Jersey School


JERSEY COLLEGE SCHOOL
1914 & 1915







The following story and the photographs above were send to me by Joan Goodpasture Quigg, daughter of Floyd and Bertha Mason Goodpasture.

"I went to Mt. Vernon one room school house that used to be seen from the Arcadia blacktop, across from property later owned by Norma and Edward Charlesworth who lived on the corner just a little east and across the road from the old school. A small farming community was located north a very short distance called "String Town." Driving east a mile or so, crossing Indian Creek, you would then be in Cracker's Bend. Traveling west, you crossed a RR track, at what is now Triopia High School. Mt. Vernon has been torn down many years. The school was on the north side of the road and on top of the hill. We had gravel springs water then at the old school and if it ran out, the teacher would take us down the road east and cross the road over to that house to get some water. They had a bucket that went down in the well and brought the water up in a bucket and we would all get a drink. Then we would run back to school.

I was thinking the Smith farm was west of the school more down towards the old Mt. Vernon-Morris Chapel-Smith cemetery. That (Mt. Vernon) would have been the school where your great-grandmother Lou Goodpasture would have gone, as her parents (Abram and Zannah Goodpasture) wuld have been living where Maxine and Robert Goodpasture used to live (the old Goodpasture homestead). They were the last of the Goodpastures to live in the old house. Abraham Jr. and Hannah Willard Goodpasture had come up bringing their family to settle and build east of Concord from Overton County Tennessee in 1826. Robert and Maxine renovated the old house and found a butter dish in the bottom of the well. It still was in good shape. During those early days before refrigeration they hung their butter and milk in the well to keep it cool. Never have thought about before that Abram Goodpasture would have been my great-grandfather and his son, Richard Parker Goodpasture, was my grandfather.

Since I never knew my grandfather it seems so far back to me, now I'm a great-grandmother. I was told if I was a boy my folks were going to name me Richard Wallace, but when I turned out to be a girl they named me Mary Joan. My grandfather said, "Mary is a good name but I don't know about that Joan!"

Uncle Ross' (Roscoe Goodpasture)farm joined up with my folks place and also Aunt Della's place. Dad bought the place where we lived from Lewis and Kate Goodpasture Rexroat before I was born. My sister now owns it. Our house burned down on Dec. 3, 1940 and the folks built a new one at the same location and we moved in the fall of 1941.

My first cousin, Farrell Mcginnis, taught me the first three grades at Mt. Vernon school, and was my teacher when our house burned. He took Esther (my sister) and me home with him the day of the fire, and then took us over to Uncle Ross Goodpasture's house to stay all night. I remember when we drove past our house and I saw it all gone from the fire how sad I felt thinking my toys were all gone. The next day someone found an old rubber doll that Uncle Ross had carried out, and how much that meant to me. I remember the church folks gave a shower and we moved into the old parsonage just west of the Methodist Church in Concord. There we lived until we moved into the new house in the fall. I think all the tramps that came through Concord stopped at our house and mom always gave them something to eat.

My dad, Floyd Goodpasture, was born in 1891 and taught school 7 terms when he was young and, in fact, he taught my mother (Bertha Mason) when he was teaching at Jersey College just east of Cracker's Bend. I have attached an old school picture (1915) of him when he was teacher there and mom was a student. She is one of the big girls standing on the right side in the back, and her sister is one of them. Mom was born in 1898. Another picture of my dad and mom at Jersey College in 1914 is also attached.

My father graduated from Chapin High School with the class of 1910. he studied up and took the teachers exam to teach. Back then you only went to high school three years .... A lot different now.

Joan Quigg


Submitted by Roena Henne


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