December 19, 2013
Memories of a Country School Christmas written by Ethelene Dyer Jones
I started school in first grade (we didn’t have kindergarten then) in 1936 in a brand new school building that replaced an old gray two-story structure. The new building with its two rooms was cozy and inviting. I remember the “new wood” smell of my first days there. Winter days the rooms were warmed by wood-burning heaters. We students carried in the wood from the woodpile fed by wagonloads of wood brought by fathers of students. Teachers made the fires early those winter mornings and kept them stoked and fed during the school day. I had seven years of happy instruction in that two-teacher country school, from 1936-1943. I had an additional year there in 1949-1950 in my very first year as a teacher. Then I was the only teacher, since student population had dwindled to 25 students in all seven grades. Christmas memories of my seven years as a student and one year as a teacher there bring happy memories of a country school Christmas.
“Drawing names” was done early in December so we could have enough time to get the present for the person whose name we had drawn. I remember the teacher wanting to see the name we had drawn, writing down who got whose name, and urging us not to tell anyone whose name we had drawn. (How hard that secret was to keep!) Of course I didn’t know as a young student why the teacher wanted to know the names each had drawn. But I found out later that was so the teacher herself could get gifts and have them labeled “from” the students to the student whose name had been drawn, as she knew which families couldn’t afford to buy gifts. The teachers did not want anyone to be left out. And the teacher assured the parents of these students that “someone” was furnishing gifts for their students to give. In this way, everyone got a gift when gifts were distributed by Santa Claus at the end of our Christmas program.
Our “art” work for Christmas (and other special days) was displayed above our blackboard and on the windows. Decorations were made for our Christmas tree which was provided by one of the fathers. We strung colored paper into chains and also laced popcorn into chains with needle and thread handled very carefully. Some years, we might have had some glitter and glue to add sparkle to our hand-made star at the top of our tree. We didn’t have electricity in the building in those years before World War II, so we had no strings of lights. But to the children who beheld it, and worked to make it so, our school Christmas was beautiful.
Preparations for “the Christmas Play,” recitations, singing and other aspects of the program were begun early in December. Every student had a part. For the younger children, an acrostic such as C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S J-O-Y or M-E-R-R-Y C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S ~ H-A-P-P-Y N-E-W Y-E-A-R would be filled in with a two- or four-line poem, memorized and practiced in order to get the recitation perfect for when our family and friends gathered for our big Christmas production. I remember how my knees trembled and how I feared I might forget my lines. But it all seemed to work well, and even if anyone made a slight mistake, our audiences liked and appreciated our attempts at public performance. In that little country school I learned to be bold in speaking and unafraid to participate in group performances. Other memories of these programs over seven years were acting in simple dramas that told the story of Christmas, and singing songs, some new, some the traditional old carols. And at the end our guests joined in to sing with us.
How our teachers there on their meager salaries managed to get all their students gifts, I will never quite know. But I can remember pencil boxes, goody bags, books and simple educational toys, all bearing names of my beloved teachers at each Christmas gathering. In addition, we got bags of candy, an orange or apple, and some nuts, given by our faithful Santa Claus, whom we learned was Mr. Joe Hunter, husband of our upper-grades teacher, Mrs. Florence Hunter.
We had a moveable partition that divided the two rooms of our two-room school. This was taken down for all our programs, like Christmas and the end of school graduations. A portable stage was set up and we were all ready for our production, the “Choestoe School Christmas Program.” We sent out invitations to parents and others, and had a great day and a crowd to watch us. We were happy and proud to have an audience. Our school was beautiful, and so were the children and teachers who were ready for “Christmas company,” with plenty of Christmas spirit and a lot of love and happiness spreading around. What a privilege it was to celebrate Christmas at Choestoe School. When I taught my first year there, the only teacher, I followed much the same patterns as I had experienced when I was a student there. The school was consolidated with Union County Elementary School in the fall of 1954.
On October 31, 2013, that same schoolhouse, dating from 1936, stood stately and beautiful on a plot of ground that had once been a portion of my father’s farm. Moved and restored, it was dedicated on that day and named The Ethelene Dyer Jones Choestoe School and Community Center. I was surprised, awed and grateful that it was named in my honor. Now the schoolhouse where I began my educational and teaching career is ready for another useful purpose, a gathering place for a community and a voting precinct to help preserve our American way of life. I hope many more memories will be made at Choestoe Schoolhouse in its new role as Community Center.
I hope you enjoyed Ethelene’s guest post as much as I did! I could just see the children gathered around the wood stove getting reading to start school. I can also see clearly the seed of education that started in that small Choestoe School House.
The growth of it begin as a small sapling with Ethelene as a young student, then as a steadily growing tree as Ethelene was a young teacher, and finally as a full grown tree with roots branching out in all directions as Ethelene spent her career educating students in Appalachia sending each one out with increased knowledge and hope for a brighter future.
—December 19, 2013
Ten years later I still enjoy reading Ethelene’s memories of school Christmases she enjoyed as a girl in the north Georgia mountains.
Last night’s video: Cozy & Festive Christmas Decorating.
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Just as I remember it too. Those paper chains were the first ornaments we learned to make as children.
I felt like I was right there in that old school. I love that story.
Oh I loved reading all the stories of Christmas past it brought back so many memories of my own!
I remember in grade school one of our teachers would hang a wreath out side her classroom door with wrapped hard candy all around it with small scissors attached so we could cut a piece of the candy off every morning.
It was so much fun!
Also I remember one Christmas I was only about 6 years old and I never was one to peak into my presents before Christmas but there was one wrapped in tissue paper and I kept looking at it because it had my name on it.
I finally picked it up and it was very heavy I just couldn’t figure out what it could be.
On Christmas morning I couldn’t wait that was the first present I opened. It was a metal cash register. I was so surprised! It made a dinging sound when you made a sale just like the real cash register at the stores with fake play money inside.
I came from a large family with 4 brothers and sisters so I know it was very hard back then but mom and dad always gave us a good Christmas. We was very blessed.
I loved reading this. I’m inspired by the way the teachers and adults of the community managed to scrape together and make it special for everyone and the joy the children got from the simple gifts and decorations. My kids love when we decorate with dried orange slices and paper snowflakes. We’ve had a popcorn string on our list for this year. I’ve never tried making one yet.
Thank you for this repost I did not subscribe to the blind pig and the acorn when this was originally posted.. It stirred up memories of my grandmother .She too taught school , in rural Mississippi ..
My Mama and Daddy both went to one room schools. They both had fond memories and some not so fond.
Raleigh is known for being a city with a lot of educational facilities. The oldest standing public school building is Murphey School in the 400 block of N. Person Street, built in 1916 and named after Archibald Murphey. In the days before by passes and interstate highways, Person Street was US #1 highway as it passed through town by the school. As kids, we use to compete to point out the ‘foreign’ (out-of-state) license plates on cars. Homes with rooms to let for tourists – with large signs out front – were to the South and North of the school.
The school served the Oakwood District of North Raleigh and all of the post War construction on the North and East sides of town, at least until post-war building allowed new schools in Longview Gardens and Brookside to accommodate growth. The 3-story building housed 17 classrooms (IIRC), a library, a cafeteria, and an auditorium. The wooden staircases were not replaced by fire resistant metal and concrete stairs until 1953-54. Student population at its highest was probably about 500 kids. The 1st floor was what we called the basement and housed the cafeteria, boiler rooms, and maintenance facilities. The PTA and ‘grade mothers’ would arrange at least one dance in the cafeteria for 6th and 7th-graders before they went off to high school for their teen years. I attended Murphey from 1948 through 7th grade in 1955.
Except for my family, this school had the greatest influence on who I became. There was no public kindergarten in those days. I suspect that most mothers of the children who attended Murphey were homemakers and didn’t work outside the home regularly because there was a very large and active PTA. My mother was one of them as well she should have been because all 9 of her kids attended Murphey for most, if not all, of their elementary schooling.
My teachers’ names: Miss Firesheets, Miss Fitzgerald, Miss Woltz (later Mrs. Boyd), Mrs. Calhoun, Miss Crawford, Mrs. Riggan, and Miss Burton. Principles during my tenure included Miss Emma Conn, for whom an elementary school was later named, Russell Jefferson, and Donald Weed, “The Tall Grassy Kind” as he liked to introduce himself.
The NC Governor’s Mansion sits 2 blocks South of Murphey School. Governor Umpstead’s daughter attended during here 4th grade year. I don’t know if other governors’ kids attended Murphey, but we all were in awe of here being delivered by car to the school, accompanied by a Highway Patrolman, and retrieved daily for the 2 block trip. As innocent kids, we gave no thought to security issues but thought it was just the governor being snooty.
Every class had its own Christmas activities and there was a Christmas pageant held in the auditorium so parents and kin could watch their offspring and siblings perform. Over the years I was a child at the manger, a shepherd, a Magi, and finally, Joseph, in my last year.
Just wanted to contrast what a mid-century public school was like in a city in North Carolina.
This brings back sweet memories from my childhood elementary school. Our school was larger with a classroom for each grade (no kindergarten), cafeteria and an auditorium. All the parents and teachers knew each other so the school was very community centered. I remember “drawing names” as Ethelene described. She is only the second person I have heard of with her first name. I used to have a friend named Ethelene.
Beautiful story. I’m each child got something . I remember in 2 grade, we drew names and when it came time to exchange our gifts, the girl that git mine didn’t come. The teacher handed me a box wrapped. I opened it and it was chocolate covered cherries. I didn’t like them but that was ok. I sat and watched the other kids play with their dolls or trucks. I gave the chocolate covered cherries to my mom.
What a wonderful, touching story. I have seen so much change in the school system here and it’s not just my area but all over. I am thankful my grandchildren have some really good teachers this year but it’s so different now. Their elementary school has over nine hundred children in it. Way too many. They don’t get to have any holiday parties and if you do want to send something for the children, it can’t be homemade. It has to be store bought for safety reasons. They had a fifth-grade musical a few weeks ago and all that went had to walk through the new metal detectors they installed last year, and wouldn’t you know, I set it off. It was my eye glass case of all things. When they had the fall festival back in October the cake walk winners received a box of Little Debbie snack cakes. I told them about the beautiful cakes that we had for winning when I was a student, and they couldn’t get over it. I want them to be safe but not afraid to go to school. I pray for them every day and for all the children that are in school.
Thank you for such a heartwarming story. My mother’s oldest sister taught my dad in rural Arkansas. She was given a scholarship to college, however, my grandparents didn’t allow her to attend saying she had to help care for her younger siblings. After moving to California she became a kindergarten teacher, however, because she didn’t have enough college credits she was fired after many years of teaching. She then began painting with her fingers. She told me at first used black paint I suspect to remove the sadness of her life’s troubles. She eventually began painting beautiful flowers and log cabins and many other subjects all using her fingers. Later she was hired by the Jr college to teach her technique of finger painting. I think this was a victory for her and showed those who make lemonade out of lemons find peace in the end.
Such a lovely story today. Sweet memories of cloak rooms, chocolate cover cherries for gift exchange, simple Christmas plays and aroma of home cooked meals coming from the lunchroom.
Thanks for sharing! Blessings to all.
A heartwarming, beautiful story! Thank you for sharing it. I would also like to commemorate this day in 1941 when my uncle was in the attack at Pearl Harbor. He survived, thank God. God Bless You All.
My Mother has told me stories of her education at Pine Top School in the mountains of Union County. It was a one room school too. She loved school and respected her teachers. Many years later it became Pine Top Baptist Church, and that is the first church where my husband Pastored. That was 50 years ago. One Sunday after church I pulled up a white pine sapling and brought it home and set it out in our back yard. Now it towers over twice as high as our house. I look at it and see it’s beauty and I think about the stories that tree could tell if it could only talk. God is the Author.
Thanks for the memories; a most enjoyable read, Tipper. I am a product of the “one room school house” system so it touched home. An auntie was a teacher in several one room schools over the years; I still find the names of some in our county quite interesting as were the little schools, themselves. Each served a small rural community which occasionally was the little school’s name; my own school was Mt. Zion – many family members attended Old Glory – other schools were Rocky Branch, Coal Bank Mt., Gap Creek, Zula, and on and on. They all served their communities well . Kudos to all!
As I write this there is now 20 comments. I have read all of them and am reminded of a Bible verse, I can not quote it word for word or tell you the book, chapter or verse. But it it goes something like this “anything you do for the least of my children is the same as doing it for me”. I think they are many school teachers along with others that are going to be richly blessed for the things they did for their students or children.
Randy- it’s Matthew 25:40. Merry Christmas.
Matthew 25:40 from the King James Bible doesn’t say “‘ do for’ one for the least of my ‘children'”, it says ” ‘done it unto’ one of the least of these my ‘brethren'”. I don’t study any but the KJV Bible. There is a vast difference between “do for” and “done it unto” in my mind. I don’t know what translation you read, yours might say “do for” and use “children” instead of “brethren”. If that is the verse, please let me know what you version read. I would like to read it.
In Matthew 19:14, Jesus blesses the little children and bids them to come to him.
No matter the verse, children are very important to Jesus. God bless all teachers – theirs is a special calling!
Lenora- thank you.
I love the stories of small school houses. It brings back my memories of going to a 1 room school. There were about a dozen or so students. Most lived close by, every one had to walk to school. Above the school was a small grave yard. My grand parents and great grand parents are buried there. I lived the farthest from the school, but got the job of going early to build a fire. The school was warm when other students and teacher got there. I got 3, dollars a month for my work, a lot of money back then. Some days it was rough walking through 30 inches of snow. We missed no school back then, not like today. The state would deliver a load of coal in the fall. I would cut the wood for building the fires. I learned more in 1 room than I did in high school when I got old enough to go there. I really miss those days, when time was hard, but there was plenty of love.
I know a couple of teachers who regularly share their funds and personal time with students who need help. It is a part of their caring nature, a testament to who they are. One is married to a retired teacher-coach who bought food and provided transportation to players who otherwise wouldn’t have eaten or been at practice some days. I’m very proud of my daughter and granddaughter, the teachers, and of my son-in-law, the coach who cared.
Gene I am commenting too often again but my oldest grandson had two very special teachers teachers in high school. One was his FFA teacher M. Rollins I have already mentioned and another teacher Mrs. Jordon, she would stay after school for at least two unpaid hours each day to help students that were struggling, it did not make any difference about their grade or subject. Rollins and another FFA teacher B. Burdette (Bird) saved and help pull my grandson out of depression he was struggling with after his mother’s death. Rollins and Bird are the names the two teachers wanted to be called by and the students went by their last name or were given a nickname by the teachers. These two teachers made their classes fun and would go along with playing tricks or jokes on one another all the while they were teaching. My son went to a technical school after graduating high school and took an auto mechanic course. He told me I thought we were just cutting up and having fun in FFA, I didn’t realize how much I was learning while in those classes. I know a lot more mechanical things learned in these classes than the others from other schools know in my auto mechanic class. Many times I have prayed and thanked God for teachers such as this and tried to tell the teachers I mentioned how much I appreciated them. I am going to say this, many times today’s teachers are blamed for the failures of the students, when the blame ought to be placed on the parents for not caring about their children’s school work or disciplining their children.
The high school my grandkids attend has approximately 2000 students, I think Ethelenes school was a better place for a kid to receive an education.
Good morning, Tipper! I am a big history buff. I have often thought how I missed my time to live. I love the Gilded Age of 1880’s up to the Great Depression. Ethelene’s description of her school and her memories just reinforced to me a gentler, more laid back time. I would love to be a bug on the wall on a typical day in her school room just to experience it in person! I hope Granny is doing well. God’s blessings on you and yours, and all your subscribers!
My mother taught in a rural mountain for two years. The school had less than twenty pupils in five grades. Her school went one to two weeks longer than mine due to closures for snow days. She took me with her those weeks so Grandma wouldn’t have to constantly chase me out of troublesome situations.
I started first grade in the Fall of 1947 at age five in a two room school for eight grades. There were folding doors to divide the two rooms referred to as the little room and the big room. Two pot bellied heaters provided heat in the Winter. If you had a seat near the heater you roasted on one side and if you were seated away from the heater you wore two pairs of socks and some students kept their coats on most of the morning. The school closed half way through my second year of high school because the pupil population had dropped. Through my first six years there were two teachers and for my last two years we had only one teacher. I was ’employed’ in grades six through eight to clean the chalk boards and burn the trash each day. In the Winter I filled the heaters with coal and closed the lower vents. The next morning I opened the vents and refilled the stoves with coal. The teacher gave me a key to the school so I could open and close it each day. I was paid the grand sum of 50 cents per week in Fall and Spring and 75 cents during Winter. I also helped teach the lower grades in reading and math while the teacher worked with upper grades. I gave out spelling words to the four upper grades on Fridays because I made 100 when the teacher gave them out on Wednesday. We had 20 new words each week. I think now that I was allowed these extra chores to keep me out of trouble. If I was busy I wasn’t pestering someone else. Today I would have been labeled as a child with A D D. I loved to read and read the entire set of encyclopedias as well as two versions of dictionaries. The County Bookmobile came every two weeks and we were limited to two books each time. I read my two and sometimes traded with other students the second week to have something to read at home. I was labeled as a ‘trouble maker’ in high school and that title stayed with me through college and graduate school. My wife and most of my family and friends would say it still fits me.
I loved this account by Miss Jones! It brought back so many memories of my early school years and the kind teachers I had. We had no idea how much love and work went into all that they did for us!
I remember the Christmas plays and the handful of parents and teachers who came to watch us in our little country school. We truly felt like a celebrity especially if we were chosen to play one of the main characters. When it was time to draw names for the gift exchange, we always hoped a certain few students would draw our names. If the student’s dad owned a coal mine the recipient of their gift might be a pair of gloves or socks and not a box of cherry candy like most students received.
I loved reading that story about the old schoolhouse. Some of my best memories were born around a wood heater and stoking the firewood. I also loved cutting firewood and stacking it. We also scouted for our yearly Christmas tree when we were in the woods cutting firewood. Tipper, I thank you once again for the memories, keeping me close to where I come from. Love and prayers to all of you and Granny and Little Mamas 1 & 2.
In reading the post and the comments thus far today I am struck by a common behind-the-scenes feature of the good memories. And that was simply caring; by the teacher, the students and the community. In such atmosphere, how could memories not be good. And yes, caring teachers still invest themselves in unpaid effort and in their own money because they care. God bless them, every one.
I love good memories. Mrs. Jones was a wonderful teacher. You can tell by her writing. I didn’t go to a one-room schoolhouse, but I did have teachers that I remember. Mrs. Repulski taught English in high school. Her love for literature was given to me. I will never forget that my love of books and stories was her gift to me. Thank you Tipper and to Mrs. Jones.
Such a sweet story.
Nothing says “Appalachia” quite like those brown paper lunch bags containing an apple, an orange, and some candy. Our church still keeps that tradition.
One of my most prized possessions is a little booklet of Christmas poems that my great-uncle, a teacher in West Virginia, apparently gave his students for Christmas. It is quite small and only a few pages long, held together with a tasseled cord. All of it is printed, including the dedication on the first page, and the publisher’s name is on the back of it. My uncle taught in a logging boom town, so I am guessing these booklets were provided by the company to the schools. It is still in fine condition; we even have the little wax paper sleeve and Christmas sticker that it came in.
I can relate to this story because I went to a little one room school, our family was the only family that lived up the hollow past the school, so we always had to walk, we had a key and would always get there before the teacher and other students. We would start t a fire in the stove so it could be warming up before others got there , the students would gather dead tree limbs from the mountains around the school to help get the fire going hot enough to catch the coal on fire ,
What beautiful memories she has of Christmas in her country school she attended and taught at for a year I was glad they saved her two room school building and moved it on her dad’s farm land to use as a community building. They have preserved history with so many memories for her and others. Now she and all surrounding families have made new memories to share as they use it for gatherings and voting. Wonderful memory stories she has shared. Thank you for sharing them with us, Tipper!
Ethelene’s story recalls me back to the stories told to me from my paternal grandparents who each taught in a tiny one room school house during the 1920’s & 1930’s. Later, a new school was built and my grandfather became principal, while my grandmother continued to teach 3rd grade. When new desks came to the school, Pa saved the old ones. The desks eventually passed on to me. When my grandmother taught me at home, she had me set up in a little school area in the basement where I was put into one of the old school desks she moved there just for that purpose. The wooden desk with cast iron legs formed in a fancy curled pattern, had a round hole in the upper right hand corner which was used by students during the days ink was used for writing. It contained a little glass jar where the teacher poured in the ink. Ma allowed me to try using an ink pen to dip in the deep black ink in that ink well. Such memories! My grandparents brought alive in my childhood in the 1960’s, experiences just like those of a student of long ago. For this I’m blessed! Allison Gunne
I really liked this story of a two room school house I believe both my parents and both sets of grandparents would relate like stories. I remember growing up in south Florida were my brothers and sisters I had( there was 5 of us) we all attended the same elementary school. My older sister and I had some of the same teachers matter of fact 4 of us had the same 2nd grade teacher. When my youngest brother started 1st grade that 2nd grade teacher retired.We all said she heard he was coming and she was done teaching the Wood clan. Oh what memories that story has brought back up. That school was retired many years ago and the building turned into a museum. Would love to go back and go through that building much memories it would bring up.
Such a lovely story, I felt like I was in the school house with them all.
Thank you, Tipper for sharing this sweet teachers memories of an old country school. My elementary school was called Jackson and I have wonderful memories of many of the same kind of PTA programs we put on for our parents. We had something called Fun Night…it was in the fall of the year. Pie Suppers were another fun activity.
If classrooms were handled like they were back in the day, our students would be better off.
Carolyn
I enjoyed reading this. I started first grade at Fork Shoals elementary/grammar school in 1960. It didn’t have a kindergarten either. We did not exchange gifts but would have a Christmas program each year in the auditorium with all of the 7 grade students present and sing Christmas carols and the Bible Christmas Story of Jesus read to us. We would also get a few pieces of fruit. Fast forward to when my children attended the same school when Mrs. Dean, the granddaughter of my third grade teacher was the principal. Her grandmother would have a devotion each morning and say a blessing each day before eating lunch with her students. At one of the Christmas programs for both the students and their parents, she said even though I am told I can’t do this, I am a Christian and I am going to start the program with a prayer. The audience gave her a standing ovation and nothing was done about her praying. Many teachers never get the credit they deserve, many do more for their students than just teach. My grandson’s FFA teacher bought and gave my grandson’s friend a Carharrt winter coat and boots along with pants and shirt ( all name brand like the other kids were wearing) for his friend. I would be willing to bet he did this for some of his other students. I know of other teachers buying and giving things throughout the school year to their students. This year my church has picked up names of some students (about 15) at the area middle school school and bought gifts they had wrote on a paper list they needed. I gave my grandson my credit card and he took his friend I mentioned to Walmart and bought him some clothes for school and would feel comfortable wearing to church so he would come to church with my grandson. This boy has became a good, fine young man and has told my grandson he would always remember me doing this for him, that is all the payback I need.
May God bless all the kindhearted teachers and people that do good deeds all along the way , not for fame, recognition, or a pay back, but from their loving heart. We all leave some kind of “footprint” in this life.
I didn’t go to a small country school. I did go to catholic school. So we always had a Christmas program. We made decorations and played outside in mountains of snow. Looking back it still seems magical.
I was privileged to have attended a four-room school house for my last two years of grade school. It was wonderful, a big family, actually. Sadly it was torn down. A real shame for all the history it provided. It was brick and even had a bell tower. I am now a retired school teacher . . . we were forever spending money on students and school supplies–even for ourselves.
Thank you for another glimpse into Christmases past. These glimpses are a good wholesome way to begin the day. At 70 years of age and being an art teacher as my career I can remember and relate. The changes in focus that I see at Christmas now are unsettling to me and the simpler, more straight forward times now past hold a bit of comfort . Thank You!
I remember drawing names for Christmas gifts in school seems like through the 3rd grade. also passing out Valentines day cards each year. for some reason I don’t remember this past 3rd grade. I wonder if some new regulation went into effect.
What a lovely story. I am a retired teacher, so I can relate as a teacher and student to her memories of school. As a child Christmas in school was always a big to do. I too remember the Christmas plays, and of course the classroom parties. Precious memories. Thank you Tipper.
I loved this story of a one room school. My mother was in a one room school with 4 other children on Hilton Head Island before there was a bridge there( or electricity) in the 1940s and 50s. Then she drove the school bus after taking a barge to high school on the mainland. As Codie could tell you from her trip to the coast of S.C. , this area has grown in population a lot since then. Wonderful memories. Thank you for this.
I really enjoyed your post this morning. I can just imagine what that two-room school house may have looked like, mostly because I went to one myself. There were two large rooms and two teachers at my school when I began in first grade. The “little” room was called that because it was first, second, and third grades. The “big” room was third through fifth grades. Each room was also heated by a pot belly stove, but being in WV, it was heated by coal. There was a coal bucket beside the stoves and the teachers fed the stoves shovelfuls during the day and kept us all cozy and warm. In the corner of each room was a sink with running water, where we washed our hands before lunch and after going to the outhouse. The only other room was a small kitchen where our wonderful cook made the most delicious lunches. We all lined up at the doorway and got our plates and milk and ate at our desks. Each Christmas, we always had so much fun making paper chains and decorations for our tree and putting on a program for our parents. I don’t really remember much about gifts but it didn’t matter. We found so much joy in decorating and learning our parts for the play and songs. I remember when I was in the 4th grade, our teacher took us sledding. There was a big hill across the road and through a field. I especially remember that our teacher had a huge wooden sled that was long enough for three kids. He always made our days special. Thank you for making me think about those wonderful days this morning.