Victory School - Former School near McDowell, MO
N 36° 46.972 W 093° 46.394
15S E 431005 N 4071064
A well-kept former one-room school in rural Barry County, Missouri
Waymark Code: WMM4MN
Location: Missouri, United States
Date Posted: 07/20/2014
Views: 2
This school is on private land; but the current landowner, a pleasant fellow, is used to folks stopping by to look at the old school. He told me that many of them say "I went to that school;" or perhaps "My mom [or dad] went to that school." The sign on the building says that it was built in 1911. See the web link, below (skipping down to Victory, not Victor), for more information.
The current (at the time of this posting) landowner bought the land with the school back in 1991. There was a cloakroom, but it was crumbling in, so he removed it. (A photo shows the outline of the foundation for it.) He said that there had been a bell tower; but when he re-roofed the building, his wife asked that he not bother with the bell tower as too dangerous to work on. So he roofed right over where it had been.
The old hand-operated pump is still out in the yard. The owner says that the inside is exactly as it had been left when it was closed: the desks are still in rows, the books are on desks or in bookcases, the teacher's desk is there, the chalk board, and everything else. It is frozen in time. But he does not open it up to visitors. He said that the former owner told him that one of the school teachers lived about 2 miles south of the school, and rode horseback to the school each day.
You may park along Hwy C at about:
N36°46.964' W093°46.412'
And walk over to the school. If the owner's bulldog comes up to you, don't worry. He's just curious.