The Foltz one-room school sits off of Route 8 near the Old Stone House. John Anderson, 96 year-old former educator and veteran, said he visited there often and to this day, remembers teachers he used to work with by name.

Anderson was principal over several one-room schools in the Slippery Rock School District, including Foltz School, during the 1960s. With its recent renovation, he reflected on his role in the county’s early education system.

“There were six one-room schools, and there was the Slippery Rock Lab School on SRU campus,” he said. “They had a principal there, but she didn’t have much to do with anything outside of that school, so they brought me in to satisfy that need.”

The Foltz School was estimated to have opened in the early 1800s in Brady Township and educated kindergarten through sixth grade students at various times until 1963, when it closed.

Foltz was the last remaining schoolhouse in Butler County, and when it’s students moved to bigger buildings, Anderson moved on, as well.

Born in 1926 in East Brady, Anderson got a taste of the teacher’s life early on, when he was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1945.

“In Fort Benning, Georgia, I was assigned to the infantry school. I guess that’s where teaching came through,” he said. “It was a most exciting time there, when West Point sent cadets and I got to instruct them. That was the most exciting day.”

After being discharged to inactive reserves a year later, Anderson was inspired to attend college and study education.

“At the time, Clarion was a state teacher college,” he said. “Actually, it was the daughter of our preacher, she came down to talk about going there, and I thought it’d be a place I’d like to go.”

Anderson was unable to start teaching until two years after his graduation from Clarion. In 1950, he was called back to the Army for the Korean War, ranking second lieutenant before he was discharged again in 1952.

That year proved a major one, Anderson said — he got married and started his first teaching job in Mahaffey School District.

“I taught fifth and sixth grade together, all subjects,” he said. “You had to spend time with both of them.”

Anderson said his favorite subject to teach was geography.

“I would go around the country in a mobile home,” he said. “I gave them an overview of the different states, the cities around them. We’d talk about what was going on in Pittsburgh. I got a kick out of that, we went to places, then discussed them with students.”

That summer, Anderson also pursued his Masters in Educational Administration, which got him his first principal job at East Brady School District.

From there, he transferred his wife and sons, Jon “Mark” and Steven “Beaver,” to Slippery Rock, where he oversaw multiple elementary school houses and the lab school.

Anderson said his time as principal meant checking up on all six schools: Branchton and Ralston schools in Slippery Rock Township, Bunker Hill and Foltz schools in Brady Township, Hickory Corner school in Franklin Township, and Wolf Creek school in Worth Township.

“I had to be familiar to the teachers, since they hadn’t been checked on in so long. They didn’t feel they were a central part to the district,” he said. “I wanted to let them know they were a part. I could be gone all day to visit schools.”

Each school varied in its combination of students. Some served only first through second grade and others served a wide range of grades.

A day in the life of a student would often include an opening academic exercise, followed by subjects of geography and reading.

“In the afternoons, when students got antsy or tired, you kept them engaged with spelling and arithmetic,” Anderson said.

He added that sometimes his responsibilities included driving substitute teachers to their assigned school, as well as solving conflicts between teachers, parents and students.

In one instance, he had to settle a dispute when a parent claimed a teacher had pushed a second-grade child into a desk.

“When you were the principal, you waited for problems to come to you so you could work on them,” he said. “Someone once said to me, ‘Oh, you’re a principal? You’re a paper clip dispenser.’”

Mark Anderson said having his father as principal of the Slippery Rock Lab School meant his second- through fourth-grade career was difficult.

“The lab school was a big two-story building with grades one through six,” Mark said. “No kids wanted to be friends with you, they didn’t want to be involved with you, if your dad was the principal. He knew my grades before I did.”

After John Anderson saw the closing of Foltz School in 1963, he assisted in the transitions of the six one-room schools to three bigger buildings in Franklin and Slippery Rock townships and Prospect Borough.

In 1965, the Andersons moved to Bellevue Elementary School, where John went back to teaching and pursued a doctorate.

“But then he’d have to be the superintendent,” Mark said. “He passed the oral exam and had his dissertation partly written.”

Instead of finishing his doctorate, John retired in 1982 as a teacher.

“I missed the camaraderie with the students. I liked to see them learning and growing,” John Anderson said. “It was an exciting time for them, getting information to use for later in life. It was a good joy.”

Anderson said he grew close to students during his time as a teacher.

“My wife told me that three came over when I wasn’t, and she asked why they were there. ‘We just wanted to tell him he’s the best teacher we ever had,’ they said. That’s what I liked best. To be able to help them learn,” he said.

Almost 20 years later, at the beginning of the Foltz School renovation, the Butler County commissioners recognized Anderson for his service to the area as a principal.

“I think it’s nice to show what the education was years ago,” he said of the Foltz School renovation. “What your grandparents went to and how they were educated. I think back to my mother going to one-room schools until only eighth grade because that’s as far as they went.”