20 return to school house for reunion at old Moselem Church School

With the theme, “Return to our school days,” the second Schoolhouse Reunion was held at Moselem Church School on Sept. 30. About 20 students ages 62 to 85 attended the reunion.

History:
There was one teacher who taught all eight primary grades in the same classroom. The teacher taught 20 to 25 students from a raised platform in front of a slate blackboard which is still there. A huge potbellied stove rested in the middle of the room, surrounded by students’ desks. There was no electric or water. A cooler was on a shelf in the back of the room and we used a common cup, shelves for our lunch boxes and hooks to hang coats and hats. We look back and say what a wonderful way to go to school.

I remember the walk through the woods from our house to school; and my Mom making a fire on a Sunday night in the stove for us the next day, then getting water in a bucket down at the farm in the morning; and, of course, the famous egg sandwiches, that’s all there was to eat, and school, eight grades, with Mr. Fegely and Walter Weigle. Their ghosts are still there. Can you feel them?

And the school building that is still surviving after all these years.

Education was always given high priority at Moselem, from the time Rev. Kraft began teaching the scripture, psaltery, reading, writing, and arithmetic during the winter of 1743 until Mrs. Glasser of Kutztown bade farewell to her youngsters at Moselem Church School in the spring of 1955.

The earliest classes were conducted in the 1743 log meetinghouse. This continued as a parochial school until 1854 when Richmond Township commenced offering public school until the existing one-room school building was erected.

The original school bell was rung. We tried to recreate the atmosphere. The shutters were opened and the magic was revealed.