OLD SCHOOL OF THE DAY
Honeoye Falls One-Room Schoolhouse
The Honeoye Falls – Town of Mendon Historical Society
1 Allen Park Dr.
Honeoye Falls, NY 14472
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, most American students attended a one-room schoolhouse. A single teacher would typically have students in the first through eighth grades, and she taught them all. The number of students varied from six to 40 or more. The youngest children sat in the front, while the oldest students sat in the back. The teacher usually taught reading, writing, arithmetic, history, and geography. Students memorized and recited their lessons. The classroom of a one-room schoolhouse probably looked much like those of today. The teacher’s desk may have been on a raised platform at the front of the room, however, and there would have been a wood-burning stove since there was no other source of heat. The bathroom would have been outside in an outhouse.
In Honeoye Falls, New York, there is a one-room schoolhouse where kids today can experience what it was like to be students in the late 19th century. For a week during the summer, they wear 19th century clothes and learn the way children learned more than a hundred years ago. In 1991 the Honeoye Falls/Town of Mendon Historical Society began the transformation of an old one-room schoolhouse into a living history museum. Mendon District School Number 15 was moved to the Village of Honeoye Falls Town Park some years ago and opened to the public as part of a Village Days celebration. The opening was met with great enthusiasm, and the Historical Society went on to restore the schoolhouse and develop a program to preserve its history.
This little one-room schoolhouse building has been beautifully restored with the inside set up as it would have looked 135 years ago. During the 19th and early 20th century, the rural school often also served as a church, meeting place, and theater, thereby bringing the community together. One of the Historical Society’s educational programs is “Miss Eliza’s Summer Session,” a week-long summer class for graduating fourth-graders. During the class, the children dress in period clothing and are immersed in an educational experience from the past. The Honeoye Falls – Town of Mendon Historical Society is dedicated to the preservation of local history and the education of the community. The Society operates a museum located at One Harry Allen Park, which is open to the public Sunday afternoons from 2 to 4.
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