On December 17, 2024, The Digital News class was able to visit the one room schoolhouse and learn about the history of it. The second the class walked in it felt like being taken back in time to the 1800’s. The schoolhouse holds so much valuable history within the four walls. A tour was given by Ruth Sturgill, who was born and raised in Hartville. Her mother attended the one room schoolhouse while it was still in use. She walked everyone through the history of the building and showed all of the antique items they still have from the schoolhouse. It was so interesting and made the class appreciate the value of Hartville’s history.
The history of Hartville’s one room schoolhouse dates all the way back to 1850. It is located on Lake High School’s grounds, on Lake Center Street. It is often overlooked and forgotten, but it is a valuable historical sight that deserves to be visited and learned about. There used to be thirteen one room schoolhouses across the district but now, there are only a couple that are still left standing. The land for the school houses was typically donated by farmers who cared about the community’s future. The house located on school grounds is one of the originals though it has been slightly remodeled. All thirteen of the school houses were built almost exactly the same. In 1928, they closed all of the one room school houses, grades first through eighth. The students were all relocated into the old high school building, which was recently torn down.
On a typical day in the 1850’s, children ages 5-13 would walk to school from their houses. Sometimes in the winter, farmers would offer the kids a ride on their wagons if they took pity on them. The teacher would ring a big bell on top of the house to warn kids that class was starting. If kids were lacking behind they would have to run to class or deal with the punishment. If it was cold out, the first student in the class would fetch firewood to be put into the wood burning boiler which would heat the classroom. The food for the class would be heated on this same boiler. They would have to fetch water from a nearby well for the whole class before the day started as well. The class’s rows were organized by age starting with the youngest on the right and the oldest on the left. Students in the one room schoolhouse learned out of textbooks, and the original books are still in the school house today. If students had to use the restroom during the day they would have to leave the classroom and find the closest outhouse on the property, because there were no bathrooms in the schoolhouse.
Schoolhouse number twelve is described as vernacular with Greek revival elements, and was added to the national registry in 1976. It was re-built and fixed up in 2003, with volunteers from the Hartville community that gave their time, donated materials, and made several financial contributions. They replaced the roof and rafters with the very generous donations from Howard Miller, Sr. Paul Yoder performed the labor along with 20 other contractors who also donated material and labor towards the restoration project.
The one room schoolhouse is something that is very important to Hartville and its community. We encourage you to take some time out of your day to take a look and learn more about this one of a kind, original one room schoolhouse. It is important to keep the history alive so that generations to come can appreciate the value of Hartville’s history and how it started out. Many Lake students have gone on to achieve amazing accomplishments, but only after attending the school that we are lucky enough to learn from today.
