Local History

Above photo: Housatonic Valley Regional High School from the 1969 White Oak yearbook. Photo courtesy of the HVRHS Alumni Association.

If you’re familiar with the local tri-state area, chances are you’ve driven past at least one of the region’s many historic schools and schoolhouses. As long-standing landmarks of the area’s educational past, these structures have witnessed a variety of changes and transformations over the years, both to their own architectural condition and to the communities that surround them and once relied on them.

Exploring a handful of local schoolhouses

The well-known 1858 Irondale Schoolhouse, now located in the center of Millerton, NY, was relocated, restored, and opened by the Friends of the Irondale Schoolhouse as a seasonal educational hub for the community and its visitors. According to a video made by the Friends of Irondale Schoolhouse about the history of the property, the school closed in 1930, and the building was left to deteriorate alongside State Route 22 for decades until Ralph Fedele played a leading role in preserving the building and planning its move from 2008 to 2013. The North East Historical Society also notes the stewardship of the Brunese family in making the move possible.

Similarly, the circa-1850 Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse in Kinderhook, NY, was restored in the 1970s to reflect its appearance in the 1930s, serving as “an excellent and intact example of a rural, one-room schoolhouse with a gable roof, clapboard siding, and a single pent-roofed entrance,” according to the Columbia County Historical Society, who adds that it is thought to have replaced the log cabin where the schoolmaster, and believed inspiration for Washington Irwin’s Ichabod Crane, Jesse Merwin taught. The society also notes that Eleanor Roosevelt visited the schoolhouse in 1952.

Maintained by the Falls Village-Canaan Historical Society, the Beebe Hill Schoolhouse in Falls Village, CT, is open for tours on Saturday mornings during the summer. On June 30, 2021, Annabelle Baum reported on the reopening of the schoolhouse for The Lakeville Journal, sharing that the school operated from the 1840s until 1918, and was restored by the Falls Village-Canaan Historical Society to bring forth the historic atmosphere of the space. Baum notes the class size once reached 37 pupils.

The Attlebury Schoolhouse in Bangall, NY, on the other hand, “was built on the cusp of New York State’s trend toward increased rural school centralization,” according to the William G. Pomeroy Foundation. The school closed in 1945, having been rebuilt in 1911 after a fire destroyed the original building in 1909. The Foundation notes that as of 2019, this schoolhouse was Stanford’s only remaining rural district school “that remained unconverted and historically intact.”

Writing for the Columbia County Historical Society’s History & Heritage magazine, Barbara P. Rielly Library research librarian Jim Benton points out that while many schoolhouses from the 1800s are still located central to the communities they served, the Snyderville School sits where a hamlet once existed in the 1860s. He writes, “Weaver Hollow, now called Snyderville, was about a half-mile west of the school and had a post office, a hotel, two mills, a blacksmith, a cider house, and a number of homes.” Benton explains that despite having closed in 1942 and passing through various owners since then, the school “still stands in close to original condition,” mainly because of its seclusion.

Writing for The Berkshire Edge on March 29, 2019, Harriet Bergmann described efforts to relocate and preserve Mount Washington’s North Schoolhouse as the last remaining public schoolhouse of the three that once served the town. The Berkshire Eagle’s community voices editor Jane Kaufman followed up on May 30, 2023, reporting that relocation efforts for North Schoolhouse, spearheaded by Mount Washington Historical Society president Hans Bergmann, had made progress in attaining the funds necessary to move the structure and had plans to make it the society’s headquarters and a place for concerts, lectures, and the arts.

The eventual move toward consolidation & centralization

As author, historian, and Housatonic Valley Regional High School history teacher Peter Vermilyea explains, the one-room schoolhouses in the area have shared four main fates: they have been abandoned, destroyed, turned into a museum or educational space, or incorporated into people’s homes. Fortunately, many have been recently restored and repurposed by local preservation aims, showing the region’s commitment to remembering the academic experiences of past generations. 

All of these schoolhouses closed as a result of consolidation and centralization efforts. For example, New York State passed the Central Rural School Act in 1913 to “encourage rural school districts to consolidate and thereby broaden the areas of learning and regionalize the tax base to pay for it,” according to the NEHS in an exhibit they arranged drawing upon New York State archives, newspaper collections, and other relevant records. This exhibit highlighted the history and development of local schools.

The origins of the Webutuck school system

The old Millerton Union Free School, which sits on Elm Avenue right in the center of Millerton, NY, provides an interesting glimpse into how consolidation and centralization transpired in the area. According to the NEHS, this school opened in 1927, and quickly thereafter, “access to a new and better school with teachers specialized in different fields or grades began to prompt the closing of the remaining one-room schoolhouses that had served the town for so long.” 

Indeed, NEHS president Ed Downey adds that this launched “a continuing process of trying to respond to the educational needs of the time.” Eventually, this meant that the school had to consider expansion to a further degree. The NEHS explains how total enrollment was at 286 in 1932, meaning that the school could accommodate first through eighth grade and all high school grades. When this changed, and crowding became a concern, centralization came next, according to the NEHS.

The society also points out that Pine Plains Central School District was the first in Dutchess County to centralize, in 1931, and it wasn’t until the late 1940s that Millerton and Amenia considered centralization, when its benefits became clearer. At centralized schools, “[c]ourses in vocational agriculture, industrial arts, home economics, music, and art enabled broader learning opportunities,” the NEHS observes. “A cafeteria served hot lunches. Larger gymnasiums, expanded athletic fields, and larger auditoriums enabled increased sports and theater programs.” Many of these aspects are taken for granted in schools today. 

After years of thoughtful discussion in the Millerton and Amenia communities, the NEHS explains how in 1953, residents overwhelmingly voted to create the Webutuck Central School District and to build a new school for seventh through twelfth grade on a scenic hilltop midway between the two community centers. It opened in 1957. Meanwhile, grades kindergarten through sixth remained in the Amenia and Millerton school buildings. By 1966, increased student population necessitated the construction of a new elementary school building on the Webutuck campus for fourth through sixth grade.

By 2009, the NEHS explains that student population trends had changed. With modifications made to the buildings on the Webutuck campus, all grades were consolidated there. Over time, the former Amenia school was given to the Town of Amenia, and the former Millerton School was more recently given to the North East Community Center.

The still-deteriorating Roeliff Jansen Central School

Anyone who has frequented State Route 22 as it stretches south from Hillsdale to Copake, NY, over the past few years has witnessed the old Roeliff Jansen Central School’s steady decline. The building’s striking architecture has dwindled away thanks to boarded-up windows, the harsh appearance of stumps and roots where greenery used to be, and a general essence of abandonment. Roots springing out of the ground have created huge swaths of tangled brush, and the flagpole in the center of the grounds stands unused and rusty, albeit resolute.

On October 7, 2024, Diane Valden wrote “Roe Jan School has new optimistic broker” for The Columbia Paper, detailing the building’s recent prospects and the logistics of the property’s upkeep over the years since it became vacant in 1999. While the building is still on sale, with an asking price of $2,195,000 and a square footage of 92,810, C.R. Properties Group LLC broker Thomas M. Cervone explained to the paper that at the time, he felt “‘cautiously optimistic’” about the potential for a sale for adaptive reuse.

However, the property, which is located at 9065 NYS Route 22 in Copake, NY, has an important history that transcends the physical, declining state of the building. Thanks to the Roeliff Jansen Historical Society, this history has been recorded and preserved, and RJHS president Lesley Doyel shared many of these records and artifacts, including a 1957 article by Howard A. Shiebler. A former journalist and State Education Department public relations director, Shiebler wrote a series of ten articles for The Knickerbocker News highlighting central school districts in the Albany area.

In his May 7, 1957, report of the school, Shiebler described how “Back in 1931, when centralization was voted, there were 428 pupils attending small schools in the 20 districts included in the merger.” The school was initially designed for a student population of 600, and by the time the school opened in 1933 and was ready for use, Shiebler reported that “enrollment had increased to 591. Meanwhile, high school classes had been held in rented quarters in the Mt. Washington Hotel.”

He noted that two students actually won and split a cash prize for suggesting the name for the school, and while Shiebler pointed out that research showed Roeliff Jansen likely wasn’t Dutch, all of the school’s iconography was related to windmills and the Dutchmen. Shiebler described the detailed architecture of the building as “quite different from the box-like modernistic school buildings” of the time: “Two stories in height, it is built of Harvard brick with wood and stone trim. There is a slate pitched roof over the central portion, which has huge chimneys at each end, and flat roofs over the wings.”

At the time of writing, Shiebler noted that the student population was about 930, with Copake and Ancram schools accommodating many students from kindergarten to fourth grade. The district also still used an old schoolhouse in Copake for some of its classes. 

Also provided by Lesley and the RJHS team, a pamphlet from the RJCS Board of Education argued for expansion circa the late 1950s to the early 1960s. This document explained the importance of constantly improving the curriculum, in tandem with the physical expansion of the space, in economically efficient ways that prepare students for life effectively. Indeed, at the time, the school had difficulties with crowding, providing adequate facilities, and meeting state standards before it expanded further.

Shiebler explained that the curriculum was notably focused on conservation and the natural environment, as well as the surrounding rural atmosphere, incorporating field trips, electives, clubs, and an agricultural fair. The school had a bird banding club and even used a driving manual as a text for learning to read so that students were more interested in the reading material. 

In a discussion coordinated by Lesley and the RJHS, longtime community pillar and RJCS alum Judy Whitbeck emphasizes the impact of her grandfather, John D. Ackley, on the school. Not only did he play a vital role in bringing everyone together for consolidation, but he served as president of the RJCS Board of Education. Reflecting on the curriculum and the learning opportunities they were given as students, Judy adds that between the core classes and the electives like art and music, “We had excellent teachers.”

By 1970, a central school district was formed, and by 2000, the entire Taconic Hills Central School District relocated to its current location off of Route 23 in Craryville, NY. 

The longevity of Housatonic Valley Regional High School

Located at 246 Warren Turnpike Road in Falls Village, CT, Housatonic Valley Regional High School opened in 1939. The school was designed by architect Ernest Sibley, and Peter describes how longevity was quite literally built into the structure’s foundations. “The whole idea of his architectural style was building a building to last,” he says. “Being built with New Deal (Public Works Administration) funding at a time where there was serious concern that the American experiment had failed, Sibley is hearkening back, architecturally, to the founding era, 1776.”

HVRHS even has a cornerstone box featuring historical objects, photos of the land, and photos and signatures of staff and students. “To open it,” Peter observes, “you’d have to destroy the building. So, it will never open. The building will always be there, and the government will always be there.”

Economics and programming were the main motivations for the building’s creation and the centralization of the school system. While all of the towns in the region had closed their high schools, they did not close their elementary and middle schools, which Peter recognizes as a core aspect of community identity. “One thing about abandonments and regionalizations,” he explains, “is that when a town loses a school, it loses its identity. The school is the fabric of the town.”

Since the 1950s, the HVRHS building has seen numerous expansions and additions to accommodate the school’s variety of offerings and programs. Indeed, Peter notes that the science and math wing was added to the building in the 1960s due to the student population increasing: at a given point during the 1970s, there were over 700 students in attendance at the school, and circa 2008, there were 650. After that, the student population declined, likely a result of socioeconomic factors making it difficult for young families to move to and live in the area.

The longevity of HVRHS is particularly striking considering the disparate fates of other school buildings from the time period, and Peter explains why this has been the case, describing how, for instance, the building’s slate roof was restored once more with slate, preserving the original essence of the structure. “There’s incredible community attachment to this building. And that’s needed, because it’s more expensive to preserve the old than make the new,” Peter points out. “There’s a commitment to the architecture and integrity.”

New visions for school buildings & their history

In some cases, schools have been drastically repurposed. Matt Moment reported for Times Union on May 29, 2024, that the Ockawamick School property in Claverack, NY, has been reimagined as collaborative art space The Campus. Meanwhile, Heather Bellow at The Berkshire Eagle reported on September 19, 2023, that the Housatonic School property in Great Barrington, MA, is being developed into apartments.

Thus, it is clear that not only the one-room schoolhouses in the region, but also the schools that later went on to consolidate and centralize local education systems have seen all sorts of changes, expansions, restorations, and abandonments. No matter their destiny, these structures and properties all reflect the rich history of the region and the educational experiences of the generations before us.