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In 1806, the children of Lower Corner attended the
Potash School by Potash Pond, which is now called Little's Pond. That schoolhouse
burned in 1825, but it was rebuilt by the following year, when the area was
divided into two school districts - Little Pond or #3 and John Quincy Adams or #16.
Thereafter, #16 served most of the children from the Lower Corner area.
The Lower Corner School was created in 1825 as John
Quincy Adams School when people of the district voted a tax of $193.70 for the
purpose of building a schoolhouse. The
Sixth Annual Excursion recorded
memories of Henry Holmes, a student at the Lower Corner School in the late
1840s: "The schoolhouse was about 25 feet square, had a double-plank door, small
high windows, and was underpinned with pasture stone. The floor inside rose
about three feet toward the back of the room. The house was heated by a large
fireplace supplied by a huge pile of trees and four-foot wood that was brought
in by the armful. To be safe from sparks a hearth extended some ten feet from
the fireplace with a low front seat as the safe distance for warming. The face
was burning while the back was freezing. All from the back seats came down by
turn to thaw out. Frocks and flannel gowns were not able to keep boys and girls
in tolerable comfort."
In 1839, when districts were numbered, it became #16.
It was known as that until 1886, when the districts were renamed and then it was
called Lower Corner School.
An addition was built about 1938 providing indoor toilet
facilities and storage. A half-acre playground was added the following year. In
1943 Ruth Vittum taught fifteen pupils there. This building served the children
of Lower Corner until 1944, when the shortage of teachers forced the closing and
the children were transported to the Center School.
Due to overcrowding if the Center School, in April 1946
there evolved a plan for the fall term whereby Lower Corner School would be used
as a junior high school and the seventh and eighth grades would be transported
to it from all sections of town.
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The opening of the new
Central School in the center brought an end to the era of Sandwich's
one- and two-room schools. The last students to graduate from the old
schools received their diplomas on June 13, 1950. After serving as a
private summer home for many years, the Sandwich Historical
Society purchased the building in March 1990. |
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