Lincoln School turns 70

SPRING VALLEY — Lincoln School is 70 years old, and on Thursday, students celebrated by stepping back in time.

Lincoln librarian Sue Kusek said activities to teach students what school was like 70 years ago were chosen to commemorate the occasion, and the idea for many of the activities came from the memories of custodian Red Nestler, who attended Lincoln as a boy.

In the gym, one station allowed students to view the Web page designed by David Lawrence’s first-grade class, in which all of the staff at the school were interviewed and photographed.

At another station, students decorated visors to wear for their walk to the post office to pick up the proclamation declaring it “Lincoln School 70th Birthday Day.” The proclamation came from Springfield, courtesy of Rep. Frank Mautino (D-Spring Valley.)

Students at the next table made brown bag book bags. Kusek said that 70 years ago, there were no lunch bags or book bags allowed, and families could not have afforded to buy one, anyway. Instead, everyone just used a brown paper bag.

The next several tables gave the students an opportunity to learn about school supplies from seven decades ago.

Seventy years ago, Kusek said parents would buy one bottle of glue per child, and then make their own to refill the bottles. Also, books were scarce and expensive, so families would buy one textbook per family and pass it on to each brother and sister as they went through school, or to a neighbor when all the children had used it. In addition, there were no workbooks or copier machines, so students used a chalkboard for lessons.

To get a feel for those days, students made their own books with paper, a popsicle stick and a rubber band. They also did lessons on their own chalkboard and got to make their own container of paste.

Another activity involved paper dolls. Boy students back in the 1930s wore coveralls and the girls would wear dresses and bloomers, so the students made their own paper dolls and the clothes to dress them.

Outside, students had the opportunity to participate in a book walk. Because Abraham Lincoln would walk 10 miles to borrow a book, the students walked five laps around the school, which equaled one mile. The students were then reminded Lincoln would have walked 10 times this distance to borrow one book.

Also, Kusek said that 70 years ago, there was not any playground equipment, and so the students would make up their own games to play. Some common games were scrub baseball, Run Sheep Run, tag, fox and goose, red-light-green light and hopscotch.

Following the activities, at 11 a.m., Principal Kim Lisanby-Barber read “Abraham Lincoln: The Boy who Loved Books,” to the students. Kusek said the book was chosen to tie in Lincoln’s love of books, and the fact that parents bought only one set of books.

“Books were a rare treasure in Abraham Lincoln’s time, 70 years ago, and should be considered so today,” she said.

Near the end of the morning, three kindergarten students from Judy White’s class were in the last group to walk around the building.

Anna Herrmann said her favorite part of the morning was making the visors.

“There were little papers, we had to cut the thing out, and we could decorate it,” she said. “Then the teacher put holes in it and put rope in the holes, and then we had a visor!”

Tori Bogatitus liked learning about the school and making the paper dolls.

Morgan Filippini, not letting the heat and humidity get her down, said she liked the book walk. When asked if she would like to walk that far every time she wanted to read a book, she didn’t hesitate.

“Yes!” she said with a big smile.

Comment on this story at www.bcrnews.com.Construction began on the first Lincoln School in 1886 and was finished in 1888. That school was torn down in 1935, and the present Lincoln School was finished in 1936.

In the beginning, there were eight classrooms, and the school was built at a cost of $55,337. Several additions were made to the school in 1956, including more classrooms, a cafeteria, a kitchen, a multi-purpose room, an auditorium and a dining room, at a cost of $190,000.

Source: “A Brief History of Early Hall Township Schools.”