Sharon’s historic one-room Brick Schoolhouse has been listed on the Country Schools Association’s National Registry as only one of five “Landmark” school buildings in New Hampshire, and the first in the Monadnock region.
Susan Fineman, a founding member and director of the Country Schools Association of America, unveiled a plaque identifying the building as a “Landmark” at a ceremony Tuesday evening.
“We are saying, sincerely, thank you to all of the people like yourselves who are willing to do the work of preserving our remaining country schools,” Fineman said. “Thanks to projects like this, visitors can learn about the history of your town through the story of one-room schools.”
The schoolhouse, which was built in 1832 for approximately $300, measures less than 600 square feet. The Brick Schoolhouse is the only remaining schoolhouse of the three one-room schools that originally existed in Sharon.
The building received designation on the National and State Registers of Historic Places over 20 years ago.
The CSAA National Schoolhouse Registry is a listing of historic country schools deemed significant and contributing to the appreciation and understanding of the country school experience and its unique architectural and historical heritage.
Fineman said the Brick Schoolhouse is rare in that it has never been significantly altered. The building contains historic school desks from the period. In the tiny entry foyer, where children used to eat lunch or play on cold days, names carved over one hundred years ago can still be seen in the original growth planks in the walls.
Sharon Select Board members Jonathan Shomody, Joel Patterson, and Rich Dufresne also attended the event, and Sharon’s Boy Scout Troop 3877 raised the flag and led the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance.
Until 2007, the Town of Sharon still used the Brick Schoolhouse for Town Meeting and other town events, including Select Board meetings.
“We still meet in the School House once a year to remember Sharon’s history, and we’ll be meeting here tonight,” Shomody said.
Gina Goff, a member of Sharon’s town archives committee and author of “The Lost Village: A History of the Town of Sharon,” said she “always loves to imagine” the children of Sharon walking to the school through rain and snow, playing on Route 123, back when it was a dirt cart track.
“When I think about what this brick schoolhouse was like in early Sharon, I think about how cold it was. There was no water, and there is no insulation in the building. The kids had to walk down the street to Uncle Bill Livingston’s house to get water,” Goff said. “Most of the kids and all the teachers walked to school every day, in the rain and snow, and a lot of them had long walks.”
All children in Sharon attended the Brick Schoolhouse until 1920, when they began attending schools in Peterborough.
Ben Wilson, Director, NH Division of Historical Resources, said that while the state preserves many large and important buildings, small buildings like Sharon’s Brick Schoolhouse are vital to preserving the state’s history.
“The buildings that mean the most to me are the humble ones. The grist mills, the blacksmith’s shops, the farms, the buildings that go with the farms; the cemeteries, and the tramp house, and schoolhouses like this one,” Wilson said. “These buildings are the archives of the stories that speak to who we are and how our state developed, and how New England developed, and I have to thank you for being such wonderful stewards of this building.”
Wilson said he could see why the Brick Schoolhouse is on the seal of the Town of Sharon.
“It’s something to be very, very proud of,” he said.