A History of
Newcomerstown Schools
by Christina MacMillan, Librarian,
Newcomerstown Public Library, 1964
(edited version)
When
the first families came to the settlement on the Tuscarawas
River known as Newcomerstown, one of their principal concerns
was the education of their children. At first small groups of
children were taught in the log cabins of the settlers. One of
the settlers, Jacob Miller, gave instruction in his cabin as
early as 1818. The three R's were also taught in the cabin of
the Stouffer family in the area of the present Pilling Street.
After
the village was incorporated as a municipality, two small
one-room schools were constructed. These were the first village
owned schoolhouses in the history of the town. One was on the
present Church Street near the site of the Trinity Methodist
Church (Church of God), and the other on the State Road south of
the old pioneer cemetery. Other small schools were built outside
of the village, one being on the Stark Patent east of town.
Finally, in 1856, a great advancement was made in school
planning when a two story, four room frame school building was
erected on College Street. This was called the Union School
since it united several one-room schools in the area. The rooms
on the first floor of this building were used for the lower
grades, those on the second floor for the higher grades, or the
high school, as it was later called. In 1880 it was necessary to
add an addition of two rooms to this structure. By 1900, the
steady growth of the town had brought the need for another
building program.
Consequently, two red brick two story school buildings of
identical architectural design were erected. One was at the
corner of River and State Streets for grades one through eight.
This building was known later as Maplewood. The other was built
on College Street, replacing the Union School that had served as
a place of learning for forty-four years. The old building was
moved to a property behind the new one and was used later for
overflow classes.
This new building was called the High School building since the
high school occupied the rooms on the second floor and grades
one through six were housed on the first floor. The high school
had no auditorium in this building so when assemblies were held,
the students were all crowded into the room occupied by the
Senior Class. The small room in the bell tower served as a
physics laboratory.
The
bells of these two buildings could be heard in all parts of the
town calling boys and girls to school. A child was considered to
be on time if he arrived at the school before the bell stopped
ringing. Many former students recall that they were saved from
being tardy by the kindly janitor who would continue to ring the
school bell as long as any student was in sight.
Both of these buildings had spacious lawns where many games and
contests were enjoyed during recess time. A favorite game of
that era was Anthony (Andy) Over, played as a contest between
two teams throwing a ball over the roofs of the outdoor "rest
rooms."
A
public building that was not a school, but was used for many
school activities, was the Opera House on Church Street. This
building was on the site now occupied by the Newcomerstown
Municipal Building. The auditorium of this center of culture in
which concerts and lectures were enjoyed throughout the year by
residents of the community provided the stage on which the
schools presented their operettas, high school class plays, and
Commencement exercises.
For
forty-one years, from 1882 to 1923, classes received their
diplomas at graduation time in this auditorium.
A room
on the first floor of this Opera House was rented by the schools
for a basketball court, since the high school had no gymnasium.
One disadvantage to this basketball floor was that the athletes
had to play among pillars that supported the auditorium above
it. Even among the pillars exciting games were played by both
the girls' and the boys' teams until the attic of the high
school building was remodeled into a basketball court by the
combined efforts of high school boys, teachers, and townsmen in
1922. The high school athletic program also included the outdoor
sports of baseball, football, and track at various times in the
history of the school.
The
year 1924 marked a time of further development in the growth of
the schools. By this time the school enrollment had increased so
much that there was no longer room for all of the classes in the
two buildings. Several classes were being taught in the K. of P.
and the Woods buildings. The erection of a large three-story
schoolhouse at the corner of State and River Streets provided
rooms for the high school on the first two floors and for the
seventh and eighth grades on the third floor. This left the two
red brick buildings for the first six elementary grades.
This
new high school building had features that had not been
available in the earlier structures, well-equipped laboratories
for science classes, a school library, and a combination
auditorium gymnasium. The latter gave the schools a place for
basketball games, physical education classes, intramural
contests, assemblies, dramatics, and graduation exercises.
An
addition was added to the high school building in 1936. A few
years later the school acquired the two story red brick building
on Goodrich Street that was known as the School Annex. Classes
in instrumental and vocal music, and some classes of Industrial
Arts were taught in this building.
On the
morning of March 11, 1955, a disastrous tornado struck
Newcomerstown. Many buildings of the town, including the two
elementary school buildings, were damaged beyond repair. Until
new buildings could be planned and erected, the elementary
grades were taught in several buildings of the town: the Masonic
Temple, the C.I.O. and three churches, the Trinity Methodist
(Church of God), Nazarene, and Presbyterian. By September 1957,
two new one floor plan school buildings of modern functional
design had been built and were ready for occupancy. One of
these, the East School, was a seven room building on College
Street, the third school building to occupy that site. The
other, the West School, was a seventeen room building on Beaver
Street built on a thirty-two acre tract of land purchased by the
Board of Education. Grades one through five and kindergarten
classes are currently housed in these buildings. Each structure
had a multipurpose room that was used for school programs,
indoor recreation, and assemblies. The multi-purpose room in the
West School is equipped with a cafeteria which serves lunches to
the children of its building and to students from the Middle
School.
In
1880 a class of five students received certificates for
completing a two-year teachers' course, but in 1882 a class of
five received the first diplomas granted by the Board of
Education on finishing the three-year high school course. Three
years of high school continued to be the requirement for
graduation until the present requirement of four years was made
in 1905.
Through the many changes and developments in the schools in the
one hundred eighty-six years of the history of Newcomerstown,
the purpose of every Board of Education, administrator, and
teacher has been to make the best possible education available
to the children of the community, so that they might be prepared
to take their places in society as intelligent and responsible
citizens.
*******************************
