Friday, Oct. 10, 2008

Old Union Students Study Their One-Room School Heritage

By Nicholas Sakelaris

Staff Writer

Old Union Elementary School students traveled back in time to the first Old Union School last week.

For one day, they traded jeans and T-shirts for pioneer garb such as prairie dresses, bonnets and cowboy hats. Instead of calculators and computers, children visited a living museum with hands-on activates like an old-style wash board, a cornmeal grinder and pans to sift through fool’s gold.

"It’s just a great opportunity for kids to experience pioneer life," said first-year Principal Mary Johnston, who dressed up as "the new sheriff in town."

The annual celebration reminds children that students at the original Old Union school lived without running water, electricity, cars, air conditioning and Central Market.

"They had to survive without going to the store," said Terry Hess, who brought the living museum to the school. "This is their heritage."

The Carroll school’s namesake harkens back to the turn of the century when a small one-room school stood at the southeast corner Old Union Church Road (now Continental Boulevard) and Breezeway. When Old Union School burned in 1910, a new building was built at the southeast corner of Brumlow Avenue and Old Union Church Road, across the street from the modern Old Union Elementary School.

Second-graders put on their own One Room Schoolhouse Play where they learned what student life was like in a small school. Students also enjoyed live performances by Tin Roof Tango in the cafeteria and other hands-on activities.

Long before Southlake was founded, many early families settled in the Old Union community in the area along Old Union Church Road. They initially worshipped at a brush arbor at the northwest corner of Brumlow Avenue and Texas 26 near the site of a well on the east side of Bear Creek.

The location had a colorful and descriptive name: Lope Up and Hitch. The school later merged with the White Chapel and Dove schools to become Carroll.

Southlake officials changed the name of the Old Union Church Road to Continental Boulevard after Continental Oil Company built the tank farm in 1960.