Payette County ID Archives History - Letters .....Schools 1935
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/id/idfiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Patty Theurer seymour784@yahoo.com October 19, 2006, 1:46 am

Book Title: 

SCHOOLS
Written in 1935 by Miss Daisy Mason

In 1896 when the N. P. Colony was settled, a town hall and a water office were 
built, but no school house.  So for five years the Town Hall became the school 
house.  This building was located about where the bakery is now.  Across the 
street and north of the vacant lot near the post office was the Water Office.  
During the year a store was built a short distance north of Town Hall.  The 
Post office was in the store also.

The first settlers in the Payette Valley located near the river and creeks.  
They never dreamed that land farther away from the river would be settled some 
day.  Some of the people just north of the colony belonged in the district down 
on the river.  But this was such a long distance to go they were allowed to the 
school in the colony providing they furnished their own desks.  This was easily 
done since all the desks had been made by a carpenter and lacked paint and 
varnish.  They were made so they could be moved as the Town Hall was not always 
just a school house.  The school district near the river later became part of 
the New Plymouth district.  

The first teacher was a young man from Iowa.  Some high school subjects were 
taught as well as all the grade subjects, but the next year high school work 
was not given.  

The next year, 1897, Mr. D. A. Clemens of Tennessee who had bought ten acres in 
the colony taught the school.  Mr. Clemens was a Presbyterian minister and 
sometimes was the minister in the Town Hall Sunday morning.  Later on he was a 
mathmatics instructor at Caldwell College.

Miss Stovel, another original colonist, was one of the early teachers.  She and 
Miss Veasey lived in a cottage on the lot where the Crawford home is.  Some of 
the material used in constructing their house came from the Chicago 
Exposition.  At one time Miss Veasey and Miss Stovel had the post office and 
store.  

Miss Helen Gillespie was the first Caldwell College graduate to teach in N. P. 

Miss Ida Schenck of Caldwell was one of the first five teachers in the Colony.  
Some weekends she rode home horseback or relatives came after her with a team 
and buggy.

Miss Lena Whiffin was another Caldwell girl who taught in the old hall.

The boarding place for out of town teachers was grandma Burn’s home.  This is 
now the George Ackerman house.  Mr. Burns, a retired Methodist minister, had 
built the house himself.  

In 1904 the little brick school house was built.  One of the school board 
members, Mr. Rose, thought it was entirely too big.  Walter Burke and Joe Mason 
were the other members of the board.  Two teachers were now employed, Mr. 
Hambleton and Miss Kitty Ransom, now Mrs. Rustin Shaw.

The new school house meant a great deal to the people of the colony.  To have 
it as the Community Bldg now quite fits in with the place it occupied in the 
early history of the town.  


File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/id/payette/history/letters/schools21gms.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/idfiles/

File size: 3.5 Kb