Washington Township’s old Zion schoolhouse was a mystery to me. I began my research into one-room schoolhouses based on a map that didn’t show it! I shook my head in disbelief after I stumbled across it after a couple years: although the schoolhouse sits on the backroads of northwestern Delaware County, it’s plainly visible from I-69. I’ve passed it a thousand times. D’oh!
A District 5 school in Washington Township has existed since at least since 1870. That’s the year Morris Jones deeded a portion of his land to the trustees of Zion Chapel, a plot “commencing at the North Northeast corner of the School house and Grave Yard lot on the East side of the west half of the south east quarter of Section 131”. The schoolhouse is visible on an 1874 plat map, but it’s only listed as “School” on one published in 18872.
C.O. Swingley taught at District 5 in 18813, and the extant schoolhouse appears to have been built around 19004. The building featured some great architectural details that set it apart from some of its contemporaries, such as ornamental brickwork and louvered vents in the apex of its gables.
Along with the District 4 school nearby, the District 5 schoolhouse closed at the end of the 1923-24 term so its students could attend classes at Gaston. The last teacher was Herschel Brown5.
The schoolhouse was used as a community center through the 1950s and 60s6. In 1966, Zion Chapel was razed so its timbers could be used for an addition to a church near Fairmount7. Its graveyard remains just southwest of the schoolhouse; about three hundred people were buried there between 1841 and 2020.
Today, the old District 5schoolhouse is a home.
Sources Cited
1 Delaware County, Indiana. (1870 July 14). Deed Book 33. p. 694. Kingman Brothers. (1874). Map of Delaware County, Indiana. Chicago, IL.
2 Griffing, B. N. (1887). Mt. Pleasant Township. An atlas of Delaware County, Indiana . map, Philadelphia, PA; Griffing, Gordon, & Company.
3 Helm, T. B. (1881). Mount Pleasant Township. In History of Delaware County, Indiana: With Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of Some of Its Prominent Men and Pioneers (pp. 268–269). book, Kingman Brothers.
4 Delaware County Office of Information & GIS Services. (2021). Parcel ID: 0113400008000. Delaware County, Indiana Assessor. map, Muncie, IN.
5 Delaware County Public Schools. (1923). School directory, Delaware County public schools, Delaware County, Indiana 1923-1924. Muncie, IN.
6 Greene, D. (1953, March 28). Seen and Heard in Our Neighborhood. The Muncie Star. p. 6.
7 Greene, D. (1966, February 9). Seen and Heard in Our Neighborhood. The Muncie Star. p. 4.
