West Virginia argus. [volume] (Kingwood, W. Va.) 1877-1946, 1900-03-15
SCHOOL DAYS.
Col. Robert McEldowney Renews His
Youth and Writes Personal Memoir.
From Tho wetzel Democrat.

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From Tho wetzel Democrat.
Our present schoolhouse is shabby affair
for the times, bu, il is palace compared to
the old New Mar,insville sehoolhouse, which
stood on the lot now occupied by Hennen's
stables. How all the pupils attending were
packed into il is now a mystery to us, un-
less Il be accounted for by the fact that the
teacher was from down East and accustomed
to packing herring aud sardines.
The school books used were an arithmetic,
called the "Wes,ern Calculator which
gave you lots of hard examples to solve and
didn', tell you thing; olney's geography,
a good book for the times, but we sang our
geography and had no use for il; Kirkham's
grammar, which told you that a hard sen
tenee was an anomaly which need not be
parsed at all, so we passed; and McGudcy's
readers and spoilers, which were the best
books we had. The principal medium of
instruction was the OK CAD, and that waved
In triumph above Star Spangled Banner and
everything else from morning until night
School "took up" at eight in the morning
and lasted until six in the evening, and
every day was fot,y-eight hours long.
We got up at five o'clock In the morning
and put on our thick woody country jeans
suit, with WOODEN stockings, cowhide boots
with pegged soles and creased to Boston.
Our socks were usually wet from wading in
nonds the aveninc L.fo.. -, . ...
mentioned it--for much of what is dry land
about here now was swamp then. A
swamp began at the upper end of the Fair
Grounds and extended right through town
to near where Eakin's stables now stand. A
deep ditch collected the water along the
cast side of Main street. We often managed
to fall into that ditch on our way home from
school.
After we had eaten our breakfast of
johnnycake ldo you know what iohnnycake
is 9,) molasses, fitch and fried potatoes, we
went out to the barn and had fun foddering
cattle II you never foddered cattle of a
cold, frosty morning you don't know what
fun is, but you needn't regret.
We then started for school with six apples
and dinner pail full of johnnycake, and
our feet being damp from wet socks we got
chilblains on our hoofs walking through the
snow, but we didn't mind them as long as
our feet were cold But when we got TO our
seat and our feet began to warm up, the
chilblains began TO itch to distraction and
we made as much noise hauling our feet
across the floor as barn door, and got into
trouble with the teacher. When we hauled
off our boots our feet swelled so that we
couldn't get them on again and we were
there for certain. We would hobble home
with our boots half on and the counters
broke down and our heels twisted out of
place, and the wonder is that the bottoms of
our heels are not on Me tops Of our feet to
this day.
We usually got six liekings each day; three
on general principles, the Others being spec
ial or particular. We were whaled in squads
of six at time. We remember a pleasing
occasion when at the sixth lick across our
back the stick broke; the teacher handed us
his knife and told us to go out and cut
good stiff one, as he hadn't begun to whale
us yet, and that we refused and that he sent
another boy, and that we afterwards wished
we had gone ourselves and never come back.
The boys all found IL good plan to yell at
the first lick as you were struck with death,
as that made him pass sooner to the next
boy. One term we got Sfubborn and
wouldn't yell at all and whole clearing
was worn out on our back, but we never
tried that but ono term.
AZ noon and at recess, when we had any,
we played town ball, the forerunner Of base
ball, and corner ball, which was dandy,
for by the end Of the term every boys's back
was as spotted as leopards from the
whacks he got at corner ball When you
fell out with boy at school you arranged
for fight on the way home, and once your
word was out there was no back out to IT,,
although often on the way to the battlefield
! we felt the spirit Of compromise risipg big
within us. We remember with pleasure that
on one occasion when boy and ourself
we're hanging our "wamuses" on the fence
preparing for gouging match, Polly Kirk
patrick came along and whaled us both, and
we thought we'll Of Polly afterwards, for we
had our doubts about that Gght. We could
tell more but this will do to let the boys
know what a nice time their fathers and
grandfalhers had going to school