Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Walnut Grove School #10



Yesterday after work I went for a motorcycle ride and found this old wooden schoolhouse tucked away in the hills of Knox County, Ohio about 50 miles from my home.  This one is in amazing shape for a wood structure complete with a bell and an engraved plaque listing the building's history:

Walnut Grove School #10

This one room school house was built in
the latter part of the 1800's, one of ten
similar schools in Jefferson Township.
The last class was held in 1920 as many
small rural schools were consolidated
into larger districts.
For the next half century, following the
addition of two side sheds, it served
agricultural purposes: corn crib,  equip-
ment storage, and hog nursery.
Ken and Ann Wobbecke restored it to it's
original configuration in 2001-2002 so
that it's history would be preserved.

I snapped some quick shots through the dusty window glass.  I wish I could have taken clearer photographs but in the end I decided to convert them to black and white.  The monochrome images slightly obscured by the foggy glass completes the trip back in time. 







6 comments:

  1. Very cool. I've always had a thing for old school houses... although most often I think of buying an abandoned/boarded up one, buying it and living in it.

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  2. Living in the West as I have most all my life, it's fun and exciting to see what Ohio really looks like

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  3. That's sure a curious carving by the teacher's desk. Nice find!

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  4. I miss the smaller schools fewer kids formation. I know it had it's drawbacks but it seems so much more personal.

    Beautiful spot, btw.

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  5. Nice looking school house and a great piece of public history. I wonder if they give tours, so you can actually see/smell the inside of that place. It'd be great if they did something like that in the winter time so they could fire up that stove!

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