I didn\u2019t go to elementary school.\u00a0 I went to ward school.\u00a0 Breckenridge had three ward schools: South Ward, North Ward, and East Ward.\u00a0 In today\u2019s world, if I tell someone that I went to South Ward they wonder if I went to a hospital or a prison.\u00a0 We also used the term grade school.\u00a0 Our parents did not say that we were in elementary school.\u00a0 They said that we were in grade school.\u00a0 Maybe the word elementary was\u00a0too long.<\/p>\n
If students lived within walking distance of the school, they walked. No one worried about a stranger waylaying them.\u00a0 If there were other children nearby, they walked along together.\u00a0 Some of them even walked home for lunch.\u00a0 Others were dropped off by a parent on the way to work.\u00a0 I was a country child so I rode a big yellow school bus.\u00a0\u00a0 I waited by our mailbox alongside a busy state highway.\u00a0 In the early years my mother usually kept watch until the bus came by, but if she was busy, she went on about her chores and knew that I was safe.\u00a0 I knew to stay far back from the edge of the highway.<\/p>\n
My school was South Ward.\u00a0 It set back from the street with a large green lawn in the front.\u00a0 We lined up in front of the main entrances each morning and waited for the bell to ring.\u00a0 The building had two levels.\u00a0 (We called them floors.)\u00a0\u00a0Grades one through four\u00a0were on the main level and the fifth and sixth grades, lunchroom, bathrooms and office were on the lower level which was partially underground.\u00a0 We called it the basement.\u00a0 When we needed to go to the bathroom, we asked to go to the basement. .<\/p>\n
There was a large playground in the back.\u00a0 We had swings, seesaws, monkey bars and a merry go round.\u00a0 We had to take turns on the equipment.\u00a0 This\u00a0usually meant waiting in line for your turn.<\/p>\n
The girls spent hours outlining rooms of playhouses with rocks.\u00a0 Broomweeds were pulled from the edge of the playground, put into bunches and used for brooms.\u00a0 We could spend an entire recess sweeping our houses.<\/p>\n
We played a tag in which the girls chased the boys or vice versa. The outside entrances to the bathrooms involved going down steps to the lower level.\u00a0 There was a railing alongside the steps.\u00a0 The \u201csafe” places were either touching the railing or on the steps going down.\u00a0 When a boy or girl got tagged, we switched and chased the other side.\u00a0 We were like a wave running back and forth.\u00a0 This could get rambunctious.\u00a0 If someone stumbled and fell, we were told to stop and play something else.<\/p>\n
The boys played with toy cars and marbles and were allowed to use short sticks for make believe guns as they played cops and robbers.\u00a0 The good guys always won. \u00a0Sometimes they shot marbles for \u201ckeeps\u201d which meant if you lost a marble the winner kept it.<\/p>\n
Bus riders waited on the playground after school until their bus came to the front.\u00a0 Teachers were nearby and available if needed.\u00a0 There were also bullies in those days.\u00a0 One boy in particular liked to taunt the first graders.\u00a0 He was a big fourth grader.\u00a0 One day as we waited after school for the bus, he ran up behind me and pushed me out of a swing.\u00a0 I fell on the hard ground on my face.\u00a0 I do not remember whether we called a teacher or whether I took my ever present little handkerchief and wiped the debris and blood from the scratches.\u00a0 I looked like I had been in a fight with a tiger.\u00a0 A few days later a family friend whose son was a fourth grader came by the dairy. \u00a0When he found out who had caused my scabby face, he said his son would take care of it.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know what happened, but the bully boy stayed clear of me from then on.<\/p>\n
The school was condemned in 1958 and a new school now stands in the same location.\u00a0\u00a0It\u00a0is no longer a ward school but is South Elementary School.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I didn’t go to elementary school. I went to ward school. Breckenridge had three ward schools: South Ward, North Ward, and East Ward. In today’s world, if I tell someone that I went to South Ward they wonder if I went to a hospital or a prison. We also used the term grade school. Our […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-early-days-to-1955"],"yoast_head":"\n