THE FOLLOWING IS A RECOLLECTION OF MR. AUDREY M. CLEMMER AS RELATED IN AN INTERVIEW CONDUCTED BY MR. CHARLES W. HITE, JR ON MARCH 10, 1994 ABOUT THE CLEMMER PUBLIC SCHOOL THAT EXISTED FROM ABOUT 1899 TO 1931. IT WAS LOCATED JUST OUTSIDE OF STANLEY, NORTH CAROLINA ON HICKORY GROVE ROAD THAT RUNS FROM STANLEY TO McADENVILLE (CHRISTMASTOWN) IN GASTON COUNTY.

About 1899, Mr. Henry Albertus Clemmer and his wife Mrs. Frances Setzer Clemmer loaned enough land to Gaston County to build a public school for the area known as Clemmertown, just south of Stanley. The land was to be returned to the heirs of Henry Clemmer when he died. The trees were cleared from the land by local parents, and lumber from the nearby Stanley sawmill was used to construct a typical one room house. It had plank sides and a slightly sloped tin roof. It may have been painted or whitewashed at one time but by 1910 it was grey, weathered wood. Then around 1910 another building was built close to the original school. The new structure had a bell-tower/steeple on top and a porch in front, but it also was just one large room. Elementary grades one, two, three, and four met in the old building and grades five, six, seven, and eight met in the new building. In 1927, Audrey Clemmer was six years old and living with his parents, Mr. Robert Lee Clemmer (a son of Henry A. Clemmer) and Mrs. Gertrude Maxwell Clemmer, in Clemmertown. When Audrey started the first grade, his teacher was Mrs. Lillian Homesly. The teacher of grades five through eight and also the school principal was Mr. J. W. Dellinger, who also owned a drugstore in the town of Stanley. The kids gave Mr. Dellinger the nickname "Sha Sha", but they were careful to call him "Mr. Dellinger" when he was present. The school bell would usually ring at 8:00 a.m. to summon the kids to classes. There were no electric buttons to push at Clemmer School. Each morning before school started, two of the older boys would walk one mile south of the school building to a water spring that bubbled out of the ground. A hole had been dug in front of the spring to create a pool of water. The boys filled two tin buckets with clear topwater, being careful not to stir up any mud. As they walked the mile back to the school house, they were glad they had the new tin buckets that were lighter than the old wooden buckets. Each school building got one bucket of water and a dipper as their drinking water for the day. The first "dippers" were gourds, but the new tin dippers were easier to keep clean and the long handle kept dirty hands out of the water. If the weather was cold, the older boys would saw two foot logs and split them to get the metal stove in each building "fired up". If the room got to hot, they opened the windows and doors. Of course there was no indoor plumbing, but there was one outhouse, toilet for the boys, and also one for the girls. When the school bell rang, Audrey went inside to his desk and put his books away in the small shelf under the desktop. This wooden desktop had a groove cut in it to hold a pencil and a circle cut in to hold an inkwell. Only the high school kids got to use ink because it was so messy. All of the younger kids had to use pencils. The legs of the desks were made of metal and had two wooden runners that allowed the desks to slide easily across the floor. This allowed the teacher, Mrs. Homesly, to arrange the desks in rows to signify what grade you were in. Also if you misbehaved, you would have your desk separated from the other students. The students used writing tablets instead of loose leaf binders. One brand of tablet had a "blue horse" on the front and the other brand had an Indian's head. Audrey wrote with "penny" pencils, so named because they cost one penny each. There was a small eraser on top, but it was glued on, and had no metal band to hold it in place as modern pencils do. The elementary students had to buy three text books; Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic. Audrey was lucky because he bought used books from other students. Not only were used books cheaper, but new books could only be purchased on Main Street in Gastonia, which meant a 15 mile trip each way down a "washboard road". This was a rough road with many bumps and valleys, just like a washboard. However Clemmer School did have one custom that is still current. The pupils had to take a report card home and bring it back signed by the parents! The teacher had a desk at the front of the class that had a keywound clock and some books on top. Beside the desk was a slate blackboard on which instructions were written with white chalk. Felt pads were used to erase the chalk, and occasionally these erasers had to be taken outside and dusted to remove the accumulated chalk. This task was usually given to some naughty students who had to stay after school as punishment. Beating the erasers to remove chalk was a messy job. Clemmer School did not have a lot of extras. There was no flag to face when the students gave the Pledge of Allegiance. Also there was no world map or globe, no picture of George Washington, no library or reference books. They did have a pencil sharpener, but many of the boys had pocket knives to sharpen their pencils. The students usually had a morning prayer or devotion. At lunch break, you ate whatever you brought from home in a brown paper bag. Cornbread, white bread, biscuits, apples, peanut butter, potatoes, and boiled eggs were common. Sweet potatoes were Audrey's favorite. You had spring water from the tin bucket to drink with your lunch. Some kids had collapsible metal cups, but most just used the common dipper. After lunch, the boys would play tag or marbles. Jump rope and hopscotch were favorites of the girls. The afternoon classes went by quickly. The dismissal bell usually rang at 2:30 p.m. In 1929, the original building was torn down and an addition was built onto the remaining schoolhouse to produce one "L" shaped building. There was still only two large rooms, one room for grades 1 through 4, and another room for grades 5 through 9. The construction was done over the summer vacation so that the kids didn't have to miss any school. You know there were bare footed kids watching the men work, and hoping for a delay in the start of the school year. About this time, Mr. Dellinger was replaced by Mr. James as teacher/principal. Some years later, about 1931, Mr. James was painting and fell from a ladder, breaking his neck. Also about this time Mr. Henry A. Clemmer passed away and his property was divided among his heirs. The schoolhouse and property he had loaned to Gaston County became part of his estate, and this was the end of Clemmer Public School. The Gaston County School system sent the elementary students who had attended Clemmer School to the Spencer Mountain School and the upper grade students went to the Stanley City School. The Clemmer Schoolhouse and 18 acres of land were inherited by Mr. Henry Clemmer's second wife and widow, Mrs. Callie Lineberger Clemmer. However Mr. Robert Lee Clemmer swapped the 20 acres of land he inherited from Henry Clemmer's estate to his stepmother, Mrs. Callie Clemmer, for her land with the schoolhouse. Robert wanted the schoolhouse because it was big enough to hold his large family of eight boys and one girl. The "Depression Era" economy of the early 1930s didn't provide Robert and Callie Clemmer enough money to remodel the old schoolhouse. The family hung sheets and blankets on ropes to divide the two large, former school rooms into a living room, a kitchen, and a few bedrooms. The Clemmer family lived there until about 1935 when the economy improved enough to allow them to move into a house in the town of Stanley. Mrs Callie Clemmer wanted a house "that looked like a house" instead of an old school building, and everyone wanted indoor plumbing! Audrey was 16 years old and anxious to see the world in 1937. He decided to join the United States Army so he could travel, get three meals a day, and learn a skill for a future job. So he walked from Stanley to the downtown Charlotte Post Office to get his Army papers for his parents to sign. Although he was only 16, he joined the Army and left Stanley behind for basic training at Fort Bragg, NC. It was months before Audrey qualified for a three day pass that he needed to return home to Stanley and back to Ft. Bragg on the bus. While Audrey was away, his brother Bill Clemmer had started building a small, wooden house on the former Clemmer School grounds. Bill salvaged enough lumber and nails from the old Clemmer School building to construct the small house which is still occupied to this day. To get to the house from downtown Stanley, you must drive south and turn left onto Hickory Grove Road toward McAdenville. You pass Smith-Clemmer Road that dead ends into Hickory Grove, and just below this on the west (right) side you can see the small house that once was the Clemmer School.

Clemmer School enrollment #41 as depicted in 1918 class photo. Photo courtesy of Mrs. Joysce Handsel.

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