Page 7 - Demo

5There are scores of old one-room schoolhouses and small high-school buildings%u2014remnants of a past way of life%u2014that still dot Indiana%u2019s countryside. Some have restored exteriors, with interiors transformed into residences, community buildings, or businesses. I%u2019m pleased they%u2019ve been resurrected and found new lives, and I%u2019ve photographed a number of them. But my camera is drawn more to those structures that are terminally forlorn%u2014those with peeling paint, crumbling brick, and rotting wood.As I walk around these sorry one-time local landmarks, it%u2019s the shards of slate shingles lying haphazardly on the ground, the outhouse leaning out-of-plumb by a back fence, the rusted cast-iron water pump minus its handle, or the eroded slab of limestone proudly proclaiming a century-old construction date and the name of a long-dead township trustee, that catch my eye. An end may be knocked out to allow farm equipment, or bales of hay, to be stored inside. Others retain their four walls, but are unsecured%u2014wide-open and empty%u2014with door-less hinges and glass-less window frames. Still others are locked and boardedup tight, silently waiting, for what?Whenever I approach one of these derelict sites, once so filled with life, I always have questions. Gazing on a set of worn limestone steps rising up to a pair of battered wooden entry doors, I wonder who attended school here? Could I ask neighbors and locate a former student? Or, have they all passed away or moved on, leaving only a silent structure behind? How about the teachers? Actually, I knew two such teachers%u2014Joe and Lucille Mendenhall. Though we weren%u2019t related by blood, they were always my Grandpa and Grandma Mendy. Both taught in one-room schools in rural Cass County before moving to the now-vanished Newton County community of Conrad, where he taught school and she stayed home to raise a family. Not long afterward, Grandpa accepted a teaching job in the small town of Talbot. It was a step up for him%u2014to a schoolhouse with two teachers.In 1927, Grandpa moved his family to Fowler, where he became a rural-route mailman. The first automobile he drove on his rounds through the surrounding farm country was a Model-T Ford, and he kept this steady civil-service job right up until his retirement in the 1960s. When I was a kid, it was a real treat to wake before dawn and head off with him on his deliveries. For some reason, it seemed as if every other person we encountered uttered a variation of, %u201cWell, Joe, it looks like you brought the boss with you today,%u201d each thinking it an original comment. No matter how many times I heard it, I ate it up.Schools and the postal service%u2014just two of the many essential components of modern society. Such cooperative ventures probably have roots dating back to when our early human ancestors first coalesced into groups and clans. Those forebears discovered that, by working together for the common good, they could all benefit. In time, simple rules of conduct evolved into edicts and mandates, then, eventually, into civil government%u2014with all its associated functions, includIntroduction