Edwin Washington Project

Background on Consolidation:    

The consolidation movement marked a pivotal evolutionary change in public education, made possible by advances in transportation.  Schools in rural communities were mainly one-room structures placed within walking distance of the potential student, or least within an easy wagon commute or by horse.  Unfortunately, it meant that teachers had to instruct a wide range of grades to a single group of children.  Many experts agree that development also meant that schooling didn’t meet it potential, so the Department of Education in Richmond pushed the idea of consolidation, in other words, multiple room schools that permitted topic specific and grade specific instruction.  The movement had controversy.   Communities were wedded to their schoolhouses and often did whatever they could to retain them.  The same was true of the many tiny High School which dotted Loudoun’s landscape.  Our files are full of references to the pluses and minuses of consolidation.

According to a 1940 study (Haden 1940):

• 1917, when Emerick became superintendent, there were 12 high schools enrolling a total of 301 white students.
• 1928/29, which preceded much of the consolidation, there were 33 one-room teachers, 10 two-room teachers, 58 other elementary teachers and 34 high school teachers in 9 high schools or a total of 135 white teachers.  Average attendance was 3276.
• 1938/39, there were 8 one room teachers, 8 two room teachers, 55 other elementary teachers, and 33 high school teachers or a total of 112.  The average daily attendance was 3595.  In other words, 23 fewer teachers cared for 319 more children daily.
• By the time of the study, the number of high schools had been reduced from 12 to 6.  Courses like home economics, agriculture, industrial arts, typing, shorthand and accounting were offered in four of the six.  Round Hill and Ashburn were deprived of those benefits.
• By the time of the study, Libraries were in serious need of improvement to meet 1940/41 State minimum standards.

In 1926, when arguing to build a high school in Lincoln instead of Purcellville, HB Taylor wrote consolidation “eliminates children in outlying districts, shuts them out of educational advantages and in many instances, the classes in these schools are often too large for pupils to receive much individual attention and teachers are too busy to give much moral training.  There is such a thing as over consolidation and in some States that have consolidated school the cry is “back to the little red schoolhouse.”[1]   In our studies of rural schools, we found even today a strong attachment to the one-room school environment.  We are a member of the Country School Association of America, which studies such schools and many of the academics are advocates for the social value of such institutions.  In Frederick Texas, we met the descendants of German immigrants, some of whom taught or studied in one room schools. Nearly all of the schoolhouses have been retained as community centers, restored, kept in good repair and continue to be vibrant centers of community life.

Schools were not just closed for classic consolidation purposes of course.  Some were closed because of a decline in student population or for safety concerns.  In the case of Taylorstown in 1940, the patrons wrote to both the State Board of Education and Oscar Emerick recommending that the school be closed, due to road safety issues.[2]

Some important examples of Consolidation Protests.

• Dec, 1922 Brownsville.  Competing petitions from colored community to keep children in Brownville or alternatively to attend in an Odd-Fellows building in Hamilton[1]. 
• 26 April 1923 Request to keep Coleman open on a promise to expand increase the number of pupils is accepted.
• 1924 rebuke of Richmond effort to reduce the number of high schools
• Consolidation of High Schools, Moses Commission, 1947[2].
• UNK.  Req to keep children in Oak Hill because they will do better in a one-room school house. Location.  White Petition Box.
• 1924. Daysville patrons ask that school be open in AY 1924/25. White Petition Box.
• 1926 request by Airmont not to be closed.  Location White Petition Box.
• Info on elementary school consolidation, 1935.
• 1926 Protest over not rebuilding Lincoln after it burned down.  White Petition Box.[3]
• 1928. Protest closing of Lenah.  White Petition Box.
• March 1930, petition not to close Paxson.  Expectant mother asks that Paxson School not be closed.  She didn’t feel a school bus was safe for her children. White Petition Box.
• March 1930.  Waterford is opposed to consolidation, but if inevitable, Wheatland, Paeonion Springs and Clark’s Gap should be consolidated with Waterford.  White Petition Box.
• March,1930.  Mrs. Parks of Paxson ok with a half day if a full day is impossible, in other words wants to keep the school open.  White Petition box.
• April 1930, Charles Gap promises to provide enough children to keep school open.  White Petition Box.
• 1935. Little River protested closing and asked to be open in AY 1935/36. White Petition Box.
• 1937.  Lucketts H.S. protested closing, asked to remain open and accredited in AY 1937/38.
• 1937, March,   Waterford protests closing.
• 1937, March  Waterford protests decision to close High School
• 1938.  Mt Pleasant wants to be reopened.  White Petition Box.
• January 3, 1940 Essay on consolidation of white schools.
• School Transportation Survey, 1947.  Deals with issues of consolidation.  Location:  See 12.3 under Routes.
• March 1938.  Waterford protests projected closing scheduled for 1939. Read rationale for not having a large population, School Board has been diverting kids away.  See other details.  Very interesting.  White Petition Box
• White petition box, Leithton (w), complaint about consolidation.
• White petition box, unknown date.  Milltown.  Request to keep school open.
• White petition box, Mountain Gap (w) about how consolidation would impact the redistribution of pupils after school was closed.
• Unk.  Philomont.  Want to keep it open as two teacher school.  White Petition Box.
• UNK Woodland, Petition to keep school open in White Petition Box.
• 1944, November 29.  Consolidation of colored and white schools.  Along with a discussion of consolidation needs and budget issues is statement by Emerick on a difference in the treatment of white and “colored” was prejudice and needed to end.
• 1945 .   It’s not entirely clear what the African-American community felt about consolidation; but it was commented on by Mrs. Ruby Vaughn Kelly, Supervisor for Colored Schools, in a memo to teachers dated June, 1945.  She noted that 14 one room schools were being consolidated, following discussions with parents and teachers and that plans were made to build two consolidated schools, by which we assume she meant Banneker and Carver, both constructed in 1947.[4].
• 1947: February.  Exchange of Letters between Oscar Emerick and Waterford Community Citizens Association.  Covers consolidation and general concerns with the direction of education.  There were practical questions on the basis for teacher salaries, with a request for statistics to prove or disprove the comment “most of Loudoun’s high school graduates who go to college either fail their first years’ work or find it very difficult because they were poorly prepared.”  They also asked if it was true “that our county schools now have only one major aim, to educate merely to the extent that might be useful to tenant farmers?”  There was expressed a general disquiet over consolidation, the meaning of which they didn’t understand.  There was also resentment over the closing of their high school, which they felt had been protected in 1926 (See 1926 Dispute Between Lincoln and Purcellville). 
  • Emerick responded by saying amongst other points that any graded school with four teachers was likely to be retained.  An exception to the rule was Ashburn High School, which burned down. In that case Sterling and Ashburn student populations were combined.  He also disputed the assertion about tenant farmers, indicating that though many high school pupils did have a hard time in university, “the basic aim of the schools is... to provide an education that meets the needs of the pupils.”
• 1947.  Consolidation of White High Schools.  Proposal for single high school for whites to be ready by September, 1949.  Covers a rationale for consolidation.  Discussion of transportation and faculty requirements, an alternative plan for Lincoln and Leesburg and a plan for four high schools, Aldie, Leesburg, Lincoln and Lovettsville.

1952.   On December 26, 1952, O.L. Emerick wrote in a private letter to a former colleague “Our great big problem continues to be our effort to build a consolidated white high school.  We are now planning the building and hope to let a contract in 1953.  However, we are surrounded by a lot of hostility and one slip on our part with some of the formalities.