By Elaine L. Orr
When early white settlers came to what is now the United States, they generally lived in groups in what would become great cities. Coming from nations with established education systems, they knew the value of collective learning.
Education in the First Colonies
New College (later Harvard University) was founded in 1636, The College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia in 1693. Both started as colleges and their university designations (which says they give degrees beyond what we call today a bachelor's degree) came later.
Free public education below that level was not available and did not emerge until well into the nineteenth century. There were initially some religious schools, mostly for (white) boys; if girls were educated it would have been at home, taught enough to run a household. Families were expected to pay a fee as there was no government role in schools.
Petty schools in Massachusetts reached more children and were open to those who could pay a fee. "Every Massachusetts town held meetings and voted on how many schools to build...how much public funds to use, and how much the students would pay to attend." Had there been no Harvard, these schools would not have been widespread. The Masachusetts Bay Colony required towns to fund schools so local boys could qualify for Harvard.
Slaveholders in the south did not permit Black children or adults to be schooled, fearing it would lead to rebellion. Even teaching them to read the Bible was almost always forbidden -- and punished. The Bray School in Williamsburg educated 400 free and enslaved Black children between 1760 and 1774.
Schools on the Prairie
My personal interest is more focused on the Midwest and the stories I heard were about schools in Southwest Missouri, which was fairly typical of how sparse country towns approached education.
In a nutshell, Missouri's early public education started with small, fee-based town schools. In 1817, St. Louis opened the first public school west of the Mississippi River. The state legislature passed a law allowing public school districts in 1839. A strong statewide system was finally built under the new state constitution in 1865. (Thanks to AI for this summary.)
My Orr family, led by William Orr and Jane Adams, went to what is now Lawrence County, Missouri in 1837. They came from Ireland, which had a strong primary education system. When brother George Orr and his wife Elizabeth Brown arrived in 1862, he had served as a teacher in Northern Ireland, some in Belfast. When the children of sister Isabella arrived in 1863 (Isabella and her husband Ephraim Campbell died en route or soon after) they became the branch of educators. (More later.)
Early public education in Lawrence County began in the 1850s when the state set up township school districts. The tiny one-room school houses were not limited to towns. The ones my ancestors attended were on the prairie and teachers would live with one of the families.
School and Church Connection
First priority, though, was creating a church commnity. For the Orrs, it was Ozark Prairie Presbyterian Church, founded in late 1837. I don't know if any of my family was at the first service, held in a private home. They provided many elders, men and women, and helped construct what is now called "The Brick" in 1872, about three miles from the county seat of Mount Vernon.
Churches brought Sunday Schools, which meant (for many) learning or expanding their ability to read. The year 1840 saw the first in Lawrence County (some say the first West of the Mississippi River). Its first location was at the "Head of the River Schoolhouse" south of Verona. The Shady Grove School was built on that site in 1861. Families rose early and brought their Bibles, likely a dictionary, and dinner and stayed for much of the day. (See the reference for Down Turnback Trails.)
Women in the Early Schools
No women, no rural schools; it's that simple. The communities built their one-room schoolhouses, generally with donated wood and labor. Early ones had dirt floors, but most had wood. No electricity, of course, and an old wood stove for heat. Teachers sometime brought the wood each day.
By the mid-to-late1800 through early 1900s (and sometimes later), children attended through roughly what we think of at eighth grade. All in one room, though teachers might divide the students into groups. The rural school year was shorter than today, often broken up by planting and harvest seasons.
Girls (usually not boys) went to 'normal' school, which was for teacher training. My Aunts Mary Frances (Tancy) Orr Schnake and Elizabet Orr Seneker attended, though Lib married a minister and didn't teach too long.
Tancy taught for 30 years, including at the one-room Liberty School (shown with students 1948/1949) and later at the modern elementary in Mount Vernon. Later in life, she earned a Master's Degree in Education. Teachers usually had the same many family responsibilities as others. Tancy and her husband had a farm in Stotts City, MO and helping her feed the chickens was a big treat.
Education Varied by When You Arrived on the Prairie
The earliest Orr families in Lawrence County found no schools and children would initially learn from their parents, starting with reading the Bible. They were smart, inquisitive people, and I've read stories about my GG Grandfather, Paul Orr, becoming an expert, through reading, on many topics. He went through a time of opining on the importance of bees, which we've all come to appreciate even more as their numbers dwindle today.
Paul was born in Ireland in 1829 and the eighth child, John Adams Orr, was born in Missouri in 1846. There were thus local school to attend. One family history said it was a family tradition to educate (beyond perhaps eighth grade) one child. He was sent to St. Louis and returned to Lawrence County very interested in all aspects of agriculture, including creating hybrid plants. He ran his parents' farm for many years and moved into Mount Vernon later. While most of his siblings were in industries related to farming, one of John's sons son was a physician, another joined the Farm Services Administration, and a third ran the local hardware store and funeral home.
As time went on, families moved to professions besides agriculture. One had many who attended Drury University in Springfield and my first cousin, Don Seneker, taught at Southwest Missouri State.
The Orr siblings who stayed longer in Ireland (George and Isabella) brought childen to the US. who had gone to established schools there, and George was a teacher in Ireland. One son had a law degree, two moved to Colorado to homestead, and a daughter married a local merchant and had several daughters who taught in Missouri or Oklahoma.
Isabella's children settled mostly in nearby Jasper County and bloomed with educators and librarians, generally women. John Adams Orr was close to these families (who were also younger than his siblings, closer to his age) and had similar education levels to his.
All work is good work, but it's interesting to see that education, to some extent, leads to work outside of agriculture. Of course, as the U.S. economy expanded, so did Orr descendants' professions. There probably would not have been an Orr Reunion Association wthout John Adams Orr. He encouraged his sons to find a way to keep bringing the broader family together and they did (in 1937), almost immediately after his 1936 death. Orr descendants from across the USA attended for 90 years.
A Very Few Sources
Hamlets and Schools of Northern Lawrence County by Willie Washam. Independently Published, 2014. Among contributors was the Lawrence County Historical Society, in which several cousins have had leadership roles for many years. (amazon.com/dp/1500583804 )
Down Turnback Trails: A Sketch Book of Lawrence County, Missouri, edited by Kathy Seneker Fairchild and published by the Lawrence County Historical Society and the Lawrence County Record, 1992. The 2018 'revisited version', is available at amazon.com/dp/1974535169.
Ozark Prairie Presbyterian Church is still a site of worship though with dwindling membership -- as is the case for many rural churches. It is at 15032 Lawrence 2077, Mt Vernon, MO 65712, with Sunday service at 9 AM. My father was baptized there in 1915 and the Orr Reunion Association (founded by Alfred and George Orr, sons of John Adams Orr and Frannie Scroggs) met there for 90 years, ending in 2026. It still maintains a Facebook Group at: facebook.com/groups/278132529600112.
If you want an appreciation of strong women running one-room schools, read about Minnie Freeman, who saved her thirteen students from the "Childrens' Blizzard" of 1888. With no forecast of the storm and plunging temperatures, to stay in the unheated schools or to try to make it home could be deadly. She tied her Nebraska students together with twine and (carrying the youngest) managed to walk them to a farmhouse. 245 children died, hers lived.
* * * *
To learn more about Elaine's writing, visit her website or sign up for her newsletter.
