What was life like in the “good old days” of one-room schools?
Nobody had a car. Nobody had a bike. The five-year-olds walked, and the teacher walked, unless she got a ride in a horse-drawn buggy.
Nobody got a hot lunch, unless they lived close enough to run home at noon. Everybody else carried their cold lunch with them, or went without. The teacher couldn’t get any coffee, unless she heated it on the wood stove. There was no electricity, so they needed oil lamps on cloudy days. They used outhouses out back.
Everybody sat in one big room, and they all had the same teacher. She taught the five-year-olds to read, and she taught the teenagers to do algebra. But most teenagers quit to go to work, especially the boys, even before they finished eighth grade. When it was time for haying, or berrying, school closed anyway so the children could be out to work.
The teacher prepared all the lessons, and graded all the papers. She cleaned the school. She had to lay the fire in the heating stove, and maybe chop the wood. She probably had to board with the closest family, and if she got married, she usually had to quit.
Some students went on to become doctors and lawyers and generals and corporate presidents. But one-room schools were dead ends for many others. Even in the 1950s, scarcely half of the one-room students in the Corning area went on to high school, even though they had several options close at hand.
State law let people teach in one-room schools even if they were still teenagers and didn’t have much training. Often they didn’t get “promoted” to bigger schools – teaching in one-room schools became a life sentence. Some people loved it, but it could be rough. Many schools were very isolated. You might have to board with the family closest to school, but just because they were close didn’t mean they were nice.
Rhoda McConnell, teaching near Prattsburgh in the Civil War, wrote her soldier boy friend about how furious she was because one of the mothers had sent her two-year-old to school along with the older kids, so that Rhoda had to mind the child while teaching. If school board members were going out, it wasn’t unusual for them to summon teachers to their homes and require them to send the evening babysitting.
At Steuben Couny Historical Society, we dedicate a lot of time and energy to one-room schools. One entire shelf is filled with town-by-town binders, in which we try to identify all 400 Steuben County schools. If 400 seems like a lot, remember that the county’s big enough to be a state, and the schools had to be spotted within fairly reasonable walking distance.
Identifying schools is more challenging than it sounds. The last of them closed over half a century back, and memory plays tricks. Names were unofficial – it’s depressing how many “Red Schools” there were, and how many “White Schools.” It took us quite a while to figure out that Twelve Mile Creek School is NOT Twelve Mile Creek ROAD School – though they’re fairly close to each other. Sometimes a school was named for the nearest farmer, but over 150 years those names would change.
Each town had its own numbering system for its districts, but those also changed over a century and a half, and so did the number of schools. On top of that, a town might have, for instance, a District 2 School and a JOINT District 2 School. Joint districts straddled town lines, and had students from both municipalities.
Steuben County Historical Society operates the 1849 Bath District 11 School (Babcock Hollow), now on the grounds of Steuben County Fair. We like to have folks drop in during their fair visits, to get a feel for one-room school days. We’ve got our binders with us, so we may be able to share information and photos if you have a particular school you’re excited about. We also get excited, because a lot of times folks bring US information and photos.
Anyhow, please come see us while you’re at the fair!
Get a one-room school education, when you join us at the fair.