall.
South School Dist. 35, Lincoln County
Left to right: Jennie Crossgrove [teacher], Marie Banks, Arvid Banks, Charlie Clement, Charlie Owens, Bill Clement, Dave Banks, Turner McNickle, Dora Babcock, Maud Wrin, Mable Banks, Mattie Babcock, Elsie Banks, Dell McNickle and Art McNickle.
North school. Jim Eckstein and Elmer Hilton
Clara, Emerald, Ora, Liona and Eva Clement, ready to leave for school, their lunches packed in pails.
Eddie and Ruby Heath of Dist. #86. They attended this school for eight years. Quite a few of the years they were the only two pupils enrolled.
1898, District 86
Ninth Grade at Lone Star, 1922-23
Front row, left to right: Ida Lehman, Gladys Martin, Daisy Martin, Nona Hayworth. Back row, left to right: Glenn Beery, Roland Lehman, Frank Martin, Lloyd Beery, Robert B. Quick Iteacher]
Lone Star School, 1919
Front row, left to right: Irene Wagner, Elsie McMichael, a visitor, August Wagner, unknown, Jack Martin, Leonard Beery, Tressie Piersol, Beulah McMichael, Hallie Piersol. Middle row, left to right: Florence Wagner, Clarence Wagner, unknown, Frank Piersol, Ida Lehman, Glenn Beery, Harold Piersol, Alta Piersol, Inez Beery, Amanda Ihfe. Back row, left to right: Emily McMichael, Clyde Wagner, Roland Lehman, Frank Martin, Edna McMichael, Viola Kuhlman, teacher, [Lloyd Beery is not pictured]
Sunflower College, Dist. #3
Including the following families: Tillotsons, Babcocks, Pattersons, Stewarts, Johnsons, Murrays, Radars and Whitneys.
|
