The Brookings register. [volume] (Brookings, Brookings County, S.D.) 1903-1971, 1922-03-23

first school district was a much dis
cussed subject during the winter of
1880. Toward spring a compromise
vas affected and the outline Of the
new district was sent to Mr.. Newton
county superintendent at Fountain. He
confirmed the boundary and called the
first meeting of the district to be held
at the home of Erick Il. Olson early
in April. At this meeting, Mr.. Olson
was elected director; Ole Mark, treas
urer, and Hans Phillipson, secretary.
The meeting then adjourned for two
weeks to meet at the home Of CLAUS
Peterson, where it was decided to
have three months of school, two
months in the spring and one month
in the fall. Minnie Lindskog was en-
gagged as teacher at 500 per month
and board. The first w months we're
taught at the house of Ole Mark,
mere the college barn now stands.
The fall term was taught by p. O.
Peterson. A motion to levy money
for the contingent fund was laid on
the tables as some one had heard that
the old district had lots of money on
hand and was going to make the new
district take owe some of it, but this
proved to be a false alarm.
LAS clerk it became my duty to
take the first school census. The
township, east of the river and II sec
tons in Medary township, and when
we had finished we had travelled 33
miles. There were originally so per
sons Of school age in the district but
one got married in the meantime and
insisted on having her name cancelled,
so the list went in with 70 names.
There were several large families
and we soon found out that they
thought their taxes would be in pro-
portion to the number of children so
we always began by telling them that
the more children the more money we
would get from the territory, and had
no more trouble on that account. The
people were all poor but full Of grit
and they were rewarded by the first
two crops which they raised for they
were very good. One place we visited,
the children were home alone, the old
est one getting dinner ready, the
younger ones all twisting hay to keep
the home fires burning until the folks
came home.
I'm October the railroad came in
and building operations began to as
sumo large proportions in the village.
A meeting was called the first week
in December in the store building of
G.. w. Pierce (now Eide's shoe re-
pair shop. At said meeting it was
decided to issue bonds to not exceed
100000 to build a school house. A
committee was appointed to work with
the school board. This committee
consisted Of G. w. Pierce, X. II. Will
liams and II. II. Natwick. It's present
location was decided on by adopting a
motion made by George A. Mathews.
One thousand five hundred dollars
worth of the bonds were sold to r. f.
on the dollar, and this proved suffi-
cient to build the first schoolhouse.
(This building is now occupied by the
Register Publishing company Only
the first floor was finished and fur
nished. The carpenter work was done
by Hans Christopherson for $164.00,
other bidders being c. w. Kelsey,
$A25.0 90 and B. F. Madget, 1886. 90. The
first teacher was Miss Emily Stanton.
The following year it became neces-
sary to finish and furnish the second
floor and $4,000 worth of bonds were
sold to James Hauxhurst. At the next
school meeting George A. Mathews
was elected secretary"