They call themselves “the last of the one-roomers.” Rural kids who attended one room schools more than 50 years ago, in the days before amalgamation and school busing - where a single teacher, often scarcely older than her senior students, would teach Grades 1 through 8.
Each year, the Dunkerron SS#1 Reunion brings together former students of the one-room school in the hamlet of Dunkerron, located at County Road 27 and Line 3 BWG, for an afternoon of shared memories. The reunion was launched nearly two decades ago, to ensure that the stories of those old school days would not be lost.
This year, the Reunion was broadened to invite anyone who attended a one room school as a child, not just S.S. #1 Dunkerron.
“Otherwise, our history is lost,” said Janice Burton Dobney, who organized the event with Linda Baker and Bill Church. “We will never continue documenting this history unless we band together.”
The reunion was held at the 1812 Grillhouse, once Holme’s Variety Store operated by Ken and Chrissy Holmes, where school kids could purchase pastries and penny candies.
“They always welcomed the kids of Dunkerron, and it did seem to be the hub of Dunkerron,” said Wendy-Sue Bishop, calling it an “appropriate” venue for the Reunion.
The 2018 reunion started with a musical journey down memory lane. Talented musicians Glenda Paxton, Linda Hughes Baker and Nancy Jean Tilt led a sing-along of tunes that included School Days, Side by Side, and Walkin’ My Baby.
“The Paxton Family left an every-lasting musical mark on the people of Dunkerron. This talented family could play every instrument, sang and danced… Dad had a dance band, and they filled Bond Head Community Hall every Saturday night," said Bishop. "Glenda herself taught piano lessons to many of the students at Dunkerron and they participated in concerts in Schomberg, Bradford, Adjala Central, Beeton, and North and South Tecumseth.”
“Music was such a big part of the Paxton family. People used to come from far away for our Christmas Concert at our school,” said Janice Dobney, a concert that was always followed by a social gathering. “It’s my most fondest memory of S.S.#1.”
Among the guests were Rev. Howard Matson, now 94, who attended Dunkerron School with his twin brother Harry, and went on to become the preacher at Dunkerron United Church. Matson, accompanied by family members, sang a song he was taught in Grade 5 by beloved teacher Emily Bennett – a rousing version of Bill Grogan’s Goat.
“Memories, memories, memories,” said Matson, looking out over the more than fifty guests who attended the reunion. “I imagine you are the grandchildren of the kids I went to school with,” he added, to laughter from the crowd.
“Times were so different back then,” Matson said. “There weren’t funeral homes. People were laid out in the parlour.” It was the neighbours who provided food and comfort. In leading Grace, he gave thanks “for memories and… for friends.”
Mayor Rob Keffer and his wife Jean were special guests at the reunion, both having attended the final Grade 1 class in a one-room school back in 1960. That was the year that Ontario finally closed the last of the one-room schoolhouses.
Rob Keffer, who attended S.S.#3 on Line 5, noted that the old schools “were a centre of a lot of activity. People got to know one another, children got to know one another” – not only through the classroom, but the school programs that included sports, concerts and special gatherings.
Jean Keffer attended S.S. #16. “I have lots of memories as a five year old,” she said. “I was wearing the little jumper my mother made for me. The teacher asked me, Is that gum?” Jean said she quickly spit the gum into her hand and dropped it in her pocket before answering, “No, ma’am” – and there the gum stuck, and “never came out.”
Ann Davis, who attended S.S. #1 in the early 1950s, remembering riding to school on bicycle, with her brother Joe – and weaving in and out of the white line on the road on their way. “If my mother knew….”
John Archibald attended S.S. #13 King, in Pottageville, and shared his memories of “the old schoolhouse. We burned wood in the old potbellied stove. The well was down the road. We took turns fetching the water from the well, that sat in a bucket with a dipper.”
The schoolhouse was built on the corner of his family’s farm, “so I didn’t have far to go – a couple of fields.” In winter, the snow made it impossible to cut across the fields. Instead, “you had to walk down the lane” – a route that added kilometres to the trek. “It was a whole different world.”
Bishop also recalled The Great Snowball Fight: "It all happened on Bob Forsythe's Hill. The teacher came out of the school and mysteriously found all the sleighs and toboggans abandoned, no students in sight. They were soon found out, amidst this amazing snowball fight, and apparently there were stones in the middle of those snowballs. Boy, these Dunkerron kids didn't fool around - they meant business!"
“We’re the Last Chance Hotel – the last chance to identify photos, write down memories,” said Dobney, standing by a display of old photographs of the various classes at S.S.#1 Dunkerron. “The last Grades 1 through 8. The blanks, if they’re not filled in, are going to stay blanks.”
