The Ronan pioneer., 1915-12-03
COLEMAN WRITES
ON SCHOOL ISSUE

Editor Pioneer: After reading
three times the article on "Consolida
tion", written by R. j. Christian, I
heartily endorsed every word of it: if
there is any mistake in it, it is that
his criticism is too mild. Of course
this criticism applies only to that por
tion of the school managers who are
so persistent in promoting consolida-
tion. They are destroying fairly
good and satisfactory school system
and replacing it with a more expen-
sive and less satisfactory one; they
are very efficient in making places for
some wealthy corporation to sell
school wagons. I predict they will
manage to have schools close to
themselves. r. j. Christian certainly
voiced the sentiment of scores of
people in his article, which was pub
lished in your issue of Nov. 5th.
About 4 years ago, the children of
South Moiese were going to school at
the clubhouse, a distance of from 8
to miles 1t was dark in the morn
ing when they left, and dark at night
when they returned. This was too
much of a hardship for both parents
and children, so the school trustees
promised the people of South Moiese
it they would build a school house on
the Moiese town site, where it was
convenient for the majority of the
scholars, they would furnish them
teacher and pay them ten dollars a
month during school months until the
building was paid for. By hard hust-
ling the people in the surrounding
community managed to get enough
money, work and credit to build a
good school house We had only two
terms Of school when the consolida-
tion promoters had meeting called
at the club b-house to take vote on
Consolidation. They stated to the
people that they had received COM
nunication from Moiese Valley asking
for consolidation and had called the
meeting to take a vote on it There
were no notices posted as required by
law. | asked one of the trustees who
wrote the letter asking for consoli-
dation and he wouldn't divulge the
secret, and it was months after, be-
fore we found outwhen a school
teacher, a resident of Sanders county,
admitted that she wrote it. At the
opening of the meeting, the remarks
from several different people indicated
that the sentiment was strong against
consolidation. AS soon and often as
an objection was raised against it,
Clerk Logan sprang to his feet with
Some argument for it. He promised
the people good responsible driver
for the wagon, but they would only
pay $50 a month The impression,
previous to this meeting, was that the
consolidated school house would be
built on the Moese townsite, and in
order to protect himself-a resident,
living about 8 miles away, made a
motion that We consolidate and place
the house near the club house, where
upon the residents living near the club
house suddenly became in favor of it.
When rising vote on the question
was called for, they, school children
and one resident of Sanders Co., stood
and of course the motion carried. Then
it was up to US to either donate work
and buy lumber to build another
school house or move the two we had
distance of about three miles and
both houses would have to be moved
over a steep hill, and the lumber bill
for neither one was more than half
paid for. On account of the distance
and the steep hills we thought it use
less to try to move our school houses
and it seemd to me poor business,
when We were not financially able to
pay for the houses we had, to begin to
build new and more expensive ones,
so one of my neighbors and / decided
to down the treacherous scheme and
with the aid of all the South Moiese
and part of the North Moiese we did.
l circulated petition against Consol-
lidation and secured the names of a
large majority of South Moiese and
presented it to one of the trustees.
He however, did not give it much con-
Jsideration. asked him if they could
force us to donate work and buy lum
ber to build another school house.
He replied that they couldn't, but that
if the trustees had the necessary
funds to put up the building; they
wouldn't ask the people much about it,