Remembrances of Attending Caldwell School, as told by former student Warren Gottshall

By Christopher Miller

GALLAGHER TOWNSHIP – The words “one-room schoolhouse” conjure images of days gone by; perhaps Little House on the Prairie, The Waltons, or even Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman. The words aren’t always made in connection with the mid-twentieth century.

Today there are fewer than 400 one-room schools still being used for their original purpose in the United States with the bulk of them being in the most rural corners of Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska, and California.

Warren Gottshall, now 89 years young, was most likely one of the last students to attend a one-room school in Clinton County.

Caldwell School in Gallagher Township was built around 1890 and graduated hundreds of students during its time as a place of public education in the county. There are very few people still with us today that recall their school days in such vivid detail as Warren can.

“Remembrances of Attending Caldwell School,” an oral history question and answer session with Warren who attended grades 1-8 at the former school from 1944 to 1952, took place on Sunday, October 6 as a kickoff event for the township’s 175th (demisemiseptcentennial) anniversary.

Below is a transcription of Warren’s recollections. Warren’s responses are italicized.

Thank you for coming out here today. I spent eight years here and I am willing to answer any questions you may have.

What courses did you study?

We had English, math, history, the basics, and of course when you’re in a one-room school your course of study from 1st to 8th grade is every day for everybody, you don’t just get it for one year, you get it for eight. If you forgot what the teacher taught you that year, you got a memory course.

How was the room set up?

There were double desks, I have some doubles and a single, there was an aisle on the outside edge and in the middle, the furnace was here (gesturing toward the back corner of the school closest to the door), it was quite an experience. We had a well outside with a pump for water, and we would slide right down into the woods in winter, and in summertime we would play ball.

Would you be here in school during winter time, too?

Oh yeah, there used to be a shed with a coal bin right next door, and we fired the stove with hard coal. When the teacher came here in the morning it would get going in the morning and we would start class around 8:30 and it was cool in here then, we would have a lot of sessions around the furnace.

How did you get to school?

Well I lived a mile and a half from here, I would walk about a half mile and wait for someone to pick me up to go the rest of the way, there were maybe 4 or 5 others who would do that with me. I’m not sure how people from farther away would get to the school.

So when the teacher was teaching all of the grades at the same time, what would you be doing when the teacher was teaching the others?

You were here either doing your lesson plans, listening, sometimes sessions, there was a recitation bench in the front of the classroom and you would be doing your lesson in english or math.

Did you have the same teacher the entire time you were here, and if so can you tell us a little bit about the teacher?

It was Mr. Bardo and he lived in Salladasburg, he would come here everyday, pick us up in the morning on his way to school, and drive back in the afternoon.

Did you get good marks, Mr. Gottshall?

Decent.

Can you tell me your most prized memory from being here at the school? Graduation?

Graduation was just a diploma, no ceremony, just a piece of paper. No celebration or anything of that nature, that was 1951.
One memory that I have, I remember a baseball game going on, I was sitting by a tree in the woods and someone hit the ball and it hit me in the stomach.

Another person who attended school in Caldwell spoke up to tell of his memories.

If the 4th grade was having their class and you were interested in the subject matter, you could go up and sit with them. I always liked math and I really liked that because I liked that I could go from 2nd grade to 3rd grade. My second memory with my teacher Mrs. Reeder, if you were a boy and you did really well in her class you could go out and shine her car. It increased the participation because you got out of the classroom.

Warren proceeded to comment on something that stood out to him the most.

In our education in the one-room school, when I went from here to high school in 9th grade, I was so far advanced from the other students in Lock Haven.

Did you go on to college after high school?

I went on to study architecture.

Did you have penmanship classes on Fridays?

I cannot remember.

Loretta Coltrane: the reason I asked is because I went to a one-room school in Berks County when I was growing up, and we had penmanship classes on Fridays. The girls that were good got to clean the blackboard, and you would practice your cursive writing. When I went to the public school they all called us “those country hicks” and yet, we still knew more and we were faster than the other kids in public schools. I got in trouble in 6th grade because I was bored.

Warren: you had asked about my classes. I have my report card here from 6th grade. The classes I had were reading, penmanship, spelling, arithmetic, geography, english, history, and it was a 179 day school year and I was graded every 30 days. I had some D’s, some C’s.

Another former student offered his memories.

In the classroom, you didn’t harass or do anything like that because that would be a costly ordeal. It was not only costly to the school, but if that teacher brought that up to your parents, you were going to get a punishment that you would remember.

How many students were in the school at one time?

Pictures showed 23, 24 so probably around then or a little more. I would say around 26.
Easter time was an unusual time here at the school. They would hide the Easter eggs donated by the parents, mom would bring some. The parents would go up in Copenhaver Fields and hide them, then for us they would section off areas for the kids’ grades, and that was a privilege if you got to go across the road and do that.

You had mentioned to me that logging had gone on around the school and that you would build forts.

Yeah, they lumbered the woods around the school and I think it was around 1946, 47, and all the tree tops were down. As kids we would go in and make play houses out of the tops making little shanty’s during recess.

Another former student added: I remember an older kid made a fireplace out of stone and he had some matches. He put some leaves inside of it and fired that baby up. It wasn’t long for Mrs. Reeder to come and see all the smoke and she pulled us out on the spot and put out the fire.

Did the kids pack their lunches, and what would the parents send you for lunch?

I would say probably peanut butter and jelly. In the early years we did not have electricity until 1948 and no refrigeration. I remember my father would get ice to put in the chest. My father had a light plant that produced 32 volts of electricity for us to charge batteries and for mother to run her sewing machine and her washer. You think back to 1940 we were real mountain people.
You might have had an apple, or fruit also or you would trade that off for something else that someone else had. Pancakes quite often were in the lunch if you had them that morning. They would roll those up and place them in a piece of wax paper.
My father and his brothers went to school here, and some relatives before then. He moved here in 1911.
In the winter time we would pump water and let it run down the hill to become a sheet of ice so we could sled all the way down into the woods.

There is much more to come as Gallagher Township celebrates its 175th anniversary over the next 12 months, including a celebration on October 5, 2025.