ELM GROVE SCHOOL

SCHOOLHOUSE IS THE LAST OF ITS KIND

       Nestled in the hills and trees south of Glenwood sits a building that looks more like an abandoned farmhouse than a country schoolhouse.

	Elm Grove School

      For 88-year-old Franklin Johnson, the old Elm Grove School is a link to his childhood and a piece of Mills County history.

      "It's the only one like this left in Mills County, Johnson said.  "It was closed in the 1950's but is still standing.  I don't think a lot of people even know it's here."

       Johnson still has vivid members of the education he received during his eight years as a student at the school from the fall of 1919 to the spring of 1928.  He can recite the names of the teachers he had at the school-Bertha Lee, George Mathew, Gladies Morford, Georgia Deitchler, Ruth Friend, Vivian Rager, Dorothy Jackson and Ruth Bannister.  He also remembers the school's superintendents--George Masters, Mary Rathke and Amy Hammers.

      "It was different back then," Johnson said.  "Kids only used to go to school when they weren't working for their parents.  Kids came to the school from a two-mile radius on horses and buggies.  I had four brothers and one sister graduate from the school, and there was an average of 40-45 people every year who attended the school."

      Johnson said the school's staff had some unusual, but effective methods of disciplining their students.

"(George) Masters used to go out and pull the elm sprouts out of the ground and he'd whip kids with them."  he recalled.  "They whipped people back in those days.  They didn't have the kids running the schools like they do now."

       The Elm Grove School is located about five miles south of Glenwood near the intersection of 230th and Norris Ave. on private property owned by the Morris Terry family.

        Johnson said he would like to see the schoolhouse restored to its original condition.  The building was constructed in 1913 after the first Elm Grove School was destroyed during the famous Easter Sunday tornado in March of that year.

        "It sure would be a wonderful thing if they could rebuild that school," Johnson said. "It would take a little money, but it's worth saving.  It's the only one like it around."

~ source:  Opinion Tribune, November 5, 2003, Courtesy of Joe Foreman (Editor)
~ Photo taken 8-16-04 and transcription by Roseanna Zehner