Jan 10, 2007 — The one-room school house is gone but not forgotten.

These early learning institutions have been replaced with gleaming new schools, but their memory remains.

Children walked along dirt roads no matter the weather. They carried their lunches in tin pails and warmed up around the pot-bellied stove on cold winter mornings. As there was no indoor plumbing, students fetched drinking water from a nearby farm.

Students in first- through eighth-grade shared one classroom and one teacher taught the basics: arithmetic, reading, spelling, penmanship, geography and history.

Classes usually began after fall harvest and ended in time for spring planting. There were no snow days and the only holidays were Christmas Day and perhaps Thanksgiving - although students were sometimes excused to help with butchering and other chores at home.

The school day began with Bible reading, the Lord's Prayer, the pledge of Allegiance.

During morning and afternoon recess and after lunch, students played ball, tag, dodge ball, hopscotch, drop the hanky and hide and seek, often with the teacher joining in. On rainy or snowy days, there were indoor games and activities such as spelling and geography bees.

Most teachers were paid about $15 a month.