Applegate School

This week in our local paper, The Crittenden Press, there is an ad seeking people that might be interested in trying to save the old Applegate school house. There are only two of these old wooden frame one-room school houses left in Crittenden County today. The other is Copperas Springs, which is beyond salvaging at this time. I'll do a column on it later.

Applegate is locate about 11 miles from Marion on Hwy. 60 East. The building belonged to Glenn and Angela Tosh. Mr. Tosh died a couple of years ago, so it now belongs to his wife, Angela. She and her daughters would like for the school to be saved or moved if anyone is interested in this project. It is in really bad condition as it has set empty for many, many years.

Applegate was a school as early as the year 1881. The name Applegate came from the man that owned the property that the school was located on. His name was William Applegate. He was from Union County and owned property in this area, and also operated some coal mines in that area. The community was known as Applegate Mines.

The pictures of the Applegate school shown above, the sketch on the left was drawn by Braxton McDonald, as he remembered it when it was a school building. The picture on the right is the way the building looked after 1929, when it was closed as a school and a local family used the school for a home. The front of the school was redone, with a door added in the center and the two doors made into windows. There were partitions added in the building to make rooms for the family, so the once one -room school now has several rooms.

Applegate was closed as a school in March of 1929, as it was one of six country schools in the area to be consolidated, and the children moved to the new school, which was being built at the town of Mattoon.