Plymouth, Kansas

History is like a garden, unless tended well, weeds grow and flowers get crowded out.

Highway 50

I was driving back from Kansas City one evening, and as I am want to do, I decided to leave Interstate 35 at Emporia and take Highway 50 across to Strong City, then south on Highway 77 south past lovely Cottonwood Falls and home to Wichita.

Plymouth One Room Schoolhouse

Plymouth, Kansas

I had barely made it past Emporia when I spotted a one room schoolhouse at Plymouth, a way station on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway. It is a fine structure made of wood with a row of eight windows on the west side and none on the east. A cupola where the bell used to ring sits precariously atop the slanted roof. Stone cutters carved large limestone rocks to make a walkway to the front door.

 

Plymouth Schoolhouse

There is precious little to be found about the schoolhouse. In 1929, Laura M. French gave us an article in the Emporia Gazette newspaper. Her recollections, however, were more about the founding of the tiny community of Plymouth, first settled in 1857 and platted in 1858. John Carter, a Friend from North Carolina built the first house in Plymouth. And before the railroad, stage coaches used to stop for meals here and quench their thirst from the deep well in the well house, next to Carter's spacious house.

 

Early History

The Civil War started, the men of Plymouth formed a militia and life went on. Schools were important to any budding community and, so, Laura French tells us of the first school in Plymouth. It began in 1862 and was taught in Mrs. Barbara Campbell's house across the street from the Carter house. Quoting Laura French, "Miss Mary Hammer was the first teacher, and Mrs. Ella Spencer - now Mrs. Brown - was the second." In 1864, a first schoolhouse was built.

See also, William G. Cutler's History of the State of Kansas, LYON COUNTY, Part 19, Plymouth.

 

Plymouth School 1882

Of life in 1929, Mrs. French says, "In Plymouth village are a well built schoolhouse and nothing more, referring to the school that was built in 1882. The door is locked, the windows shuttered, the house stands alone, but well tended. Someone cares.