One-room schoolhouses defined education in Illinois for decades

Today, new school buildings are state-of-the-art learning centers with the latest technology, clean and well-maintained facilities, and plenty of space. For much of early Illinois history, school buildings were very different.

Until the mid-20th century, millions of Illinoisans received their education in one-room schoolhouses. The small, basic school rooms posed numerous difficulties for teachers, who not only had to oversee multiple grade levels but often had to act as janitors and maintenance workers.

And that was all for a bare minimum of pay. A 2024 source on Kendall County schools reports that one female teacher earned $15 a month during the summer session in 1858, and was responsible for her room and board.

That same source tells the story of Dorothy Atlee, a 17-year-old hired in the fall of 1921 at a rural school near Yorkville. There, she had to “preserve the school house, grounds, furniture and other belongings,” as well as handle custodial duties. The young woman also had to teach first through eighth grade, all for the sum of $90 a month, or nearly $1,600 in today’s dollars.

Atlee certainly earned her money. Younger pupils in the school studied arithmetic, reading, phonics, spelling and language, while students from fifth through eighth grades also worked on geography, history and grammar.

At Holcombville School, a red brick schoolhouse built in McHenry County in 1858, Nellie Doherty was hired as a teacher in 1919. She was a former student at Holcombville and had a sparkling record in 1910 of being “neither tardy or absent,” in the words of one local source.

Doherty also taught first through eighth grade and did “all janitorial work.” Her students fondly recalled that each lesson was “designed to build moral character.” She was paid $72 per month.

As many as 12,000 one-room schoolhouses were found in Illinois, including 10,638 in 1908 alone. Most were cramped and basic.

Dale Sutter, who attended grades 4-8 at Ballard School in McLean County, said the building “was a frame construction, with one door on the west end” for an entrance and exit. A “short hallway” greeted the students, who turned left into the boys’ cloak room or right into the girls’ cloak room.

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Many students walked a considerable distance to get to school. At Holcombville, Ken Pearson recalled, “we lived … a mile or a mile and a half from the school. So we walked, often picking up neighbor kids from down the road along the way.”

Some students walked even farther than that. Once, Pearson’s father picked up several kids on his flatbed Model T and drove them to school. In many instances, students did not have adequate shoes and would walk without them, especially in warmer months.

In 2014, Myra Rousey of McLean County told of her experiences at a “little red schoolhouse” in Normal in 1933, where she “walked from an unimproved farm house – no running water, central heat or electricity – on a single, sunken dirt lane south” to the school.

Elsewhere in McLean County, sisters Luceille and Mary Gleim also recalled in 2014 that “our grandparents gave us a pony to ride to school” during their time as students in the 1930s and 1940s. They also wryly remembered that “the hot lunch program during the winter included baked potatoes and maybe soup, placed on top of the heating stove.”

Of course, the teachers were usually charged with firing the stove themselves, although in most schools, the students were required to help. Some pupils, especially older boys, pumped water and hauled coal or wood to fill the stove.

Sutter said that, at Ballard School, “each day one of the older boys pumped a bucket” to set in the boys’ cloak room,” where “a ladle was provided, and we all drank from it.”

In one Adams County school, near Quincy, a teacher paid a student $1 per week to arrive early and fire up the stove, creating a warm room for the others when they arrived.

The warmth of the stove did not radiate around the room. The Gleim sisters remembered that “with the wind blowing through those non-insulated school buildings, those sitting close to the heating stove … were cozy and warm. The unfortunate students in the far corners might be shivering.”

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Students didn’t go to school for long; many attended only through eighth grade. In many rural locales, students often had to take breaks from school to help with chores, particularly for spring planting and the fall harvest.

Like Dorothy Atlee, the teachers were often just slightly older than the students themselves. Some had only eighth-grade educations, and many lived on their own or with nearby families of students.

Female teachers were not allowed to marry until the World War II era. Many gave up their profession after just a few years to settle down and raise a family. Those who stayed in teaching were often nomadic, jumping from district to district in search of higher pay.

Their work ethic, though, was unquestioned, and many schoolrooms were defined by discipline. One source on the one-room schools of Adams County writes that “students were expected to work diligently and quietly,” unless “reciting lessons.” That source adds that “repetition was a good teaching method” and “memorization was also used frequently.”

The teachers didn’t have much support, and supplies were sparse. In 1910, the state of Illinois required that a “comfortable and sanitary schoolhouse” with “proper equipment” should include “dictionaries, maps and globes.” Paper came at a premium in some schoolhouses, as did pens and pencils; in many districts, students were expected to provide paper and writing utensils themselves.

Many one-room schoolhouses came with large windows, serving the need for good lighting in a time before electricity. In 1919, the state actually mandated a minimum number of windows for schoolhouses.

Two years before that, the state also required indoor toilets in one-room schoolhouses. Some, though, were rudimentary at best. Sutter remembered at Ballard School, the indoor toilets were “simply a stool over a pit in the ground.”

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Despite the many drawbacks, the level of education in one-room schools was remarkably strong. Rousey, Sutter and the Gleim sisters all went on to graduate from Illinois State University. Other former students of one-room schools became teachers themselves, as well as attorneys, political leaders and captains of industry.

But as the decades passed, the number of schools in Illinois, as well as their cost, became prohibitive. In 1935, Illinois Gov. Henry Horner called for the abolition of one-room schoolhouses. Many passed out of existence with the state-mandated school consolidation movement in 1948.

Some, however, remained into the 1950s and 1960s. The last fully functioning one-room school in use in Illinois was McAuley School District No. 27 on Illinois Route 38 in DuPage County, a mile west of West Chicago. Constructed in 1913, McAuley finally closed in 1991.

Across the state, many communities are seeking to preserve the legacy of one-room schools. In Macoupin County, south of Springfield, a massive volunteer effort in recent years helped create a website with information on many of the hundreds of one-room school buildings that once dotted the county.

Several one-room schoolhouses remain in the area, and some have been preserved as museums or landmarks. One is the McAuley school, a 28-by-36-foot, red brick, rectangular structure with six large blackboards and maple flooring that are reminiscent of the state’s recommendations “for a less expensive building” for school districts in the early 20th century.

McAuley, which was one of the earlier schools in the area to have indoor toilets, underwent a sweeping renovation in 1963.

Northwest of Sycamore, the white, wood-frame North Grove School at 26475 Brickville Road was constructed by Swedish immigrants in 1878 as a Lutheran parochial school.

The local Swedish Lutheran congregation had decreed that the school should be built, as one preservation document states, “for an amount not to exceed $200.” In 1880, the school was absorbed into the DeKalb school system. Forty-one students were registered at the school in 1900, and grades 1-8 were taught in the building for many years of its existence.

Its historic value has been enhanced by the installation of many features that would have been found in days gone by, including an iron pipe hitching post, a 4-foot board fence, a flagpole, a water pump and outdoor toilets.

The interior of the school is also full of period décor, including tongue-and-groove floorboards, wainscot bead boards and a teacher’s platform. The school, which closed in 1952, underwent a massive renovation in 1970.

The Lone Tree School at 19292 250 North Ave. near Tiskilwa was one of 236 one-room schoolhouses formerly found in Bureau County. Built in 1876, the pristine white, rectangular building features a bell tower, brick chimney, limestone foundation and shingle roof.

As elsewhere, teachers in the school did not earn much; between 1881-86, salaries were between $23 and $48 per month.

The Lone Tree School closed in 1942, and its remaining four students were transferred to the Tiskilwa schools. A row of desks and one blackboard from the time of closure are still found in the schoolhouse today.

McAuley, North Grove and Lone Tree have all been added to the National Register of Historic Places.

A remarkable number of one-room school buildings still exist, including around 50 in Adams County alone. Some are used as storage buildings, while others have been made into private residences, like the final rural school in the Oswego school district, Church School in Wheatland Township, which ceased operations in 1960.

• Tom Emery is a freelance writer and historical researcher from Carlinville, Ill. He may be reached at 217-710-8392 or ilcivilwar@yahoo.com.