Myrtle Emma -- School and Bumps & Bruises

Union School, 1926

I realized that it had been a while since we'd seen another installment from Myrtle Emma, the memoirs of Mill Creek Hundred-raised Myrtle Emma Morris White. In light of the trying times in which we all find ourselves these days, I've selected two chapters that seem appropriate in their own ways. With children all over the country currently receiving their education at home and not in their schools, the first segment sees Myrtle recounting her memories of attending the small, mid-19th Century schoolhouse that stood just up the road from her home. In the second chapter, we have her writing about things that I'm sure many antsy kids are getting at home -- Bumps and Bruises. As a special "bonus", she even mentions the "Q word."

The school Myrtle attended was the Union School, District 31. A few years back it shared with another school a post which gave the general outlines of the school's history, as far as it's known. The problem is...the history's not known all that well. The school stood a couple hundred feet west of Corner Ketch Road, just south of today's Estates of Corner Ketch neighborhood. The datestone on the two-story schoolhouse was inscribed 1850, but it's said that this date was for the addition of the second story. Supposedly the original structure was a log schoolhouse built in 1780, replaced by the first story of the stone school in 1811. I don't have any particular reason to doubt this story, but I can't confirm it either.

Myrtle's Champion Speller certificate from Sixth Grade, 1935

Not Myrtle Emma's Union School, but same era (1926)
This is the Forest Oak #35 School, near Milltown

Myrtle Emma attended Union School from 1929 until 1935, before moving on to schooling in Newark and eventually graduating from Newark High School. She was an excellent student, to which the spelling certificate above can attest. Union School closed for good after the 1936 school year, and was purchased a year later by Samuel Hallock du Pont, who by then owned numerous acres in the area. It was converted into a dwelling, and used as such for years. It was torn down some years ago, but I'm unsure exactly when. In any case here's Myrtle Emma's recollections of her little country school.

School

Our one-room school was a walk up the main road from our lane. It had a cloak room for our coats and our lunch buckets made from syrup containers. Sometimes we kept our leggings on if we didn’t feel like undoing all the buttons. There was a wood stove in the middle of the room and a platform up front with the American flag to one side. The blackboard had a ledge for erasers and chalk. There was always something written on the board to make you think, along with the month and day. The desks were usually double. We all listened to each class as it was taught and hoped what we heard would stay with us.

The teacher would ask us to bring vegetables to school and she would make soup. We each had a small white bowl and spoon we kept in our desks. What a treat to have hot soup at lunchtime, with our sandwiches of peanut butter and jam on homemade bread.

Sometimes a lady from the School Board came and read to us. It was my favorite time. She brought the book Hans Brinker and the Silver Skates and a box of things she took out one by one to illustrate the story. What I remember most was a pair of tiny skates just like my father’s that hung in the cellar way.

The last day of school was picnic day. The parents came with ice cream and cake, talked to the teacher about our grades, and saw all the neighbors. We buried a time capsule with mementoes from our class. I don’t think it was ever dug up. When I met one of my classmates years later, he said he knew where it was buried and we should go dig it up. We never did, and he passed away.

Our school teacher boarded with the Crofts. Mr. Crofts was janitor at the school, so she came to school with him. On cold days, he always had a fire in the stove so it would be warm when we got there. Our parents liked to play cards. They would invite the Crofts and our teacher to play a game called euchre. On those nights, we children went to bed early.

When the Morris kids were not in school or doing their chores, like any kids they were out and about and liked to play. And being in a semi-isolated area, in a time with only early modern medicine, they sometimes got hurt or sick. Our second chapter here contains Myrtle's remembrances of how she and her siblings were cared for when they needed special attention. Boy, that quarantine things sounds rough, huh? As she says, getting well is better, but do make it your time.

Bumps and Bruises

We were a hearty bunch, but sometimes one of us would get a cold, and Vicks VapoRub was the cure—in our nose, in our throat, and rubbed on our chest and back. If we did not feel like eating, Mother made milk toast—warm milk with cinnamon and sugar over toast—served in the blue-rimmed soup bowls with windmills and waterways. We felt warm and loved.

Another treat she would make was cry baby cookies. She kept them in a pan with a fitted lid up on the top shelf of the pantry. We would take them in our lunch bucket and maybe have one before bedtime.

Mother was our nurse for all hurts. Our cuts were bandaged with sterile gauze and tape. Our bumps and bruises were tended with hugs and kisses. One time my brother got a beetle in his ear. Of course, it was doing everything to get out and making my brother cry and jump around. My father blew smoke from his Camel cigarette into my brother’s ear and the beetle backed out. We thought it was a small miracle.

Getting the mumps and measles was bound to happen and did. The Board of Health could come and post a chart on the door, and we were quarantined for a time. We weren’t going out anyway and that meant we could stay on the day bed in the living room and be waited on and read to, and play all day. If we felt feverish, we took a nap and awoke to lamp light and a bowl of milk toast and lots of attention. Were we hot or cold or thirsty? We made it our time, but to get well was better.