The Many Transformations Of Taunton Hill School

By Dottie Evans

When Taunton Hill Road was no more than a cart track winding through the uncut forests of colonial Newtown, a one-room schoolhouse was erected on a shady hilltop at the northern end of town.

Built in 1738, it would be the first of many outlying schoolhouses built by the town for children of farming families who lived too far away to attend in-town schools.

 Though Newtown was incorporated in 1705, within 50 years it experienced a mini-population explosion, expanding from the 45 families that lived here when the town was chartered, to the more than 1,250 families that were recorded in the first census of 1756. (This information is chronicled in Town Historian Dan Cruson’s booklet published in 2000, titled Educating Newtown’s Children: A History of Its Schools.)

Over a period of 265 years, one could say that the Taunton Hill schoolhouse has enjoyed many transformations, changing from a busy rural schoolhouse to a vacant or seldom-used storage facility to a country home.

“It was in active use as an educational center for nearly two centuries, until the town sold several of its old one-room schoolhouses in 1950,” noted Newtown author Mary Mitchell in the 1996 photographic book written in collaboration with Al Goodrich, titled Touring Newtown’s Past.

From 1950 to 1975, Pauline Knibloe, a neighboring landowner in the Taunton District purchased and looked out for the old schoolhouse, but the structure remained vacant until 1975, when local schoolteacher John Vouros bought it.

Mr Vouros and his wife Jane, also a schoolteacher, subsequently moved into the old building after a long struggle with town boards to gain variances allowing them to live there while making renovations. They launched an extensive remodeling project that involved moving it further back on the lot and away from the road, and they added on 11 rooms.

In March 2003, Peter Campbell, a painting contractor from Weston, purchased the renovated schoolhouse from the Vouros family. He set about making improvements that included repainting the exterior, adding a new roof, rebuilding the stone walls, installing a new gravel driveway, and adding heavy, wooden double shutters to frame the schoolhouse windows.

“These are in keeping with what might have been here long ago,” Mr Campbell said of the shutters, speaking in late March to a visitor who had become intrigued with the old building and its history.

Some changes to the property itself were simply brought about by the passage of time. Among these was the loss of the giant maple that stood near the schoolhouse door when the building was nearer the road.

“During one windy rainy night last year, a big limb fell, so we had to call Al Potter [owner of Newtown Tree Service] to come take it down,” Mr Campbell said.

When Mr Campbell and his fiancé, Virginia Hendel, first saw the old schoolhouse with the Vouros’ renovations, they new it was the right home for them.

“We absolutely fell in love with the place. Jane’s gardens were beautiful, and there was this peaceful quality about the whole area. Weston had just gotten too crowded for us,” he added.

Mr Campbell admits he would like to know more about the children who once sat in the 32-foot by 23-foot space that now comprises his comfortable living room, painted lemon yellow with Phillipsburg blue trim.

“We got these old pictures along with some other documents from the Vouros family when they left, and I’m hoping someone can identify the children, maybe put a year on the photos,” he said.

Preserving The Core Structure

Despite all the years, the changes, and the extensive renovations, much remains of the original 18th Century schoolhouse building.

The two outside doors and entrances leading to two separate cloakrooms, one for girls and one for boys, are still intact, as is the belfry and its bell. The cloakrooms were changed into a bathroom and a small kitchen, but their original hand-hewn beams are exposed for all to see over the inside door lintels.

Whoever the original 18th Century architect was, his design was nearly universal for the time, since most one-room schoolhouses had separate entrances, as well as separate outhouses, for each sex. The integration of the cloakroom spaces into one room at the center for all students was also universal –– a way to create one space where the eight grades could learn together at varying rates.

The many side windows afforded ample light for studying, and a pot-bellied stove near the middle of the room was supplied with wood provided by some member of the school district who also may have been awarded a discount in his school fees.

 The right hand back corner might have housed an organ used for Wednesday night prayer meetings, and the front center was where the blackboard stood. The teacher’s desk would have been to the left of center.

“Architecturally, [the one-room schoolhouse] was the ultimate in efficiency and for more than 150 years, no one found any compelling reason to seek any change in the design,” wrote essayist Alan Olmstead in a column published by the Waterbury-Republican in September of 1978.

Today, motorists passing by the much-changed and renovated historic dwelling at 26 Taunton Hill Road will have to slow down if they hope to spy the original outlines of the old schoolhouse.

Set far back on its shaded lot, the white, peaked roof building with its two black front doors can be identified. The old well capped by a large stone can still be seen by the road, as can the outhouse-turned-woodshed located to one side.

If passers-by happen to see Mr Campbell or Ms Hendel in the front yard, they might ask them to ring the old school bell that hangs in the cupola behind the flagpole.

 They would be glad to comply, and the sound carries for miles.