Back in 2021, I fell headfirst into a deep dive on Madison County’s one-room schoolhouses. I spent hours driving back roads, poring over old maps, and tracking down buildings that hadn’t seen students in nearly a century. Fortunately, all that research paid off: by year’s end, I’d uncovered the remains of 45 long-forgotten schools scattered across the countryside. Each site had its own story to tell, but five of them stood out among my favorites.
Green Township District 1: Gravel Lawn
An early District 1 school in Green Township was established just northeast of where it sits today. In 1880, it was located at the northeastern corner of West County Road 1000-South and Indiana State Road 13 on farmland owned by the Cotterell family1. By 1901, it moved to its present location on land owned by Thomas Jenkins Doty, whose surname gave the school its first colloquial name2. The present structure seems to have been built in 19093.
The school’s common name of Gravel Lawn came after the adjacent cemetery was established in 1914 once a neighbor named Charles Hiday sold seven acres of his land to a board of trustees4. The Doty/Gravel Lawn schoolhouse served students until 1930, when Green Township’s Center School opened as a consolidation between District 1 and the District 3 schoolhouse, known as Hardscrabble5.
Jackson Township District 7: Hamilton
The first District 7 school appears to have been built on the Noah Ryan farm a mile west of the present-day intersection of West Eighth Street Road and North County Road 600-West. It may have originally been called Ryan due to its location there6. In 1880, the schoolhouse stood three-quarters of a mile further east7.
The schoolhouse that still stands -the third- was finished in 1903 as a two-room structure8. Upon its completion, students from the old District 7 school and the District 8: Epperly school consolidated into it9. In 1955, a Jackson Township consolidated school opened nearly four miles northwest of the District 7 schoolhouse, and it was shuttered10. At the time, the Hamilton school was one of the oldest in the county.
Lafayette Township District 3: Salem
Josephus W. Layne -later superintendent of Evansville schools and a member of the state board of education- taught at an early version of the Salem schoolhouse as a seventeen-year-old in 186711. In 1875, a frame building was erected at the northeast corner of today’s county roads North 500-West and West 700-North, a mile south of Frankton12. The extant schoolhouse, its replacement, was built in 1904 for $7,000.
Along with the Prairie, Keller, Beech Grove, Elm Grove, Closser, and Florida schoolhouses, the Salem school closed in 1932 when Lafayette Township’s six-room Leach consolidated school opened near the center of the township13. Today, the old District 3 schoolhouse is a home. After removing its aluminum siding in a recent renovation, the present owner discovered the names of former students written on its brick walls14.
Monroe Township District 13: Osceola
A schoolhouse serving Monroe Township’s District 13 was established in the tiny community of Osceola by 188015. It’s about all that’s left of the town! Unfortunately, a petition circulated with hopes of abandoning the schoolhouse and sending its pupils to the school at Orestes in 1922. Residents were thankful that it failed16.
Despite popular sentiment that called the institution one of the best of the old one-room school buildings in the county, the District 13 schoolhouse was condemned in 192517. Its students were sent to Orestes for good the following year18. The old Osceola schoolhouse was eventually remodeled into a residence.
Pipe Creek Township District 5: Hawkins
In 1880, Pipe Creek Township’s District 5 schoolhouse was located about an eighth of a mile east of the present-day intersection of North County Road 900-West and West County Road 900-North in Madison County19. William R. Hawkins owned the 160 acres immediately north20.
The present District 5 school was erected at some point during 1880 and 1901, when it seems to have been shuttered. Despite its early closure, it appears as though the schoolhouse was reestablished prior to 1904. That year, Emma Jackley was the teacher21. Newspaper references to an active Hawkins School end around 1906-1908. The thoroughfare that passes it was called the Hawkins School Road up through 1917 and possibly even today22.
Most of Madison County’s one-room schools are gone, but these five survivors serve as landmarks of the townships they once anchored. For me, they served as a reminder that education didn’t always come with parking lots and auxiliary gyms! A hundred years ago or more, potbelly stoves and slates were a big part of the picture. While my list of favorites could easily stretch longer, these five represent something special: the resilience of rural education and the deep roots of Madison County’s history.
Sources Cited
1 Kingman Brothers. (1880). History of Madison County, Indiana with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches. Chicago, IL.
2 (1901). Stony Creek Township. An atlas of Madison County, Indiana. map, Cleveland, OH; American Atlas Company.
3 Madison County Office of Information & GIS Services. (2021). Parcel ID: 48-15-33-400-001.000-014.
4 Crowe, R. (2015, September 3). Gravel Lawn Cemetery marks its centennial. The Greenfield Daily Reporter. p. 20.
5 Crowe, R. (2015, April 16). One teacher looms large in Center School history. The Greenfield Daily Reporter. p. 20.
6 Bock, G. (1969, August 23). No Kidding, There Was Once Bell Rattle School. The Anderson Daily Bulletin. p. 4.
7 Kingman Brothers. (1880). History of Madison County, Indiana with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches. Chicago, IL.Harden, S. (1874).
8 Schools of Jackson Township Good Ones (1904, February 5). The Elwood Daily Record. p. 1.
9 (See footnote 1).
10 New Township School Planned (1952, January 22). The Anderson Herald. p. 1.
11 Josephus W. Layne (1896, October 2). The Elwood Free Press. p. 1.
12 Jackson, S.T. (2009, November 14). In History: Township schools set by districts. The Anderson Herald Bulletin. Web. Retrieved December 3, 2021.
13 Leach School to be Dedicated Next Tuesday (1932, August 19). The Alexandria Times-Tribune. p. 1.
14 Jackson, S. T. (2021, August 24). Madison County schoolhouses. email.
15 Kingman Brothers. (1880). History of Madison County, Indiana with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches. Chicago, IL. Map.
16 Osceola School District Refuses to Consolidate With Orestes Schools (1922, May 31). The Alexandria Times-Tribune. p. 1.
17 Some School Houses In County Condemned (1925, August 24). The Alexandria Times-Tribune. p. 3.
18 Osceola School House Condemned By Board (1925, July 13). The Alexandria Times-Tribune. p. 4.
19 Kingman Brothers. (1880). History of Madison County, Indiana with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches. Chicago, IL.
20 Atlas and Directory of Madison County, Indiana (1901). The American Atlas Company. Cleveland. map. 3 Jackson, S.
21 In The Country Schools of Pipecreek (1904, February 9). The Elwood Daily Record. p. 1.
22 Places to Register (1917, June 4). The Elwood Call-Leader, p. 7.
