Chase, Indiana

A little more than a half mile south of Chase is the old Isaiah Perigo homestead. Here in the summer of 1848 was built a log smoke-house. At the request of his neighbors Mr. Perigo permitted the building to be used for a schoolhouse the winter following, Luther B. Hawley having charge of the school. Some of Mr. Hawley's pupils were Jonathan Howell. Allen and WMfliam Gillespie, George Perigo and John M. Stan ley. Mr. Stanlev savs that this house was seated with rough puncheon seats without backs. The pupils had to sit upright facing the center of the room. Many of them could not touch the floor with their fc^t and sometimes grew tired beyond enxlurance. The only desk in the room was a shelf placed on two slanting pegs in the wall. But one person could use the desk at a time, and the pupils were coming and going all of the time, glad to get a chance to use the rough board shelf.

Passage source: Progress of Education in Benton County, Indiana : with an Explanation of the Indiana School System and the Duties of School Officers, Patrons and Pupils, published 1906.

In 1852 the school affairs of the west half of range eight passed to the control of the trustees of Parish Grove township. Soon afterward the districts were renumbered, Cassel's becoming district one, Perigo's two, McDaniel's three, and a strip two miles wide, off the northern part of the township as it now is, became district four. In 1858 West Pine was created, leaving district four in Parish Grove. Asa H. Vanover was the first trustee of West Pine. His successors were John T. Stokes in 1859 and James M. Harris in 1861. In 1800 Henry Robertson, then trustee of Parish Grove, built a schoolhouse in district four (north of Chase), and Jesse Curl taught the first term in it. His patrons were John Henderson, William Lindsey, John Gillespie, Frederick Besser and Joseph Hixon, Another school (probably the Dimmick) was built in 18G1, and John J. Ripple, William Marvin, Charles Ford, Elizabeth Scott and C. M. Scott taught in the various schools in 1861-2. B. Freeman, Mary Town, Samuel Cheney, J. G. McNeil, Stephen Adsit, Henrietta Freeman, Spencer Shanklin and H. Edwards were among the teachers of Grant in 1862-3-4.

Passage source: Progress of Education in Benton County, Indiana : with an Explanation of the Indiana School System and the Duties of School Officers, Patrons and Pupils, published 1906.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

Read the whole chapter on Grant Township.