MEMORIES OF HALE SCHOOL

Marian Dwelley Cousins was the youngest child in her family and they lived across the road from the school. At age four she would tag along with her brothers, Dana, Harvard, and Paul and play with the children before school and at recess time. While the others were inside, she would wait on a rock pile. Storekeeper and neighbor Charlie Brown suggested that Marian should go to school instead of waiting outside. Thus started Marian’s formal education.

The building had two doors, the door on the right for girls and the one on the left for the boys. Inside each door was a coatroom. The teacher’s desk was in an alcove between these two rooms. In the classroom were the typical desk/chair sets for two people each, big ones in the back. Also in the front, between the teacher’s desk and the pupils, was a long heater stove that could hold wood three or four feet long. The stovepipe ran all the way to the chimney in the back of the room, allowing for lots of radiant heat. The woodshed was outside, between the schoolhouse and the Spearin Road. On cold days the teacher might make a big pot of cocoa for after recess. The older boys kept the fire and also filled the water jug using ten-quart pails. In the back of the classroom were two doors, each leading to an attached toilet.

Within this one room schoolhouse, most lessons were taught to small groups or individuals. Marian’s first book was The Hen Found a Bag of Flour. Marian learned to read this by rote. She also listened in on other lessons and had finished grades 1 – 9 by the time she was twelve. Her father would not allow her to go to high school in Woodland at such a young age, so she repeated grade 9 several times.

The school was decorated for most holidays, turkeys at Thanksgiving, Christmas tree and a gift of candy and popcorn from the teacher, hearts and a valentine box. At recess everyone played together as one big happy family. Her brother Harvard and Cecil Frost would occasionally get into a fight with a bloody nose, but would end the day best of buddies.

Marian’s sister Marjorie taught at the school. Marian considered that she was harder on the brothers than on the other children. Some other boys would blame her brothers and they would get punished. Marian didn’t like that. Miss Farnsworth, Francis Parlin, Joe Bragdon, Loretta Cortrell, and Nora Seamans were some of her teachers. Her favorite was Marshall Berry. He wasn’t the best disciplinarian, but his lessons were fun. He also would carry Marian to school on his shoulders when the snow was deep. Miss Kelley was the critic teacher. She was a large woman who visited once a month and was called Wee Miss Mousie behind her back.

Some of the schoolmates that Marian remembers are Ethel McArthur, Laurence Frost, Bertha Frost, Florice Hunnewell, Irene Perkins, Edith Hunnewell, Arlene Perkins, Elwood and Ira Perkins, Edna Frost, Arnold Perkins, Carl and Cecil Frost, Elbridge McArthur, Eleanor Frost, Buster Holmes, and naturally her three brothers, Dana, Harvard, and Paul. Others were Ellis, Freda and Grace Maxwell, Helen Demers, Ethel Knowles, and Shirley Hunnewell.

Marian went to high school in Woodland in the fall of 1931. Fletcher Perkins was just starting his years at Hale School when Marian was getting ready to leave. He remembers playing ball in Charlie Brown’s pasture, behind the school. Charlie had a spring house down there with a water pump. He remembers hearing the pump start and stop. His favorite teacher was Olive Edgerly, a nurse. She taught about the various body systems and the children would diagram them on the board. One day, the superintendent, Frank Day of Princeton, was visiting and Fletcher was asked to do the diagramming on the board. Mr. Day was quite impressed.

RETURN