Clarkson Schoolhouse bell rings out again

If you go over to look at the Clarkson Schoolhouse these days, what you'll see is a very old, abandoned, two story building with its windows all boarded up. When you look up you'll see that the bell tower is off kilter and is leaning backward, making you wonder how much longer it is going to stay up there. The only sign of life around the school for the past 50 years has been the flocks of pigeons which roosted there and made it their home.

But progress is being made by the Clarkson Historical Society that plans to restore the building and bring it back to life. There are some positive signs that this is going to happen as they encourage the community to contribute to the Schoolhouse Fund. The community is responding, giving the Society the vote of confidence it seeks to go forward with their plans to renovate the building.

Just recently, the bell in the old bell tower rang out once again after standing silent for so many years. "I haven't heard that bell ring since they rang it to celebrate the end of World War II," said Irwin Duryea, on his most recent trip to the old Clarkson Schoolhouse.

Clarkson Historical Society members Kermit Mercer and Don Lage decided it was time to put a rope on the bell and invited Mr. Duryea to take a first hand look at the elementary school that he attended many years ago. Asking "Ike" to ring the bell brought smiles of recognition to everyone's faces as the long-silent bell came to life after its 50 year silence. It seemed a fitting way to acknowledge the progress made at the schoolhouse in recent months. The pigeons in the bell tower have been evicted, the belltower has been cleaned for the first time in decades, and now the school bell is ringing again in Clarkson.

The person who rang that bell in 1945 was Sandra Maw Hare, another student at the school at the time. She was so small, however that she had to jump to get a hold of the bell's rope. Quite a feat, and quite an honor for a young Clarkson girl.

"Another kind of school bell in Clarkson got my attention recently when I saw a picture that well-known local artist, Helen Smagorinsky painted some years ago," said Mary Edwards, a member of the Clarkson Historical Society (CHS). Her painting of the Clarkson Schoolhouse shows the Greek Revival building with sun shining in the windows, a teacher in the doorway ringing a hand-held school bell and schoolchildren playing on the lawn. It is a painting that looks back at an earlier time when going to school required only the simplest things, Edwards said. In the picture the children play hopscotch, jump rope, play leap-frog and crack the whip. It is a picture brimming with small town rural life. And it reminds the CHS that putting the people back in the picture is what this project is all about, Edwards stated in a press release.

Submitted material