“Windham Village”, or “Canada Parish”, as Hampton was called, was initially divided into districts. The villages of Appaquag, Goshen, Rawson, Boston Hollow, Bigelow, Howard Valley, and Hampton Hill maintained their own one-room schoolhouses to serve students in grades one through eight. Though the town itself was incorporated in 1786, district education wouldn’t unify for another 150 years, when the seven separate schools were reduced to three: Boston Hollow’s Bell School for the primary grades, grades four, five and six in the village Center School, and the Clark’s Corner’s School in Goshen for seventh and eighth graders.

A school in the town’s center is the only location in continual use. The Elementary School, the brick building north of the village, has served students in pre-school through grade six for the last 30 years. Due to decreasing enrollment, its continued existence was called into question last fall when voters rejected a proposal to form a cooperative school with Scotland. Prior to its construction, the Consolidated School, south of the village, initially for first through eighth grade, then kindergarten through sixth, served the town’s students for forty years. The “Center School” was the third one-room schoolhouse in the village. Evidence of the first is found in an 1802 deed for the property at 237 Main Street, which stipulated the preservation of the section which contained the school. An 1832 map shows the one-room schoolhouse across the street, on the property north of the post office. And an 1869 map of the districts shows the “School” at its last location, behind Fletcher Memorial Library on Cedar Swamp, where Hampton students were educated for almost 100 years.

Center School also housed the Town Hall; Jane Marrotte relayed, “The Town Hall was upstairs and sometimes the teacher brought us up to learn about the roles of government.” And the library. Ethel Jaworski recalled, “When the library moved from upstairs over the Center School to the present site, the pupils carried armfuls down, making several trips to complete the job.”

The history of Center School is best remembered, or at least most colorfully, through the eyes of the students who attended, and we are fortunate in the wealth of information we have from them, in recorded interviews and in Alison Davis’ “Hampton Remembers”.

When I was in the fourth grade at the Center School I was the fourth grade, lock, stock and barrel. So I got promoted so there were three in the fifth grade, my bother Merriam, Barney Pawlikowski and me…We had one book and w’ed open it up, y’know. Barney’d run his eyes down one page and down the other, turn to Merriam and say “Shall I turn?” and Merriam would say, “No, I’m still there,” and pretty soon he’d finish and they’d say to me “Where are you?” and I’d point at the top of the first page. So finally Barney’d say “Listen, get your heads in here, I’ll read it to ya’.” Very soon I was demoted to the third grade.

Wendell Davis, from “Hampton Remembers”

We went to the Center School near the library. In good weather we walked, but if the weather was bad, Grandpa would take us in whatever motor vehicle he had at the time. We farm kids had special clothing in the winter—heavy underwear with a buttoned pocket in the back which we sometimes forgot to re-button. What a joke to see someone at the blackboard with their flap hanging down. This underwear also had long legs and we wore long heavy stockings, so the underwear legs had to be folded before putting on the stockings. No matter how hard we tried, we could never smooth away the lumps.

Marion Halbach

I went up the hill every day to the Center School. I can’t ever remember startin’ out without a dinner pail. There were maybe a dozen to twenty-five at the Center School depending on the season. When there was farm work to do there weren’t so many. There were two doors, one was the boys’ entry and one was the girls’ entry. You could go in either just ‘slong as you didn’t slam the door – or you got the ruler!

Russell Thompson from “Hampton Remembers”

When I went to the Center School we didn’t have very much in the way of supplies and least of all books. We had window boards to hold the windows open in the hot weather and if we didn’t have enough books to go around we had to take the window board and put it across the seat — it was narrow, about six or eight inches but fairly long and that would allow us to share a book so one book would do for two pupils. Well, if someone wanted to liven things up a little he’d raise up a little on his end and of course the person on the other end would fall into the aisle. Then, of course, there’d be no decorum at all and there’d be great hilarity and by then we’d hope the lesson would be over and we’d have to go on to some other subject….At school we had swings and a see-saw but no kind of a physical education program and we thought we were really making progress when the school board brought in a beam, a sort of a balance beam to walk along on. And bean bags — we could play with those indoors on a rainy day. Another game we liked at the Center School was called “Haley Over”, a type of a catch-ball game. “Red Light” was a favorite. The one who was “it” counted fast “1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 — red light!” and then everyone who was moving toward him had to stop and if he saw anyone moving, that one had to go back to the starting line. He counted over and over until someone reached him and got to be “it”.

Ethel Jaworski from “Hampton Remembers”

I remember at recess playing hop scotch in the road. Lillian Vida was our teacher. For a while it was Dorothy Horowitz, but the boys gave her trouble. I remember Frank Postemski telling her his name was “Francisco”, and another boy named John said he was “Johann”.

Jane Marrotte

I went to Center School for grades four, five and six. There was no homework, but we were all responsible for chores, sweeping the entries, separate for girls and boys, erasing the blackboards and clapping the erasers. The boys were in charge of the wood stove. I think it did us all good.
Peggy Fox

The remainder of my elementary years was at Center School which had a hand pump outside for water and a wood furnace. The most outstanding event was a multi-town trip to Boston on a steam engine. Students from surrounding towns gathered at Hampton Station. It was a wonderful trip, visiting the U.S.S Constitution ship, the North Church, Breeds and Bunker Hill. That was my first trip on the Airline Trail on the steam train.

George Miller

Seventy years ago, the last six students graduated from Center School –Arthur Fitts, Jimmy Rodriguez, Herbert Kemp, Nancy and Sue Macmillan, and me. We had a ceremony at the Grange Hall. We were the last ones to use that venue for graduation. It took two men and an army to roll up the curtains on that stage.

John Russell

The era of the one room schoolhouse in our town ended in 1950 when the Consolidated School was constructed and merged students in the Bell, Center, and Clarks’ Corners schools. Other significant changes included an auditorium, cafeteria, playground, and plumbing. Initially there were not enough students to warrant separate classrooms for individual grades, and students in grades one and two, three through five, and six through eight continued to be combined, yet shortly after the school’s construction, the population grew rapidly and exponentially, with classes of twenty to thirty students. Programs expanded as well. Special education, remedial reading, music and art class, a library, and kindergarten necessitated extra space, and in 1991, the new building was completed. The population continued to increase to nearly 200 students, with most grades separated into two classrooms; however in the last several years, the population has continued to decrease drastically, with grades, once again, combined as they were in the one room schoolhouses.