Late last year, I followed Green Street Road out of Albany toward Dunkirk and was stunned to find the old Green Street schoolhouse reduced to a heap of fallen bricks. In hindsight, the collapse shouldn’t have shocked me since the front gable had been clinging to life for years. Nevertheless, it set my mind spinning about other rural schoolhouses that might be teetering on the same edge. One of them was Niles Township’s old District 9 school, known at different times as Smith or Lowe. Thankfully, it’s still standing- at least for now.
In 1863, John T. Ray carved off a small slice of his land along County Road 900 North and handed it over to the Niles Township trustee for one purpose: to build a schoolhouse1. By 1881, the District 9 school had picked up a familiar nickname: the Smith School2. The name likely came from its northern neighbor, the sprawling 380 acres owned by Benjamin F. Smith, whose farm loomed just beyond the property3.
In 1887, Sophia and George R. Lowe sold a piece of their land to Niles School Township for the tidy sum of sixty dollars, clearing the way for a brand-new District 9 schoolhouse4. The replacement went up soon after, and became known as the Lowe school.
The Smith/Lowe schoolhouse dismissed its final class after the 1916–17 school year, when Niles Township shuttered its remaining one-room schools5. From then on, local pupils were routed to classrooms in Albany, and the building entered a strange second life. No longer echoing with lessons, it spent a few years as a bus barn for Albany’s city schools6. After its closure, the schoolhouse was used to store hogs and farm implements7. When I visited the building in 2015 and 2021, it appeared to be abandoned.
Today, the old Smith/Lowe schoolhouse stands as one of the last witnesses to Niles Township’s early educational past. Its roof has fallen in, its brick walls are weathered, and it’s surrounded by trees, but it still clings to its corner at County Road 900 North and Black Cemetery Road. It’s still standing for now, but its future feels uncertain. All we can do is document what remains to honor the stories held inside those crumbling walls.Â
Sources Cited
1 Delaware County, Indiana. (1863 December 22). Deed Book 26. p. 127.
2 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. book, Kingman Brothers.
3 Kingman, A.L. (1874). Map of Delaware County, Indiana : from recent & original surveys, made expressly for this map, drawn, compiled and published by A.L. Kingman and assistants. map, Chicago, IL; A.L. Kingman.
4 Delaware County, Indiana. (1887 June 25). Deed Book 58. p. 466.
5 Delaware County Public Schools. (1916). School directory, Delaware County public schools, Delaware County, Indiana 1916-1917. Muncie, IN.
6 Marks, M. (2006, March 31). Only one 19th-century Niles Township school is standing. The Muncie Star Press. p. 3C.
7 Profile. (2006. October 20). The Muncie Star Press. p. 4A.
Interesting! Any remains of the first schoolhouse on the piece of land donated by John Ray?
Not to my knowledge. Probably frame and long gone.
Makes sense.