In One-Room Country Schools, award-winning author Jerry Apps has collected memories from those who learned and taught in the one-room schools of Wisconsin.
One-Room Country Schools follows the students through the day as they walk to school, recite lessons, listen to School of the Air, play games at recess and take on prestigious assignments such as ringing the school bell and filling the water cooler.
Remembering his first day of school, award-winning author Jerry Apps writes,
"Mother insisted that I comb my hair, which I reluctantly did before clamping on my cap. A cap was wonderful for little boys who hated combing their hair, but now I had to comb mine before I could wear my cap. This simple event signaled great changes that were about to occur."
From 1791, when the first school was established in what is now Wisconsin, to the 1960s, when consolidation of the schools was finally complete, the one-room school's history has been one of change and growth. In One-Room Country Schools, this history along with unique memories and shared recollections--the smell of mittens drying on the stove; the feel of the chalk as you stood at the board with sweaty hands and a fear of long division--tell the story of these institutes of learning.