This page is still under construction.

Today I will begin inserting the information that I received from Connie Nichols, but a couple of things that you must keep in mind.
1) My time is very busy this time of the year so, to use the words Connie used, "This (will be) done on the installment plan"
2) I am a 2 finger typer, so my WPM is very low. My errors, however, are generally quite high to offset my low wpm.

The Winton School

The Winton School is currently located just NW of Plain, on Beaver Valley Road, right next to Beaver Valley School.
This location is probably quite practical as it is easier to keep an eye on it there, but it is a long ways from it's original home location................


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The following is directly from Connie's letter to me. Un-edited by anyone.

"The school itself is the second building at that site, the first one having been a similar structure only without a basement. It was always white. The present building (now sitting in Plain and looking like a sinking ship) was built in 1926-or1927 and was hugely improved by the addition of the basement. The original furnace i that building I was told was coal, but by the time I got there in 1981, it had an oil furnace in the basement. That furnace was cranky as all get out, and to operate it properly required a wrench, a hammer, and a tolerance for black oily smoke when it would backfire, which it did frequently, with an ear splitting sound. There was a large grate in the floor of the school room and all the heat came up through that. In the winter, that grate was a popular place to stand when kids came in wet and cold from recess. It was also the only place to get gloves and mittens and hats dry, and so during the winter, the air in the schoolroom always smelled of wet wool, and the room was always a bit steamy, to say the least. (My first year there I had a family of three kids, quite poor, from up Coulter Creek. All three wet the bed (they only had an outhouse) and would come to school reeking of urine. Of course, because of their primitive living conditions, they were also always cold, and guess where they would park themselves?!!! Of course, fight atop the grate. Gag! It was difficult for all of us to be polite and tolerant, but we were and the other kids impressed me no end, as they did not like it, but never complained and never judged. Thank heaven the three of them were pulled out of Winton right before Christmas break and from then on. Their parents did not want them involved in the Christmas program. We all heaved a huge but silent sigh of relief when Jan. 3 arrived and they were no longer there. More square footage for those other students who remained, and NO urine!

The teacherage was only a one-room affair until 1978 or 79, when Lyman Boyd and his then-employees Dwayne Broaddus, and Dave Leonard were contracted to build the addition, which was the bedroom. Prior to that addition, it had to have been one of the most uncomfortable shacks in the area. Most of the teachers who lived there over the years were single, so a one room cabin was probably not as wretched as one might think. However there was one teacher there who had two children, and it is unimaginable how stressful that must have been! Indeed Kay Richards related to me that that teacher got fired for child abuse (of her own children)! well, gee I can sympathize

Of course for a great many years the only 'facilities' for the teacherage or the school was an outhouse. The Richards told of when there was a push to install a real bathroom in the one room teacherage for the teacher. Claude Thompson, who was then on the Winton School board along with Orville, was adamant that the teacher did NOT need a abthroom! Fortunately for that teacher and all of us who came later, Orville and the other board members prevailed and the bathroom was installed. It was not much, only a toilet and a very small shower, but it was a huge improvement from the outhouse!

The property Claude Thompson, and his son Bill Thompson own now was homesteaded by the Dillon family, and one of the Dillon women (Gladys, I think was her first name) was a teacher at Winton for a great many years. Another long-time teacher was Becky Corey Gross Thompson (several marriages) who was there for 6 years, then took a year's leave of absence, then back for a final year, and then I replaced her. Last I knew she was living in the Idaho panhandle. During Becky's leave of absence, Gayle Stoltenow-Norris was the teacher. Gayle recently died of cancer. She had taught at Leavenworth for the years after being at Winton. I was there from 1981 - 1996

For all the years prior to my arrival, the school had been grades 1-8. The year I arrived the Leavenworth school was in the process of rearranging their grade groupings, and so the 7th and 8th graders were supposed to go to L-wrth.
However, there were two girls who did not want to go to L-wrth, and I think mostly wanted to stay at Winton to check out the new teacher. At any rate, that year I had 27 kids; there were two 7th graders and one 6th grader that were of inestimable value. I also had9th graders!!! Yikes! That was my first year of teaching, although I had been a cop for 6 1/2 years prior, so I was not a complete babe in the woods. In addition I had attended a two-room school for most of my elementary years, and so I was quite aware of how multiple grades should be handled, and how subjects should be taught. I had no aides at all until midway through the year when the superintendant agreed that I should have some help. I then gained the assistance of Barb Darlington for 2 hours per day. (Wife of Randy Darlington, Merritt, and mother of former student, Kelly, now deceased) Since Barb had been around Winton during Kelly's first 6 grades, she was a great deal of help.

The first year was a little rugged due to the fact that the textbook situation was pretty much worthless. My predecessor, Becky Corey, was a firm believer in the McGuffey Reader Series, and that was all I had. (Talk about Dark Ages! But she liked it because there was a great deal of religion in those books. They were not much good for teaching reading, however.)
There were some ancient science books and some equally outdated history books, and a 'library' consisting of maybe 150 titles, mostly boring or old and tattered. (there were piles and piles of old Nat'l Geographic magazines.) In addition creating my own material was difficult, as I had a box of stencils and an ancient mimeograph machine. I spent most of my year with hands and arms in varying shades of purple, from the mimeo fluid. If I wanted to use a bona fide copy machine, I had to amass all my materials and make arrangements to visit Osborn when school was not in session,..(God forbid they should trust me with a key!)

In addition to teaching, I was responsible for upkeep: janitorial, snow removal, yard and general outside work, etc. But of course, the school district had provided NO implements with which to do all of this stuff! (My predecessor had always using tools belonging to Orville.) My personal vacuum cleaner wore out after the first year, as it got about 3 lifetimes of use in that time. Same with my personal lawnmower.

there were no laundry facilities, so I had to make a weekly trek to Leavenworth, which at that time had a laundromat downtown. After that building was turned into more shops, there was a period when L-wth had no Laundromat, and then I had to trek all the way to Cashmere. The Laundromat thing worked OK during winter and spring, although I was not fond of extraneous trips down the icy canyon. The next summer Orville mentioned that he had two wringer washers stored out in one of his outbuildings, and asked if I would like one. Having had ample experience with wringer washers as a child, I leaped at the chance.

It was not quite as idyllic a situation as it might have been, however. In order to wash clothes, I had to wrestle the heavy machine up the front porch steps, and balance it precariously on the very small porch. Then I had to attach tthe filler hose to the kitchen faucet, run it out to the porch, and then finally attach a long drain hose to the drain fro the washer and run it out past the driveway. doing two loads of laundry used up a goodly portion of the day, by the time clothes were hung out to dry. However, cold weather ended that pleasure, and once again I was driving to town with a pile of quarters and dimes.

Along with the lovely mimeograph machine, the school was equipped with an ancient film projector, an equally antiquated filmstrip projector, an overhead projector, and an old record player. These were all items that were considered modern when I was in school in the 50's and 60's. However the film projector got quite a bit of use, as the Educational Services Dist. in Wenatchee had a good film library available to member school districts at no charge. I coordinated my film orders with the units of study I had planned, and those first few years, I had students that became skilled in the operation of a projector!




To be continued.........
Tim