Newtown Historical Society invited everyone to a special educational open house at Middle Gate Elementary School’s Little Red Schoolhouse on Sunday, September 22.

Led by Head Instructress and Newtown Historical Society President Melissa Houston, the event took people back in time for a special 19th Century educational experience and had them learn what life was really like in the schoolhouse all those years ago.

Everyone sat on the wooden benches running along the outside of the room, listening to Houston explain how the building used to be a genuine one-room schoolhouse that was built in 1850. Besides talking about the storied history of the schoolhouse, Houston showed off old photos of students and the building and held up and opened primers, which were workbooks that taught students the basics and everything else they needed to know.

Houston then briefly taught arithmetic and had everyone work on sums together. She passed around chalk and slate boards, thin objects made out of slate stone, for people to write questions and answers on and wipe clean afterwards. Children proudly held up their boards with a smile after writing their answer as Houston moved from person to person to see if they got it right.

Afterwards, everyone got to run outside and play a wide variety of outdoor historical games and activities. These ranged from familiar activities such as ring toss, sack race, and jacks, but also ones that were new to some people like graces, a game where people use two rods to toss a wooden circle back and forth between each other. Another one was hoop rolling, where people try to keep a large hoop rolling for as long as possible.

In case someone had no idea how to play something, Docent Sam Evans-Oquendo was ready to help them and teach them how to play.

Children ran across the grassy field outside of the schoolhouse, laughing together as they tried to beat each other whether they played sack races or hoop rolling. Everyone could also beat the heat from the sunny weather by drinking cold apple cider provided by Newtown Historical Society.

People continued to pop in throughout the multi-hour open house, excited to get firsthand experience of Newtown’s history.

To Newtown Historical Society, which has owned and taken care of the Little Red Schoolhouse since 1973, the open house serves as an extension of their mission to preserve the town’s history and get people to connect with the past.

“A lot of what I think historical societies do is preserve daily life, and everyone can relate to the experience of school,” Houston explained. “And I feel like when we share those core human experiences, even if they’re different either across cultures or time periods, that it brings us together as a community. I think people love the schoolhouse because it’s something that they can imagine daily life in; that shared human experience.”

A Special Open House

Newtown Historical Society holds an open house for the building every year in September. However, this year’s open house is especially meaningful to them because it is the first event at the Little Red Schoolhouse after it was vandalized earlier this spring.

The organization has worked extremely hard since then to repair the schoolhouse, throwing themselves into months of restoration work to get the building back to where it once was. According to Houston, the wooden frames around the building’s windows had to be replaced, with her adding that it was “tricky to decide what to save.”

Houston says the schoolhouse has been restored a couple of times over their ownership, but that it is like any other historic wooden structure and “needs a lot of love.” While this made the vandalism discouraging to Newtown Historical Society, Houston said that it really showed them just how much the community cares about the Little Red Schoolhouse.

“The Middle Gate janitors came out and helped clean up, the Middle Gate families donated towards repairs, we had people from all throughout town come to help,” Houston said. “The biggest thing we learned is that people actually care for this building, and that it’s kind of a shared symbol of Newtown’s history.”

Houston says that they were very excited to have the windows finished in time for the open house and that the building is now finally reopened to the public. In other good news, she says Newtown Historical Society has received enough donations that they can now do other projects on the building that have been “waiting in the wings.”

“It’s just been so amazing to have the community support,” Houston said.

For more information about Newtown Historical Society, visit newtownhistory.org, call 203-426-5937, email info@newtownhistory.org, or find them on Facebook (Newtown Historical Society) or Instagram (newtowncthistoricalsociety).

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Reporter Jenna Visca can be reached at jenna@thebee.com.