About 50 people attended Saturday’s dedication ceremony for a new audio exhibit in the Alton one-room schoolhouse at Forest Park Museum near Perry, most with roots in Dallas County’s rural schools and two who were themselves students in the Alton School.
JoAnn Harmelink of the Nu Alpha Gamma Chapter of Delta Kappa Gamma welcomed attendees and spoke about the genesis of the audio exhibit in the Alton School. The Nu Alpha Gamma Chapter, a society of women teachers, adopted the Alton Schoolhouse at Forest Park Museum in the hope of making people aware of the crucial place of the one-room school in Iowa’s rural educational heritage.
Harmelink thanked the project’s sponsors for grants received from the Dallas County Foundation and Grow Greene County, Preservation Iowa, the Upsilon State Chapter of the Delta Kappa Gamma Society and PEO International. Local help came from Applied Art and Technology in Urbandale, the Raccoon Valley Radio, PEGASUS TV 12, Graphics2U, Hometown Heritage and the Dallas County Conservation Board.
Attendees first gathered to view a video produced by PEGASUS volunteer Doug Wood, featuring interviews with former students in one-room schoolhouses. In the video, Nu Alpha Gamma member Sue Leslie moderates a group discussion with one-room schoolers Rose Menz, Darlene Pitsenbarger, Gloria Renshaw, Linda Burke and Charlie Thompson, who shared many memories of
School days, school days,
Dear old Golden Rule days,
‘Reading and ‘riting and ‘rithmetic
Taught to the tune of the hick’ry stick.
Two former students of the Alton School itself attended Saturday’s dedication, Patricia Daugherty Siglin of Perry, who went to third grade in the Alton School in 1939, and David Menz of Perry, who attended Alton School in its final year. The school closed in 1961 after 94 years in operation, the longest tenure of any Dallas County rural school. The structure was moved to Forest Park Museum in 1964.
Having met some of the people behind the voices on the audio exhibit, the audience moved to the one-room schoolhouse itself. Leslie demonstrated the array of push-button audio narratives, which each last one to two minutes. Their sound quality was excellent, and the console that houses them perfectly matches the school room’s aesthetic.
Education in Dallas County springs from humble roots. Writing in 1869 in “Past and Present of Dallas County,” R. F. Wood said, “The first school was taught in 1847-8 in a log cabin which stood a few rods northeast of the present site of No. 7, Adel township. The expenses of this first institution of learning were borne by W. W. Miller, who engaged Stephen K. Scovell to teach the first term. The school was free to all who wished to attend. The teacher received eight dollars per month and board.”
Leslie reviewed other historical highlights of county education, thanking the many residents who shared their memories as well as some who could not attend Saturday’s dedication, such as the late Hazel Whitney, who taught at many rural schools in her long career. Whitney never married, but several of her nieces and nephews attended the dedication in her honor.
“One-room schoolhouses are vanishing from the landscape along with the unique education experience they offered,” Leslie told the assembly. “We hope to preserve those memories for generations to come.”
Taking my grandmother, Kaye Peoples, to visit this today. She was the last teacher in the Alton School House!