The Newtown bee., 1905-11-10
OLD MEMORIES STIRRED
BY READING ARTICLE IN THE BEE.

To the Editor of THE VIEWPOINT BEE, Dear Sir: I was interested in reading the account in THE BEE of the flag raising at the new schoolhouse in the North district of Sherman and had l known when it was to take place
 1 should have enjoyed being there, for
 the First district of Sherman was my
 home for the first 26 years of my life.
 1 attended school as mere boy in the
 old brown schoolhouse which ante dated the red one many years. The same old frame was used and a cover ing put on and painted red to create
 the one which is now standing on the small plot of ground nearly in the
 road. l have not seen the new build- ing, but if it is as fine as described it
 must be pleasure to attend there
 We older children did not enjoy the convenienceS of such easy seats and
 desks as are now in use. When first attended school, slabs from logs with legs driven into them were used with no backs except the sharp edges of the counters which were nailed to the wall and the edges to our backs when we faced the teacher. My first teach CT was Mrs Mariah B. Duell, the mother of Hiram, under whose gentle
 miniStratiOnS few of us children of
 four or five years of age were allowed to while away our time on the play l ground or perhaps in cOZy corner of | the room in short nap, for l remem- | Der our teacher held the school in her own house and did not believe in fore 1 ing the very youthful to study hard. The next teacher I remember to have received instructions under by the rule, birch twig or otherwise, was my Aunt Eliza Sanford, who taught in the old brown schoolhOuse. She be- gan teaching at the age of H years and taught nearly every year until she was 45 and stopped then to marry William Albert Knapp and lived to be quite aged. 1 remember other teachers, among them Miss Sabra Kellogg, Miss Lucretia Hungerford and Miss Alice | Woolsey. There have been great changes in the district since those days. 1 do not recall but three per- sons now living in the distsict who at tended school at the time l did, viz, Hiram B. Duell, George G. Hunger ford and Anna NJ. Hungerford Dun- can. l taught there one term when l was Is years of age and if my memory serves me the latter was pupil. The inhabitants of the district now are mostly newcomers. The first district of Sherman was in it's early years one of the most important in the town, having sturdy reliable set of inhabi. tantS, whose influence in the affairs of that town and region was very large. Captain Joseph Giddings, my great. grandfather was one of the pioneers of the place taking up his abode at
 first in the year 175l on an eminence in the extreme western end of tn dis trict, overlooking the New York line, where the howl of the wolf and the cry of the wildcat were their pleasing nightly Serenade. His nephew, Capt
 William Giddings, settled near him some two or three years later. They cleared up the wilderness and raised
 large families, whose descendants for and numerous in the district and town:
 both Captains Joseph and William
 were defenders of the colonies under the King in the French and Indian
 war, and later striking for freedom in
 the Revolution, William serving
 through the war, having received his commission from the hands of Gen
 Washington. Of course the first dis
 trict school was made up largely of the
 GiddingS name. At one time, of the , 3S pupils who attended school, 36 were of that name, and the other two haC mothers whose maiden name was Gid
 dingS. I rejoice that the enterpriSine ' inhabitants of the district have put
 their heads together and their hands
 in their pockets and the result of theil
 labOrS has been the erection of { schoolhouse worthy of the tradition!
 of the district, where the young car ; obtain useful knowledge which will
 it them for exalted stations in life
 MinOt $. GiddingS, New Milford, Ct