Students Return to Colonial Classroom Days in Monroe

From the Monroe Historical Society:

Twenty-two students representing four grades at Saint Jude School have been carried back in time to the one-room classroom of the Monroe of Colonial years in the first outreach since the Monroe Historical Society started rehabilitating three sites in town preserved from bygone days.

Garbed in a bonnet as an old-fashioned schoolmarm, the society’s docent Nancy Zorena simulated an abbreviated class in the society’s authentic Old Schoolhouse (circa 1790) on Wheeler Road, showing how the young scholars of yesteryear were taught--using slates, quills and inkwells—and how they played by rolling barrel hoops. She was assisted by the society’s president, Vic Casaretti, dressed in a waistcoat like the classic old schoolmaster.

Patrick Higgins, the principal of Saint Jude, supervised the excursion with three teachers, Paula Davenport who oversees grades three and four, Ryan McCabe, grade two, and Kelly Ambraz, grade one.

The society has been reenacting classes in the schoolhouse since 1973, largely for Monroe’s grade school population now and at one time for primary students from outside communities like Madison and Bethel.

But the resumption for Saint Jude Sept. 20 was the first presentation since the society allocated funding to refurbish the schoolhouse and two other properties representative of Monroe’s legacy, the Beardsley Homestead (circa 1780) on Great Ring Road and the Meeting House (circa 1811) at the intersection of East Village and Barn Hill Road, all containing antiquities like clothing, furniture and heirlooms from years gone by.

Work is under way to repair roofs, walls, windows and flooring where time and weather has degraded the framing, ensuring that the replacements are authentic to the period. At the schoolhouse, for example, all of the cedar shingles have been reinstalled.

Casaretti, the president of the society, says: “These sites reveal with an engaging realism what the hard-scrabble life was like when Monroe was a farming community. Our obligation is to ensure that our heritage--buildings and articles you can touch--are restored for the generations to come.”

He said donations to support the restorations could be sent to the Monroe Historical Society, Restoration Fund, PO Box 212, Monroe, CT 06468. The society is a 501c3 nonprofit and donations are tax deductible to the extent permitted by law.

Eric Iott, who grew up in the Samuel Ufford House in Stratford and lives today with his family in the Jonathan Miles Homestead in Seymour, both houses that go back to the 1700s, is working on the renovations with Paul Gregory, a contractor with a 50-year background in restoration, remodeling and masonry. They were awarded the contracts separately after the jobs were put out for bids.

Photos by John Babina

(Image 1) Nancy Zorena takes the youngsters back to the classroom of the Colonial era.

(Image 2) Mr. President: Vic Casaretti, president of the Monroe Historical Society, appears in character as James Monroe Sept. 21 in the Ehlers Room of the Edith Wheeler Memorial Library, delivering a 90-minute talk on the life of the fifth U.S. president (1817-25) and namesake of our community when it was incorporated in 1823. The presentation was videotaped by the Trumbull Community Television. James Monroe was pivotal under Andrew Jackson in negotiations with France to acquire the Louisiana Purchase, doubling the land mass of the U.S. He also established the Monroe Doctrine, stipulating that the U.S. has a legitimate interest in all developments in the Western hemisphere.