Ref: The Hearthstone Town and Country Pennsburg, Montgomery County, PA Thursday - April 17, 2003 WARNER'S SCHOOL HOUSE The Littlest Red School House Upper Hanover Township 1856-1948 PART 5b OF 5 Bicycle and Crutches - Meanwhile, on many days, Robert WALBERT gave fellow sixth-grader Carl SCHOENLY a bicycle ride from Shady Nook to school. Carl had a bad leg. Robert would pedal nearly a mile, Carl on the back, his crutches across the handlebars. The last Warner's students were: Ollea ALBITZ, Verna ALBITZ, Warren ALBITZ, Richard ASTON, Howard DUTTON, Clyde FOX, Gloria HOFFMAN, Robert NESTER, Carl ROTENBERGER, Elaine ROTENBERGER, Roger ROTENBERGER, Shirley ROTENBERGER, Carl SCHOENLY, Janice STOUDT, Lee TAYLOR, Robert WALBERT, Roger WRONOWSKI, Warren WRONOWSKI, Yvonne WRONOWSKI and Eugene ZIEGLER. Warner's Sold in 1948 - On May 15, 1948, the Warner's School House was sold for $2,475 at public auction. William S. and Alice WEISS of Niantic, the successful bidders, received the deed July 6, 1948. The WEISSes were pupil Richard ASTON's grandparents. The school bell was sold to Louis SCHULTZ of New Berlinville for $19; SCHULTZ apparently took the bell tower, too. The original school desk sold for $3 to the Rev. H. Morris SCHOFER, who was Warner's teacher from 1890 to 1894. In 1949, the Rev. SCHOFER published a book, "The Story of Warner's," which is available in the Schwenkfelder Libra ry at the Perkiomen School, Pennsburg. The book includes the minutes of various Upper Hanover School Board meetings and the by-laws of the Warner's Literary Society to shed light on the school's history. School Becomes a Home - The small brick building that was Warner's School House has been used as a home since 1948. Victor DUKA, a Pennsylvania Power & Light Company worker from Green Lane, and his wife, Dorothy (LOZOWICKI) DUKA, formerly of Philadelphia, moved into the old school house around 1950. After renting three or four years, the DUKAs bought the house from the WEISSes on September 1, 1953, for $5,500. The DUKAs had two children, Don, born in 1952, and Cynthia, born in 1954. Victor DUKA died in 1978; Dorothy died in 1997. At the old school, the DUKAs dug out a narrow underground passage through the length of the older part of the building. It reached from the front basement to the rear of the building, where they added a cellar door. The underground passage came out a foot or two left of the chimney. In 1952, the Upper Perkiomen Joint Schools were organized. The Joint Schools committee represented the school boards of the Upper Hanover Township, East Greenville, Pennsburg, Red Hill, Green Lane, Sumneytown (Marlborough Township) and Hereford Township districts. The Joint Schools built the Hereford Elementary School, called "the round school" for its circular shape, in 1958, the same year the Perkiomen Creek was dammed up to create the Green Lane Reservoir in Upper Hanover. In 1966, voters approved the formation of the Upper Perkiomen School District, under one school board. The new district built the Upper Perkiomen High School in 1968 and converted the old high school in East Greenville into the Upper Perkiomen Middle School. The Marlborough Elementary School would be added in 1990. Now pupils in kindergarten through fourth grade would go to the Hereford and Marlborough elementary schools, and fifth through eighth-graders would go to the middle school. Lydia MILLER, the Warner School's last teacher, died March 13, 1967, 50 years to the month after she arrived in Upper Hanover. She was 80. Her husband, Charles, died August 27, 1980. He was 93. The old Warner's School House was gutted by fire January 17, 1980, but repaired. .....other grandson, lived in Stowe, Montgomery County, with his wife, Georgiana. Both Larry and Thomas had children and grandchildren of their own in Pennsylvania and other parts of the eastern United States. In the Upper Perkiomen School District, 560 pupils in kindergarten through fourth grade were learning at Hereford Elementary School, with its 25 classrooms. The Marlborough Elementary School was teaching another 725 K-4 pupils, in 32 classrooms. In grades 5-8, the district had 1,100 students at the Upper Perkiomen Middle School, which has 44 classrooms. Warner's School House closed more than a half century ago. Its classes are over, its blackboards long gone. And yet the lessons learned by Warner's students live on in significant, if subtle, ways. Generation to generation, the old school echoes in our culture, in our love of learning and in our joy at seeing a child open a good book to read. In spirit, the Warner's School House remains in session. Its teachers still teach; its bell still rings. Whenever its best traditions find their way into a classroom, the littlest red school house of Upper Hanover Township again inspires "the hope and promise of a new spring and a new life." Warner's School House Teachers: 1856 Amos KRAUSS; 1857 John K. HOUCK; 1858 Daniel K. KEPNER; 1859 John K. HOUCK; 1860 Bejamin F. DOTTS; 1861 M.S. KEEL; 1862-1863 Oswin F. WAAGE; 1864 Henry BOBB Jr.; 1865 Not available; 1866 Not available; 1867 John W. STAUFFER, 1868 Not available; 1869-1870 John G. HERSCH; 1871 John J. TROXEL; 1872 Henry J. SMITH; 1873 Madison SCHWENK; 1874-1877 Not available; 1878-1879 W.K. HEINLY; 1880 F.M. MOLL; 1881 W.F. BUTTERWECK; 1882-1883 John P. KLINE; 1884-1887 Frank Y. HOFFMAN; 1888 Alice L. WELKER; 1889 Jerome BOWMAN; 1890-1893 H. Morris SCHOFER; 1894-1899 Dan K. DOTTERER; 1900-1901 Daisy GEHMAN; 1902-1903 Mamie C. HILLEGASS; 1904 William Z. GRUBB; 1905 William H. GARLACH; 1906 E. YOUNG; 1907-1908 Osborne F. YOUNG; 1909 Carrie LEHMAN; 1910-1912 Osborne F. YOUNG; 1913-1914 Mabel MILLER; 1915-1916 Edith ERB; 1917 Meriem OTT; 1918 Marie OTT; 1919 Mabel HUNSICKER; 1920-1921 Lydia (SCHMIDT) MILLER; 1922 Louis UPHOLTZER; 1923 Beta SAYLOR; 1924-1926 Dan K. DOTTERER; 1927 Helen BROWNING; 1928 Elmeda HOFFMAN; 1929-1930 Sarah (KURTZ) ACKER; 1931-1933 Paul BITTING; 1934-1936 Mabel SCHWENK; 1937-1939 Bertha (ERDMAN) HUNSBERGER; 1940-1943 Bertha (ERDMAN) SMITH; 1944-1947 Lydia (SCHMIDT) MILLER. Picture - Warner's Schoolhouse as it appears today in Upper Hanover Township. The building now serves as a residence. After a fire in 1980 the building received several alterations including the addiition of a second floor. That's All.