Saturday, June 14, 2025
No Result
View All Result
The Chimney Rock Chronicle
FREE SUBSCRIPTIONS
  • Home
    • About Us
    • Pickup Locations
  • Columns
    • All
    • Book Notes
    • Faith
    • From the Potting Shed
    • Fulks Run Follies
    • Local Legends
    • Personal Development
    • Reflections from the Past and Present
    • The Wandering Wilkins
    The Chimney Rock Chronicle.

    From One Chimney Rock to Another

    Ken West.

    Learning to Dwell In the Secret Place Part 3

    George Bowers.

    Licking the Fruit 

    A Clear Picture of THEIR Purpose

    The Chimney Rock Chronicle.

    Another Story from Our North Carolina Friends

    Ken West.

    Learning to Dwell in the Secret Place – Part 2

    George Bowers.

    Stocking Trout and Jesus’ Return 

    Ken West.

    Learning to Dwell

    George Bowers.

    Who Are We Pleasing?

    Spotlight on the Off Broadway Players

    Gospel Vault

    Gospel Vault: April 1990 A Look Back

    Ken West.

    My will or God’s will?

    George Bowers.

    Dealing With Smoky Nostalgia

    Connecting Compromise to Our Clear Purpose

    Women in Leadership and Athletics:  Personal Reflections on How We’ve Come a Long Way!

    • Entertainment

      Spotlight on the Off Broadway Players

      Gospel Vault

      Gospel Vault

      Gospel Vault

      Gospel Vault

      Off Broadway Players Announce 2025 Season

      Spotlight on the Off Broadway Players

    • History

      Highlights from the Plains District Memorial Museum

      Life Lessons from Fulks Run Grocery

      When This You See

      When This You See

      161st Anniversary Battle of New Market Commemoration

      Timberville Historic Notes

      Timberville Historic Notes

      Justice in the Good Old Days

      When This You See

      When This You See

      Highlights From the Plains District Memorial Museum

      Connecting With Others, Bite by Bite

      Brocks Gap Heritage Day April 26

    • Lifestyle
      • All
      • Health
      • Inspirational
      • Travel

      The Wandering Wilkins

      Sarah’s Recipes

      Sarah’s Recipes

      The Chimney Rock Chronicle.

      Retta’s Column

      Local Teachers Attend VRTA

  • Events
  • Our Sponsors
  • Advertising
  • Home
    • About Us
    • Pickup Locations
  • Columns
    • All
    • Book Notes
    • Faith
    • From the Potting Shed
    • Fulks Run Follies
    • Local Legends
    • Personal Development
    • Reflections from the Past and Present
    • The Wandering Wilkins
    The Chimney Rock Chronicle.

    From One Chimney Rock to Another

    Ken West.

    Learning to Dwell In the Secret Place Part 3

    George Bowers.

    Licking the Fruit 

    A Clear Picture of THEIR Purpose

    The Chimney Rock Chronicle.

    Another Story from Our North Carolina Friends

    Ken West.

    Learning to Dwell in the Secret Place – Part 2

    George Bowers.

    Stocking Trout and Jesus’ Return 

    Ken West.

    Learning to Dwell

    George Bowers.

    Who Are We Pleasing?

    Spotlight on the Off Broadway Players

    Gospel Vault

    Gospel Vault: April 1990 A Look Back

    Ken West.

    My will or God’s will?

    George Bowers.

    Dealing With Smoky Nostalgia

    Connecting Compromise to Our Clear Purpose

    Women in Leadership and Athletics:  Personal Reflections on How We’ve Come a Long Way!

    • Entertainment

      Spotlight on the Off Broadway Players

      Gospel Vault

      Gospel Vault

      Gospel Vault

      Gospel Vault

      Off Broadway Players Announce 2025 Season

      Spotlight on the Off Broadway Players

    • History

      Highlights from the Plains District Memorial Museum

      Life Lessons from Fulks Run Grocery

      When This You See

      When This You See

      161st Anniversary Battle of New Market Commemoration

      Timberville Historic Notes

      Timberville Historic Notes

      Justice in the Good Old Days

      When This You See

      When This You See

      Highlights From the Plains District Memorial Museum

      Connecting With Others, Bite by Bite

      Brocks Gap Heritage Day April 26

    • Lifestyle
      • All
      • Health
      • Inspirational
      • Travel

      The Wandering Wilkins

      Sarah’s Recipes

      Sarah’s Recipes

      The Chimney Rock Chronicle.

      Retta’s Column

      Local Teachers Attend VRTA

  • Events
  • Our Sponsors
  • Advertising
No Result
View All Result
The Chimney Rock Chronicle
Subscribe
Thank you to our Sponsors! Thank you to our Sponsors! Thank you to our Sponsors!
Home History

Retta’s Column

Retta Lilliendahl by Retta Lilliendahl
November 4, 2022
in History
Orebaugh School

School Days

If you never clapped erasers on a windy day or sat in a drafty classroom heated by a wood stove, here are some things you might have missed. The country schoolhouses in the 40s held some unique memories for those who experienced them. It was halfway between Little House on the Prairie and today.

Lois May Rhodes and her siblings attended the Orebaugh School on North Mountain Road in Timberville, Virginia. This two-room schoolhouse taught grades first through third in one room and fourth through seventh in the other. No one seemed to care that there was no “eighth grade,” and after seventh, you headed off to high school. Seated in a classroom with multiple grades, you could acquire knowledge of all subjects at once if you were diligent and observant. It was common for a child to skip a grade or two. Lois heard John Wallin’s Virginia History four times through her four years in one room. She could have answered all the Virginia History questions on Jeopardy with ease.

L to R Patsy Biller, Nancy May, June Turner
Back Betty Eaton, Ruth Emswiler, Edith Baker

Children took turns each morning acquiring the daily water supply for each day. They would walk to a spring, a hardy walk from the school. Sometimes so much water splashed from the buckets on the trip that they had to return for more.

Their recess was plain and simple. Any game equipment came from home. In those days, almost everything purchased in the country store was placed on brown paper and wrapped in twine, but families saved paper and twine for other purposes. Winding twine tightly, you could fashion a crude ball for play. All you needed was a board for a bat. It worked for a while until that day when it soared into the air and unraveled before your eyes. You might manage to remake it or play a game that didn’t require a ball. Imaginations ran high, and numerous games involved sticks, stones, and empty cans.

The teacher would announce that they were taking a nature hike on a special occasion. A favorite destination was up Little North Mountain on Supinlick Ridge. Upon arrival, the students scattered in all directions, searching for anything interesting. Lois doesn’t remember the teacher being nearby, and the children taught each other. She recalled that another girl taught her to identify lady slippers, jack in a pulpit, and other wildflowers. It was an all-day outing. They ate their packed lunches brought from home.

Lunches were simple then, whatever they had at home. Some children would bring pancakes, called “flapjacks,” with pudding in the middle. Now, this was not a pudding as we think of today. It was a greasy mixture of cooked pork ends. Lois’s family wrapped their sandwiches in waxed paper and reused the paper as long as they could. Some mothers used newspaper to wrap sandwiches. A fried egg sandwich might leave reverse printing on the bread. One day a family of six brought in a homemade pie for lunch. Whatever they had worked.

After graduating from Bridgewater College, Lois was offered a teaching position at Cootes School in Fulks Run. She was only 18 when she started teaching. She had grades 3, 4, and 5 with a total of forty pupils. It was a big responsibility for a young lady. In cold weather, she tended the stove by dumping the ashes from the day before. Then she built a wood fire, adding coal to make it last longer. A pump outside supplied water. Children would help wash the blackboards and clap the dust from the erasers at the end of the day. She swept and oiled the classroom floor. Her salary was $150 a month.
|
A lunch option was now available at a small cost. Helen Carr would prepare a lunch like mashed potatoes and barbecue. There were no screens on the windows back then, and “the flies ate the food about as fast as we did.” Lois remembers her concerns about a boy who refused to eat anything except mashed potatoes. In the back of her mind, she feared he would starve to death, but later much to her relief, he became a strapping young man.

Lois taught in the Broadway schools for forty-five years. Through the years, she has touched the lives of many. She is a dear friend and a wealth of information to me.

Retta Lilliendahl is the former assistant director of Northern Virginia Christian Writer’s Fellowship, and the co-author of Regards to Broadway, Local Lore of the Shenandoah, and Stories from the Shenandoah. She resides in Broadway, Virginia with her husband, Al.

Retta Lilliendahl

Retta Lilliendahl

Retta Lilliendahl is the former assistant director of Northern Virginia Christian Writer’s Fellowship, and the co-author of Regards to Broadway, Local Lore of the Shenandoah, and Stories from the Shenandoah. She resides in Broadway, Virginia with her husband, Al.

Next Post
Randy image

Randy’s Ramblings

Popular Articles

  • Life Lessons from Fulks Run Grocery

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • A Little-Known Piece of Fulks Run History Uncovered

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Natural Healing

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Reflections from the Past and Present

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • The Hair Nook

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • 161st Anniversary Battle of New Market Commemoration

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Paramount Plant Co. Enters Second Season

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • The Promises of Springtime

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • F&M Bank Hosts “Hotdogs for Heroes” to Support Timberville Volunteer Fire Department

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • From One Chimney Rock to Another

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • About Us
  • Advertising
  • Contact
  • Pick Up Locations

© 2024 The Chimney Rock Chronicle - Website & E-Commerce by Bare Web Design, Broadway Va.

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Columns
  • History
  • Sports
    • Thank you to our 2025 Sponsors!
    • Advertising

© 2024 The Chimney Rock Chronicle - Website & E-Commerce by Bare Web Design, Broadway Va.