Little School on the Prairie

Part One of Two
The very first school held in the Hardingrove area was in the Picker home with Anna Haley as the teacher. The first actual school building was of logs. Then in 1906 a nice new Hardingrove School was built of lumber, which was furnished by the school district (Leslie School District), with local men donating the labor to build it. The building was made of 12 inch boards with one layer on the studs, then tarpaper, then more boards. The boards were not mismatched, so the cracks were opposite each other. In hot weather the paper got pushed full of holes, so in the winter it was plenty breezy. In a few years they got a new school building.
The first teacher was Miss Velva Wedeman who later became Mrs. Velva (James) Bell. Miss Velva Wedeman had taught for two years in Bon Homme County, South Dakota, when she was offered the Hardingrove job, when her parents homesteaded in the area. The following is her account of that first year (1906-07), with a few minor edits, as she recorded her memories for the 1956-57 YCL local history book.
“The first school at Hardingrove opened about the second week of September in 1906 in a nice new schoolhouse located a bit southwest of the Hardingrove store. Eighteen pupils, including Hester, Ethel, Harold and Sam Bellamy, Harry Hood, Wilhemina Herman, and Albert Picker, Viola and Edith Denhem, Florence Yoeman, Helen and Clifford Dregger, Myrtle and Homer Lyle, Carl and Lydia Bower and Hazel Wedeman, were enrolled. A ten-year-old boy from Pierre, whose father was doing carpenter work in the neighborhood, enrolled later and attended for about two months. Helen Bellamy and Edna Bower attended a few weeks in the spring, as they would be ready for first grade the following fall. {So…these girls were probably the first kindergarteners in Haakon County.} Smaller pupils who had to travel quite a distance dropped out during winter months so average attendance was fifteen or sixteen.
“The Lyle children and Hazel Wedeman were not from the Hardingrove community. Lyle’s lived near the old Ferguson ranch and Hazel Wedeman was from West Fork. Hardingrove was their closest school. These three children and the teacher (Me) lived in a homesteader’s shack about a half mile from the schoolhouse. We were six or seven miles from home across the rugged breaks of Spotted Bear Creek, so except for Thanksgiving and Christmas, we did not go home until the end of the school term. Board members (of the Leslie School District) were Charlie or Bill Haxby, Thomas Harty, William Griffith, Fred Marrington, and Mr. Sechler, with Mrs. Carrie Wood of Ft. Pierre as Stanley County Superintendent.
A family in the neighborhood by the name of Picker {Picker’s ran the “Hardingrove Store” at that time}, kept a small supply of groceries and we were able to secure the most necessary staples from them. Later in the year, another family named Denhem, laid in a more complete supply of groceries, so we were better provided for. When kerosene ran low, we used the light from glowing coals by leaving one lid of the stove off, and considered ourselves fortunate to be able to buy a pint of kerosene when the next freight wagon arrived from Ft. Pierre.
When I (Velva Wedeman) arrived Monday morning (that first day), I found a clean schoolroom…. completely lacking of any furniture or equipment, with the exception of a new broom which stood in the corner, a bucket, and a stove. However, as each patron arrived, he brought crude homemade desks for his children, and books which had been used in other schools. Mrs. Bellamy sent a small homemade table and Mrs. Picker a chair for the teacher’s use. As the textbooks came from Pierre, Omaha, Bon Homme and various other schools, there was no uniform text, and studying together had to be done. These books were used the entire year, making it very difficult to follow the Course of Study. {Back in those days, there were no standard textbooks for each grade. Teachers were guided by the S Dak Course of Study which laid out what concepts were to be mastered in each grade. For example, 4th grade learned long division, 6th grade learned the major rivers in North America, etc.}  However, at the end of the year, all three eighth graders and two seventh graders passed their state examinations and the younger children did very well in spite of considerable absences during the cold weather.
Most of the children lived close enough to walk to school, with parents bringing others each day. Harry Hood had the longest distance to travel, about four miles. He rode a little gray mule named, Bluebell. This mule paid little attention to activities until it came time for singing, and then she often added her mournful voice to those of the children. Quite often the music lesson ended in utter confusion, due to Bluebell’s interference.
We had a Christmas program, and Mr. Bellamy furnished us with a tree, which we decorated with strings of popcorn and paper chains and a few ornaments which the children brought. My mother made stockings from bits of gay print which I filled with treats to be passed to the children by Santa. Mrs. Denhem also sent candy from their little country store. The grownups received only popcorn balls, as it was too cold to bring apples from Ft. Pierre.