Remembering......

Local One-room schools

Withee Township

Clark County, Wisconsin

From Kris Leonhardt's Owen-Withee Enterprise series,

"School Days:  Remembering local one room schools"

In the days before custodians, cooks, and aides, teachers were responsible for the day to day operations and maintenance of the school.

Throughout the day, students were assigned chores by the teacher to help keep the school in working order.

When students were chosen to complete a task, they saw it as an honor and completed them as quickly and properly as possible.

Younger pupils longed for the days when they would be asked to perform the duties that only older students were allowed to complete.

Duties included: placing coal or wood in the furnace/stove, erasing and washing black boards, cleaning erasers, sweeping the floor, raising and lowering the flag, bringing in the mail, and burning the waste paper.

As there was no indoor plumbling, students were also asked to bring in drinking water at the beginning of the day. Some schools had wells with pumps, while others required water to be "fetched" from a neighboring farm.

"We had to go outside and pump water into a pail," explains Donald Rogalski, "Then we carried it into the school and placed it into a water cooler."

Upon completion of the tasks, students were then granted a reward in the form of praise or payment.

"After we carried in the wood, the teacher would give us an extra piece of candy," says Rogalski, "My sisters swept the floor after school. They were paid 10 cents a week for sweeping the floor."

Roglaski and his 11 brothers and sisters attended Pozen School.

The Pozen School was located in section 28 of the Withee Township approximately 1/8 mile north of County Road X on the east side of Gorman Avenue. The school stood to the immediate south of the railroad tracks where trains once traveled west to Minneapolis.

"We had freight trains going by the windows. You could see all the animals and hobos," says Rogalski, "If we were caught (looking), we would get our fingers clipped with a ruler."

The Pozen School housed two rooms. One room being used for classes, while the other was used as a playroom.

One-half mile south and two miles east of the Pozen school site, the "old" Sterling School building still stands.

The words PUBLIC SCHOOL still span the front of the brick building, looking much as it did when eager students performed their daily tasks.

Established in 1881, the Sterling School was one of the early schools in the area

The Sterling School building is located in section 34 of the Withee Township, on the southwest corner of what is now Highway 29 and Fischer Avenue. The building is now used as a private residence.

One mile east and two and one-half miles north of the Sterling School, you will come to the site of the Pineland School.