Eight-Sided School: the Many Sides To a Historical Schoolhouse

As the final days of the school term approach, it seems a good time for the history lovers among us to reflect on how education and schoolhouses in particular used to be, not just 50 years ago, but a century ago.

As the people who built the schoolhouses and attended classes in the tiny structures have long ago passed away, we feel especially honored that the folks at the Blair County Genealogical Society provided us with a copy of an article which ran in the Altoona Mirror on Oct. 26, 1948, spelling out the history of the eight-sided schoolhouse in Woodbury Township. Blair County.

The schoolhouse, which ultimately became a church, in more recent years has deteriorated into a sad dilapidated shack-like building.

It is located in the Piney Creek area just outside Williamsburg between Ganister and Royer in the general area where an iron furnace was once operated.

While a couple dates of construction are offered up in history books and among the general public living in the area, we will rely on information provided in the Altoona Mirror article of 65 years ago.

“Pennsylvania historians agree that the eight-sided schoolhouse began to guide the education of America’s youngsters probably a half century before the better known little red schoolhouse,” the article says. “Usually it was built between 1810 and 1831. Few were built after 1831.”

The year 1831 was pivotal in school-building construction, the year Pennsylvania legislature enacted its first public school law. Along with requirements for school attendance, teacher qualifications and academic courses, the state leaders, in broad reaching specifics, determined size and the eight-siders were too small for the progressive concept of suitable education.

Yet the article asserts, “It has been fairly definitely established that 1868 marked its opening.”

Further adding to the confusion over dates is a reference to deed transfers, which points to an 1834 date.

Woodbury Township was still a part of Huntingdon County on March 14, 1834, when Charles Eicholtz, Daniel Hewitt and Jacob Sollady, identified as the Salem School on Piney Creek, obtained title from David Gibboney to the tract on which the eight-sided school was to be erected. The property was part of a larger tract that had been conveyed in 1798 to Joseph Chapman.

The location of the odd-shaped schoolhouse in the Williamsburg area seems only fitting when one considers the importance placed on education by the founder of the town.

Williamsburg history buff Cathy Over said Jacob Ake, founder of the town, then known as Aketown paid for everything needed to get a school started.

“Williamsburg has the oldest school in Blair County,” she said.

The territory included present day Blair, Huntingdon and parts of Bedford counties.

“Blair County’s First Hundred Years — 1846-1946” emphasized Ake’s dedication to education.

“The first known school within the territory was established about 1795 but not at public expense. The elementary school was established in Aketown by Jacob Ake who was the owner of the land upon which the village was laid out.

“Mr. Ake employed teachers and paid all expenses from his own pocket for a period of about 15 years,” the book’s author wrote. “It is said he served also as his own truant officer and the admonitory shake of his cane many a delinquent off to school.”

Ake started a trend and soon after the Williamsburg school went into operation another was opened. Red Ore Bank School on Clover Creek was held in an abandoned farmhouse on the Hyde farm.

The owner left the house to move west and changes were make to the interior to make it suitable for school.

At the time of the closing of the eight-sided brick schoolhouse, 28 children were attending.

The eight-sided schoolhouse design is believed to have come to Pennsylvania by way of England where they were built to admit maximum light, make heating easy and permit the teacher who sat in the center of the room to maintain discipline.

The structure functioned as a schoolhouse until 1942, when the dozen or so schools in Catherine and Woodbury townships and Borough of Williamsburg were consolidated by the state.

The odd-looking little building was auctioned off by the Woodbury Township supervisors and it was purchased by a group of people with the Brethren in Christ denomination and renovated into a house of worship.

Transfer of use from educational to religious purposes appeared to have caused no challenge, because Daniel Hewitt, who owned the ground and donated it for the school did so with the understanding that it could also be used for religious purposes, according to the article.