SCHOOLS: NEW HARMONY, MARSHALL COUNTY, KY, 1897 From: "Julia Mortenson" Subject: New Harmony School, 1897 Date: Friday, April 08, 2005 4:38 PM ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ky/kyfiles.html ************************************************ From the memoirs of my grandfather, Ernest Greenwood Maddox, p. 42: "That Fall 1896 through the influence of Naomi Reeves I was given the school at New Harmony, a country school near Fristo Ky. New Harmony was in a prosperous farming community - God fearing, church going, honest, up right, looking to the future for better things. I boarded with W. N. McGregor. a died-in-the-wool Republican and a devout Primitive Baptist (Hard Shell). He was a firm believer in predestination and I, being half Methodist and half Christian (Campbellite) we had many discussions on religion. And he being a staunch Republican and I a Democrat, politics were not neglected. This was election year and would be my first time to vote. Mr. McGregor loaned me a horse and I rode the six miles to Briensburg and voted for Wm. Jennings Bryan. My school at New Harmony was by the current standards at that time a success. 1898-1899. I went back to New Harmony. To get me to teach the school the patrons agreed to give me free board if I would stay a week at twenty different places. W. N. McGregor agreed that I could make his home my headquarters and stay there Saturday and Sunday if I desired and I desired because it was a good place. He had three boys, Thomas B., Cad and Roy. Tom was developing into an orator. He went on and for several year followed the Chatauqua circuit. He studied law and has practiced civil and corporate law for many years. He has make his home in Frankfort, Ky. Frank Reeder, another one of my pupils, studied medicine and was in the medical corps with the U. S. Government in the Canal Zone during the building of the Panama Canal. After that he had his own hospital in the Canal Zone. Boarding with a different family each week was a pleasant experience. Of course, I had the best of everything to eat and was treated like a guest, and I had a wonderful school. I believe everyone in the district liked me. When school was out I stayed on with the McGregors and worked through the wheat and hay harvest, and became interested in selling mowers, rakes and binders. I was always interested in machinery. " Julia