The  School  Jericho Friends Meeting And Its Community Randolph County, Indiana                                                     Surnames in this are: Peacock, Thornburg, Hinshaw, Hadley, Cox, Kendall, Macy, Peacock, Blackburn, Chenoweth                                                         1860 TO 1900                                                                        The School                     It has been stated that the first school on the site of the present church property was built in 1838. How long this frame school building was used is not surely known. The only reference at hand is a statement by Arthur Peacock that it stood, in the year 1864, a mere shell with lightless windows. It may be that the new school was built          two or three years earlier.  Wayne Township wasorganized in the year 1838 in its present form though it existed, at least on paper, as a much larger territory as early as 1820. By the beginning of the Civil War, the organization of the Township had begun to be felt in the lives of the people. When the old Jericho School of 1838 became inadequate for the number of pupils and it was decided to build a new school, the folks of the community turned to the township Trustees for financial assistance. An agreement was made that the Township would build the school house but that the Friends should continue to select teacher sat an annual meeting held for the purpose. It was further agreed that the pupils          were to be allowed to attend fifth day Meeting in a body, as they had in the past. It is probable that the teacher continued to be paid by the Friends, at least in the beginning.           The newschool house was built across the road from the burying- ground in the extreme northwestcorner of 531 R15E and stood just to the west of the place where the Conservative Friends Meeting-house was later to be erected. The school was hence forth known as the No.7 School. The school as first built was only a one room house. However,the attendance soon became so large that it became necessary to add a second room and to hire two teachers.  It was inthis school that the Literary Society and the Jericho Debating Society were organized. The arrangement of a two room school          and two teachers continued until about 1878, when the Conservative Friends split off from the Meeting and built the white frame meeting-house. It appears that at about this time they also with drew their children from the school and sent them to a new school which they had built at about the center of the north 1/2 of the northwest 1/4 of S31         R15E.This later became the land of Levi Thornburg. This defection of pupils so decreased the attendance that the Township Trustees (now paying the teachers' salaries) refused to hire more than one teacher. The two rooms were accordingly thrown together.           The Conservative Friends school was soon moved from its first location to a place on the north sideof the road, a quarter mile west of the Meeting, in S25 R14E. It stood on land now owned by Charles Hinshaw. Teachers at this school of the Conservatives are said to         have been: Emily Hadley, Susanna Cox, Mattie Cox, Sally Kendall, Charley Hinshaw, Adeline Macy, Abe Peacock, and Abbie Blackburn. Allowing at least one year for each teacher, it is probable that this school continued for at least a decade or more. Its pupils were finally absorbed by the district school. The building is now a part of the  house where  Alice and Edith Hinshaw live, a little south and west of  the last location of the school. About the year 1890, a dispute arose between the Trustees of Wayne and White River Townships as to the proper allocation of the cost of  the Jericho or No. 7 School, it being located on the line between the two Townships, though the building stood wholly within WayneTownship. While the majority of the patrons favored the old location, the Trustees wished to move the building to Sorghum Corner. As a compromise, a new brick building was built on the north side of the road, halfway between the two points. This is the building where James Chenoweth now resides. This brick building was the last of the one-room schools to be identified with the name of Jericho.When the writer knew it, it  was heated by a single pot bellied stove in the center of the room. This was later replaced by a furnace-type unit set in the northwest corner. The school was attended by from fifteen to twenty children. A list of the teachers at the Jericho School, for the period under discussion, follows. It will be noted that two teachers are listed for  most of the years from 1869 to 1880.This is the time during which the school consisted of two rooms.