A few miles from the New Mexico border, in Chromo, Colorado:
East of Durango, along U.S. Highway 160 84, a school building with a sign suggesting it was built in 1895. The map said it was Chromo, Colorado. Photos by Ed Darrell; use with attribution is encouraged.
Difficult to tell how many rooms; it could have had up to four classrooms at one point, I reckon. The belfry is still there, but the bell is long gone — a prize for some scavenger if it was not removed for re-use, or for a museum.
Bigger windows that many modern schools, windows students could use to actually look outdoors. Modern school architects seem to want students to be unaffected by the outdoors, or light from outdoors, often.
Off in a field by itself, there was plenty of room for kids to run around, at recess.
In this photo the sign is legible: “State of Colorado 1895 Approved Standard School.”
Was this a standard design, or does “standard school” refer to the program of instruction offered?
There were a few homes and farms close by. The community has always been small. How many students learned to read, learned how to handle numbers, read the greats of American history and literature in these walls? Who were they, and where did they go?
How big a mark can a school, or a teacher, actually make?
More:
- John Little taught 24 students in this building, in 1950; great stories; he writes that it is a one-room schoolhouse, then serving eight grades (don’t miss his photo of the teacher’s home, or cabin)
- Prairie Sagebrush Award 2011, at Sage to Meadow (featuring more photos of the school)
- Chromo School resides on the Colorado Registry of Historic Places, in Archuleta County; “Chromo School, US Hwy. 84, State Register 6/12/1996, 5AA.1907; The 1922 Chromo School served the area’s children from 1922 to 1954, and it continues to function as a community center. The concrete structure is a well preserved example of a rural school complex that also includes a teacherage and privy. Its design is reminiscent of local Hispanic architecture.” Teacherage?
- Nice photo with horses, at Desert Marmot
- Ghostroad Images has nice black and white photos for sale (see 3/32)
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
[…] “Colorado schoolhouse, 1895,” Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub […]
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[…] Colorado rural school, built 1895 […]
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Ed: nope. Never quite sank to the level of journalist to pay the bills. (grin)
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(Bob, did you work with the Daily Utah Chronicle once upon a time?)
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We have a school in Duncanville, Kennemer MS, that feels a lot like a prison inside — largely due to those high windows.
It’s been explained to me that such windows prevent daydreaming. That’s what I fear.
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