Dublin Core
Title
Description
Creator
Coleman, Irene
Date
Contributor
Source
Avon Preservation & Historical Society, Avon, NY
Format
Type
Oral History Item Type Metadata
Interviewee
Irene Coleman
Location
Avon, New York
Transcription
-March 10, 1996 (when the interview was done)
-school fire; october 27, 1961
-first schoolhouse was just north of Zion Episocopal church
-Avon Central School district
-1836 Avon Academy built on Temple St. (then was called Academy St.)
-built by Wadsworth for school of ladies
-1864 was changed and remodeled
-october 1867 they added an academy department (called the academic department)
-Reuben Wallace made principal and stayed for forty years
-contributed a lot to get the Avon school system organized
-hard discipline (paddle in the basement)
—$2000 to run the school and pay the four teachers
-paid the academic dept. $5 a term, three academic sessions a term to go there and there were 3 terms a year
-each year they had 2 graduates
-primary dept. was only $3 because they felt that the teachers didn’t need to know as much (Irene laughs at this becuse we know this to not be true today)
-Union Free School became Avon High School (1896) was approved by the Board of Regents
-1907 they built the Avon High School and built it for $40000
-Wallace was the principal until the end of WWI
-wife taught at the school
-1926 they added two wings to the front of the building including the gym
-both of these wings were ruined by the fire
-1929 principal James Green and stayed for 14 years and decided that we needed more room and then the back wings were added (which were saved by the fire)
-wings that they lived in after the fire while they were waiting to do something
-1943 they add to centralize all the school districts
-1946 Caledonia Road School was added to Avon School Disrict
-Avon-Caledonia school was built in the 1900s and they had a chemical toilet inside which was very rare as well as a cloak room (no pot bellied stove and they had a furnace)
-in this school district they dug a well and the well was sulphur water so when you pump the water (only tin cup) the children didn’t like it so the students would bring their own water
-oldest boy in the school was the janitor but also would bring the water
-moved from tin cups to paper cups
-1959 had outgrown the room
-for four years they fought to see if they really needed a new school
-four votes
-meeting to vote on the room (meeting went until 2am!)
-auditorium was a “bone of contention”
-the auditorium won by two votes which is interesting to Irene because it has been used by everyone in town
-beautiful elementary school which was the old high school; plenty of room
-October 27, 1961 was the fire that started
-fire alarm at 11:59 but clocks stopped
-1961-63 the elementary classes had just two back wings
-everyone came to help
-not one child or fireman was hurt
-the floors over the years had been oiled
-cold air in the hall just shot it right into the attic
-12:53 Harry Clemens and Dwayne Staples discovered there was smoke up by the ceiling and reported it to Annie Clemens
-480 students at the time of the fire
-many fire drills and had had 3 in the cafeteria which was wonderful because they knew what to do
-that morning they had had a bomb drill (faced the wall, hands and knees, head down on the floor, NOT a sound)
-four kindergartens and they went to the basement of the Avon Free Library (2 in the morning, 2 in the afternoon)
-moved 3 years later
-used the partitions later on for stage plays as scenery
-two second grades went to Central Presbyterian Church
-very small room
-had a gym area, library, and phone, no cafeteria
-6th grade had to move to the high school into the home making classroom
-no connections, no telephones, PA system, no bells
-no way to know if the busses were ready to go so they had runners to go look (typically boys but then later on the girls wanted to as well because it was “kinda fun”)
-no announcements
-Mrs. Mahar in the office and kids always said hello to her
-principal’s office was at the end of the hallway
-Irene was supervisor and was made principal Decemeber 1961 (after the fire)
-Irene would sometimes take the kids home if they looked really sick at the nurse
-the nurses’ office was very cold
-no cafeteria and the kids always forgot their lunch
-so Irene would take big loaves of bread and peanut butter and they would make peanut butter sandwiches for anyone who forgot their lunch
-no one ever went hungry and milk was always delivered
-someone dropped an apple and Irene slipped and fell and her whole arm was black and blue
-the kids picked up everything after that and said “rememeber Mrs. Coleman’s arm”
-November 21, 1961 it rained and kept on raining and the wing on the right gave way in 6-8 places and started dripping
-placed garbage pails and went right on teaching
-Irene was concerned about the children and would go check on them a lot
-had to have the reading groups out in the corridor
-Stan Coleman (husband) built furniture and built the mailboxes for the office and also built bookcases that had burned in the fire
-built the balance beams and framed all the pictures in the hallway
-lost every book in the library except for the ones that the kids had out
-librarian said that she would buy the books and catalog them and every week there were new books coming in
-Irene took over her classes then
-the teachers wouldn’t stay because that was the time they had a break because otherwise they were with the children all day
-coffeepot; mostly got a coffee to warm your hands because it was so cold in the hallways
-line for the toilet all the time
-Albany wanted Avon to join with Lima to make a bigger school district but both didn’t want each other
-“changing of the guard” for the bathroom
-4-6th grade had no coat racks so they mustered as much as they could coat racks because otherwise they didn’t have room in the classrooms
-everything had to be very organized; coats, hats, boots, lunches, musical instruments
-couldn’t open the school until they opened fire escapes (had to have 2 exits)
-took 3 weeks to put them up and just 3 hours to take them down with an air hammer
-5th grade class had a cement truck outside
-on the day of the fire, Irene was teaching Mrs. Mayer’s classroom (5th grade)
-Irene knew it was the real thing because she didn’t pull the alarm
-tar smell and Irene tried to convince the kids that it was a “clean” smell
-they had birds in the corridor
-March 18 there was a big snowstorm; no outside phone, frantically trying to get the message out to families
-day that was scheduled shots in the clinic
-two teachers cars were stuck in the mud
-1 movie machine
-Albany said in October 1962 that Avon was given state aid to build a school
-finally they voted on the new school and there was drama because people weren’t going to vote because they figured everyone was going to vote yes but that wasn’t true
-111 that voted against the school (some people just vote against the school no matter what it is)
-asking for $340000
-Dr. Gail (Last Name Here) came down from Geneseo and asked if Avon was looking for student teachers
-wanted his student teachers to come because they have excellent teachers and you’re doing things in the classroom for your students
-parent conferences and for 12 years 100% of the parents came for conferences
-Christmas program where they had just one day to rehearse
-Valentine’s Day was special in the elementary school and the girls would deliver valentines to all the workers
-Irene did all the IQ tests
-achievement scores never went down
-May 1: special day and there wasn’t a sound, that was the day of the strike
-the men went on strike
-students said “Don’t they know we need a new school?”
-Betty Mahar got a heater finally
-highest teacher morale, never had a teacher complain to Irene
-parents and the teachers were both cooperative
-write an article at the end of the year
-Irene write hers in 1964; “3 years and 30000 shining experiences”
-Sally Letter taught a fifth grade in the bus garage with an overhead door; had to build another door out of the window which was right next to the office
-cold out there and they bought new rugs for that room
-only classroom that had rugs on the floor
-moved into the new building there were 570 children
-when Irene retired there were 850 children
-kept growing all the time
-“The classrooms were warm and attractive, filled with creative and wonderful ideas…most important ingredient in education is an inspiring teacher to inspire children…”
-school fire; october 27, 1961
-first schoolhouse was just north of Zion Episocopal church
-Avon Central School district
-1836 Avon Academy built on Temple St. (then was called Academy St.)
-built by Wadsworth for school of ladies
-1864 was changed and remodeled
-october 1867 they added an academy department (called the academic department)
-Reuben Wallace made principal and stayed for forty years
-contributed a lot to get the Avon school system organized
-hard discipline (paddle in the basement)
—$2000 to run the school and pay the four teachers
-paid the academic dept. $5 a term, three academic sessions a term to go there and there were 3 terms a year
-each year they had 2 graduates
-primary dept. was only $3 because they felt that the teachers didn’t need to know as much (Irene laughs at this becuse we know this to not be true today)
-Union Free School became Avon High School (1896) was approved by the Board of Regents
-1907 they built the Avon High School and built it for $40000
-Wallace was the principal until the end of WWI
-wife taught at the school
-1926 they added two wings to the front of the building including the gym
-both of these wings were ruined by the fire
-1929 principal James Green and stayed for 14 years and decided that we needed more room and then the back wings were added (which were saved by the fire)
-wings that they lived in after the fire while they were waiting to do something
-1943 they add to centralize all the school districts
-1946 Caledonia Road School was added to Avon School Disrict
-Avon-Caledonia school was built in the 1900s and they had a chemical toilet inside which was very rare as well as a cloak room (no pot bellied stove and they had a furnace)
-in this school district they dug a well and the well was sulphur water so when you pump the water (only tin cup) the children didn’t like it so the students would bring their own water
-oldest boy in the school was the janitor but also would bring the water
-moved from tin cups to paper cups
-1959 had outgrown the room
-for four years they fought to see if they really needed a new school
-four votes
-meeting to vote on the room (meeting went until 2am!)
-auditorium was a “bone of contention”
-the auditorium won by two votes which is interesting to Irene because it has been used by everyone in town
-beautiful elementary school which was the old high school; plenty of room
-October 27, 1961 was the fire that started
-fire alarm at 11:59 but clocks stopped
-1961-63 the elementary classes had just two back wings
-everyone came to help
-not one child or fireman was hurt
-the floors over the years had been oiled
-cold air in the hall just shot it right into the attic
-12:53 Harry Clemens and Dwayne Staples discovered there was smoke up by the ceiling and reported it to Annie Clemens
-480 students at the time of the fire
-many fire drills and had had 3 in the cafeteria which was wonderful because they knew what to do
-that morning they had had a bomb drill (faced the wall, hands and knees, head down on the floor, NOT a sound)
-four kindergartens and they went to the basement of the Avon Free Library (2 in the morning, 2 in the afternoon)
-moved 3 years later
-used the partitions later on for stage plays as scenery
-two second grades went to Central Presbyterian Church
-very small room
-had a gym area, library, and phone, no cafeteria
-6th grade had to move to the high school into the home making classroom
-no connections, no telephones, PA system, no bells
-no way to know if the busses were ready to go so they had runners to go look (typically boys but then later on the girls wanted to as well because it was “kinda fun”)
-no announcements
-Mrs. Mahar in the office and kids always said hello to her
-principal’s office was at the end of the hallway
-Irene was supervisor and was made principal Decemeber 1961 (after the fire)
-Irene would sometimes take the kids home if they looked really sick at the nurse
-the nurses’ office was very cold
-no cafeteria and the kids always forgot their lunch
-so Irene would take big loaves of bread and peanut butter and they would make peanut butter sandwiches for anyone who forgot their lunch
-no one ever went hungry and milk was always delivered
-someone dropped an apple and Irene slipped and fell and her whole arm was black and blue
-the kids picked up everything after that and said “rememeber Mrs. Coleman’s arm”
-November 21, 1961 it rained and kept on raining and the wing on the right gave way in 6-8 places and started dripping
-placed garbage pails and went right on teaching
-Irene was concerned about the children and would go check on them a lot
-had to have the reading groups out in the corridor
-Stan Coleman (husband) built furniture and built the mailboxes for the office and also built bookcases that had burned in the fire
-built the balance beams and framed all the pictures in the hallway
-lost every book in the library except for the ones that the kids had out
-librarian said that she would buy the books and catalog them and every week there were new books coming in
-Irene took over her classes then
-the teachers wouldn’t stay because that was the time they had a break because otherwise they were with the children all day
-coffeepot; mostly got a coffee to warm your hands because it was so cold in the hallways
-line for the toilet all the time
-Albany wanted Avon to join with Lima to make a bigger school district but both didn’t want each other
-“changing of the guard” for the bathroom
-4-6th grade had no coat racks so they mustered as much as they could coat racks because otherwise they didn’t have room in the classrooms
-everything had to be very organized; coats, hats, boots, lunches, musical instruments
-couldn’t open the school until they opened fire escapes (had to have 2 exits)
-took 3 weeks to put them up and just 3 hours to take them down with an air hammer
-5th grade class had a cement truck outside
-on the day of the fire, Irene was teaching Mrs. Mayer’s classroom (5th grade)
-Irene knew it was the real thing because she didn’t pull the alarm
-tar smell and Irene tried to convince the kids that it was a “clean” smell
-they had birds in the corridor
-March 18 there was a big snowstorm; no outside phone, frantically trying to get the message out to families
-day that was scheduled shots in the clinic
-two teachers cars were stuck in the mud
-1 movie machine
-Albany said in October 1962 that Avon was given state aid to build a school
-finally they voted on the new school and there was drama because people weren’t going to vote because they figured everyone was going to vote yes but that wasn’t true
-111 that voted against the school (some people just vote against the school no matter what it is)
-asking for $340000
-Dr. Gail (Last Name Here) came down from Geneseo and asked if Avon was looking for student teachers
-wanted his student teachers to come because they have excellent teachers and you’re doing things in the classroom for your students
-parent conferences and for 12 years 100% of the parents came for conferences
-Christmas program where they had just one day to rehearse
-Valentine’s Day was special in the elementary school and the girls would deliver valentines to all the workers
-Irene did all the IQ tests
-achievement scores never went down
-May 1: special day and there wasn’t a sound, that was the day of the strike
-the men went on strike
-students said “Don’t they know we need a new school?”
-Betty Mahar got a heater finally
-highest teacher morale, never had a teacher complain to Irene
-parents and the teachers were both cooperative
-write an article at the end of the year
-Irene write hers in 1964; “3 years and 30000 shining experiences”
-Sally Letter taught a fifth grade in the bus garage with an overhead door; had to build another door out of the window which was right next to the office
-cold out there and they bought new rugs for that room
-only classroom that had rugs on the floor
-moved into the new building there were 570 children
-when Irene retired there were 850 children
-kept growing all the time
-“The classrooms were warm and attractive, filled with creative and wonderful ideas…most important ingredient in education is an inspiring teacher to inspire children…”
Original Format
Analog sound recording
Duration
55 minutes 10 seconds
Bit Rate/Frequency
128 kBit/s