Published: August 08, 2008 02:23 pm            

Looking back at the one room school

Rock Island School was on the “county line” road about six miles south east of Pella. Just to the north was the Rock Island Line and to the south was what the children called School Creek. In suitable weather the children often ate their lunches beside the creek or caught minnows and bull frogs. The closeness of the railroad track was a distraction to students and teachers as trains rattled by. The school was built about 1883 on an acre of land donated by William Vander Kraan. Although the building was always on the east side of the county line road it was under the supervision of Marion County until the mid 20’s when it was transfered to Mahaska county.

In her “History of Rock Island School” Bertha Van Zante, a student and later a teacher there, mentions that in 1909 the school board bought 6 steel guards costing $26.14 to protect the windows from stray balls as well as to keep tramps from getting into the school building at night. In her description of the interior she mentions that mice could often be seen playing around the shelves that held the lunch pails. These pails were recycled tobacco and syrup buckets. She reports there was a good well on the school yard. Sometimes the boys would carry water from the well or the creek to drown ground squirrels in Joe McComb’s pasture.

The original building burned down the last day of school in 1939. Eleanor Ver Ploeg was the teacher that year. A new building was erected on the same site in time for the fall opening.

Abe Vanden Berg who attended school there in the 20’s told his daughter Delores Van Rees about riding the railroad repair car home. The workers would say “You big kids hop on and hold tight. We’ll hold the little ones.”

In the spring of 1932 Delores’ mother, Miss Edna Hackert, sent a letter of application to the school board for the teaching positions at Rock Island. The letter states “I am eighteen years of age, in perfect health, and a member of the Third Reformed Church of Pella . . . I will be willing to teach for whatever you think you should pay a teacher of my ability.”

The letter of acceptance from the school board president D. G. De Jong offers $65 per month (the minimum wage for a beginning teacher with high school normal training certificate). He writes “If you accept our offer, call 616 on 39 at 8 p.m. and say yes or no and don’t say anymore over the telephone on account of other applicants on this line applying.”

In 1958 the school was closed and the grade children were sent to Leighton. In 1961 the school was sold at auction to Lee Nossaman and remodeled into a home.

The official records of Marion County show these teachers: Fannie Gelderblom 1898, T. H. Kaldenberg 1899, T. H. Kaldenberg, Bertha Van Zee 1900, Jessie Inskeep, Lela Coster, Ollie Gelderblom 1902, Maude Inskeep, M . E. Gelderblom, Ethel Ghrist 1905, Margaret Dulen 1908, Bernice Phelps 1909, Eva Corey 1909-11, Bertha Harvey 1911-13, Cora Mathes (or Mathews), Byron Bush, Mamie Jackson 1914, Mary Wilson, Katherine Shovelain 1915, Gladys Barnwell 1916, Amy (or Elma) Chapman, Christine Ter Louw 1917, Mrs. Ethel Hawk 1918, Reefa Wilson 1919, Hattie Van Veen 1920, Eva Dixon 1922-23, Margaret Wynia 1924. From the lack of any further information it appears that the school may have been transferred to Mahaska County in the fall of 1925.

Other teachers known to have taught at this school are Minnie Redding, Bertha Van Zante Beulah Steinkamp, Marcia Garden, Sarah Klyn, Edna Hackert, Ethel Van Zante, Irene Van Haaften, Esther Brummel, Wilma Den Hartog, Eleanor Ver Ploeg, Louise Dillinger, Mattie Olivier, Freida Reed, Esther Kooi, and Ruth Rempe.

The next article will feature East Amsterdam. There is a good deal of information about his school at the Sterrenberg Library but there is a lack of information about many of the other rural schools in Marion County. I would like to hear from readers about any pictures, history or personal stories you about the school you, your parents, or grandparents attended. The pictures can be copied and returned to you. Even though your school has already been featured in this series we would like your additional information to be added to the “school books” at the Pella Historical site and/or the Marion County Historical site. (628-4716)

        

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