Sheldon High School
Class of 1925
My great-grandmother, Clara Marie Light Schlotman (1905-2001) had a short career as a country schoolteacher in the mid-1920s. After talking to her daughter (my grandmother) in 2021, I did a little research and was able to put together this information.
After graduating from Sheldon (Illinois) High School in 1925, Clara Light attended Mrs. Brown’s Normal Training School for Teachers in Homer, Illinois. She was one of about forty students that summer. The students gathered at Mrs. Brown’s home for a group photo, shown below
Mrs. Brown
From 1917 until about 1931, Lucy Stewart Brown offered training for aspiring teachers. At that time, there was no requirement of formal training to start teaching school. But the better one’s education, the better the salary one could command. Her school seems to have filled a niche for those who wished to teach with more than just a high school education but didn’t have the means or inclination to attend a university program. (This information is from a dissertation written on one-room schoolhouses and from the Facebook page for the Homer, Illinois Historical Society.)
Mrs. Brown’s payment was tied to her students’ success with obtaining certification. If a student failed certification exams after two tries, they owed Mrs. Brown nothing. But, if they passed, they owed her $25 from their first paycheck. (Carol Erb told me this. See next section for more information)
Mildred, a fellow student
Also at Mrs. Brown’s school that summer was Mildred Wilson, later Mildred Hall.
In 2021, I conversed with her daughter, Carol, on Facebook. She identified her mother in the photo as the girl in the dark dress in the group to the far left. Before passing in 2009 at the age of 102, Mildred told her daughter that…
“…the classes were held in the old high school — that was the upper story of what is now considered the Homer Opera House at the corner of Rt. 49 and First Street in Homer. Her words were that the days were long, hot, and brain-taxing.”
Carol Erb, 2 Dec 2020, commenting on a Homer Historical Society Facebook post about Mrs. Brown’s school.
When asked about living arrangements, Carol remembered her mother telling her that…
“…there were some small houses across the street from the Brown home that the girls in the classes lived in during the week and probably most of them went back to their homes on weekends.”
Carol Erb, 2 Dec 2020, commenting on a Homer Historical Society Facebook post about Mrs. Brown’s school.
She also said that the boys lived in the unfinished upstairs of the Brown home.
Clara Light, Country School Teacher
Her first job was near Gilman, Illinois. The name of the school was the Brooke School.
Note: Nana remembered the name of the school because, after the death of Aunt Nona’s first husband, Albert Diefenbaugh, Aunt Nona worked as a housekeeper for Ed Brooke who lived near Gilman. They were eventually married. Aunt Nona was Grandma Schlotman’s older sister.
Brooke School was located 1.9 miles ESE of Gilman (40.753925, -87.957260), northeast of the intersection of County Roads 900E and 1700N.
Nana said that Grandma lived with a family from the school through the week and would go home to her mother’s house in Sheldon on the weekend. Her brother, Darwin “Dobby” Light would drive her most of the twenty-two plus miles to her destination, but would let her out at the point that the paved road ended. Grandma would then walk the rest of the way. The roads, being dirt, could be very muddy and unpleasant to navigate.
Nana also said she remembers that most of the students Grandma taught were of German descent — that there was a German settlement in the Gilman area. This jives with the photos I found of some of Grandma’s students. One is of Margaret Habben. The label says that she was Grandma’s “7th Grade girl.” Another photo shows, “Gerhard giving Nero a ride in the wagon.” He was Margaret Habben’s younger brother.
It’s unclear at this point when Grandma began teaching. If the summer school was enough to prepare her to pass the examination required for her teaching certificate, she probably started at Gilman in the fall of 1925. That would mean that she taught two seasons.
In July of 1927, Grandma was hired to teach closer to home. She was to begin at Clark School, 2.7 miles north of Sheldon, for the 1927-28 school year. Her marriage to Grandpa in August permanently terminated her teaching career, as married ladies were not allowed to teach in Iroquois County at that time.
Questions
Do we have her teaching certificate?
Which family did she live with during the week? It might have been the Habben family. Where did they live?
What would her pay have been?
Sources
Homer High School “Panthers” at Illinois High School “Glory Days” http://www.illinoishsglorydays.com/id98.html, accessed on 3 Dec 2020.