April 25, 2010

•  HOW I SPENT MY SUNDAY AFTERNOON

  by AmericanJanet

  After fortifying ourselves at a bountiful fellowship dinner after the morning worship service at church, we boldly set out on an adventure. Our goal:

  To Find The Evening Shade School.

  Why, you may ask, would a school be lost? Well, it wasn’t, exactly. It just had not been used in many a year….many a decade, in fact.

  Let me explain. My good friend and fellow history and genealogy enthusiast, Susan, and I are compiling stories about Ozark County’s one-room schools for a book. At one point in the early 1900s, there were at least 90 such schools dotting the landscape of our fair but rugged county.

  Consolidation occurred in the 1960s, and the old school buildings were no longer needed for educating the children. All these years later, many of the old schools have disappeared, victims of progress, neglect and the ravages of time. A few survive, some having been remodeled into dwellings, some still being used as rural churches, and some just existing but in ruins.

  I had heard about Evening Shade from a couple of her former pupils, now in their 80s. They gave me the surprising information that this particular school was built of logs, and that it was still standing, although it has been since the 1940s that it has been used. The number of students dwindled in that decade to such a few that it became impossible to support a teacher. So the Evening Shade children were transferred to Romance, a neighboring district.

  All the earliest schools were built of logs, but this was the first one I’d heard of that was still standing. So off we went! We traveled down a graveled county road, turned at a mailbox onto an overgrown driveway, wound our way down into a holler and came to the house of the owners of the property.

  It sounds simple, doesn’t it? But let me also say that we went several miles down that county road, and all the while my Farmboy was protesting. He didn’t think it was a good idea. There was a No Trespassing sign beside the mailbox. These folks weren’t “natives” and might not welcome intruders who drove right up to their door uninvited. The hill going down was very steep, and there was absolutely no way to turn around. The minute he turned off the truck, we could hear the dog barking, not real friendly-like. And it just felt like we were perhaps not going to be welcomed.

  But I was on a mission. The only remaining log schoolhouse in the county deserved at least a photo in our book, and I was determined to get that photo, if it could be gotten.

  Mr. Meelhuysen came to the door, and I introduced us and plunged right into my spiel about the book, not giving him a chance to refuse. In fact, I don’t think he minded one bit. He grabbed a jacket, and we set off on “about a quarter-mile” hike through the woods.

  Some people measure distance in “abouts” with little reference to reality. This might have been the case with our hike to the Evening Shade School. We wound around the pond and began our ascent. For it was pretty much straight up. Henrik and I were in the lead, and I was carrying on a non-stop explanation of one-room schools and their importance to the history of our county. But soon, as the huffing and puffing became more insistent, the history lesson gave way to hiking and climbing in, pretty much, silence. Except for the gasping. I was thankful that Henrik was also huffing and puffing, so there was really no need to talk at this point. (Farmboy, bringing up the rear was effortlessly moving along, smiling as he became aware of my breathlessness. “I’ve been saying you need to get back into walking regularly…” Yes, dear.)

  I kept looking ahead for my first glimpse of the school, and after what seemed like a half-hour, it came when we summited that little hill. 

  

  Set back among the huge trees, I could see the weathered gray boards and was THANKFUL we had arrived!

  

  At first I was alarmed because I could not see logs. But Henrik said they were under the clapboards, which were probably added at some point when the logs began to deteriorate.

  

  I stepped right up to the door and peeked inside, hoping to get a photo of the logs that way. Suddenly, something BIG in there began thumping around noisily, and I jumped back, startled and stumbling. Henrik reassured me that it was not a bear but that buzzards were nesting in the attic. Dear Farmboy was doubled over with laughter and offered not one bit of assistance except to say that I should probably go right on in, since it probably wasn’t anything dangerous. I thanked him for his advice and did not take it. I did, however, peek in quickly to snap one quick shot of the logs.

  

  Below, you can see the chinking between the logs where the siding had come off. Thin pieces of wood were placed between the squared timbers before the gaps were filled in. There was evidence of repeated chinking….different colors and materials.

  

  As you can see from this rear shot, a previous owner had covered over the broken-out windows with tin.

  

  And you can see the foundation….stacked, flat stones.

   

  

  Henrik closed the door on the Evening Shade School, and we made our way back down the hill, via a nearby spring

  

  where drinking and washing water was obtained by the bucketful for the use of the students. They took turns carrying the day’s water up the hill to the school. And it didn’t hurt them one bit.

  

  In the valley, the old road bed was filled with masses of May Apples…do you know what a May Apple blossom looks like?

  

  I was satisfied with the results of our hike through the rugged woods. It is difficult to imagine that children received an education in this tiny structure, but the ones who did so remember it fondly. And from what Susan and I have learned, the standards were often much higher than what is required of most elementary school children today. One woman, now 92, said she had to do advanced square-root problems to pass her eighth grade examination. I remember learning that as a junior in high school….and sure couldn’t do it today!

  

  I will share some more things about one-room schools in the days ahead. Hope you enjoyed visiting Evening Shade with me this evening!

   

   

  • 10:25 pm
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