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COUNTRY SCHOOL
My introduction to formal education was in a one room country school. It was 1.75 miles from home and there were very few days that my brother and I didn't walk this distance. Occasionally on stormy days Dad would hitch old Charley to the buggy, and take us.
I remember one day in September when the temperature was above 90 degrees F, and one winter day when it was 40 below zero. I was 7 years old and my brother 6, so this was in 1914. The only early record I have is a souvenir from my first teacher, Cora Sowers, dated 1914.
The 1.75 miles to the school was the longest mile and three quarters I ever saw. Lawrence and I tried every device, and every method possible to break the monotony of this walk. We would take the shortest route as often as possible by crawling over fences and walking thru fields. This method was frowned upon by the neighbors, because we broke down their fences and sometimes damaged young crops. Mumsie did not like it, because it meant torn clothes that she had to mend.
We devised methods of travel that helped time pass. If we could ride a stick horse, it seemed to us to shorten the distance. The most useful to us was a machine that we make ourselves. This machine consisted of a small wheel about 12 inches in diameter, we would put a small 3 inch board on each side of the wheel, put a half inch bolt thru the boards and the wheel. The bolt would serve as an axle. The boards were fastened together at the top, about six feet from the wheel, so this served as a wheelbarrow.
The use of the wheel kept our minds occupied, and time seemed to pass more rapidly. To make it useful we would put a nail in the board about half way from the handle to the wheel. This was a machine to carry our lunch pails. When the ground was smooth it worked fine, but when the ground was frozen, where the cattle had walked in the mud, it was a disaster. Mumsie made sandwiches, some with jam or jelly, or perhaps we would have a small jar of stewed fruit, and when we arrived at school it was hard to tell just what we had for lunch. It wasn't soup, but it looked like it.
It was some time before Mumsie found out what happened. There was dried jelly and fruit stuck to the pail, and when she packed our lunch the next day she would have to give the pail a good cleaning.
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Metzger Memories
