History of Reading News. Vol.XXII No.1 (1998:Fall)
by Al Tucker

Managing the transition from catalogs to toilet tissues for the two outhouses presented a major problem for one school board during the 1930s. Just how many tissues are needed, anyway, for servicing 40 pupils for an average school year? If each pupil used two tissues three times a day, that would compute to 240 tissues per day times the number of school days in the year. After a lengthy meeting, the school board charged the teacher to see that the pupils were not wasteful with the newly ordered toilet tissue. However, they failed to say just how the teacher was to do that (p. 165).

Many more amusing anecdotes are found among the memories of school teachers and pupils in Clegg's The Empty Schoolhouse. This compilation of reminiscences from retired teachers and ex-pupils retains the colloquial language and idioms that characterized the days of the Great Depression and rural life in Texas. The one-room schools of the 1930s were not so long ago that the former pupils and teachers from the era won't relate to the events. They will read with smiles, no doubt accompanied with frequent affirmative nods and deep-rolling chuckles. This is a book for all, but especially for historians, educators, and sociologists. It contains a wealth of primary sources for further study. The interviews are faithfully recorded, word-for-word, warts and all. The book is an open invitation for scholarly analysis and interpretation using a matrix of significant pieces of information, which, when rightly fitted together, may create a mosaic of rural education that is unavailable elsewhere. The scholarly value is enhanced by the bibliography of published works about rural and one-room schools.

The introduction is a micro-history of education that ties the growth and demise of the rural school to the growth and work patterns of America. School, in those days, had to wait until crops were in, and it ceased when spring planting time arrived. School met sporadically, depending on the availability of a teacher, the sickness that swept through communities, and the weather. The curriculum was kept simple and open-ended. A teacher might have only a few opportunities to teach pupils before some event would call them away for more pressing duties.

The author has divided the contents into two parts: interviews with pupils and interviews with teachers. Confessions of misdeeds color many of the pupils' descriptions of one-room schools. One former pupil even confessed burning down the schoolhouse. Former teachers readily admitted to their ignorance on how to teach reading. They told embarrassing stories on themselves, such as the explosion that resulted from warming up a can of beans in the wood-burning stove. Those were austere days when teachers were paid by scrip and vouchers, and pupils came to school to learn. Both teachers and pupils appreciated a warm school building during the harsh winters, even if they had to chop the wood themselves. Many of the teachers really didn't want to become teachers, but were pressed into service due to hard times. The State of Texas granted limited teaching certifi-cates upon passing an examination, but permanent certificates required, in addition to the examination, the completion of pedagogical training and a bachelor's degree.

The epilogue is the most enlightening section for educators. The nostalgia for schools before consolidation and the growing demise of neighborhood schools has inspired the author to reexamine some basic purposes of education. In the search for ways to revitalize schools, recent so-called "innovative" ideas are but rediscoveries of the way one-room schools operated. The explanation of a "new" teaching method led one retired teacher to exclaim, "Mercy sakes, that's what I started with, you might say, team teaching" (p.158). Instructional units, phonics mixed with sight words, cooperative learning, and literature-based reading, all of which are today touted as innovative, have long been used by good teachers doing what was necessary to teach children.

These reminiscences contained excellent insights into teaching and learning, but noticeable was the absence of certain items that seem to be overly important in today's schools. No mention was made of "lesson plans" and "curriculum guides." Teacher "inservice days" were few and far between, often consigned to the summer months. Fears of physical harm or being sued by angry constituents were not mentioned. Scrutiny by state agencies other than the local school board was of little concern to these teachers and pupils. The community highly respected and trusted teachers. A grade was never questioned. Perhaps schooling has become unnecessarily complicated and confusing. After reading these simple and inspiring pupil and teacher tales, I want to tell the educational reformers of today to do what Clegg said at the end of his journey into the past: "Now let us shut the gate and get on home!" (p.210).

Al Tucker is Director of Institutional Research at Howard Payne University, Brownwood, TX. Formerly professor of Education at Sul Ross University, Alpine, TX, Tucker has held several offices in the SIG, including president.