The One Room Schoolhouse of Yesteryear

By Ed Sommerville

There was a time in America that the one room schoolhouses were the only schools available in small towns and rural America.  Their schoolteachers were very dedicated to do the job they were chosen to do.  During the cold winter, the only heat was a wood or coal stove in the room.  She as well as her students had to find their own way to school regardless of rain or snow.  There was no such thing as a thermostat at that time so it was necessary to add wood or coal during the day.  She would have to teach all grades through 8th and prepare for the next day’s lessons.  Would you say these conditions were desirable for these young children to receive a good education in a schoolhouse that only cost a few hundred dollars?

Now a little over one hundred years later we have what it takes to get a good education.  We have built multimillion dollar schools with central heating and air conditioning and millions of dollars in school buses to take them to school in any weather, along with all the comforts imaginable.  They have state of the arts in electronics along with gymnasiums, cafeterias and some with swimming pools. 

In the thirties a new subject appeared in schools called Social Studies which became one of the most important subjects, the one that was used to attack Christianity along with our American independence and our true American history.  Their goal was to change our values into a secular humanist nation with interdependence, whereby we could become citizens of the world.   This has worked out well for them as God is not welcome in our schools or any government property, and you will find little resistance for the intrusive surveillance and police state actions that are starting to surface at a rapid pace, or the one world government they have planned for us. 

Later we had new subjects taught in our schools, an idea that did not originate from the parents, called sex education.  This has really worked out well, as we no longer have teen age pregnancies or sexually transmitted diseases.  Teen age abortions are now a thing of the past.  Today’s students are taught that there is no difference in the races except the color of  their skin, and any other idea is racist. 

They are also taught tolerance, diversity and homosexuality along with same–sex marriage, as it is just an alternate lifestyle and anyone that does not agree with it has not become the enemy.  They have been able to stop the drug problem with children by putting up drug free zones around the schools.  Anything they see on television or movies along with all the mind alternating prescription drugs that are used on them today do not contribute to  the school shootings that are becoming epidemic.  We did not have this problem a few decades ago as we are to believe there were no guns then.

Being in one of those old schoolhouses you would be in close proximity with each other for years, and they would become as family.  After they graduated, the Christian values and work ethics would remain with them through life.  Our one room schoolhouses have turned out some of the greatest statesmen America ever had. 

About 40 years ago, Erica Carle, a woman I know from Milwaukee, wrote a book called The Hate Factory that received national recognition.  In it she explains how our teachers with the help of the powerful teachers’ union gradually became “change agents” in our schools.  Over the years they have succeeded in changing  this once  Godly republic  into a Socialist dominated Democracy that our founders tried to prevent.  In the last 80 years our schools have produced the ones responsible for helping our nation to become void of morality, justice and righteousness.

In spite of the countless billions spent on our government’s Public School System, it’s up to you to decide what children got the better education.  Do you know of any teacher or college grad that could pass this test today?  This has been nothing less than the deliberate dumbing down of the last two generations of our youth by having them listen to the tune of a different drummer. 

This is the 1985 eighth grade final exam  from Salina, Kansas. It was taken from the original document on file at the Smokey Valley Genealogical Society and Library in Salina, Kansas and reprinted in the Salina Journal. 

Here are a few questions taken from this exam:

Grammar: (one hour)

1.  Give nine rules for the use of Capital Letters.

4.  What are the Principal Parts of a verb?  Give Principal Parts of do, lie, lay and run.

10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar. 

Arithmetic (1 1/4 hours)

1. Name and define the Fundamental Rule of Arithmetic. 

2. Find cost of 6720 lbs. coal at $6.00 per ton.

3. Write a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt. 

U.S. History (45 minutes)

3. Relate the causes and results of the Revolutionary War.

4. Name events connected with the following dates:  1607, 1620, 1800, 1849 and 1865.

Orthography (One hour)

10. Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks and by syllabication.

Geography (one hour)

7. Name all the republics of Europe and give the capital of each. 

8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the Pacific in the same latitude?