PEA RIDGE — With the closing of the Pea Ridge Masonic College in 1916, the former college property in downtown Pea Ridge was deeded to the Pea Ridge Public School.
The land occupied about 15 acres, between the streets we now call North Curtis and North Davis. In the early days, the street we now know as Davis Street ran past the school grounds to the north city limits, turned eastward, descended the hill, passing near the Utah Smith home, crossed the branch, and proceeded up the east hill, joining into the road we now call Patterson Road. The buildings that house today’s Pea Ridge Intermediate School, (the former Pea Ridge Elementary campus) are on land acquired later, in the 1960s.The last owners of that property that I knew were Loyd and Ola Miller. They farmed the place, had sizable chicken houses, etc. I remember going to school with their daughter, Charlotte, and with their sons, Carroll Miller and Argie Miller. The 1970s gym on today’s Intermediate School campus stands on our old softball field, on the original 15-acre college property.
Apparently the Pea Ridge School did not originally have a school shop.
But in the early 1900s, the teaching of vocational agriculture came into demand. We know that at least by 1929, the cement block building, which we today are calling the old S.E.E.K. Building or Old Lunch Room, was serving as the school shop and agri classroom. Russell Walker recalls attending his firstsix grades at Shady Grove School, then came in to Pea Ridge in 1929 to do seventh grade in the old college building. In those days the old two-story school building had a fire escape slide extending from the upper-story auditorium to the ground level outside. One could slide down the fire escape into the courtyard behind the school house. Russell recalls sliding out to agri-shop class that way.
Fire escape slides are fascinating to me. Somehow, I think school must have been funner when schools had fire escape slides.
I am unable to pin down a date when Pea Ridge High School teams first played basketball.
We do know that by the mid-1920s, Pea Ridge basketball teams were strong contenders amongBenton County schools, and in some years were district and state contenders. Basketball as a sport was invented in 1910 by the YMCA as an off-season sport, and it quickly caught on in high schools.
Early on, most school basketball was played on outdoor courts. In the late 1920s, Mr. Charlie Tetrick and others in Pea Ridge made an effort to provide a building where the basketball teams could play.
The building was begun on property now occupied by our downtown motel. The walls were of concrete, and there was a rough board floor, but the building never had a roof, and it was never completed. The backboards were fastened directly to the concrete walls. It is interesting to me that some really fine basketball was played on that open floor. I wouldcertainly have hated to come in for a fast lay-up and ended up crashing into that wall!
In the early 1930s, Pea Ridge basketball teams were some of the strongest ever, and city leaders decided it was time to build a school gym. Russell Walker told me the story of how the gym was begun in 1931, with local volunteer workers putting up the structure as they could raise funds to buy materials. The gym went into use well before it was completed, and over several years the workers raised funds and pushed ahead with construction, finishing a section at a time. It was finally completed about 1936. During some of the gym’s early days, it served as a roller rink, as well as a basketball court. That was no longer happening when I started to school in 1946.
I have also been told that the gym early on hosted some name country bands and singers, like the Carter Sisters with June Carter, Red Foley and Porter Waggoner.
As the 1920s came to a close, Mr. J.P.G. Roulhac, school principal, and other Pea Ridge School leaders were moving to build a modern new one-story school house to replace the 50-year-old college building. The last Pea Ridge High School senior class to graduate in the old college building was the Class of1929-30. There have been some publications which say that the old college building was taken down in 1929. I contend that the old building was taken down in May 1930, at the end of the 1929-30 school term. This is more in line with the memories of people who attended the school in that time, such as Mr. Joe Pitts, Mrs. Inez Price Craker and Russell Walker. I also believe it to be most unlikely that the community would tear down the school house before school was out. There was no other place in town to hold school. The supposition of a 1929 demolition is based on ideas about how long a building project takes. That supposition doesn’t take into account that in those days, new buildings were often occupied for use well before they were completelyfinished. The PRHS Class of 1931 started school in the new building in the fall of 1930. The workers had labored on the new school house through June, July and August that summer.
Finish work inside still remained to be done, but the walls were up, the roof was on, and most rooms were useable.
(To be continued...)◊◊◊
Editor’s note: Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history.
He is vice president of the Pea Ridge Historical Society. He can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected], or call 621-1621.
Community, Pages 5 on 06/20/2012