McLEAN COUNTY HISTORY & GENEALOGY NEWS
By Euleen Rickard
The back to school advertisements, mothers and children shopping for clothes and back to school supplies and school buses on the streets and roads remind us that the school year 2004-2005 is beginning. Today very few students walk to school, most are bussed or taken in cars by their parents. Even in the cities bus service is provided, unlike the children of the one-room schools of long ago who walked the dusty roads from home to school.
Norma Borneman wrote of the one-room school “School began by nine o’clock, We were on our way by eight, We must hurry right along or else we would be late. Two miles from home to school down a country road, Dust puffing with each step as along we strode. Through the warm fall days, we met September in her glory, then reveled to the fullest in October’s bright blue weather…. The lore we accumulated as to school we made our way, added to our education, priceless treasures every day.”
For many, old pictures and histories of the old one-room schools give insight into lives of ancestors. Last Tuesday Linda Rawlins of Evansville, Indiana came to the museum with a picture of a one-room school that her grandmother had attended. She thought it was in McLean County. The name of the school was Lickbranch and it was not on our list of one-room schools. McLean County had a school in the Poplar Grove community named Branch but none named Lickbranch.
Some of the old one-room schools had name changes. Back Creek, later became Riverdale; Reeves, Laton; Poverty, Eureka; Buck Creek, Briar Field; Tanner, Underwood; Cedar Hill, Harrison; Swamp Valley, Sunshine. There were various reasons for name changes, some we do not know. Cedar Hill burned and afterward was held in the home of a family named Harrison, thus the change to Harrison. Complaining that Swamp was a depressing name for a school brought about the change to Sunshine, a much better name for the mental health of the students and teachers.
The name Lickbranch did “ring a bell” so a search began for information on the school. In our files we found a teacher’s application for Zilpah Robertson that gave the following: Elementary school attended, Lichbranch, Daviess County-1917. High school, Calhoun, Kentucky, 1917-1921. Further information: Schools taught: Lickbranch, Daviess County, Grades, 1-8, 7 months, salary $85.00 monthly. So Lickbranch did exist!
We now are looking for the location of the school. If you have knowledge of it please send it to the McLean County History & Genealogy Museum, P. O. Box 34, Calhoun, Kentucky 42327.
Gifts to the museum include items for display from Hugh and Shirley Moore, Sacramento, Jill Boyken, Beech Grove, Grace Carter Ford of Utica and history from Linda Rawlins.
We welcome to new members Linda Rawlins, Evansville, Indiana, Norman Holland, Kansas City, Missouri, Hugh and Grace Ballantine and Jerry and Earlene Abney, Calhoun. Also, thanks to all that renewed their memberships in July.
TheTrash and Treasure building will be open Thursday and Friday the 12th and13th of August. Stop by and shop.