Schoolhouse brings history to life

Lori Nickel, Montgomery Messenger

Preserving history is important to Verna Ziegenhagen, 90, of Le Center. The fact that she lives in the house she was born and raised in, emphasizes that point. In addition to keeping her family's history alive, Verna also cherishes her past experience as a country school teacher in the days of the one-room schoolhouse. This love for preserving the past prompted Verna to purchase the old schoolhouse in Le Center and restore it to resemble the country school she taught in more than 70 years ago.

The old Le Center School, which had been called Shoemacker School, Sullivan School and Brown School, quite literally traveled a rough road after it was closed in 1950 and sold to a farmer who moved it down County Road 11 one mile to his farm. For more than 30 years, the building was used for grain storage.

In 1984, Verna purchased the schoolhouse, moved it to her family farm on 231st Avenue, cleaned it up, restored it and filled it with student desks and chalk boards once again. Verna said that one of her most prized possessions at the school is the pump organ built in the same era as the schoolhouse. It was given to her by a friend whose family had it delivered to Le Center in a covered wagon more than 100 years ago.

The organ was brought here back when Le Center was still a territory and not yet a town