Original Location of Neff’s One-Room Schoolhouse?
Neff’s One-Room Schoolhouse is currently located on the lawn of the Edgar C. Moore Elementary School in the Red Lion Area School District. I learned this fact three weeks ago and was immediately puzzled why old maps never had a one-room schoolhouse placed at this location.
Several people have told me “it’s on the Internet, the maps must be wrong,” or “it’s always been there.” One did suggest, “Maybe they moved it.” This weekend I was reviewing old aerial photos for an upcoming talk and decided to look at the area where Neff’s schoolhouse is currently situated. This location, the yellow encircled area, is in the middle of a farm field in the 1937 Aerial Photo. The photo was taken November 24, 1937; those are probably corn stalks nicely bunched together in the field.
The 1937 School Directory has Neff’s listed as an active one-room school in York Township. I’ll show that Neff’s schoolhouse was moved from York Township to Red Lion sometime after 1971. Please reply to this blog if you can help in pinpointing the original location of Neff’s schoolhouse.
I searched the Internet for Neff’s schoolhouse and immediately found this impressive photo by Gregg Obst. Check out the full size photo with a detailed description at this web site. From this site one can also click to get a map showing where the photo was taken; i.e. the Google map section shown below. The yellow encircled area is Neff’s schoolhouse, complete with boys and girls outhouses.
I’ve cropped both aerial photos (from Penn Pilot) to match the area seen in the Google map section. The August 12, 1971 Aerial Photo shown below shows the Edgar C. Moore Elementary School however Neff’s still has not made an appearance.
Old maps show two nearby possibilities for Neff’s schoolhouse in York Township. Both locations are along Country Club Road, west of the current schoohouse location:
- A schoolhouse symbol is located on the southwest corner of Country Club Road and Dairyland Drive. See post confirming this is the original location of Neff’s Schoolhouse.
- A schoolhouse symbol is located on the south side of Country Club Road, just east of Burrow Road
I’m also having a similar situation with Raab’s schoolhouse in York Township; I believe Raab’s schoolhouse was also moved from its original location. Please reply to this blog if you can help in pinpointing the original locations of these schoolhouses.
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