1893 school bell finds home at La Posada

Special to the Green Valley News

You will NOT marry during term of this contract.

You are NOT to keep company with men.

You may NOT smoke cigarettes.

You may NOT dress in bright colors.

You may NOT dye your hair.

Those were some of the rules when Marcella Krahn started teaching in a one-room schoolhouse in rural Wisconsin in 1938. Two years later, she was earning $85 a month in Freedom, Wis., and keeps the contract in a frame.

That’s not all there is to remind Krahn, 92, of her teaching career. She donated the 19th century school bell that hangs over the arched entry to the courtyard of the newly opened Shoppes at La Posada.

When Krahn and her late husband, Bud, bought a house in Wisconsin it came with an 1893 bell that hung on a telephone post by the back door.

“If I wanted my husband who was out in the field I’d ring the bell. It was so loud.”

When she moved, the school bell moved with her.

When she came to La Posada two and a half years ago, she asked Mark Dugan, vice president of the La Posada Foundation, to look through her memorabilia to see what he might find useful.

“He had a vision... he has a wonderful ability to look into the future,” Krahn said, as she told about him selecting the old school bell.

“Where it ended up is where we hoped it would be,” Dugan said.

The bell now enjoys a new role as more decorative than functional, and has many admirers.

Back to school

Krahn chuckles as she looks at some of her duties clearly listed on the framed contract: “janitorial work such as sweeping, starting the fire, carrying in drinking water and ringing the school bell one-half hour before school begins.”

“To start the fire I had to carry coal in buckets and pour it into the potbelly stove. Then came packaged coal; I didn’t have to get my hands dirty... I remember those freezing mornings and getting to school around 6 a.m. to get the fire going.”

If she performed well she received a raise of $5 a month — but only if she submitted her year-end report on time.

Krahn taught about 32 children from grades one through eight. There was no kindergarten and no break. She ate lunch in the room with the children and supervised recess outdoors.

Once, when playing baseball with a group of third- and fourth-graders, Krahn made a home run. One boy told her, “You’re a true American.”

When a problem arose Krahn had to handle it by herself; there was no principal or fellow teacher to call on for help.

“If a child got sick in class, I’d drive him home. The kids were fine by themselves. If a child was sick and couldn’t come to school I brought the lessons to their home at night.”

She remembers a supervisor, Mrs. Margaret Thatcher, coming by once a month unannounced. When the children left at the end of the day she would tell Krahn if she did anything wrong.

“No time was wasted. I’d write assignments for each grade on the blackboard, often at the end of the day for the next morning. Blackboards covered the walls except where there were windows.”

Krahn said the main advantage of teaching multiple grades in a one-room schoolhouse was “the closeness I had with the kids; eighth-graders took care of first-graders.”

Comparing that to public education today, Krahn said advantages now include specialized teachers and sports programs.

“My biggest challenge was meeting the needs of all the children... as a teacher in a country school you had to be organized. At the end of the year there was a great feeling of accomplishment.”

Ellen Sussman is a freelance writer in Green Valley. Contact her at ellen2414@cox.net.