Monday, July 13, 2015

Restoration effort resumed for 132-year-old Daniels School in Venado!!!

June 29, 2015, 2:27PM
It’s been 78 years since Florence Nylander Bates attended a one-room schoolhouse in the hills west of Healdsburg, but the memories are still vivid — the white dresses the girls wore on graduation day, the play they staged in a meadow, the potbelly stove they warmed themselves with on rainy days, and the 12-mile, daily round-trip journey she made on her horse to get to school.

Bates, 90, sat outside the 132-year-old Daniels School on Mill Creek Road last week recalling those halcyon days.

“It was almost idyllic. You felt protected and everybody was nice to you,” said Bates, who graduated from the school’s eighth-grade class in 1938.

Florence Bates attended R.A. Daniels School off Mill Creek Road near Venado, west of Healdsburg, in 1938.  The school had been in disrepair for years, but in the past few years, restoration has begin to preserve the old school, 
Monday June 22, 2015. (Kent Porter / Press Democrat) 2015

She is part of a handful of alumni working to restore the schoolhouse, an effort that has regained momentum thanks to a $14,500 grant from the Sonoma County Landmarks Commission, coupled with donations and volunteer work.

A new roof and windows were installed this spring on the schoolhouse, which was built from old-growth redwood but exposed to the elements following its closure in 1951. Next comes siding and interior work, including a renewed electricity supply, something the old structure only had after World War II, when its kerosene lanterns were replaced.

“I’m making real progress,” said Bonnie Cussins Pitkin, 71, who is spearheading the $40,000 restoration effort for the cherished school, which she attended one year prior to its closure, when she was in first grade.

New Windows at the R.A. Daniels School off Mill Creek Road west of Healdsburg frames school alumnus Bonnie Pitkin, Monday June 22, 2015. (Kent Porter / Press Democrat) 2015

Pitkin’s vision is to provide an opportunity for local schoolchildren to take field trips to Daniels School and learn what it was like to go to a one-room school, which were common in rural areas across the country. At Daniels School, one teacher taught academic basics to boys and girls in grades one through eight, the typical arrangement.

In 1916, there were 120 one-room schoolhouses in Sonoma County — including Daniels School — according to a thesis written then by Stanford University student Tillman Elliott Baker, who proposed reorganizing the school system.

Today, only a handful of the one-room schoolhouses survive.

Daniels School sits on a slope up winding, redwood-lined Mill Creek Road, seven miles from the intersection with Westside Road and a little more than eight miles from Healdsburg.

Pitkin’s family owned it until they donated the 16-by-26-foot building and a half-acre around it to the Venado Historical Society, which draws its name from the surrounding community established in the early 1900s.

These days, about the only time Venado gets mentioned is when a meteorologist calls out the impressive rainfall totals it can reap in winter storms. Located in a step of the steep hills on the edge of the Cazadero “rainforest,” one TV weatherman dubbed it “the rain capital of the Bay Area.”

Venado, Spanish for “deer,” was named by mining engineer Stillman Batchellor, the first postmaster in 1921. By then, earlier generations that came to log the giant redwoods and work a magnesite mine had departed.

The schoolhouse was built over eight days in the spring of 1883, following a bitter fight over where it should be located. The land was donated by Daniel Davis, a sea captain from Maine whose wide interests landed him in Sonoma County, according to Holly Hoods, curator for the Healdsburg Museum and Historical Society, who wrote the grant proposal to help restore the school.

Daniels School Students From A Bygone Era

By 1903, the resident population dwindled and the school shut down for lack of pupils. But it reopened four years later and was rechristened in honor of Ray A. Daniels, a primary mover and shaker in re-establishing the school.

Fruit ranching and the tanbark industry brought new purpose, people and prosperity to upper Mill Creek, according to Hoods.

“The land that has been cleared has proved fine fruit land, and vineyards and prune orchards are taking the place of the redwood groves,” is how the Healdsburg Tribune described Venado in 1925.

One of those who attended the school at the time, from 1921 to 1929, was centenarian Stewart Wade, whose father was a contractor and road builder who helped complete Mill Creek Road.

“We had very good teachers; I thought they were quite dedicated,” Wade said of the female instructors who came for two-year stints and were put up in the homes of area families.

Wade, who will turn 101 in November and still works part time as a real estate agent, spoke by phone from his Honolulu home this week.

He remembers there was no running water at the school.

“We had to carry a bucket from the spring down the road,” he said, adding that all the children used the same dipper to drink from. If one caught a cold, he said, they would all get it.

The oldest boys in the school got the job of janitor and were paid a few dollars a month for sweeping the floors with redwood sawdust soaked in oil.

“The only playground we had was a road where we played most of the time,” he said. “It was very safe in those days. Cars didn’t travel very fast, and the wagons, we could hear them coming from a long way.”

One wagon in particular, Wade said, came from a Santa Rosa candy store, but it wasn’t there to satisfy the children’s sweet tooth. It was during the Prohibition era and the sugar hidden under a canvas in the back of the wagon went to a nearby still where it was used to make booze, he said.

Wade also recalled the “fruit tramps” who came to work the summer harvests. They hailed from the Midwest and typically had one big car with all their possessions and family inside. They were on a circuit that included the raisin harvest in Fresno, with a swing through Sonoma County before heading to Oregon for the pears and apples.

Usually, they had two or three kids with them, who would end up for a short time at Daniels School.
When Bates graduated in 1938, a decade after Wade, Franklin D. Roosevelt was president, Babe Ruth was coaching the Brooklyn Dodgers, a gallon of gas was 10 cents, and the average price of a new car was $763.

But her family was poor and she was still riding to school on her horse named Lady, sometimes having to navigate the rain-swollen East Austin Creek with the help of her father and sometimes getting home after dark.

“My sister would ride double with me to the top of the ‘ladder,’” she said of the steep grade at the top of Mill Creek Road where her older sister would get off the horse and walk back home while Bates headed for the schoolhouse.

On the way to school, she said, “you would talk to yourself, which I still do,” and look out for bird nests to see if the eggs were hatching. “If I saw a rattlesnake, I killed it. That’s what you did in those days,” she said.

Bates relishes those bygone school days.

“I remember the teacher taking us to the creek and reading out loud to us. I loved that,” she said.
She also lifted her forearm to show the scar she has from when she fell onto a broken windshield near the school and needed stitches to close the cut.

There hasn’t been a lesson taught in the little schoolhouse since 1951, when unification brought five small schools (Felta, West Side, Mill Creek, Junction and Daniels) together in the Westside Union District.

Efforts began in the late 1990s to rehabilitate the old schoolhouse. The foundation, porch and awning were rebuilt, but renovations were delayed when the leader in the effort, Flora May Cootes-Caletti, became ill.

In 2010, a fundraising drive was renewed, with local contractors, including Mike Flower, donating time to the rebuilding, ZFA Associates doing the structural engineering and local businesses like Healdsburg Lumber Co. donating materials.

Contributions are still being solicited to complete the interior work. And Pitkin is still looking to hear from former Daniels School pupils.

Contributions can be made at danielsschool.blogspot.com, or sent to the Venado Historical Society, 8000 Mill Creek Road, Healdsburg 95448.

You can reach Staff Writer Clark Mason at 521-5214 or clark.mason@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter@clarkmas.

Monday, June 8, 2015

Daniels School In The Healdsburg Tribune!

Daniels School Restoration Proceeding In Rural Healdsburg

A work in progress...Bonnie Cussins-Pitkin, a former student at the Daniels School, is working to restore it and create a historical resource for the community.

The Daniels School, a one-room schoolhouse built in the 1800s, is receiving a thorough restoration by a dedicated group of former students and history buffs.


Bonnie Cussins-Pitkin is leading the current phase of the restoration, which was begun by her former third grade teacher, Flora May Caletti, a dozen years ago.


Cussins-Pitkin and other Daniels School supporters formed the Venado Historical Society and were able to set aside a half acre along Mill Creek Road as a historic district.

They are working with engineers and contractors to restore the school, and the old redwood siding is now shored up inside with new framing. New windows are coming soon.

The ultimate goal is to create a historical resource, so local students can learn about rural life a century ago. “We want students to come and visit and go see the wild flowers we used to pick and draw,” Cussins-Pitkin said.

She went on to explain that students will be able to learn about local trees, walk to the creek to see where rural students once got their drinking water, and find out about the Pomo Indians, who were in the area prior to European settlers.

Once restored, the schoolhouse will have a real slate chalkboard, an upright piano, wooden desks and photographs that illustrate local history.

Cussins-Pitkin attended Daniels School for first grade, and now lives up the hill from the old school, which was first built farther up Mill Creek Road in 1883.

It was originally called the Venado School, and was moved a few years after it was built.

“A man named Daniels sad they could move it to his property if they renamed the school after him,” Cussins-Pitkin said.

Leafing through a binder of old documents and photos, Cussins-Pitkin shows that the old wooden flagpole for the school is still there, and points out photos from “the day the goat came to school” and the shaved heads of the boys the year the students got headlice.

Holes in an outside wall show where pegs were installed for students to hang coast and hats.

Funding for the project is coming from a Sonoma County Landmarks Commission grant and local donations.

ZFA Structural Engineers and Mike Flowers of Oak Shadows Construction are donating time, and Healdsburg Lumber is providing building materials at or below cost. “We try to help nonprofits anytime we can,” said Eric Ziedrich, president of Healdsburg Lumber.

To support the Daniels School project and see photos of the restoration, visit www.danielsschool.blogspot.com.

By: Ray Holley, Managing Editor
Posted: Wednesday, June 3, 2015


Thursday, May 14, 2015

Daniels School Update: May, 2015!!!

Dear Donors and Friends of the Daniels School Restoration Project,
 

Sitting on the porch of the Daniels School, I was waiting for delivery of windows.  I glanced around to see the pastel pink buds of the old rose bush on the corner of the porch.  Then I remembered the wedding we had in a play held in the Spring of l951.  Richard Tabor was the only other 1st grader and he was the groom.  The students threw rose petals at us as we walked down the steps and walkway..
 

I cherish that joyful memory of the past, but the jubilation I feel in the present is beyond compare.  At last work has commenced on the restoration of Daniels School again.
 

Many thanks to Mike Flowers owner, Oak Shadows Construction, who has volunteered his time.  The framing inside is complete, including the "sistering in" whenever possible to preserve the old redwood, and we can look up outside at the new shake roof with pride.
   

Sincerest thanks to Eric Dietrich of the Healdsburg Lumber Company for the generous reduction on lumber costs as well as the windows from Hudson Street Design.

The flagpole, restored to white again stands amongst a patch of  yellow Diogenes Lanterns.  These and the Redwood Orchid are among the many wildflowers we collected, identified and drew.  The teacher displayed the art work above the windows and I was amazed at the fine detail, color and likeness in every petal to those we had collected.  These memories in the school and down by the creek, where the teacher read to us, come back to me as I watch the restoration unfold.
 

Most of all, we wish to thank the Sonoma County Landmarks Commission for their grant funds, as well as the many dedicated and generous donors who have continued to support this project over the years.  We will be applying again to the Landmarks Commission for Phase 2 of the project, but will move forward to continue the project as monies and volunteer time allow.

TOGETHER WITH YOU, WE ARE NOT ONLY SAVING SONOMA COUNTY  HISTORIC LANDMARK #186, WE ARE SAVING A PIECE OF HISTORY AND THE STORIES OF THE PEOPLE WHO LIVED AND WORKED IN THE TOWN OF VENADO ON MILL CREEK ROAD.


THANKS TO ALL OF YOU!

Sincerely,

Bonnie Cussins-Pitkin, President
Gloria Egger, Treasurer


Thursday, February 12, 2015

13.68 Inches Of Rain Falls On Little-Known North Bay Town During Latest Storm!

VENADO, Sonoma County (KPIX 5) – The Bay Area received some impressive rain over the last few days. One of the wettest spots is a place many people probably haven’t heard of.


Venado, located west of Healdsburg, received 13.68 inches of rain since Thursday.


“Out Mill Creek Road about nine miles is Venado,” resident Bonnie Pitkin told KPIX 5.


Go searching for the town, you won’t find too much. The homesteaders, miners and loggers are long gone, leaving a handful of quiet neighbors living in hand-built houses.


“As you can see, there’s very little activity, very little traffic, which we appreciate a lot,” said Venado resident Bob Alpern.


But Venado does get a lot of one thing, and that is rain, which finally returned over the weekend.


“It stormed like you couldn’t imagine,” Pitkin recalled.


Alpern said about the storm, “And I mean this was rain like, I call it biblical rain. A deluge like you’ve never seen.”


And that’s exactly the way it’s supposed to be here. Venado is tucked in a set of steep hills that are perfectly positioned to the catch low-level moisture that pacific storms bring in. These mountains wring out the storms like a washcloth.


The evidence of that phenomenon literally hangs from the trees.


“We’re at the edge of what’s called the Cazadero rain forest,” Alpern said.


But even in this perfect bull’s eye for wet weather, the drought has taken its toll.


“On my mother’s ranch, there are two springs, and they both went completely dry,” Pitkin said.


When the skies finally opened, and creeks started flowing, quiet Venado just got back to normal.


“Everyone that you could talk to around here will say that it was such a welcome sight. To see the rain and to see the creek running full, it’s just exciting. The rain has made all the difference,” Pitkin said.